Sunny Days and Wood Wandering

A few weeks ago, I had the privilege of photographing this lovely family.

Wendy, the mom, is a great woman who leads the women's ministries at church. I was excited to be able to take pictures for them. We enjoyed a beautiful sunny day in the midst of uncertain weather.

We started with Reese's senior photos (go to my last post to see those!) and then grabbed a few brick shots with the family.

After that, we headed to Oak Openings. It wasn't our original plan. I'm not very familiar with the park, and it wasn't the most convenient location.

But Wendy had seen a photo that struck her, and so we were off to find these giant gray trees that supposedly existed somewhere within this park.

But first I was distracted by this fence and the line of trees on the other side of the field behind it.

And then I had to stop everyone on this path - some of my favorite pictures from the session.

Wendy is great. This is a difficult pose to do well, and I think this is my favorite of all I've done, mostly because, well, Wendy!

We proceeded to traipse into the woods, spying a few of those elusive tall trees, but no background of them en masse as we had hoped. I tried to figure out spme angle, but eventually, we gave up and worked with what we had.

When I saw the faces in this picture, I had to have a little fun. I could imagine Gotham rising in flames behind them.

Anyway...continuing.

I love how this picture captures the great legacy behind these two.

Some good smiles,

and some silly faces. The best part of this photo is the oldest boy Alex's face after I told them to make silly faces.

Finally, we had gotten everything we'd wanted...except some certain tall trees.

Clearly going straight back to the road the shortest way would be most efficient, so we began heading back.

No one got poison ivy, and I don't think anyone was even seriously scratched by the thorns and brush we went through, so it was worth the trek, even if it may not have been the quickest way out.

At least everyone emerged smiling.

After we emerged, Wendy asked if we could go down just a bit farther and check another spot. There is this new technological thing wherein one can send a geographical pin, just like a Google location, and for some reason we hadn't tried the exact location.

We followed a small trail off of the road.

Lo, and behold. The trees existed.

It was the sort of place a child would love to disappear in for hours. I know younger me would have - not to mention present-day me.

We decided it was all worth it.

I'll be coming back.

Thanks for the adventure, folks!