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This was such a sweet and exciting session to photograph! Jackie and Caroline are friends of mine. My sister Lisa met Jackie years ago at the office they worked at and they've stayed super close even though they don't work together anymore. Caroline proposed to Jackie this year on her birthday and we were so happy for them! Jackie decided to book an engagement session with me for her, Caroline and their adorable pup Charli, and Jackie had a surprise up her sleeve.... She told me she wanted to surprise Caroline at the session with a ring of her own! We discussed beforehand what our code would be for when she decided to get down on one knee, so that I would be ready and waiting to capture the moment! We got some great shots of the surprise and tons of other beautiful portraits set against a gorgeous sunset at the beach. Thanks to my sister Lisa for tagging along to hold the prop bag and to keep a hand on Charli in between her close ups! Congratulations Jackie and Caroline!! Here are some of my favorite shots from their romantic session! Get in touch to book your session here!
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In a year as hard as 2020 has been, it can be kind of hard to feel thankful. The year started off very rough for my family when my grandmother entered hospice care in January and we lost her in early February. Shortly after, the quarantine started and it seems like it's been a real downhill slope since then. But there have been bright spots this year, and there is still a lot to be thankful for. Even though I haven't seen much of my family this year, we're all still relatively healthy and most have managed to stay virus-free. My friends and I have managed to stay connected digitally instead of in person, and I'm happy that they're only a text or a FaceTime away. Although this year will be so different than others when it comes to meeting for a Thanksgiving celebration, I look forward to next year when we can hopefully get together without any fear. Since March I've been staying with my sister Lisa and her family to watch my nephew Seth during the week so my mother who usually watches him won't be exposed to any germs. Even though it means we have to stay six feet from my mom, I'm grateful I get to be with Seth every day and that I'm quarantining with my sister who's my best friend, even if we've been driving each other a little crazy. I'm so thankful I have my girl Gracey here with me. She's the most affectionate and silly little dog and I love her so much. I'm thankful my business has survived a year that has been the death of many small businesses. I had so many inquiries and reschedules from the lockdown, that I booked up really quickly for the year once I was able to work again. I've worked with so many wonderful clients this year and I also created so much personal work with the downtime I had, which was so invigorating creatively. We didn't go out much at all this year, even after the final phases of reopening happened. We've been very cautious. But we did go out one day after taking Seth's Christmas and some family photos at Prosser Pines to visit Fink's Country Farm. We thought he'd be overjoyed to see all the animals, but his favorite part was actually the pumpkins. He has a real affinity for them like his Aunt Laura and it was so adorable to see how happy he was running around and patting all the pumpkins in sight. That's a memory I'm thankful for. I hope you all have a safe and happy holiday! Happy Thanksgiving!Little Stella is so smiley because this year is her First Christmas! Actually, she's just always smiley because she's a super happy baby. But she was really happy to go with her big sister Addison and her mom Lauren (one of my besties) and dad Mike to Prosser Pines this year for family photos! Every year there seems to be one spot that get super popular with my clients. One year it was Blydenburgh Park, another year it was Islip Grange. This year it was definitely Prosser Pines in Middle Island. I always give clients a few suggestions based on the kind of backdrop they want, and this spot was the big hit this year. I think maybe because it's in the woods where we can spread out and there aren't a lot of people there, so it turns out to be a good venue for photography in the age of COVID-19. When we met for this session, the leaves were at their most beautiful I think. The color of the fall foliage was so gorgeous, and the girls did such a good job! Here are some of my favorite photos from our session! Get in touch here to schedule your session!I've been following Brody on Instagram for a long time. Not only is he super cute but he and his mom Debbie are out there doing a lot of good. Brody is a registered therapy dog. He regularly visits the Stony Brook University Hospital to cheer up the patients there. The kids there especially get a lot of comfort from Brody. Right now because of the pandemic, Brody and Debbie aren't able to visit the hospital to do their important work and I know that they're definitely missed by all their friends there. They can’t wait to be able to get back into the hospital and bring comfort to people who desperately need it. I really admire what they do and I hope they can get back to their very inspiring work soon! We met at the Stony Brook duck pond to do these photos. The light was beautiful and my subjects were so sweet. We did some family photos, then some super cute shots of daughter Lauren and her