My last post!

I am pleased to announce that I am retiring this blog as I have moved my blog over to my website. If you would like to visit my new blog, please follow this link http://reflectionsbylouise.com.au/blog/

My gorgeous lads!

Today I went walking around the neighbourhood with my gorgeous little lads. We walked up to the shops and stopped to say hello to people.

I love the way simple things like flowers grab their attention. We had a little debate over whether these flowers are blue or purple!

We stopped to hug a teddy...

We even had a little hug and kiss

Somedays, it is just nice to stop and smell the roses, well...flowers!

Cake anyone?

Well they say, never work with animals or children. That is, unless you are working with the cutest little babies in Sydney!

We decided to have a group cake smash for a Mother's Group. The cake smash typically celebrates baby turning one, and recognises that babies love mess and of course, they get their first experience of cake. This was certainly a fun experience.

Initially, some of the babies were nervous. Some looked cautiously at the cake, and a couple had a little cry, but one by one each baby stuck their finger in the cake to explore what on earth was going on.

The babies started to become more adventurous, some more than others. Soon, they got the idea.

A couple of the babies preferred the more refined experience and insisted on using a spoon :)

And some didn't care so much and felt that using their hands was just as fun.

I think it is fair to say, that each baby became very messy! 

There was crawling through cake...

Sitting in cake...

And lying in cake...

But regardless of that, they still looked so cute and dainty eating their cake...

We really did have such a fun time. Some of the babies wanted to explore more than others, but each baby enjoyed it in their own way.

The power of family...

I've met many families, couples and babies through my photography journey. Most of those experiences were initiated through times of happiness and joy and wanting to capture that moment.

This particular shoot didn't originate from such joy, in fact, this family is facing one of life's toughest battles. But without this prior knowledge, I wouldn't have known this. All I felt was joy, happiness, peace, harmony and love; lots and lots of love.

I feel privileged to have taken these portraits and to have spent time with this beautiful family and I wish God's strength and compassion through their journey forward.

Lovely twin girls

We managed to get a few gorgeous images of these lovely baby girls before they went down for a nap. They were such perfect, precious girls...

Gorgeous baby girl

I met this lovely baby girl who was so smiley and happy. She thoroughly enjoyed sitting in the cereal and laughing at us and was very obliging with all the changes around her. It was lovely to meet her and her adoring Mum.



Photographs: your most valuable possession

In Queensland, Australia we have just had huge floods that caused a lot of families to lose everything. Many of them had notice to evacuate but some did not. One thing that you hear so often when people are fleeing floods and fires is that they grab their most valuable possessions and leave quickly. Photographs are always, always packed in the car to be rescued. After all, material possessions can be replaced but those reminders of those precious memories cannot.

I wanted to do a blog post to help people protect their most precious items; their photos.

At the moment there are plenty of ‘back to school’ specials at stationary stores like Officeworks. All you need to back those photos up is a good external hard drive and a scanner. You can get a 1TB (which is HUGE) hard drive for around $100 and scanners are similar prices.

You need to back up all of your digital photos. For the older physical photos you can scan them in and then back them up. If you live in bush fire or flood prone areas can I also suggest that you purchase two external hard drives and leave one backup at another safe location.

This is the perfect time to start this project as the kids are home on school holidays and are often looking for things to do. I am sure they will also love looking through all of those old photos as they scan them in.

Furthermore, you can start a special Mothers Day project. With all of those old photos scanned in, why not create a photo book for your Mum for Mothers Day in May. If you start the project now you will have plenty of time to finish it.

There are plenty of places where you can print your photo books like snapfish. Or if you would like a professional album like one of these, please contact me at louise@reflectionsbylouise.com.au and we can discuss your options.

(Images from Seldex)

But please, at the very least, make sure that you place all of your photos in one area so that they can be easily relocated in case of emergency. Televisions, couches and beds can all be replaced, but photographs can’t.