Sprouts by Heather

Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get–only with what you are expecting to give–which is everything.

–Katharine Hepburn

I had an amazing time photographing the beautiful Brown Family several days ago. Their love for one another made my job easy, as I captured the beauty of their connections. Sessions where everyone is relaxed and simply enjoying each other’s company are always so much fun for everyone. To them, it was just another bit of time to spend together as family and I can tell that family time is cherished with this precious crew. I had a hard time choosing favorites, so here is an overload of love and beauty.

I have been photographing this sweet family in Charlotte now for a few years and just love spending time with them. Even after moving to Birmingham last year, I still love to hear little tidbits of their lives from their mom on Facebook and I always look forward to photographing them when I travel back to Charlotte. Little boys have a special place in my heart and I love the challenge of making the experience fun for them and working hard to get some special images for their families. It has been so special to see Chase go from baby to toddler and Charlie from toddler to little boy. Each time I am with these boys, I fall more in love with this sweet pair and their  little BIG personalities!

Introducing the beautiful and PERFECT Miss Evelyn Ruth Ealy!! If you missed Tuesday’s post, this beautiful little girl is my best friend’s baby! I traveled back to North Carolina last week to photograph her newborn session at 12 days old.  As you can see, she is absolutely perfect! I love this baby girl so much!!! Quite obsessed actually….

But of course I’m not the only one! Nathan and Laura are truly naturals. It was so sweet to watch them with their baby girl. Like most new parents, they spend the majority of their time just like this…..cuddled up and just staring at the baby. I did a good bit of that myself when I was there last week.

I love the curled up phase in a newborn’s first weeks. It goes by so fast until one day they are just all stretched out and kicking their legs all the time. But those first 1-2 weeks when a baby is still folded up just like they were in utero, it’s just irresistibly sweet.

I loved seeing Laura in her new role as “baby inspector”. I remember these days with Mason where I just sat and stared and truly marveled over this little being. Studying every detail. Trying to memorize things that would so quickly grow and change. These are sweet sweet days you are living in friends. I am so thrilled for you.

I adore little baby fingers, tiny knuckle after knuckle. All the little wrinkles are so precious!

Evelyn will of course grow up to be an Auburn fan just like her mommy and daddy, AND Aunt Heather! She seems to be fond of the idea. We joke that Evelyn will arrive at Auburn as a freshman when our Mason is a sophomore, so it will be his job to show her around campus and watch over her like a big brother. Actually, did I say “we joke”….. scratch that….we are NOT kidding. They at least have to do their undergrad at Auburn, it’s the only way.

I have so many “favorites” from their session but this one almost makes me cry. I love love LOVE seeing Laura with her baby girl! They are both so beautiful!

We love you sweet friends and are just over the moon excited for you guys to experience love and life with your precious child. I am so proud of your beautiful family and the love you share. xoxo

Picture a Cure on Fox News

This morning if you watched Good Morning Alabama on Fox News, you may have seen a special interview with fellow photographer Ashley Warren and her friend Letitia Kennedy talking about Picture a Cure. 12 Birmingham area photographers have teamed up to do a fundraiser for an organization called Stop SMA. SMA (spinal muscular atrophy) is a deadly neurological disease that affects children. The medical field is hard at work trying to find a cure for this awful disease and Stop SMA is there to help raise money to fund the research. When I think about other diseases where much progress has been made in treatment over the last decade or two, I see much hope in these doctors fighting to find a cure for these children and their families. It is possible (!!!!!) and teaming up with an organization like Stop SMA can help bring these families HOPE! As photographers, we are donating our time to each provide mini-sessions to the public (with digital files!) and 100% of the proceeds go to Stop SMA. It gets even better because Stop SMA is also a 100% volunteer organization, so they will then turn around and give 100% of that money to fund research to find a cure. If you want to get your family involved in making a difference in the lives of these families, go to the Picture a Cure website to sign up for a mini-session. All sessions are 20 minutes long on September 11th at the Birmingham Botanical Gardens. You will receive 15 edited images on a disc with full printing rights, perfect for Christmas gifts for family and for Christmas cards. (This is actually a really great deal with all of these photographers since the digital files are included.) Not to mention, the opportunity to truly make a huge difference in the life of another family! I hope you’ll join us. Go the website to choose your photographer and sign up for a session. (Pick me! Pick me!)

These adorable little boys drove a long way to see me! Well, their parents drove them a long way to see me. I was a little nervous about the weather since we’ve been having so many evening showers this summer, I didn’t want their three and a half hour drive (each way) to be a bust. So I was really excited when we ended up with clear skies (but very high temps) and beautiful evening light. Julie, their mom, was on staff at the church we attended in college and I went on a mission trip to Africa with her and Robert in 2002, way before any of us had our precious boys.

