Making San Diego photos for families from West Texas is especially fun for me, since I spent a lot of time in Lubbock growing up and still have family in the area. Cindy’s first email made me so excited to meet her and her family, who were visiting from Amarillo. Cindy has a way with words, and I loved reading all about her sweet family before our session — including some fun stories about her kids and husband to help me make them smile. I’ll let Cindy tell the story of their session below (and I’ll leave in her very kind compliments even though they make me blush! ☺️).
“I always tell my husband that no one loves the beach more than I do. When we decided to take our first beach vacation in San Diego I was most excited about having professional family pictures taken on the beach. Considering this was something I dreamed about, I knew getting the right photographer was extremely important. I spend considerable time looking at photographer websites and comfortably decided on Amy Gray. From the first email I received from Amy, I knew I had made a great decision. Amy is thorough, professional, responsive and most important an EXCELLENT photographer. My husband and I are so in love with our pictures. Amy’s efforts put our family at ease and allowed her to capture genuine smiles of a family have a lot of fun having their pictures taken. Overall, an amazing experience!”
My son had such an extreme growth spurt right before our vacation that he grew out of the clothes I bought him for the beach photoshoot. The day before we left for vacation I had to run out and find him something else to wear. This may not seem like a big deal but it was to this mom that plans and organizes everything well in advance.
I distinctly remember thinking, “I can’t believe we are here, on the beach, taking pictures.” It was surreal because I had wanted to have this experience for so long. I even bought a frame that said “beach” about 7 years ago when I knew I did not have a picture to put in it. I held onto it and now I get to display it with a beautiful picture from our photoshoot. I also remember watching my kids get individually photographed and feeling immense gratefulness for them and for our vacation time.
My favorite image is one of our family where my daughter interlocked her hand in mine and rested her head on my shoulder. It was such a sweet moment, one I will treasure forever.
We finished up with some special mermaid photos for Sienna, who brought her FinFun tail for the occasion. This was my first opportunity to photograph a mermaid on the beach!