I’ve said it before but it bears repeating: in-home lifestyle family shoots are my absolute favorite. But, they’re especially my favorite when they involve breakfast. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s because making a special breakfast has always signified to me that it’s the weekend because that’s when you have time to actually make sausage and french toast and all that other yummy stuff. So I enjoy hanging out at other peoples’ houses on Saturday mornings while they make breakfast and wear their pajamas – this is comfortable and fun for me. And sometimes it’s fun and comfortable for the kids too, particularly when their names are Andrew and their favorite activity in the whole world is being photographed.

So here we have Allison and Nathaniel, two very intelligent people with lots of incredibly fun hobbies (Allison used to make balloon animals for parties!) who have interesting jobs and a good sense of humor (plus a killer selection of vintage My Little Ponies). And we have Samuel, the very cute baby who we occasionally forced into a cowboy hat because he was wearing a bandana bib and it just felt right. And last, but certainly not least, we have Andrew, toddler extraordinaire, who immediately smiled at me when I walked in the door like he knew that I was another shot at the big time for his inevitable career in show business. Then he continued smiling directly at me throughout the entire 1.5 hours I was there. He was *this close* to winking at me pretty much all the time. He is a total ham and hilarious. When he’s not waiting for his career to take off, he enjoys walking like a penguin, working in his garden, making OJ, cracking eggs for french toast, and helping his Grandma June play the piano when she visits. I immensely enjoyed hanging out with this crew on a weekend morning.

Kirsten and Matt are my kind of people. Geoff is insistent that the amount of animals living with us don’t outnumber us, but he’s wrong. Kirsten and Matt are living in a joyous dreamland of cats and dogs living together, cuddling on the bed and everyone getting along. They live very happily living alongside the following:

*Chip – yellow lab, exceptionally good boy, friendly, cuddler
*Pascal – white Ragdoll, friendly, goofy, likes to chase shadows on walls and harass Chip
*Cinder – insanely handsome very-good-boy long-haired Siamese who enjoys being the center of attention and is very good at jumping
*Weston – human toddler, likes to dance to the Black Eyed Peas, owns the coolest shoes, has the most wonderful cable-knit sweater known to small children, and has an insanely cute laugh

In addition, they also live with Tansy, a calico who spent the session hiding from me under the bed, and two bunnies. And soon they’ll have a 34 year old photographer who moves in as the “Cat Nanny.” So it’s a full house with an unbelievably high cute factor over there and I’m definitely jealous of how well everyone gets along. Also 100% jealous of Weston’s shoes, which I went home and immediately put on my Amazon wish list. What a good looking bunch!

I met Julie, Ben, Claire, and Yoda on a chilly day to get a photo for their holiday card, and despite the chill we had a great time! I say “chilly” but Julie and Ben are from Michigan so they’re pretty hard to make cold. I’m from Pittsburgh and used to think I was also hard to make cold, but now that I’ve lived down here for many years I no longer go anywhere under 70 degrees without at least a jacket (how did this happen to me?). Claire, who I was warned has a bit of stranger danger, didn’t take long to warm up at all (figuratively, since we were outside) and was excited to walk the trail down to the beautiful little park near their house. There we saw lots of deer, hung out near the gazebo (which Claire loves), and played on the swings. Claire is in an “all things leaves” stage and enjoyed holding and giving away her colored leaves, and she loved riding on the gazebo porch swing with her parents. She is adorable, strong-willed, and very smart… she also has the best shoes. Yoda the Very Good Boy of a Dog stayed closed and obediently took part in family portraits even though Claire didn’t always want that (it wasn’t part of her vision for the pictures apparently). I had such a good time spending some time with this beautiful family and exploring a new-to-me gorgeous little park.