WizBlog

happy new year - it's a boy!

"A baby is God's opinion that life should go on." ~Carl Sandburg

Non-traditional. Our clients and readers know that describes us as well as the way we photograph.

For baby pictures, many folks are used to having to pack up the baby and trek to an unfamiliar, cold studio. Usually only 20 minutes are scheduled for sessions, bright strobes flash unrelentingly into babies' startled eyes, and lots of noise is made to get the little ones' attention.

Our lifestyle sessions are the polar opposite. Our families have our full time and attention. We shoot as long as we need to until we know we have captured our baby and the family's essence. We take time before our session to connect with our families and make sure children feel secure and comfortable. For newborns, usually the best place for that is the familiarity of their own warm home, where mommy's reassuring arms are always within close reach, and breaks are taken when little ones need feeding or comforting. Capturing a family's interactions is our goal, rather than getting everyone to stare into an inanimate camera.

This single WoggShot tells a rich story of the D family's newborn session. At the top of the image you'll see one of SoCal's rare gray, overcast, rainy days, limiting our natural light. On the left, there's Wizzy, right on baby's level, wearing, of course, her signature overalls and backwards ballcap. As we often do, we moved furniture and household items so we can position our clients - big and small - in the best light.

Once we were ready to shoot, Baby L - a New Year's Day arrival - needed just a little top-off to fill his tiny tummy. Then a few minutes of swaddling and snuggling, and he relaxed into sleepytime in our baby bean bag nest, covered with one of his baby gifts - a hand-made crocheted blankie.

What we love the most is seeing mommy C and daddy K sweetly cuddled and relaxed on their master bed, warmth reflected from deep gold walls, watching us shoot, secure that we'll treat their precious little boy with gentle care.

Mr. Wogg is quite the creative photographic storyteller - clever, hunny!



And here is this little cutie from Wizzy's perspective:


We do adore our mommy-love portraits -

There is something so special about a daddy with his newborn son.

We love our readers' opinions - which of these images appeals to you most, our rich color or timeless black and white?




Proud parents, peaceful peanut -


Of course, we love to focus on family faces -


Designing the D family's birth announcements is so much fun. Instead of our usual StoryBook layouts, here is a peek at the preliminary draft for one of our unique vertical fold-over cards -

Inside:

   

(mini) island adventure | 1 of 2 parts

... where the cats are fat and lazy, the houses are quaint and enchanting, and the living is creative and carefree ...

Sounds pretty much like a perfect WizWog adventure destination.
Balboa Island - a long-time local legacy location (can ya tell we love alliteration?).

Wizzy has photos from the early 1950's, where she is swimming with her sibs on the north end of this teeny local island. Somehow, despite a plethora of commercialism aimed at magnetizing tourist $$, during the off-season - most of the time between Labor Day and Memorial Day - this charming destination, about 15 minutes away from the WizWog home, still holds culinary and visual treasures, just waiting to be discovered.

Just one teaser today - the rest to follow tomorrow.
Several times a year we visit - usually for breakfast at Wilma's Patio, a small family restaurant. Then a walk with our cameras, strolling for ever-changing details to capture.

This little lady was actually at eye-level, lurking with catlike mysteriousness deep within the branches of a front-yard tree, momentarily pushing her head into view and allowing us to briefly skritch her fuzzy forehead. We snapped this as she withdrew to near-invisibility, watching sidewalk pedestrian traffic from the safety of her tree lair.

we love our families!

"To us, family means putting your arms around each other and being there."      ~ Barbara Bush

Brightly lit from the many windows in their beautiful new home built by dad Ryan, we had fun choosing special places to photograph the Z family.

One of our favorite places to shoot lifestyle moments - family gathering on the master bed. Such a sweet look on Miss J's face feeling loved with her mommy and daddy.

The foyer stairs, a rich dark hardwood, were the perfect backdrop for all their beautiful blond hair -

Three-year-old Miss J had an angelic face we could have photographed all day. We may even have to ask her mommy if we can set up a special session with her just to show off more of her in our portfolio.

5-month-old baby H was just content and happy hangin' out and being part of the fun. Isn't his face just the cutest giggling with his mommy L?

His  serious "little man" personality with his daddy -
 
Our classy clients love to put 10"x20" images like these next two in their powder rooms. One with a little artistic texture -

One of our signature FamilyFeet shots - stunning on metallic paper. In fact we love it so much, we're having it printed as a studio sample.

We couldn't resist turning this image of happy roly-poly baby H and his daddy into one of our signature framed 12"x12" WizWords pieces. "SON: charming boy child, heart hugger, joy bringer, daddy's pride." We love that many of our clients hang these in their kids' rooms as visual reminders of their loving family connections.



