Lily's parents Brandon and Richelle are friends of mine, so it's always nice to photograph her because I get to hang out with her awesome mom and dad too! I haven't seen them in a long time because they live in Connecticut and because of this darn pandemic we've all been dealing with for what feels like forever. But we got together for a socially distanced photo session where Lily could have her run of the yard and stretch those legs out after being in the car for so long! Lily wasn't super interested in sitting on any of my little rugs. She wanted to RUN. She was having a blast finding acorns, holding up gigantic sticks and ripping leaves off the trees. At one point Brandon said "These are going to be the weirdest Christmas photos ever", but you know what? I've been a photographer long enough to know that a 2 year old just does their thing and I have to be quick enough to capture the smiles when they happen! Luckily from years of experience and from photographing my nephew Seth so much, I have a very quick trigger finger! After she was done exploring the grounds to her heart's content, I finally lucked out with a prop she was interested in. My trusty Radio Flyer wagon with a tree plopped inside of it never goes wrong. She had lots of fun pulling it around and also using it as an acorn receptacle. Whatever keeps them smiling for the camera is alright by me! Here are some of my favorite photos from Lily's 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!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!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 [email protected] or call me at (631)256-7476.Meet the Petrellis! Just kidding, they're my friends and they've been all over the blog for years haha. We had a lot of photos to get to this holiday season, so when planning our photo session, mom Diana and I decided we'd do two days in a row to make sure we got everything we needed. The first day we met in Stony Brook for a family session with dad Michael. The next day, Diana and her mom Janet (it's always good to bring a helper!) came with the boys into the studio to get some Christmas photos of just the twins. It's the best of both worlds! The boys had a lot of fun playing with the props in the studio, and I made sure to save the best for last. Earlier this year, our friend Dina was cleaning house and getting rid of some stuff and she offered me an adorable little red metal fire truck for the studio. I knew this would look great in Christmas photos, and I knew Vincent and Louis would love it. They have a real fascination with anything automotive, like their dad. Remember when we took some of their newborn photos on dad's car and even...in his tires? The day before at our family session, Vincent and Louis made sure to point out every car that went by! Because I knew it would be a big draw and that it would probably distract them if it was in the room the whole time, I stowed the fire truck outside the studio until right at the end of the session. The boys loved taking turns riding on it and it was really adorable! Here are some of my favorite photos from our double session! Book your session with me! Email me at [email protected] or call me (631)256-7476.The Camerons and Ryans are some of my oldest clients! My mom Lorraine, a veritable Laura Pea Photography business card dispenser, connected me with both of them, and it turns out there are a lot of connections between the families too! My mom's best friend since the first grade is Emily. Her daughter Erin and son-in-law Tom are my clients. The other client is Robyn. She knows my mom because her husband Patrick worked for my mom at the library years ago! It turns out Erin and Robyn are friends and their daughters go to dance classes together, so all the kids are friends too! Erin's mom Emily was also Robyn's first grade teacher! Like I always say about Long Island: it's a big island, but a small world. Since they always come to me for Christmas photos, this year they suggested that we do the sessions together! This was my first time doing a simultaneous two family session and I wasn't sure what to expect. What I forgot is that since I've been photographing both families since the kids were in diapers, they're all essentially pros by now. They gave me beautiful smiles and there was no need for silly jokes to get them to have fun. They were effortlessly adorable and they had a blast being able to hang out with their friends while we took photos! Here are my favorite photos from the session! Book your session with me! Email me at [email protected] or call me at (631)256-7476.Avery’s mom Lizzie is one of my oldest friends! I posted her family maternity session a while back (see those photos here!) and I was so excited when I heard Avery had arrived, so I could shoot her newborn session! Just like the maternity session, we made the newborn shoot a family affair! Big sister Morgan had asked to dress Avery, so she showed up in a special unicorn outfit that perfectly complemented Morgan’s! We took photos with the whole family, with just her sister Morgan and brother Liam, with mom and dad and some of Avery on her own. She did really well sleeping, and even when she woke up at the end, she wasn’t crying so we were able to get some eyes open shots! Here are some of my favorite photos from our session! Email me at [email protected] or call me at (631)256-7476 to book a session!It’s been a little bit of a crazy time over here at Laura Pea Photography! I try to dedicate a blog post to most sessions I do, but this V-Day season got away from me. If you follow along on my Instagram (@laurapeaphotography), you’ll have seen all these photos but I decided to do a roundup post of the sessions I did for Valentine’s Day this year for those that follow my blog! First up is my nephew Seth! This is his first Valentine’s Day and I was so excited to get him in the studio to use some of the props I’ve been accumulating over the years! He’s so used to the click of my camera and the flash of my lights, so he did an amazing job! Next is Juliette and Owen! I photographed them at two of the pet portrait programs I did at the Islip Public Library and then I was honored to photograph Juliette’s 1st birthday photos! They came back for her 18 month photos to surprise their dad whose birthday is the day before Valentine’s Day. They had so much fun playing around with the props I have in the studio! I love how these came out! Jules has such a brilliant smile and Owen is such a great older brother, who was so happy to pose with his little sister. Next are my little girl Gracey’s photos! I always take photos of her when I’m figuring out my setups for sessions. She’s always happy to model for me, especially because she knows there are freeze-dried beef liver treats in it for her! Finally is my cousin Peyton’s Valentine’s Day photos! Peyton’s mom Lori is the reason why I have this very cute little play kitchen. She saw it for sale online and told me about it. I agreed it would be a very cute addition to the studio and picked it up. Peyton was very happy to play with it in exchange for a few beautiful smiles toward the camera! I hope everyone had a great Valentine’s Day! Book a session with me by emailing [email protected]
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