I could not believe how big Hudson is, but I was not surprised that he is an absolute sweetheart. I knew he would be. Little Bentley was on the move, much like my nephews in my last post. I love to get these little guys laughing though when I chase them. I don’t give up very easily!

I love this family shot because it embodies a bit of the action involved with having a toddler boy in your family. Sometimes getting their feet off the ground is just about the only way to get them to stay in one spot.

I loved capturing them all just playing and laughing together, and loving on each other. These are the types of images that I think are truly priceless as your young children grow into teenagers. I love seeing families having fun together!

If you’ve been following the blog very long, you may remember that my husband Jeremy is from the Bahamas. His family is from Nassau (his parents, grandparents, and extended family still live there), and his older brother & family live in Georgetown, Exuma (a little town on a southern out island), and his sister & family live on a little cay in Abaco (a northern group of  islands). Then we have his younger brother and his wife, and ourselves who all live in Alabama currently. We are all pretty spread out. With the addition of all the grandkids (5 in the last 3.5 years and another on the way) its been a little hard to be so spread out and only get to see  our niece and all of our nephews a couple of times a year. So it was a wonderful treat that all of the grandkids ended up in Nassau on the same day at the end of our vacation. As you can see, Nana and Papa were pretty happy to have all 5 of them together for the very first time. From left to right is Joss, Emit, Olivia, Mason (our son), and Luke. Aren’t they an adorable little crew?!

Jeremy and his older brother Dallas are best friends, so it was fitting that we spent most of our trip with them in Great Exuma. They love free diving and spear fishing together so when they get together they are in the water pretty much constantly. I really enjoy seeing Jeremy in his element and “happy place”. Here is a great underwater video of Jeremy and Dallas teaming up on a nice size grouper (a delicious dinner!). They are free diving up to 50′ to spear and it is ridiculous how easy they make it look!

Spearing Brothers on Youtube

Great Exuma is one of the largest and most southern cays (pronounced “keys”) in the Exuma Cays, a chain of hundreds of islands. Most of them are uninhabited, but some have little settlements and some are privately owned by the rich and famous from around the world. It is a beautiful paradise, so natural and untouched and uncommercialized, unlike many other parts of the Bahamas and Caribbean. You might be wondering what Dallas and Tamara do for a living to be able to live on a little island in paradise. They own a company called Out Island Explorers (check them out if you want your next vacation to be a truly unique and amazing experience!) They rent out kayaks, sail boats (Sea Pearls), and camping equipment for people to explore the Exuma Cays. They also lead amazing guided trips by kayak or sail boat where guests are privileged with being immersed in the beauty of Exuma. Camping on private beaches. Sailing the beautiful turquoise waters. Spearing (or line catching) fish during the day and Dallas grilling it up for dinner at night with one of his famous marinades. It is such an amazing experience for a group of friends or a family. The kind of trip that all other vacations are measured against for years to come. I can’t wait until our family is complete and our kids are a little older so we can spend a week out on the water together like this.

So now that you know who they are, what they do, and why we were there, let’s get to the point of this blog post.  I was SO excited that it worked out one evening to take these guys out to the beach for a family photo shoot. Usually when they are back in the States it is a very busy, fast-paced trip so I’ve never been able to photograph them as a family here. But I am so glad that it worked out to photograph them at home in Exuma. They live in a beautiful bay off the ocean side of Great Exuma and spend a lot of time at this beach as a family. I was so thrilled to capture them in a place that is so meaningful to them at this stage of life with the boys.

We started out with a few family shots before the sand and water enticed.

There is something extra special about seeing our siblings (in-laws) playing with and loving on their children. To see the happiness and love in this little family….I just adore it! They are all four so perfect together.

The photo shoot was fast….both in terms of amount of time I spent shooting, and fast in terms of the movement of my subjects. There is nothing like photographing two little boys on their turf. Especially when those two little boys are your nephews! I love these sweet little faces!

Joss & Emit play this little game where they run around in the sand and push each other down (all in the name of fun!) or just dive down in the sand on their own. I love this next one because it is such a familiar scene with these two!

I LOVE to see them in action!! Can you hear the giggles?!  I love that the sand is like their very own version of accessorizing their outfits. It wouldn’t be Joss and Emit without a good layer of sand in the mix! They were having so much fun!

And I can definitely say this is my first photo session that has ended like this.  LOOVVEEEEE!!!!! As you can tell I’m pretty smitten with this pair of coppertone babies!

And just for good measure here is an extra dose of cuteness for you. These three cousins had the best time together! Joss and Emit did a great job of inducting Mason into the island crew.

And a little more beauty….

Definitely check out the Out Island Explorers blog for more pictures and underwater videos from Exuma……and start dreaming up your vacation to the out islands!!