The Bly Family | A photography adventure in Seattle!

Last weekend I traveled to Seattle for my niece Kaydriana's first birthday party. The only bummer was that Sunday was mother's day, meaning I had to be away from my own husband and son. However, we ended up having an amazing day. My brother-in-law took us out to a beautiful brunch at a fancy country club (I don't remember the name), I did a shoot for the awesome Bly family, and when we got home, he had a fantastic steak dinner waiting for my sister and I. I want to give a shout out to my sister for being an awesome assistant during our shoot. Or, should I say, professional dog handler? haha. I love the Seattle area - it's gorgeous, green, lush, and full of activity. What I don't love? The weather. I'm a California girl to the core and 50 degree highs in May just don't work for me. My niece's party was outside on Saturday and I wore my biggest winter coat, boots, a hat and a scarf. Stand out much?? Everyone made fun of me, but hey, at least I was warm!

Happy birthday to my beautiful niece!!

The proud parents with their girl (and Minnie!)

I have never seen a child enjoy cake as much as Kaydriana did!

The view from the country club on Mother's Day. That's downtown Seattle that you see.Views like this make me think that I MIGHT be able to handle the weather. Maybe. Probably not.

I bought these crazy red heels for Vegas but never got to wear them. This was my attempt at classing them up with a little black dress and black coat. I can't even tell you the last time I wore heels. I really need to get out more.

 

Meet the Bly family! Anita works with my sister and we arranged to do a shoot while I was in town. I don't consider large families to be my strong point, photography wise, but they were the easiest family to photograph - even the dogs were great! We were so worried that it would be raining that we initally arranged to do the photos in their home. However, the weather (you know how I feel about you, Seattle weather...) finally cleared up and we were able to get outside. Gorgeous!

Too much cuteness

 

The End of Year Contest | Vote for your favorite photo here!

I am so excited to post this! I've thought long and hard about what kind of contest I wanted to do since I've never really done one before. As 2010 comes to a close, I loved the idea of looking back on all of the wonderful people that I've been able to photograph. As I was preparing the images I was able to watch myself grow as a photographer and I was reminded of all of the great memories from each and every session. The photos here represent ONE image from each individual session that I did in 2010. It was nearly impossible to choose only one photo per session, but I went with my gut and chose my personal favorite. What a wonderful year! I photographed weddings, engagements, families, seniors, maternity, kids, toddlers, newborns, baptisms, boudoir, sports teams, couples, twins (4 sets of them!), and basically, I feel like the luckiest photographer on the planet :) THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! HOW IT WORKS:

- Each person may vote for TWO photos. Each person may vote only one time. - To vote, comment to this post and state the photos that you wish to vote for, identifying them by number. - Make sure to include an accurate name/email address when you comment. - You may encourage family, friends, and people you know to come and vote! The more the merrier!

THE PRIZES

1st place - 11x14 Gallery Wrapped Canvas of the winning photo 2nd & 3rd place - 11x14 print (traditional e-surface paper) of the 2nd/3rd place photo

Also!! I will use an outside source to randomly choose 3 of the people who voted to win a $10 Amazon Gift Card!

Okay.....get voting!! Don't forget to tell your family and friends to come and vote - you can help your favorite photo win a beautiful canvas and you can also be entered to win a gift for yourself!

Contest ends on Sunday, December 5th at 6pm. No votes will be counted after that time. Winners will be announced that evening! Prizes will be delivered before December 23rd.

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The fine print: Bre Thurston Photography reserves the right to make a change to the contest at any time, at her discression. If you had a session with me in 2010 and do not see one of your photos represented here, please contact me ASAP at bre@brethurston.com. Participants may not ask Bre Thurston Photography to change the photo that she has chosen to represent their session. You may notice that certain people are represented more than once. That is because they had multiple sessions with me this year. I included one photo per session. Lastly, have fun and thanks for participating in my contest!

Kailyn | Just your basic photo shoot!

Kailyn is my nearly 16 year old cousin-by-blood but sister-by-choice :) We just wanted to go out and have some fun. I guess that's what you do when you have a photographer in the family. I drove up Salmon Falls Drive in El Dorado Hills for about 10 mins looking for a new place to shoot. It was already 7:15pm and I was worried about the sun going down behind the hills. I was looking for this park (that I actually think is on a road that runs parallel to Salmon Falls) but found this little gem instead, tucked right off of the road. I love spontaneity in photography. We just drove and I am so pleased with how the session turned out! Kailyn humored me and let me dress her up in my clothes and accessories. She rocks the serious face!