A gift from heaven (Jensen - 5 days old)......

If you've followed my blog for about a year or more, you might remember my posts about Elyse. Well Elyse has been doing her work up in heaven and has been watching over her parents...and her little brother Jensen :) Jensen wasn't due until later this month, and not only showed up early.....but on Christmas day! My Christmas was complete the minute I got the news that he had arrived and was doing great. Even though he was a month early, he was still great size (5 lbs 7 oz) and never needed help breathing, an incubator, etc. He's a strong little guy....and proved so during the shoot! My jaw literally dropped to the floor when we tried to set up the first shots I wanted to get. For those of you who work with newborns, you know about the infamous "pose" (for those who don't, it's where the baby is laying on their tummy and their head is propped up straight on either their arms (chin or head resting on arms) or theirs hands (so hands on cheeks propping their own head up)). Since Jensen was a month early, I thought "Sweet! He'll be knocked out the whole time and be super poseable!". Well what I didn't know is that Jensen is baby Superman! As we layed him down and tried to get him into "the pose", I kid you not, he pushed himself up with his arms and turned his head! Needless to say, he wasn't having it. After I picked my jaw up off of the floor, we moved onto the next idea.

For those of you who know me, you know that i'm not a copycat. It's just not my style. I love finding inspiration through other photographers, but blatantly copying is not my thing. If someone has done something I like, i'll either not do it at all...or think of a way to try and do it differently. So anyway, as I was strolling through an antique store one day I saw this amazing vintage produce scale that was in pristine condition. Anyone who is familiar with newborn photographers knows that Carrie Sandoval is literally THE most amazing newborn photographer in the world and has used scales in her newborn shoots for quite some time now. So as I was at the antique shop, I shot Carrie an email and asked her if she wanted me to pick up the scale for her (like I said, i'm not a copycat and in my opinion, Carrie has "trademarked" so many unique baby shots and I literally cringe every time I see another blatant copy of her work - so yeah, I wanted her to have it). As much as she loved it, she decided that she didn't need 3 scales, so she told me that I should still get it and use it. I debated for a while and went back the following week and it was still there......and on sale (on top of the fact that they were having a moving sale and I asked if they would drop the price again (even though it was already ridiculously cheap hehe - hey, that's the chinese in me! I'm a bargain shopper!). I took the fact that it was still there, on sale (plus extra discount) AND that Carrie said *I* should get it.....and grabbed it.  

With only about an hour to shoot (mini session for a mini guy, I guess lol), close to no natural light (see post below - this shoot was right after that one since I was already up in Orange County....and we ended up having to call it quits at 4:30pm because it was literally night outside) and super baby, here were some of the shots I was able to snap.

*Disclaimer* - I am NO Carrie Sandoval.....not even CLOSE, but she is a true inspiration and a total sweetheart, so Carrie, thank you for your friendship, encouragement and for sharing your talent with the world.....