Portraits by Angie Lane Celebrate Life Blog

I did a little mini-photoshoot of Kayla over the weekend. I just wanted to get a few fun, creative pictures right at sunset with a bunch of lens flare. We got to the spot about 3 minutes before the sun went below the trees so we had to work FAST! But we got a few shots that I love.

I’ve had a lot of inquiries lately about when I’m doing beach portraits this year. So here you go! I will be holding beach sessions from October 13-17. Usually one session in the morning and one session in the evening. This year I’m including a set of holiday cards with your session fee! The sessions will be at Capitola Beach (just a few miles from Santa Cruz). Last October I did sessions at Capitola and I fell in love! This location has the obvious sand and surf, but also has a great pier and some awesome buildings with brightly-colored stucco. It really gives that feeling of a quaint beach town. There’s so much variety there!

Sessions are filled on a first-come, first-served basis and they usually fill up fast! This is the only time I will be doing beach sessions this year.

I meant to post these pictures FOREVER ago, but I just got busy. I took my kids to my hometown of Petaluma over spring break to take some new portraits of them together. I wish Petaluma was closer! (sigh). There are so many amazing places to shoot there. I always loved all of the old buildings when I lived there, but when I went back and looked at the town through a photographer’s eye, I couldn’t believe all the spots that I had never noticed before!

Anyway, here are a few of my kiddos:

Well I have tons of ideas for this week for beach portraits. There are really tons of things that look great at the beach. One thing to keep in mind is that the colors at the beach are fairly subdued (especially in N. Cal where we often have fog) so I usually suggest to people to wear something colorful (otherwise you run the risk of having grey ocean, grey sky, brown sand and  . . . colorless clothes).

When planning portraits at the beach think of what you have that might be “out of the box” so to speak — (like the purple frilly dress from Chasing Fireflies). That’s not something you would usually wear to the beach, but the contrast between the frilly dress and the outdoorsy look of the beach looks awesome. Right now many clothing stores are sending out catalogs with pictures done at the beach. Take note of what the models are wearing and how it looks in the photograph.

So my last newborn slept through the entire session (I think I have one picture with her eyes open) and this little guy was WIDE awake for the first part. He did eventually go into a milk coma towards the end  and I have a feeling he may have slept for quite a while this afternoon. He seemed pretty worn out! :) 

Congrats C family!!

Since I focused on girls last week, I thought it was only fair to do a feature on boys clothes. With boys a lot of classic items look great like cargo pants/shorts, jeans, Converse shoes and hats. Layered shirts look awesome. Stay tuned for next week — I’m going to start doing some features on clothes that look great at the beach! Even though I’m not planning to do my beach sessions until October, now is a great time to find clothes in the stores that look great at the beach.

I could have photographed little L all day! She was so sleepy and squishy and chubby — my favorite kind of newborn! I had just been saying something about newborns smiling in their sleep when she started grinning up a storm! She must be having sweet dreams!

Congrats F family on your BEAUTIFUL little girl!!

I got a call a couple of weeks ago from the F family and Mrs. F was due any day and decided to do maternity pictures. Doesn’t she look GREAT?! Hopefully you’ve had your little one by now and I can’t wait for our newborn session!

Well this is a day late because I was having internet connection problems yesterday. Today I wanted to focus on some really fun hand-made items. If you are not familiar with the addiction that is etsy, then you’re in for a real treat! Etsy is this great online market where people sell ALL KINDS of handmade items. I’m not joking (and neither is my wallet) when I say it’s an addiction! To shop on etsy just go to www.etsy.com and then do a search for an item or seller etc. I listed the names of the sellers next to the items I’m showing to make it easier if anyone wants to find their shop. 

I haven’t found many cute boy items so I’m just going to stick to girls today. One style that I think is so cute is to pair some of these cute tops/dresses with jeans or denim capris that have a cuff and plastic rain boots or ballet flats.  And another super cute idea is to pair funky leg warmers with tutus or petti skirts (or denim etc.) Who knew leg warmers would have a comeback?! And finally I am showing some of my favorite crocheted hats (many of you may have seen the ones I have).

(Oh, FYI, I did not take the photographs on these pages — they are from the etsy buyer’s listings.)

This session was so fun and I have SOO many favorites! (This may be my biggest sneak peak yet!) These guys were up for anything (even hiking over big boulders to get to an ice-cold river!) Thanks for being such great sports and I can’t wait to shoot your wedding next year!