Category: Families - LONG ISLAND NEWBORN AND PET PHOTOGRAPHER - LAURA PEA PHOTOGRAPHY

Christmas Session at the Waterdrinker Family Farm Winter Wonderland Festival

12/23/2021

The first time we visited Waterdrinker Family Farm this year for their Winter Wonderland Festival, it was a beautiful temperate day. My sister and I decided we’d do her family Christmas photos there. The day we went there for our photos turned out to be FREEZING. The wind was brutal and we were wishing we’d done them much earlier! Even though it was super cold, my
nephew Seth did really well posing! He’s so used to me taking photos of him by now! In fact, he routinely tells me “take a picture, Aunt Laura!” at random points each day.

He was excited to explore the gingerbread houses and the Airstream village most of all. After we finished up with family shots, we let Seth have some time on the jump pad, the part of the farm he likes the best! Because we went during the week and it was such a chilly day, he had the whole thing to himself! When we got home that day, he indulged me by taking one last shot in front of their Christmas tree!

Here are some of my favorite shots from the day! I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season!

Get in touch to book your session today!
Email me at laurapeaphotography@gmail.com
or call (631)256-7476.

Family Session at Islip Grange

12/21/2021

This session was particularly fun because it was of one of my best friends Lauren’s family! I’ve been taking photos of them all the way back to her engagement session with her husband Mike and I’ve had the pleasure of capturing a lot of their memories as they grew their family!

Beautiful Addison has such a sweet disposition and little Stella already has a big and bright personality! I love these girls! It was so fun following them around while they explored Islip Grange and all its adorable historic buildings.

Here are some of my favorite shots from our session!

Get in touch to book your session today! Email me at laurapeaphotography@gmail.com or call (631)256-7476.

Owen's Birthday and Family Session at Prosser Pines

12/16/2021

I met this awesome family years ago at my first pet portrait program at Islip Public Library. I've been lucky enough to have many shoots with them since then and they're always so much fun! This session was booked to celebrate son Owen's 10th birthday (he was only 5 when I met him the first time)! Mom, Dad and his two little sisters joined in so we could also capture some great family shots during our hike in the gorgeous woods of Prosser Pines! We got a beautiful fall day for our shoot and the kids had a great time exploring the trails and fallen branch tents that are scattered throughout the park.

I'm going to climb on my soapbox for just one moment here, so please bear with me. Prosser Pines is a really popular spot for photographers; there are even some times when I'm shooting there that I have to make sure there are no other shoots going on in the background of my photo (and sometimes even Photoshop them out if I can't avoid them)! Last year in October I shot there and there was litter left from photographers setting off smoke bombs during their sessions. I was happy to see that this time there was no trace of anything like that. It's so important for us photographers to respect the places where we shoot. Not only is it just common decency, if we don't, we might not be allowed to keep using those locations. If you visit a park or nature preserve, remember to take out what you bring in!

Ok, rant over, back to these amazing folks! The best feedback I can get from my clients is not reviews (although those help!), it's the fact that they return to me for more sessions. That tells me that I did my job, that they love their photos, and that they can stand me telling corny jokes or doing my silly noises to make their kids smile! As a small business owner, I appreciate every single client who books with me because they allow me to live my dream, but clients who come back year after year are something so special to me and I can't thank them enough!

Without further ado, here are some of my favorite shots from this very fun session!

Get in touch to book your session today! Email me at laurapeaphotography@gmail.com
or call (631)256-7476.

Photos from Islip Public Library's Fall Pet Portrait Program on 11.14.21

12/13/2021

It was great to be back at the beautiful Islip Public Library outdoor terrace for another fun pet portrait program. While I was there for our summer program, we discussed the possibility of doing a fall program. Since there are many families who come back each time I'm there to shoot, we decided to add some themes so that there would be a nice variety to the photos we've done.

Our original program was set for October 30th but the weather was not cooperating, so we moved it to November 14th. Two themes were available, a fall backdrop and a winter backdrop and patrons could choose to use either or both for their photos! It was a lot of fun seeing old and new faces coming to the program, and all the pets were so adorable and very well-behaved! Some pets showed up in really cute Christmas costumes.

Thank you to all the families who brought their pets to be photographed and to the library for having me again! Here are some of the great shots we got!

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Pet Portrait Program at Islip Public Library 11.14.21

10/14/2021

We had so much this summer that we decided to do another program at Islip Public Library for the fall! The program will take place on November 14th (postponed from 10.30.21 due to rain) from 1-4pm in the library's beautiful outdoor terrace! We'll be booking time slots to make sure not too many people congregate at once, to keep everyone safe! The program is open to Islip Library patrons and patrons of all other Long Island libraries! Out of district patrons may have to call the library to register, ask for Laurie Aitken if you have any problems!

Register for the program here!

You’ll receive a free 8x10 and a digital file of your photo! Any pets are welcome, but please make sure they’re restrained with a leash or in a carrier to keep everyone safe.