boyfriend and their dog Augustus, all in adorable matching outfits! Then Brody joined in for some solo shots, some portraits with Mom and then a few photos with his dog nephew Auggie! It was so nice get to know this family and their sweet pups. Check them out on Instagram: @adailydoseofbrody and @augustus_frenchieboy to follow along with these adorable boys! Here are some of my favorite photos from our session! Get in touch to book your family and pet session!Halloween is absolutely my favorite holiday. Even though I couldn't have my annual spooky party this year and the holiday looked a lot different than usual, it was still fun to dress up Seth and Gracey and take some photos. We didn't have even one trick or treater this year, so I'm going to be suffering from a sugar high for the next few weeks while I eat through all the candy! I bought Gracey's costume waaaay back in May when I saw it on clearance at Target. I loved dinosaurs when I was a kid, so I was excited to dress her up as a little Triceratops. She actually cooperated very well for her photos. There were a good few treats involved! My favorite one is a shot I caught just as she was licking her lips. She looks like a fearsome little beast (which she is sometimes) haha! Here's my little Gracey girl!       Seth's costume was thrown together a little quicker! My sister Lisa didn't want to spend a bunch of money on a costume he was going to wear once, since we weren't going to bring him trick or treating this year. So she decided to dress him as cousin Eddie from the movie National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, one of her and my brother in law Will's favorite movies. She bought him a robe and a hat, figuring that he could wear both of those again after Halloween! We put him in a pair of rainboots and went up to my studio for a few photos! If you've ever tried to take photos of a toddler in a hat, you know that the first thing they usually want to do is rip it right off their head. But I've found through much trial and error that if you slip that hat on just as you give them something else to hold and take their mind off of it, you'll be able to keep it on a lot longer. We gave him a little cup to hold and it completely distracted him from the hat!     Happy Halloween everyone!I've had so many memorable shoots with this family since I first met them at one of my pet portrait library programs! I always have so much fun with them! Last year's newborn session for Evelyn was a Fall lover's dream. We used pumpkins and hay bales and sunflowers, so this time we kept the theme going by visiting the sunflower field and pumpkin patch at one of my favorite Long Island spots, Waterdrinker Family Farm in Manorville. We started out doing some family photos in the sunflower field. Then the rest of the family took a break to enjoy some of the fun stuff the farm has to offer, while mom Nina and Evelyn and I stayed in the field to take some individual first birthday shots of Evelyn. She's such a smiley baby! Sometimes it's a struggle getting kids to smile when I have my mask on to shoot sessions, but with Evelyn it was a breeze. She's just a naturally happy baby, so there was no problem getting her to have fun for our photos. Nina brought lots of stuff we had used at her newborn session to the first birthday session. I love when clients do that, it's always so sweet and sentimental. After we were done with Evelyn's close up, we met back up with her dad and brother Owen and sister Juliette and we took a few more family photos in the pumpkin patch. Evelyn was very happy to stand up holding onto the big pumpkins and to spend some time sitting in the pumpkin carts! After we finished up, Owen and Jules were rewarded for their good job modeling by going back to play more on the farm! Here are some of my favorite photos from this very fun session! Schedule a session with me by emailing me at laurapeaphotography@gmail.com or calling (631)256-7476!Dominic turns 2 this month! This little cutie is the son of one of my best friends Dina and her husband Mike, and he has always rocked his photo sessions with me, from newborn to 1 year to Christmas photos to now! He's such a happy little guy and he's got a great smile. For this year's photos, we decided to visit the duck pond in Stony Brook for some socially distanced photos. Dominic loves to visit the geese by the water near his house, so I had a feeling he would enjoy the pond, with its large population of ducks, geese, pigeons and swans. I've shot a lot of sessions at the duck pond and I'm always cautious when I go there because of an incident I had there once, involving a close encounter with a swan. Thankfully the swans kept their distance that day, but the ducks, geese and pigeons practically swarmed us at one point because a passerby had the unfortunate idea to bring out some food! Dominic loved it though and he had a fun time following around the birds, climbing onto stumps and throwing things in the water. Ah, throwing. A two year old boy's favorite past time. Here are some of my favorite photos from Dominic's 2nd birthday session! Want your own fun visit to the duck pond? Email me at laurapeaphotography@gmail.com or call me at (631)256-7476.I got an email recently that made me SO happy. I've been nominated for Best Pet Photographer on Long Island! The awards are presented by Bethpage Federal Credit Union. If you're an islander, you've probably seen these Best of Long Island signs occasionally hanging in your favorite local shops, in the Long Island Press, etc. I never imagined that one day I'd be nominated for one of these awards! When I heard, I went to my sister, "did you do this?" and she said "I didn't even know I could nominate you or I would have!". I'm still not sure who nominated me, but thank you so much to whoever did! I don't expect to win my first year in the running, but I'm completely honored to even be nominated in the Best Pet Photographer category. If you'd like to vote for me or any of the other amazing photographers nominated this year, you can do so once a day every day from today, October 1st through December 15th! The link to vote is HERE. Thanks to Bethpage Federal Credit Union for presenting these awards and giving Long Island businesses your support.  