Watching a family grow and evolve as the years go by is one of the greatest blessings there are in life.
That blessing is even greater, when it's a family that is so near and dear to my heart. Photographing my sister's beautiful family is one of the great joys that I get to enjoy year after year!
These four always find ways to keep me on my toes when it comes time for their semi annual photos. While you might think being related to a photographer they would be the easiest people to photograph, I can tell you that's not always the case. A few years ago my youngest niece decided to skip her snack time at school and was quite hangry during the photo shoot. All at once she decided to leave the family photo, go off to sit by herself and rip off her shoes and sulk. I'm not sure what taking her shoes off did to help her hungry belly, but I snapped the photo as is anyway and our families got such a kick out of it that some of her grandparents printed it in an 8x10 to hang up on the wall! While she hasn't had any repeat episodes of that event since, we do still love to tease her about it from time to time!
Even though my nieces put me through my paces when it comes to getting real smiles from them, I still love them to pieces and always love when I get to photograph them. It's so crazy to me how much they grow up every year! I can hardly believe the sweet little babies I used to babysit, and rock and sing to sleep are turning into vibrant little ladies full of personality and sass. I swear even though I had lots of quality time with them when they were little, I had nothing to do with the sass ;-)
One of the really fun developments that has been happening as my nieces get older, is that they like to take a turn posing everyone. My youngest niece especially enjoys having a turn telling everyone where to stand and what to do! It makes their sessions more fun for both them and me, and this little game of taking turns posing helps keep them happy and interacting during their photo shoot. Who knows, maybe when they're older I will be able to bring them on as associate photographers!
While my sister loves photos of her beautiful girls, every year I always think it's important to have my sister and brother and law get some updated photos together too. After all, if it wasn't for the two of them I wouldn't be auntie to two of the cutest nieces around! They are good sports about following my posing prompts, because nobody, and I mean n o b o d y is safe from getting my combination of both silly and romantic prompts when it comes to couples. I think my brother in law has secretly come to look forward to and enjoy when it's photo time because lately he has really been hamming it up during photo shoots! I always love it when the men in the group get into the photo shoots and have fun with it too!
I will forever be thankful that I get to capture all these special memories for my sister and her family every single year. I am so blessed to have such an incredible family that doesn't just love me, but also loves and supports my small business and has been there for me from the beginning. These four will always be some of my favorite people to photograph and spend time with, because these are my people.
