This month, we took the girls on our first flying trip as a family of five (say that ten times fast). Travel is important to us. When it comes down to choosing how to spend our time and money, I will always choose to have experiences over things. I want to impart that on my kids. When we had baby #1, we certainly didn’t have much in the way of things, but we were on the go all the time. By the age of two, that girl had logged more frequent flyer and road miles than probably many adults. I was smug about how easy it was to get out and around, how silly it was to use kids as an excuse to stay home. Let me be honest, I was terribly smug about a lot of things when it came to parenting. I had it all figured out. Noooo problem.

Then we had baby #2. Insert the sound of screeching brakes. Suddenly everything was exponentially harder. I’ve had a couple of friends comment that since I chose to have a third, the transition from one to two must have been easy. Not true. I’m just crazy.

But I digress from the topic of travel. Air travel, as a family, slowed down to almost never. Road trips have been limited to two states or less. There have been other extenuating reasons why we’ve left home less, but the number one has been laziness, or maybe fear. It is WORK to take young children through airport security, with carseats, and diapers, and enough snacks and diversions to get you through the longest possible flight delay. It’s exasperating to try to find a clean bathroom to take your toddler into when you’re in the middle of nowhere on the interstate, not to mention taking 50% longer to get to the destination than it does without kids.

Now here we are with three wonderful, precocious, high-energy, high-maintenance little girls. Thankfully, going from two to three has been much smoother. And we have decided that enough is enough. We are going to get back to getting out. Not just to Atlanta, which we love, but to explore what else is out there.

Thank goodness, I can report that the trip was successful. We managed to fit in a lot of activity and time with family, and had zero MAJOR meltdowns. Small meltdowns are to be expected, dealt with, and forgotten. We are a family with four females. Realistic expectations are key. I couldn’t be happier and am feeling empowered about the BIG trip that we are setting our sights on in the near future (more on that later).

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I beat myself up for not taking as many photos of my family as I used to, before I also used my camera for work. I truly believe that the best moments are the little ones, the ones we too often take for granted until they have passed. Most of the time, I see two ways to maximize these moments. One, is to catch it in my camera, on my computer, and on paper. This gives me the opportunity to let others see what I see, to share that with others now and in the future. The other is to be present. Put my camera, my phone, the mile-long to-do list in my head all down and savor what is in front of me right now. I constantly vacillate between which I think is the better choice. Last year, the idea of a 365-day photography project sounded exactly like what I should do. Capture the day to day. Print more. Blog more. I didn’t do that. It just became another thing on my to-do list I was not accomplishing. I continue to look for a balance.

With that in mind, here are my big girls in the backyard last Tuesday. Scavenging for treasures. Building their collections.

Doulananda Birth Services and Jennifer Mendoza Photography are happy to announce our new partnership! Because we share a passion for celebrating and supporting families, we are joining forces to provide photography services to Doulananda HypnoBirthing students and doula clients.

With our likeminded approach to creating experiences that honor each of our clients as individuals, we think that our collaboration is a great fit and benefit to Doulananda families. Each family will receive credit for one maternity or newborn session with Jennifer Mendoza Photography. This is a $300 value, but is complimentary to you with the price of tuition, or doula fee.

The phases of pregnancy, birth, and new parenthood are among the most beautiful and fleeting in our lives. Together we are committed to making it a positive and joyful experience that will be captured and cherished for generations.

If you are expecting, or may be in the near future, I encourage you to consider taking a HypnoBirthing class, or consulting with one of their doulas. I did both, with my last pregnancy, and with beautiful results! I’m thrilled at the thought of the families and babies that I will get to meet as a result of this partnership.

This is one of the very first photos of me, T, and baby CA, taken by our friend, doula, and HypnoBirthing teacher, Melissa Johnson (thank you for, on top of everything else, having the presence of mind to grab my camera)!

Here she is, on a cold rainy day a couple of weeks ago, helping me scope out the site of this year’s mini sessions.

At three and one quarter, she is funny, and charming, and, well, funky. And I mean that as a high compliment. Her days are stream-of-consciousness musical theater. She is sweet and fiery, and you never know which you might get at any given moment. My VC. She’s one of a kind.

The first six tips should be getting you closer to taking less and better photos. These last few will encourage you to make the most of your images AND the moments which you are trying to capture in the first place.

7. Print more.

There are many great uses for digital images (Facebook!), but I think that we still want to have those keepers that we print, display, give as gifts, and that make us smile every time we pass them in the hallway or on the mantle.  Take the time to get your favorites printed, framed, and up on those walls and shelves. And please get them printed by a quality lab. A bad print can ruin a great photo, and that is tragic. A print should be beautiful – good color, quality paper, thoughtful presentation – the day it is made and just as good one hundred years from now. I recommend Phototechnika locally, and Mpix.com online. Lately, I have been obsessed with Pinterest. You can find great inspiration there for ways to display photos in your home. Join me there at http://pinterest.com/jenmenphoto/, but be warned: it is highly addictive for the visually minded.

8. Don’t miss the moment, in the moment.

Someone I love once told me that her dad missed most of her childhood, even though he has it all recorded on VHS. Don’t be that parent who is so caught up in getting the photo, or recording the video, that they forget to cherish the moment as it is actually happening. Get a few photos for posterity, then put that box down and live it. Being a more confident photographer will help you to do just that.

