NO.

That was the response every time we pulled out his costume over the past week.  As a last ditch effort, I took him to the firehouse down the street Halloween morning to show him the uniforms that hung on the wall of the house and talk about how firemen can’t fight fires in their PJs.  A fireman spotted us and opened the door.  Immediately Fiver was smitten by this man and went full cherub on him (i.e. big eyes, round face, perfectly pursed lips, polite nods).  ”Do you want to see my fire jacket?”, the fireman asked.  ”Do we?  Indeed!” I replied (Fiver nodded).  ”You know, firemen…”, he began.  ”Poop on the potty?!”, my son interjected with great hope, reaching for a common thread between himself and this amazing man in uniform.  (Well, 85% of the time anyway.)  ”Um, yes, we do”, the fireman recovered.  He showed us his uniform and Fiver promised he would wear his for trick or treating.

Then, the golden hour of trick or treating was near.  Out came the costume….

NO.

So what do you do as a parent?  You want them to experience something really cool and you know its only scary because its new.  But you don’t want to traumatize your kid by hammering your own values of fun onto them either.  So here’s what you do.  You bribe them.  ”Let’s practice trick-or-treating”, said Sam as he handed out a piece of candy to Wonder Woman (aka Merit) and a giraffe (aka Cadence) when given the correct prompt.

You wonder, sometimes, how you measure up in the game of parenting and out of nowhere your kid announces the score.  When Sam turned to our son and said, “Now what do you have to say to get the piece of candy?”,

He said, “Please.”

Needless to say, that one piece of candy pushed him in the right direction.  We never got the suspender pants on him but he couldn’t be bothered, he couldn’t get his boots and jacket on fast enough.  And he did get the hang of saying, “Trick or Treat” pretty quickly.  And for one hour of one evening anyway, we turned the lens on our life.  Hope yours was just as happy a Halloween…

Posted by Mel @ 7:35 pm, in Personal, Wee Ones | No comments | Permalink

If such a thing as the quintessential Washington, DC wedding exists, it would be Cortney and Andrew’s.  Who, by the way, couldn’t be two nicer people if they tried!

We met the couple downtown at Hotel Monaco where they were getting ready and would meet.  Then it was off for a quick stop for pictures by some well know local attractions…

…before arriving at the amazing Andrew Mellon Auditorium across from the National Portrait Gallery, where both the ceremony and reception would take place.  The auditorium was transformed into a magical, cathedral-esque ceremony space.

After the ceremony, guests enjoyed cocktails in the Green Room while the ceremony site was flipped for the reception.  Table assignments hung from ribbons on trees.

Lois of The Party Portfolio did an amazing job planning the event and managing all the things that need to happen to transform spaces.  For the reception, the auditorium was nothing short of breathe taking and included lounge seating and a 4 sided bar.  Each table was a wonderland of gold trimmed china and crystal against deep purple linens.  As if that wasn’t enough to love, there was a gelato stand and a photo booth as well… which turned into fun picture taking for us too!

There’s really only one word for the night: amazing.  Cortney and Andrew, congratulations to you both and thank you so much for choosing us to be a part of it!   Here’s a slideshow of our favorites and if you would like to be notified by email when the gallery is available for viewing, click here.

Posted by Mel @ 5:47 pm, in Weddings | No comments | Permalink

Remember Jessica and Kim?  Their adorable son, Kellen, made a rather big entrance into the world at close to 10 pounds!  He was the baby that the nurses liked to wheel around the delivery ward and show off… “look at how big THIS one is!”  At two weeks old, he is a big deal indeed.

I love Kellen’s room with its bright, cheery aqua walls and handmade accents.   As a mom, I definitely think that decor that hangs from the ceiling of a nursery trumps anything you can put on a wall since babies spend so much of their infancy looking UP…  the wall stuff is more for us than for them.  So of course, I love the handmade balloons above the crib with colorful, matching stars above the changing table.  The bright green dresser and modern rocker make perfect accents:

Speaking of handmades, check out this blankie made by grandma.  Be still, my crafty heart.

The leaves on Kellen’s rocker seem pretty appropriate for a fall baby!

We tried so hard to get Kellen to sleep.  So hard.  You wouldn’t believe the tricks we pulled.  And finally, after much cradling, rocking, shushing, swinging, eating, and then more cradling and rocking and shushing, he was out.

And then he was up:

Pretty short lived.  But don’t worry, he got lots of cuddles:

The nice thing is that I got to take a crack at cuddling Kellen to sleep myself, which was by far the best part of my day.

Congratulations to Jessica and Kim on such a beautiful little boy, I loved catching up with you both.  Here’s a slideshow and the online gallery, I’m so happy I get to watch this little big guy grow!

Posted by Mel @ 7:00 pm, in Newborns, Portraits, Wee Ones | 1 comment | Permalink

Warning:  This post rates HIGH on the sweetness scale.  So if you can’t stand gorgeous, happy, very-much-in-love couples then move along now… this post is not for you.  Hannah’s smile is so infectious.  And anybody who can jump that high as Scott did in a tux is tops in our book.  Honestly, we haven’t had so much fun shooting a wedding in a really long time!

Hannah and Scott’s wedding brought us all the way down to Greensboro, North Carolina on a glorious fall day.  Scott is a local photojournalist so we felt especially honored to be chosen, its a really big deal to us when fellow shutterbugs get married and ask us to pull the trigger.  The ceremony took place at First Presbyterian on Elm Street, a gorgeous, cathedral style church that is Hannah’s home parish.  Then it was on to the Grandover Resort for the reception, where trees were a bit of a theme.  The cake was a big hit with guests, who loved searching for the couple’s initials carved at the base of the tree trunk.

I’ve written and then rewritten this post about seven different times now, you would think I would learn.  Sometimes the photos say more than I can and these are so genuine that they make anything I write about them sound hollow.  Which is not what I am going for since this is a couple that we hope to hear from when they are coming through town. (At the risk of sounding desperate, pretty please do!!!)

So, without further ado, congrats to you both, H&S, and thank you for your trust and your hospitality.  We felt so welcome and so happy for you both.  Here’s a slideshow of our favorite favorites (there were too many favorites so we had to have favorite favorites) and click here if you would like to be notified when the gallery with all their photos is ready for viewing.  I shall say no more, I’m zipping it, mummmm…..

Posted by Mel @ 8:26 pm, in Weddings | 1 comment | Permalink