It’s been a busy month for me.  As the deadline for this month’s Life Story began encroaching upon me, I had to make a decision: spend a ton of time shooting and then editing pictures of my children playing OR spend that time just playing with my children.

I chose the latter.

As a photographer, I see it as my job to document their lives.  And believe me, they are WELL documented.  And in my endeavor to tell the perfect story, capture the perfect image of the perfect moment that just so happens to be captured in the perfect light with the perfect clothing, I sometimes lose sight of the simple fact that my children want to spend time with me.

And while I love doing these Life Stories and hope to have the time to do a “real” one next month, this month, I just didn’t want to take the time to tell the full story of anything.

I just wanted to spend time with my kids.

And so I did.

So, what I’m sharing here is just some of the pictures I captured this month.  Not a full story of any one event… but just snippets of our month.

We biked.

We waited for friends to arrive.We went to the library and read book after book after book.

I found my daughter immersed in cat books.

We swung.

We played in the sun.

We went to the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco.

We hunted for eggs, played with cousins, and laughed with family.

We ducked.

We played tennis…

…it was hot.

And we hugged.  And we loved.  And we laughed.

So, there you have it.   I suppose it IS a life story of sorts.  The story of our month.

If you are not familiar with this whole Life Story thing, well, I hate to say it, but you’ve been missing out.  It’s basically a blog circle…start here, and follow the links at the end of each blog post to continue the circle!  You can get a full description of what it’s all about right HERE.  And if you want to see some of the other ones, you can go over there yonder to the left, click on the Categories tab, and then click on Life Stories.  It’s been a fun project for me this year, and I’m happy to be part of such a wonderful group of photographers who are participating in this with me!

Speaking of wonderful photographers, up next is Audrey Frantz of Kentiga Photography!  Follow all the links at the end of the post until you end up back here!  Thanks for visiting!

You can follow me on Facebook right HERE.

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I have an interesting story of how this photo shoot came to be.

Over two years ago, I was scheduled to fly to a photography workshop when my mom was diagnosed with cancer. I canceled the trip, called the airlines, and got a voucher number that I could use within a year. In my distraught state, I just threw that voucher number into my desk and forgot about it. I found it right before it expired and ended up booking a ticket to Portland to visit and shoot with some amazing photographer friends. On my flight back, I sat on the plane and edited those photos on my laptop. Unbeknownst to me…

someone was watching…. (insert ominous music here)

She liked what she saw, and by some sneaky moves that I still don’t quite understand, she found out who I was (I’m guessing I watermarked an image?) and a year later, she contacted me to do this session.

That’s cool, right?

And gosh am I ever glad she found me, because her family is amazing.

They all came together from different parts of the country to celebrate the littlest guy’s 100th day birthday, a Korean tradition.

Here are some of my fav’s from the session.

I am really close to my family and it was wonderful to watch all of these guys interacting. The comfort and love that family brings is like none other.

Both the kiddos had fallen asleep on their way to our session. When this sweet little three year old started to wake up, I couldn’t resist grabbing a picture.

Seriously…I love this family.

It took him a while to warm up, but gosh, it was worth the wait.

I really was tickled when the sun came out and little baby E woke up.  I love that he is so chubby that he has a dimple on his forehead.

Isn’t he a little angel?

And my favorites of the day were the last several shots fired.

Mother and daughters.

So much love….so much energy….so much laughter….

I had a wonderful time with this family. Who knew that a ticket voucher, almost lost, would be the reason for this session? Pretty dang cool.

Thanks so much for looking! You can follow me on Facebook, if you like, and I always appreciate comments.  Have a wonderful day!…

I’m excited to share this month’s story and also thrilled to finally be live with my NEW BLOGSITE.  Woot woot!  Isn’t it purty?

This month’s story is about an incredible group of kids.  I hope you enjoy it!  If you don’t know what this Life Stories thing is all about, click here to find out more!

My daughter is pretty dang amazing.  And so are her classmates.  Since Kindergarten, she has attended the Mandarin Immersion Program at our local school.  She’s learning Mandarin.  And she’s pretty dang awesome at it.  I don’t speak Chinese.  I’m not even Chinese.  I’m half Japanese, but um, yeah, I don’t speak Japanese either.  My husband doesn’t speak Chinese either.  He’s Korean, and um, yeah, he doesn’t really speak Korean.

But my kids?  My half Korean, quarter Japanese, quarter Caucasian kids?  Well, they’re learning Mandarin.  The program is amazing.  This year, she also had the opportunity to learn Kung Fu and Chinese music as part of this program.  THAT’S called AWESOME.

And because of some seriously awesome parents and staff, they got to participate in the San Francisco Chinese New Year Parade.  That’s a huge deal, people!

I wish I could share more images, but I didn’t get model releases for everyone, so am sharing what I can!

I took headshots of all the kids before the parade so that we would have a reference sheet in case anyone got lost.  Luckily, it wasn’t needed but I did love the shots I took.  These were probably taken in a span of 10 minutes.  Aren’t they cute?

In preparation for the big parade, they had an assembly where I was asked to take pictures.

My proud sweetie, waiting to perform:

Excuse the blurred faces.  I wasn’t able to get model releases for everyone, but had to share how amazing they look!

It was pretty dang cool because they had these Wu Shu Kung Fu masters from Beijing perform for the kids.  They were amazing.  The guy in the middle was in the movie Karate Kid.  Not the old one with Ralph Macchio and Pat Morita, but the new one with Will Smith’s kid.  The kids were totally stoked to see him. And that guy that’s “lying down?”  He was jumping up and down in THAT position while swinging a rope under him.  CRAZY.

After months of practicing and preparing, the kids were ready for the big night!

They were just a little bit excited.

Excuse me for a second… I have to gush about this woman.  She is the mom of one of the kids in the Mandarin program, as well as a teacher.  Her energy, determination, and enthusiasm was contagious.  She did SO much to make this parade happen.  Let me just publicly get it out there: she ROCKS.  I love this picture of her at the parade, looking excited and so proud.  She’s quite a woman.  Thank you, Mrs. M.

The San Francisco Chinese New Year Parade is the biggest Chinese New Year parade outside of China.  It’s a very organized parade, and only 10 adults were allowed to be with the kids once the parade started.  I was not in that group, so did my best to get pictures of the kids before the parade started.

It was such a fun night! Everyone was so excited.

I love these next two. I asked them to hold up their streamers that they had during the parade, and shot through it.

And here’s my sweetie cakes. She wrote an essay inspired by this picture called “The Ladybug Parade.”  She pretended that this picture was a picture of her peeking through the streamers at a group of ladybugs who were performing.  I love her imagination.  I love her intensity.  I love her face, her eyes, her smile.  I love this child.

When it was time for the parade to start, I had to get off the street.  Due to the crowds, I wasn’t  able to follow her for very long.  I got this shot of her just as they were getting ready to start.  I love the look of pride in her eyes.

Such a wonderful night.

Click here to continue the Life Stories chain!  You’ll know you made it all the way through when you make it back here!…