 Movie night with my daughter and her animal friends. It was too cute not to take a photo, but I would have missed so much more if I had not taken the time to snuggle and enjoy the way she cackles unabashedly at the funny parts. 

9. Read your manual, then try to shoot in manual.

When you are ready to dig a little deeper into the technical aspects of photography, start with your camera’s manual. Learn what all those buttons actually do. Most of them will be useless to you, but knowing what they are will make them less intimidating. The better you get, the less buttons you will need. The goal is to be able to shoot in manual mode because then you will have the most control over the images you make.

10. Let someone take your picture.

This isn’t just a shameless plot to convince you to hire me. Of course, I highly recommend investing in professional portraits at least once a year, but here I am talking about your spouse, extended family or friends, or older children. When it comes to family photos, one parent, usually mom, ends up being the main photographer and therefore gets left out of most family photos. Some moms are comfortable with that for many reasons, and will happily go for long stretches completely absent from the family’s visual chronicle. If you are one of those people, remember that the photos are not just for you, or those you share your online albums with, but they are for your kids and their kids. They want to see you, in your prime, as the young, beautiful, busy, and multi-faceted person that you are. Right now. Not just on holidays, or after you’ve lost ten pounds. Refer back to my first tip. Family photos are about telling a story, and you are a central character in that story.

As a family photographer and mom, I get asked often, “what kind of camera should I buy?” My stock answer is stick with what you have and make the most of it, or buy a good (but not necessarily top of line) version of whichever of the most reputable brands that you prefer. With the quality of affordable consumer cameras out there, it’s not the camera that makes good photographs, it’s the photographer.

Here are a few of my tips for parents who want to take better photographs of their kids and family.

1. Tell a story.

We don’t look through old family photos just to see what our ancestors’ faces looked like, but to learn something about them and the times and places where they lived.  Take photos of your kids, not just in their Sunday best, in the most formal room in your house, but in the clothes they live in every day, doing the things that mark this particular day or stage or of life.  Even if you just want a great head and shoulder portrait of your son with his gaptooth smile, you could take it out in his treehouse, or on his bike, and it would tell even more about what stage of his boyhood he is in. Also, think about taking photos of the objects or places that help tell your story, such as the beloved lovey, or their seat at the dining table, complete with highchair and sippy cups.

This captures the dynamic between my daughters when they were 2 and 5. The oldest clowning for the spotlight. The youngest smiling adoringly at her idol. Things have gotten more contentious since then, so I’m glad to have this to remind me.

2. Look them in the eye.

It’s a cliché for a reason. Eyes really are a window into one’s soul.  I NEVER ask subjects to smile or say cheese, but I will ask, coax, or beg to get their eyes toward my lens. Of course there are exceptions, but eyes are usually the essential element to good portraits.

Camping out under the dining table on a cold morning.

3. Skip the cheese!

As I mentioned, before, I never ask directly for a smile. I might joke, dance, or make a fool of myself, but I never say, “Smile!” Want to loose an authentic expression on a kid in no time? Ask them to say cheese. And yet, we are conditioned to do it. Even my kids sometimes say it and I always cringe and ask them not to, as if they’ve just cursed in my presence.

Here’s one that my husband caught of me (pregnant, early this year) with my girls. We were enjoying the winter sun in St. Augustine. We know he’s taking our photo, but he’s just talking with us and not asking us to stop and smile for the camera. I love how relaxed we are, even myself, who is sadly the worst in front of the camera.

Try these out, and stay tuned for more tips later this week!

Every day of parenthood is bittersweet. This morning I discovered the cause of CA’s newly prolific drooling. A tooth. The very first one. It’s starting to break through on the top. Then I took the baby to her 4 month well visit, where the doctor started talking to me about introducing solid foods. This took me by surprise as I’d waited until 6 months with my first two girls. These are exciting little milestones, but to my surprise they brought me to tears. I got into my car at the pediatrician’s office and wept.

The gummy smile will soon have an intruder. My baby’s body is growing to need more than what just my body can provide. It was only weeks ago that this child was inside me. 18 weeks, but to me it has felt like a only a handful of days.

I’ve never been an outwardly emotional person, but as many of you can surely relate, that changed when I became a mom. I can cry at commercials or songs that I once thought were corny. I honk at the jerk who comes flying through the school zone. I realize that my baby – my last baby, as far as I know – is no longer a newborn and I lose it in the parking lot.

Those two words, last baby, have been ringing in my ears for a year now. They make me pay closer attention than I did with my first – when I was in shock at the fact that I was now a mom, and terrified of making a mistake – and my second daughter – when I was slightly overwhelmed by the challenge of caring for a baby and a 3 year old. To be a parent is to be for your child the personification of love, protection, and safety, and, at the exact same time, give them the skills, confidence, and encouragement to be able to leave you. For a night in the crib, for a day at school, and, one day, forever. This is why every day of parenthood is bittersweet. Today was simply a day when I’ve been more aware of it. This last baby of mine is constantly reminding me to slow down and take it in. Not just with her, but with each of my children.

Is it possible that CA has already been with us for one third of a year? Here are a few of the photos that I took of her in the first few days, way back in May. I don’t think she ever quite looked like a newborn. We joke that I gave birth to six month old. She certainly never fit into anything newborn-sized, but it is amazing to see the subtle changes that have happened already. I’m doing my best to savor every nuance of babyhood with this one.