Baby Plan!

Babies never grow as much as they do in their first year of life. The type of growth a baby experiences in that first year is equivalent to me gaining 300 pounds, learning to understand Portugese, sprouting wings and taking flight (now there is a sight... a 420 lb Portugese speaking photographer flying through the air...)

One of my biggest regrets in life (and I try not to regret ANYTHING... it is such a pointless emotion, don't you agree?) is not having an organized photo album of each of my kids that showed that first incredible year. Sure, I took thousands of pictures. And they now happily reside on a pretty silver external hard drive.  

I finally got my act together and started creating awesome birthday signature albums for each of my kids.  And one day - in between soccer games, birthday parties, and staying up all night with whoever has contracted the virus of the week- I will get around to printing and organizing baby books.

So what's my point? I am going to, very soon, introduce a very cool baby plan for that first amazing year.  The details are being tweaked (i.e:  I need to create pretty brochure that sums it all up), but give me a holler (tracy@doe-ee-bird.com)  if you just can't wait and want to hear more :-).

And some recent newborn pix.

This little beauty was perfect, just perfect.

I love her little round face!

Tags: Houston newborn photography, Houston newborn photographer, The Woodlands newborn photography, The Woodlands newborn photography

Remember these beauties?

The mom of these girls was my manager when I worked for IKEA. Aside from being an AMAZING manager, she is an incredible human being. She speaks a ridiculous number of languages (like five or something). Think you can't travel to Europe by yourself with a tiny infant? She did.  

And their dad... one of the funniest people I have ever met. Like the kind of person who would sport a really pretty, colorful silk handkerchief in his suit pocket at a formal company holiday party.  And then you sneeze and he pulls it out and it's actually women's underwear.

I'm not saying he did that.  Just that he is the kind of person that would do something like that {wink!} 

My Kiddos

OK, these pictures are from months ago when it was freezing cold outside and I had to find something to do inside (those of us that live in Houston consider 38 freezing cold and try not to venture out for fear of immediate frostbite :-)).

Someone once told me to remember that EVERYTHING is washable.  Which is why I not only allow this type of activity, I usually encourage it- much to Jesse's dismay.  Call me crazy, but anything the kids are doing that shows creativity- even making an ungodly mess that I knew would take 2 hours to clean- is usually encouraged.  Sometimes I regret that decision ...like the time they said they were going to build a fort out of styrofoam peanuts...inside... and they were demonstrating such teamwork and creativity, I chose to ignore that my house looked like it had been snowed on ... that little project took me two days to clean... who knew styrofoam peanuts stuck to EVERYTHING?!?

The BEST class I ever took in my entire life, including college and graduate school, was one called Creative Thinking.  Why I had to suffer through required classes like Business Calculus, but Creative Thinking wasn't even offered to undergrads, is a travesty!  Creative Thinking is something that everyone can use in all aspects of their life. I spent almost ten years in the corporate world and... shocker... business calculus was never needed. Creative thinking WAS.

OK, off the soapbox. Some more pix of my kiddos... I just ordered these in big floating canvases, I'm so excited!

Presley and Jude

and Emily prior to getting eleven inches of hair chopped off !

Tags: Houston Children's Photography, Houston Children's Photographer, The Woodlands Children's Photographer, The Woodlands Children's Photography

I Know.

I know.

I KNOW.

I want to eat him too.

This baby is not only freaking adorable, but has the COOLEST name ever- Ezra. Don't you LOVE THAT NAME?!? I sure do.

HIs aunt bought his mom a session with me as an early mother's day present. Isn't that a cool gift?!?!  (hint hint, tell your hubby and your kids you DON'T want the Shake Weight, but you DO want a gift certificate from yours truly!).  

OK, now I have the giggles, the Shake Weight is so awesome... maybe you DO want one after all.

As for me, I am asking for a Shake Weight AND my hardwood floors to be refinished- the recent purple nail polish incident has reminded me just how badly they need it.

Do you like my new chair?   I saw a similar tie chair at a boutique in New Orleans and tried to buy it, but it wasn't for sale, so along with my friend Teresa , I made one!

Tags: Houston baby photographer, The Woodlands baby photography, Houston baby photography, The Woodlands baby photography

If all I had to do all day...

... was photograph smiley, blue eyed babies like this one - I would die a happy woman!

And I just can't resist posting this picture. This is the kind of scene I walk into on a daily basis.

Welcome to a little slice (or should I say crack?) of my life.