This time, I'll be bringing along some props. You can go with a fall theme, a winter theme, or just take a photo with the natural beauty of the library's terrace! These are some shots I took at our last program in June!
Hope to see you there!

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Photo collage of photos of dogs, hamsters, and their families

James’ Newborn Session

9/3/2021

I first met this awesome family a few years back when they had their twins Nathaniel and Caroline. They wanted photos of them with their eldest child, a beautiful Airedale Terrier named Benjamin Franklin! You can see those here! I got the pleasure of photographing them again for the twins’ first and second birthdays and it’s been amazing to see them sprout up into sweet toddlers and see their personalities develop over the years.

This year I was so happy to be there to photograph the newest member of their family, baby James! While James was getting ready for his close up, I started off getting some shots of the older bunch. Nathaniel and Caroline were a little hesitant to start but once they watched the master Benjamin Franklin pose, they felt much more comfortable. Once we got those, sweet baby James made his debut and joined his siblings for some group shots.

After he dipped his toe in the modeling world with his brothers and sister, he was ready for his solo career! He followed in his elder siblings’ footsteps and did such an amazing job posing. The theme of James’ nursery is space, so I brought my moon and star props, including my big white wooden moon which I love to use. Here are some of my favorite shots of this new little man!
Welcome to the world, James!

Get in touch to book your newborn session today! Email me at laurapeaphotography@gmail.com
or call (631)256-7476.

Photos from the Islip Public Library Pet Portrait Program 6.12.21

8/14/2021

I was so happy to be able to come back to the Islip Public Library for another pet portrait program on their awesome outdoor terrace. This was my second in person event back from the pandemic and we were lucky to get such a beautiful day for it.

We had many families come
to bring in their pets for a portrait. We had mostly dogs, but one family brought in their two hamsters, who were named Hamstie and Tim. This was my first time photographing hamsters and I was surprised at how well they did! I always love adding another animal to the list of those I’ve photographed!

Thank you to all the families that brought their pets to the program and to the library for having me back! Stay tuned for another pet portrait program I’ll be announcing soon!

Here are some of the photos we got that day!

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Photos from the Middle Country Public Library Pet Portrait Program on 5.22.21

6/30/2021

I was so happy to be back at the Middle Country Public Library in Centereach for another pet portrait program. This was my first pet event back after the pandemic made it impossible to gather safely for so long! We had 13 dogs come in to be photographed, along with one turtle and even one stuffed fox (a very low maintenance pet indeed!) Those last two didn't sign my model release forms, so unfortunately you'll just have to imagine those, but I assure you, they came out beautifully :D. It was so nice to be surrounded by pets again, even those of the stuffed variety.

To be safe, we held this program outdoors in the library's Nature Explorium, which is a really cute area at the library for kids that has all sorts of fun activities. It also provided some beautiful backdrops and really nice shade on a particularly hot May day. I can't wait to bring my nephew Seth there to play! Thank you to the library for having me for another awesome program, and thank you to everyone who brought their pets in for a photo!
Here are some of my favorite shots of the day!

To be notified of all the events I’m participating in,
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Seth's Christmas and Family Session at Prosser Pines

12/21/2020

My sister, brother in law and my nephew accompanied me on my shoot at Prosser Pines with our friend Lauren this year. When they were there they took a walk around the preserve and afterwards said "Ok, can we do our Christmas photos here too?" Of course! It's such a beautiful spot for it!

Lisa had the idea to use Seth's Little Tikes car in the photos and put some of my little tree props on it as if Seth had gone to the woods to chop down his own tree. The problem was that his car is green with yellow dinosaur scales! But that's where Aunt Laura's years of Photoshop practice came into play. It was more time-consuming than my normal edits but I was able to turn his car red to match her vision for the photos. We wrapped a string of fairy lights around it to complete the look and Seth was happy to pose in it, because he loves his dino car! He wouldn't wear the trapper hat we brought for him, but that's ok because they still came out super cute.

We also took some sweet family shots of the three of them, but most of the photos were about Seth, because he's obviously the star!

Here are some of my favorite photos from our session!

Happy Holidays!

Dominic's Christmas & Family Session at Prosser Pines

12/9/2020

You might remember Dominic's adorable session at the Stony Brook duck pond recently for his second birthday. I was so happy to get this little guy in front of my camera again for a Christmas and family session at Prosser Pines in Middle Island! His mom brought a super cute mailbox and a letter so Dominic could send out his wishlist to Santa. I hope he gets everything he wants!

We did some individual photos of the handsome boy and a lot of family shots too. The light was so beautiful that day in Prosser Pines and we had a lot of fun exploring the trails, despite one alarming incident where Dominic dropped his Larabar snack on the forest floor and was NOT PLEASED when it got taken away from him! I feel you, buddy.

There are these cool tree structures in the Pines that Dominic loved to dart in and out of. I'm not really sure what the story is behind those or who made them, but they look pretty cool. If anyone has any insight into how those came about, comment below because I'd love to know. Google has failed me and I'm curious!

Here are some of my favorite photos from our session!

Get in touch here to book your session!