Gray Family Portraits 2024 | Holiday Photos San Diego

January 3, 2025

I’ll admit it . . . I’m a little jealous of my meticulously styled sunset beach photography clients. These days, my own family portrait session takes place 15 minutes before we sit down to Thanksgiving Dinner, and everybody just pulls whatever they have out of the closet! It’s hard to wrangle college students and early sunsets in the fall, and Thanksgiving is the one day I don’t have a session and Lissa is home from CBU. We’re blessed that my parents live near a beautiful nature preserve, so backgrounds like these are just a short walk away. My sister does our family portraits, and we toss the camera back and forth for the kid, hubby, and dog shots. This year we added some bonus images of Lissa with her boyfriend Taylor.

Williard Baby Announcement | Coronado Beach Holiday Photoshoot 2024

December 26, 2024

When my friend Alli approached me with VERY special news several weeks ago, I was thrilled to be involved in her big announcement! She and Robert have been married for over a decade and have desired children all the while . . . but there seemed to be some delay. As Robert and Alli waited, they poured themselves into serving the Lord at church and through coaching, and they built a business flipping houses, with Robert putting his contracting and construction skills to use and Alli contributing her eye for design and decor. Their Christmas card and Christmas Day post on social media was so fun to read, and hundreds of responses show how much they are loved and how happy everyone is for them. We can’t wait to meet Baby Williard next year!

Linett & Raz Reunited Post Deployment | San Diego Photographer

December 22, 2024

It was wonderful to see Linett and Raz’s Spring Valley home all lit up for Christmas and to see them back together again after Raz’s long deployment. He came home to a baby girl who had grown up quite a bit, and she is loving having Daddy home! I see a daddy’s girl in the making!

Military Family at the Hotel del Coronado at Christmas

Kim Family Portraits at the Hotel Del Coronado | 2024 Holiday Photos

December 20, 2024

The Kim family stayed at the Shore House at the Del over Thanksgiving, and I met up with them the morning after the holiday for their Christmas photos. Cynthia and David two sons and two daughters (twins) who took time out of their busy school and Armed Services schedules to be together. Both sons are on active duty, and one of their daughters is currently a cadet at West Point. Cynthia and David are the founders of Children of Fallen Patriots, a non-profit providing college scholarships to the children of Gold Star families.

The Britton Family 2024 | Hotel Del Coronado & Beach Photography

December 18, 2024

I’ve known Sophie almost as long as I have been a photographer, and I’ve admired her wonderful posed newborn work for over 15 years. She is the gold standard in San Diego newborns! I was so honored that she asked me to photograph her family this year, especially since this was a very important session. Sophie’s pups Kona and Molly are getting older, and Kona the black lab was diagnosed with soft tissue sarcoma last year and not expected to make it this long. Thankfully, she is still doing well, and Sophie was excited to capture the whole family while everyone is still thriving and while her oldest, Ava, was home from college. The weather was gorgeous on Coronado, and the king tide made incredible reflections.

Birds in the Air above Woman Walking on Beach

Birthday Photoshoot at the Beach | Coronado Professional Photographer

December 16, 2024

A therapist and author, Trinese recently relocated to her old hometown of San Diego after spending decades in Washington State. Her new beginning here includes a new place Downtown, reconnecting with old friends, gathering with her daughter for Thanksgiving, and celebrating her birthday with a photo session on the beach! I loved chatting with her in between shots, and I’m so glad we got to work together to capture these fun headshots!

Chelsea & Steve’s Family Photos 2024| Coronado Beach Photography

December 11, 2024

Chelsea, Steve, and Penelope are just relocating to San Diego, and the traffic caught all of us by surprise on the afternoon of their session. Driving from the extreme North County, they were racing the sun and made it to Coronado just 15 minutes before sunset. Fortunately, baby Penelope was fascinated by the beach! She loved everything about the sand and water, and we swung from one location and pose to another with the greatest of ease. In the end, it was impossible to whittle down Chelsea and Steve’s gallery, and I love how everything turned out! I can’t wait to see them again next year and watch Penelope grow up as a San Diego girl.

Little Italy Professional Headshots | Group & Individual Portraits

December 2, 2024

What a fun headshot session! This is becoming one of my very favorite types of session, where a company or corporate team has an offsite meeting and incorporates photography as one of their activities. Not only does it provide some fun creative team-building, but the images we collaboratively produce work for both social media and the website. Jessica’s team came from all over the country and stayed in an Airbnb in Little Italy. We explored the property and then ventured out to the neighborhood and took in the Italian piazza, walked around in the middle of the street, and did some cute sunglasses shots. Since Jessica’s firm is involved in marketing and graphics, there was plenty of creativity to go around, and so many fun personalities.

Dean & Karina’s Family on the Beach | Crystal Pier Pacific Beach Photography

November 26, 2024

Karina and her family are off on a new adventure! Her husband Dean is retiring from 20 years serving our country, and they are taking their enthusiastic little one to live closer to family in Texas-on an actual cattle ranch! Everyone is happy they’ll have Dad at home, since this family has endured multiple long separations during their years in the Navy. (Thank you for your service, Dean!!) It was fun celebrating the end of their San Diego chapter and the beginning of their new life in Texas.

Extended Family at the Del | Hotel Del Coronado & Beach Photography

November 19, 2024

This extended family from Bismark, ND, agreed to a last-minute switch-up to start their session off the beach since it was so bright at our start time. We enjoyed walking across the hotel grounds and observing the attendees arriving for a masquerade ball. There were some pretty zany costumes! We played peekaboo with the surfboards, climbed on the lifeguard tower, and ended our time down at the shore, with the adventurous boys getting completely soaked in the waves. It was the night of the last game of the Padres-Dodgers post-season match-up, and I made my North Dakota friends say “Go Padres!” for smiles, but it didn’t work and the Padres still lost. Got some good expressions, though!

Coronado Family Portraits | San Diego Sibling Photographer

November 12, 2024

Incredible coincidences sometimes happen when I am photographing several families in a row, and I was surprised when I checked the names for this session to find out that Lauren and Nathan were the mom and dad . . . because just the night before, I had photographed another family where Lauren and Nathan were the mom and dad’s names! This L&N pair had a couple of very sweet kiddos who were super easy to pose and up for pretty much anything, including climbing the lifeguard tower, peeking from behind the surfboards, and jumping waves! Poor little Harper fell in the water while she was twirling, but she fought back the tears and continued twirling! She kept her happy smile through the session . . . such a champ!

Samantha & Noah’s Engagement Session in the Fog | Windansea Photography La Jolla

October 25, 2024

Samantha and Noah came with their family all the way from Texas to celebrate their upcoming wedding, and they chose to do their engagement portraits on the beach while they were here. They were staying in La Jolla, so Windansea was a logical choice. It had been a bit cloudy that week on the shore, but I wasn’t prepared for thick FOG as I drove west from my home in East County. I couldn’t reach Samantha by phone (sketchy reception at Windnasea), but when I arrived, I leveled with them . . . this was REALLY foggy! On the other hand . . . . check out that amazing red dress!! I remembered this session from long ago and felt like it could work. Samantha and Noah were all for a low-visibility session, and so was I. The fog + that dress + their up-for-anything personalities MADE the session, and I’m so glad we went for it!

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