Vail Fall Family Photos

The snow that's starting to settle in marks the end of another great fall/leaf season in the valley.  I got to work with so many wonderful families in lots of great locations, including Vail Mountain, Homestake Creek, Brush Creek, Beaver Creek and East Vail, during the most vibrant time of year in our valley.  The shoots included engagement, maternity and family photos and naturally the kids were more than happy to run and play in the leaves.  My family even managed to get out do our very first  photo shoot too (I know, I know...).  I'll post some of them shortly.  Now it's time to start moving on to Christmas Card photos season.  Here's a mash up of some of my favorites from leaf season.

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Minturn Family Photos - Greysen's 1st Birthday

After shooting Kimber and Phil's wedding, then the newborn photos for their baby Greysen, I was very excited to shoot Greysen's 1 year photos in Minturn recently.  Minturn is one of my favorite places in the valley.  It's a special place for our family and we take our dog Beans to run and swim there regularly.  It's a quirky, hidden gem in the valley and also one of the most beautiful backdrops for photos with it's magnificent mountainsides.

Lionshead Rock is a large rock formation, in the shape of a lion's head, that protrudes from the mountainside looking out over Minturn.  A large chunk of the rock fell and tumbled down towards the town below earlier this year.  Luckily nobody was hurt, but it did some serious damage to the train tracks that run through the town.  We started our shoot at the far end of town, and then made our way towards the damaged tracks for the last photos of the session.  If you look closely, you can see where the path that the rocks took as they tumbled down the hillside.

3 generations of very tall boys!  We weren't sure if we could get this shot because of the power lines  and their height, but it worked out.

One of the rocks that fell.  There is a much larger rock on the other side of the tracks that was too big to get in the shot.

Lionshead Rock is above and you can see the path the rocks took as they fell towards the town.

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Vail Mountain Family Photos - Lena family

When Carol contacted me about taking photos of her family in Vail, she had an idea of what she wanted for the scenery and it included a view of the Gore Range.  There are plenty of great spots that capture the range, but most of them are also completely overpopulated with locals and tourists alike.  People wandering around shopping don't usually make for great backgrounds for portraits, unless you have a ton of time on your hands to Photoshop them out.  I decided we should try something else instead.  Not too many people have had the privilege of driving up Vail Mountain, but given that Russ and I both worked up there, we've done the drive more than a few times.  I knew a spot that was the highest point on the mountain that the public can drive to, and it also had a great view of the Gore Range, so we chose to take the photos there.

I loved the colors that the family chose because they really popped against the greenery.  If anyone is curious about choosing colors for family portraits, I have a great link on Pinterest that shows a few different color combinations that work well.

Here are a few photos from the Lena's Family Portraits on Vail Mountain.

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Newborn Photos in Minturn, CO - Ellory

I feel like I can't start every blog post with 'I'm so far behind on my blog entries', but I really am.  This session is from the beginning of the summer and according to the temperature outside, it's already fall here in the Rockies.  

Miss Ellory was fantastic during our newborn session, with her beautiful big blue eyes.  She was so alert and happy to play around the bean bag.  I kept saying over and over again that she reminded me of my kewpie doll that I used to carry around as a child.  

More posts to come shortly, in a much more timely manner!  I need to catch up before the fall rush starts.  I can't believe the leaves are changing already!

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Newborn Photos in Eagle, Colorado - Cash and Jess

It was kindly pointed out to me yesterday that I haven't posted "anything on my Blog...or Blurb...or whatever you call that thing" in a long time.  Thanks Mum!  Well, when it's put to me like that, I figure I better do something about it.

I seem to be shooting lots of families with 2 boys at the moment.  Maybe it's just something in the air in this valley, but there really does seem to be an influx of boys here.  I was so happy to do a newborn shoot for Cash the other day in Eagle and his big brother Jess got in on the action between photos.  Here are a few of my favorites from my session with these handsome brothers.

I love this prop and I hardly ever get a chance to use it.  It's a hanging basket cover from Home Depot!

Big Brother Jess, hamming it up.

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Newborn Photos in Edwards, Colorado - Nicholas

Have you ever wondered how newborn photographers are able to get babies to relax for their photos?  I usually have an arsenal of tricks up my sleeve, but every now and again, I have to get creative.  Nicholas hadn't been particularly happy when we started our photo shoot.  He loved having snuggles with his Mama, but every time we put him down for photos, he'd cry.  As many of us mothers know, babies will definitely pick up on your smell, so we figured it might be easier to bring Dad on board to help out.  Luckily, the concept worked, but he still wanted to be held.  The easy fix was to just take the photos while he was being held!  Here are a few  behind the scenes photos and the resulting photos.  As you can see, we were able to get Nicholas to relax afterwards, and we ended up getting some great shots!

Snuggling up with Dad to get relaxed shot.

The resulting photo.

Another method we tried...

and the resulting photo

Posing with his Dad's uniform

For more, go to the Vail Newborn Photos Collection.

Beaver Creek Wedding Proposal - Blake and Kacy

I'm a few weeks behind on posts, so I'm going to start with a great shoot I had recently for a wedding proposal at Beaver Creek.  Blake had contacted me a few weeks in advance and we had decided that a small bridge outside the Beaver Creek Chapel would make an ideal spot for him to pop the big question.

The date was set for just after the ski season had finished, so I knew there wouldn't be too many people around.  I went up a couple of times before to check out the area and to see how things were looking.  If you've ever spent time at a ski resort after it's closed for the winter, you'll know how quickly things can change.  The environment can morph drastically every day with mud and runoff, areas will suddenly close for Elk migration and snow melt can lead to flash floods, so you have to be prepared.

The bridge was snowy and there were old leaves under the snow from the fall, so I went up a little earlier than planned with my handy broom and shovel to clean the bridge up a little for the photos.  Then I secretly feared that Kacy might notice how clean it looked and realize something was up, so I had to make it look somewhat natural.  I tend to over think these things because I always get so nervous for the guys!

They arrived a few minutes later and after a small detour to look at the church, they made their way down to the bridge, where I was waiting and trying to look like a random tourist taking photos of the stream.  I found out afterwards that Kacy had told Blake to watch out, because they might accidentally get in my photos!!

Thankfully she said yes and the proposal was a great success!  Here are some photos from the big moment.

Click here for more Vail and Beaver Creek Engagement Photos