Adrian's 1st Birthday Session

105 degrees is not ideal photo shoot weather, but even with the terrible evening heat, Adrian managed to surprise us with adorable smiles and expressions in his session to celebrate his upcoming first birthday. Adrian, his mommy, aunt, and grandparents met me last week at Fair Park to get some photos  taken. I'll admit, we all had to work together with Adrian to try and keep him cool despite the heat, and happy... well, despite the heat. At first, I think his family was worried because baby Adrian didn't seem very excited about getting his picture taken, but some of the best images we got, I think, are of him with little bits of his family in the frame. I'll even say that it made the pictures better, because who loves him more and wants to celebrate his life more than his family, right? We started out taking some photos of Adrian and just getting him comfortable in front of the camera, and then his family brought out a little birthday cake and a big balloon and let him go at it! I love the whole smash cake thing. You can't sit a one-year-old in front of a cake and not have the most adorable images ever. You just can't. Here are a few of the images of the day. Hope you all like them :)

 I think this one is so sweet. Adrian's grandpa was holding him just to keep him close to the cold air coming in from a door next to them, but Adrian just happened to lean into his grandpa and when I called to his attention, it made a sweet moment. 

 His eyes! That's all I have to say. 

 See? Baby + Cake = Adorable

It really was soooo hot outside! Adrian was having a good ole time with the cake frosting, until he accidentally grabbed a bite of cake, and he did noooootttt like it. At all. So, his mommy and aunt Jennifer quickly cleaned him up with wipies and water. He wasn't quite done yet when his mommy picked him up to soothe him and calm him down. I took the photo on the left while Jennifer continued to clean up the area and while his mommy held him. And it's my favorite picture from the whole session.

Juana's Graduation Session in Denton

I met Juana when I started working in the Mac Lab at school almost two years ago. There were days when neither of us got anything done because we were too busy talking about everything! Juana is so awesome because she graduated with a degree in Journalism a semester early, and just yesterday graduated from UNT again with a master's degree in Women's Studies, also a semester early. 

Although she doesn't brag, Juana really is quite inspirational. She spent some time interning at a non-profit organization that helps women get legal services, particularly in immigration and violence against women cases. I even attended an event in which she spoke in front of students about domestic violence awareness. Almost any day that I'd go into work, she was working on a 20-page paper of some sort or preparing for a test. She is a role model for any young woman who wants to be successful. 

On top of her education and career accomplishments, she is also so much fun. She always cracks me up and is such a good friend. I am so happy for her successes and I'm proud to have known a woman that will go so far in life. We decided to celebrate the end of her journey at UNT by shooting her session in Denton, the place that has been her home away from home since 2007. Thank you, Juana, for the laughs, the stories and the fun. I can't wait to see what you have in store for yourself next! 

We were in love with this light at the courthouse!

 I love, love, love this one! 

This was about ten seconds after I jumped four feet to my left when Juana said there was a man behind me! After my dramatic reaction, we squinted to see that it was just a long-haired guy taking a break from skateboarding in the distance. If he were barefoot, we would say that this was an image of typical Denton.

 This spot, that we found by accident was my favvvvorite location of them all. Her outfit, the location and the golden sky made this perfection.

 We couldn't have made it better if we had planned it on purpose.

Juana, you look beautiful in this one! Your skin is perfect and your makeup was the perfect accent. I am so jealous of your curly locks! 

 That's right, ladies and gentlemen.

 This was an experience to say the least. While trying out off-camera flash was fun and produced some cool results, we definitely had to work together to get the images we wanted. It's something I'm going to be practicing in the near future though!

:) 

Sneak Peek at Juana's Graduation Session in Denton!

Yayyy! One: I'm blogging new content. Two: I'm blogging content that I lovvvvve. Three: The lovely lady is my beautiful friend, Juana. She is one amazing lady and I can't wait to tell you about her, but that will wait until her full blog post, which will probably go live at the end of the week. So here's a peek into her session:

 

There is plenty more to come! Check back later this week to )ee more :_