Vote for me here!One of my favorite things about photographing babies is seeing them come back every year and watching them grow like weeds. I photographed Nathaniel and Caroline for the first time when they were teeny tiny week old newborns, then again for their 1st birthdays! Now they're 2 years old, running around with their big brother Benjamin Franklin the Airedale Terrier, who has been there every step of the way! This time their parents joined in on the fun too and we got some super adorable family shots. Even though this year was a little different because we had to keep our distance, it was still so much fun for me to hang out with this awesome family! We decided to do the session in their backyard this year so we could all spread out and the twins and Benjamin could run around to their hearts' content! We started out doing some family photos, then the twins posed on their very cute little lounge set and in front of their playhouse. They also enjoyed some time on their tire swing pushing each other and giggling. Near the end of the session, mom Sarah asked each of the twins to give Benjamin Franklin a kiss and of course they obliged. It reminded me of the sweet moment when they were tiny newborns and we were contemplating putting peanut butter on Nathaniel's head to get Benjamin to kiss him, but then he went ahead and did it all on his own. He has been the best dog brother right from the beginning!
Here are some more of my favorite photos from Caroline & Nathaniel's 2nd birthday session! Want to book a socially distanced session with me? Email me at laurapeaphotography@gmail.com or call (631)256-7476.I wanted to update here that I'm back to business! With the arrival of Phase 4 of Long Island's economy reopening, I'm able to get back to serving clients. I have several sessions that I was booked to shoot in March and April that were postponed because of the pandemic and I've been reaching out to those clients to get new dates on my calendar. I also have a list of everyone who inquired throughout the pandemic to see if I was available and I'll be getting in touch with them in the order that they inquired. If you're one of those people, you should hear from me soon! Back to business unfortunately does not mean back to normal completely. For the time being, I'll have to suspend my studio sessions, as my studio is too small to practice social distancing. For my clients' safety and my own, I'll only be conducting outdoor sessions until such time as a vaccine is distributed. Since I work with newborns, I have always kept up to date on vaccines that can help protect my clients from harm. The last thing I would want is for one of my clients to get sick, so I want to make sure I am properly protected so that I can keep my subjects protected. So if you book a session, you can feel confident that I will be wearing a mask for the entirety of our shoot and I will stay the recommended 6 feet away at all times. For family sessions and pets, this is not too different from how I normally operate. For newborns I obviously usually do much more hands-on posing which won't be possible at this time. For any newborn sessions I take now, they'll be conducted like family sessions with the baby in parents' or siblings' arms for the duration. I can direct clients on posing from a safe distance away. I know this isn't terribly convenient and possibly not what you imagined for your photo session with your newborn, but I would rather my clients be a little bummed but know for a fact they and their family are safe at one of my sessions. I look forward to a time when I can meet my clients normally, high five their kids, and hug them when the session is over. This is a really strange and difficult time in all our lives and it's been pretty tough for me to have to stop doing the job that I love. I'm really happy I can get back to it now, even though it's going to look slightly different for a while. Thank you so much to all of my clients who have been so understanding, and to everyone who reached out with interest during the quarantine! Knowing I had sessions to look forward to was very comforting in the scary times of this pandemic. For fun, here are some of the photos I took during the lockdown. I kept shooting as much as I could to stay sharp during the long break! Want to discuss booking a socially distanced photo session?
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AuthorLaura Paesano 
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Email LauraPeaPhotography@gmail.com or call 631-256-7476
All images copyright 2020 Laura Pea Photography
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All images copyright 2020 Laura Pea Photography
Contact Laura here.
Privacy Policy