This family, con't...

I go way back... WAY back with this mom, like I've known her over half my life and wouldn't be the person I am without her.

Alicia and I met in high school and with along with her and her, were pretty much inseparable. We're the kind of friends that- if there is a microphone and stage anywhere in sight, you can bet we'll be on it together- sharing the mike- belting out anything and everything 80s pop has to offer.

Alicia and I roomed together all through college and even both moved to San Antonio (for different reasons) after college.  So I think it's only fitting to take a trip down memory lane right now... you agree?

Alicia, remember when you put on a one woman comedy show for myself and Laura late one night in college after coming home from JD Wells?  And Laura and I clutched onto each other, choking and unable to breath with tears streaming down our faces because we were laughing so hard?  

Remember when we thought we would be all cool and backpack across Europe? But we weren't really the "backpacking across Europe" type and dragging our suitcases with our hair dryers and bottles of wine across the street in France and staying in a hostel with bugs in the sheets just wasn't working for us?  Not to mention all the personal stuff we both had going on at home.  And we went home early and were never  ever so happy to see the stars and stripes as we were when we got off that plane on US soil?

Remember in high school, how we all crammed into the front of Krista's grandma's Oldsmobile (that wasn't really her grandmas, but it looked like it could have been) and drove past people's houses (particularly certain boys) late at night to see what they were doing? And then once we were spotted and you and I ducked and left Krista looking conspicuously like she was pulling the drive by solo?

Remember that black and white midriff bearing shirt you and Heather and I used to all take turns wearing? And we wore it with high waisted jeans and combat boots? We thought we were the pinnacle of high fashion... that shirt was awesome! I hope you still have it ... for nostalgic purposes of course. I'm sure you do since you keep all your clothes and even brought your stirrup pants from 1987 to grace our college dorm room...

Remember working at Chili's together- oh gosh, I could go on and on and on about the Chili's memories...

But enough of memory lane for now. Some more pix, continued from the post below, of that awesome family of yours...

Because I know this family has been waiting

... and waiting. And waiting. So patiently without even a sneak peek. Here is one little bitty peek :). Forgive me for being slow!

More to come! Soon...promise!

Tags: Houston children's photographer, Houston child photography

A Celebration of LIfe

I really struggled with what to write for this post or if I even should post this session. You see- shortly after this session, this family experienced a very sudden and tragic loss of a member of their immediate family.  

I decided to post- as a tribute to the BEAUTY of their life and a celebration of their love and family. 

Tags: Houston Children's Photography, Houston Family Photographer, Houston Children's Photographer, Houston Baby Photography, Urban Baby Photography

SOOO glad I had my camera with me this day...

I don't normally carry my pro camera around because it weighs about 787 pounds.  But I happened to have it this day at the park.

And these pix make my heart smile.

Big.

Love these guys.

My phone got all kinds of jacked up on this shoot...

...probably because it fell into a pile of wet leaves and Dad had to go dig through that pile to find it... about 30 minutes after the fact while it sat there getting soggy. Now I can't read text messages (the horror!) and can't tell who is calling me, so its always a fun guessing game- is it my mom? Is it the kiddo's school? It it Simon Cowell calling to tell me my singing really IS awesome? (Jesse has this theory that everyone on the planet ,even Celine Dion and Beyonce, THINKS that they are a better singer than they actually are. And he likes to remind me of this when I am rocking out to a little MJ in the car...)

Back to the lost phone. I'm sure you are vaguely remembering - didn't something similar happen on another shoot?!?

Yes. *sigh* details here. Me and my phone are not best buds right now.  Holding out for a certain brand of phone that everyone else on the planet has except for me (don't you feel SO SORRY for me!?!)... I am locked into a contract with Sprint for the rest of my life... I just couldn't resist their last temptation of a bright green slider phone ( I mean really how COULD you resist THAT?), which extended my contract from then to infinity... and I refuse to break it and give them an extra dime of my hard earned money.

Anyway, this guy is pretty special isn't he?  Behold Mr. Owen.

Tags: Houston Children's Photographer, Houston Child Photographer, Houston Child Photography

Happy Easter!

To celebrate that miracle so long ago, some newborn photos.

"A baby is God's opinion that life should go on." ~ Carl Sandberg

Tags: The Woodlands Newborn Photographer, The Woodlands Children's Photographer, Houston Newborn Photographer, Houston Children's Photographer, Houston Natural Light Photographer The Woodlands Natural Light Photographer