Finally, of course, two pages of a perfect StoryBook for a perfect family.
More of Miss J's angelic face -
 
"A family is a little world created by love."

Thanks to mom L for getting her busy family together and inviting us in to capture these priceless treasures that will bring them a lifetime of joy.

For Isis: A Parting Prayer

For fourteen years, this precious girl has been here for me with comfort and unconditional love. Today, I needed to be there for her to hold and comfort her as we sent her on her journey to Kitty Heaven.

   

A Parting Prayer
Dear Lord, please open your gates and call St. Francis to come escort our beloved companion, Isis called Roobie, across the Rainbow Bridge.

Assign her to a place of honor in the sun, for she has been a faithful companion and has always been there to offer us unconditional love.

Bless the hands that send her to You, for they are doing so in love and compassion, freeing her from pain and suffering.

Grand us the strength not to dwell on our loss.
Help us remember the details of her life with the love she has shown us.
And grand us the courage to honor her by sharing these memories with others.

Let her remember us as well, and let her know that we will always love her and hold her safely in our hearts. And when it's our time to pass over into Your paradise, please allow her to accompany those who will bring us home.

Thank you, Lord, for the incredible gift of her companionship and for the time we have had together.

And thank you, Lord, for granting us the strength to accept having to give her to You now.

Amen.

treadmill antics | OK go!

Didja make a New Year's resolution to go to the gym more often?
Think the treadmill is boring?
Maybe this is coming soon as a new Group-X class? LOL!

Treadmill antics

oh, precious grandkids

Multi-generation sessions - especially with under 6-month infants who don't sleep and snuggle like newborns and can't sit up yet - are photographers' biggest challenges ... and are often our greatest joys!

The A family - three adult sisters - gifted a session to their mom and dad. They waited to schedule til not one but two babies were born in late 2007. Then all the children and grandchildren gathered at Christmastime.

Special thanks to 11-year-old A, who is not only handsome, smart and sweet, but he also adores his new baby sister M and new cousin E. He was an expert at wrangling and lovingly soothing the girls, while 3 year old brother was great working with us for group shots.

First we had a little play time with the boys ...


When the babies joined us, we  made grandparent-precious portraits like this one ...

Once gramma and grampa joined the fun, little brother had pretty much had enough of us, and of getting directed. We did cajole him to join us for a couple of shots - and this one is exactly the kind we love the most. This portrait is a perfect snapshot in this time of his li'l life ... and about the way most 3-year-olds feel about instruction overload. If we had portraits like this with our grandkids, we'd get it printed big!

Finally, look how sweetly these two simple moments ...


... come together to make heirloom pages of a Wizzy & Friends signature StoryBook - "Holding hands, holding hearts ..."

twelve days of christmas | fun facts

"On the twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me twelve drummers drumming ..."
 
We love learning, and trivia is such an easy way to absorb lots of good stuff!

The Twelve Days of Christmas is probably the most misunderstood part of the church year among Christians who are not part of liturgical church traditions. Contrary to much popular belief, these are not the twelve days before Christmas, but in most of the Western Church the twelve days are those between the birth of Christmas (Christmas, December 25) and the coming of the Magi - the Wise Men (Epiphany, January 6).

Some have suggested that it is a song of Christian instruction dating to the 16th century religious ward in England, with hidden references to the basic teachings of the Faith. The popular song is also seen as simply a nonsense song for children. It is certainly possible that various views of the song - both secular and non-secular - are legendary of anecdotal.

The Twelve Days of Christmas is generally thought of as a secular song that celebrates the Christmas season with imagery of gifts and dancing and music. Some misinterpretations have crept into the English version over the years, though. For example, the fourth day's gift is four "colly birds" (or "collie birds"), not four "calling birds." (The word "colly" literally means black as coal," and thus "colly birds" would be blackbirds.)

[with thanks to snopes.com and Dennis Bratcher, among others, for the research facts]

Click HERE to watch a clever version of the song by Straight No Chaser.

paper whites progress

On December 11 we posted about our Christmas garden gifts: newly-sprouting paper white Narcissus bulbs.

Since then we've had unseasonable cold and yet more rain, so the growth of our poor outside annual bulbs, which usually thrive in warm November and December, have been a little slow to bloom. But our inside bulbs, set just in front of our kitchen sink, were warm and cozy and thrived inside the house.

Inside:

Outside:

Our last few days have been pretty warm and sunny - so outside blooms won't be far behind.
This year's garden gifts have been so fragrant and delightful, we may even see if we can find a few extra paper white and amaryllis bulbs for inside spring planting.