Meet the gorgeous Curtis family! Their two daughters Meryn + Lyvia are the cutest ever! Sean is the pastor at GRX SF a church in the Mission in SF and Kerry cooks the most delicious food! I really hope you guys had as much fun being photographed as I had photographing you!

Grandma!

Can these two be any more precious?

I love the next set of photos. I feel like it shows their personalities so well! Meryn is totally free spirited and adventurous whereas Lyvia is a little more shy and reserved.

They were pros by the end of the shoot!

It was through Newsong that I heard about their life journey. Having struggled with infertility and trying for years to start a family.  The road to starting a family can be rough for so many and can bring pain, suffering and tears . And then they had a shift in their thinking and their plan. Maybe God’s Plan A wasn’t for them to have their own biological children, but to adopt. That started another new and amazing story; the adoption of their two beautiful children from Ethiopia. I couldn’t help but follow them in their journey as I was utterly captivated.

Once they brought their kids home I knew I wanted to be part of their journey as well. I offered them a portrait session because my heart longed to be part of their story. I wanted to be able to capture their life at that moment as a new family of 4.

Well if I had blogged this session a long time ago when I took these portraits that would have been a lovely end, but now their story gets even sweeter. Just this week April announced that she is expecting!!! I couldn’t be happier for them!

If you want to be encouraged please visit their blog. I promise their story is quite amazing!
Plan A : Ethiopia

This is the bench where April came to pray monthly for 3 years as she struggled with starting a family. It was amazing to be able to place her family on this very spot and see it come full circle. 

Meet Judah!

Meet Addise!

Absolutely loved her necklace! A heart for Africa.

A photo of Addise to celebrate turning 1 in her traditional Ethiopian dress!

Last but not least, the loving parents. So happy and so excited for you guys as you become a family of 5!!!!

These pics are cute overload!!!! Cute kids, cute costumes, and pumpkins!

Let’s take a stroll down memory lane. A few months after my niece was born I made her into sushi and yes that’s a real platter. I can’t believe she was so small at one point!

And last year she was a flower (excuse my blurry phone photo)

This year she’s….a COW! Mooooooooooooooo!

On Saturday we went to Arata’s Pumpkin Farm. It was Karly’s first time at a pumpkin farm and she had a blast!

Seriously how CUTE are these two?!?!?!

CJ the monkey & Karly the cow!

Ladybug, Monkey, Cow!

Karly’s been taking photos with my iPhone and sometimes she actually gets some good ones! Budding photographer!!!

Looking at a spider.

Olive the ladybug!

How cute are these two?!?!?! They kept holding hands all day!

Taking a little stroll in the corn field together.

The farm had this huge maze that we decided to try. It took 5 adults, 2 kiddies, & 1 baby 45 minutes to complete it!

We really wanted to find the Minotaur so we could get the golden pumpkin! Karly was terrified of the Minotaur! So sad, but she was happy with her golden pumpkin!

Still in the maze!

Pony ride!

Choo Choo!!!

A beautiful sunset in Half Moon Bay

 How cute are they doing the same exact pose!

Have a safe Halloween everyone!

Well Adriane & Sean have an even more magical story. Adriane and her family are true Disneyland lovers; having had annual passes forever. They even have a family brick out in the front where the ticketing gates are. It was only appropriate that Adriane met Sean, a chef at Disneyland!

When they asked me to do their engagement session at Disneyland how could I say no?! Little did we know it would be the first day of spring break for Southern California, so I have to admit it was a bit tricky with the amount of people we surprisingly encountered on a weekday! All in all I think we had a lot of fun for this shoot!

Zina and I can’t wait to shoot your wedding this weekend!

I honestly don’t think I’ve ever laughed so hard at an engagement session in my life. The second Terry put on that costume all I could do was burst out in laughter. We even had some strangers do a drive by and photograph Terry!

Meet Dumbledore!

Meet sweet baby Aria!

Meet the fam!

Ceremony – New Vision Church
Reception – Dynasty Seafood
Assistant – Zina Chung
Additional Assistant – Jim Kang

The First Look

Jin definitely looked surprised from Naomi’s gift!

A storm trooper made a special appearance on the dance floor!

After the wedding I spent a few days with a friend hanging out and exploring. About 2 years ago I visited Boston for the first time to help my friends move. (Part 1, Part 2, Freedom Trail) I wanted to go whale watching on that trip, but I felt unprepared both in the motion sickness and camera department. I figured if you’re going to go whale watching you might as well try to document it right?

Luckily on this trip I had to bring most of my equipment with me so I brought my 70-200mm on my whale watching excursion! I have to admit, it was probably one of the first times in my life I felt self-conscious with my camera because the minute I pulled it out I think half the upper deck on that boat was staring at me, but who cares because I was able to capture these moments.

I crossed my fingers, took my motion sickness pill and hoped we could see some whales! The New England Aquarium takes their boats to the Stellwagen Bank Marine Sanctuary which is about 1 – 1.5 hours away. The day I went we didn’t have to actually go all the way into the sanctuary because we saw whales right before we reached it. The naturalist on board gave us lots of interesting info about the whales. Unfortunately because I was trying not to throw up I honestly don’t remember much. The ride there was pretty smooth, but as soon as we stopped to observe the whales the boat rocked back and forth pretty violently. They said it was a lot more rough than normal (probably because Hurricane Irene was coming!) I probably wasn’t supposed too…but I took a second motion sickness pill…just in case!

On the bright side, I can cross off whale watching from my bucket list! We got to see humpback whales doing tail breaches which was pretty cool (although I wish I could’ve seen one actually do a full breach) & I now know that even under severe nausea I can still take a decent photo! All in all it was fun feeling like a National Geographic photographer for an afternoon!

Cute little lighthouse on the way to see the whales! They said it’s the first time in the history of the lighthouse that a woman is the caretaker.

The clouds were looking pretty ominous on parts of the ride!

My first glimpse of a humpback whale!

We got to watch two humpback whales doing tail breaches for awhile.

We saw another whale watching boat. Pretty neat perspective on the vastness of the ocean and how big the whales are.

As we were leaving the two whales breached together as if they were saying bye to us!

I have no idea why I remember this fact, but they told us that the water reached that clock tower before and it was the original location where ships would check in. It’s also Boston’s 17th tallest building.

1. I went on a paddle boat for the first time in my life.
2. I went on a paddle boat for the first time in my life with 2 fantastic people AND their dog Titan!
3. I have never seen a bowl of pho so big in my life.

I can’t wait to shoot your wedding this coming September!

Some of my favorite moments are when I pose a couple and have them look serious, but a split second later they’re completely cracking up!

The biggest bowl of pho ever! The three of us couldn’t even finish it! It’s pretty astonishing that people have finished this challenged!

What makes this story of Hannah + Albert even more special is I think I can confidently say I was a huge factor in bringing them together! Matchmaking victory! Let’s just say potluck, a friend bringing a friend, and the following week I so conveniently left a hang out at D&B asking Albert to give Hannah a ride home *wink* The rest is history!

I can’t wait to be part of their big day as a bridesmaid! What an honor it is and will be!!! Although I can’t photograph their wedding I was able to do their engagement shoot. A quick shoot around San Francisco. Counting down the days until your wedding!