Tea for Two

   Another one of Alana's super cute ideas for a photoshoot in July of 2012 was to have a tea party with Squirt. She had a table with purple tulle and a cute fluffy skirt. I helped her pick out the little cups, plates and other decor for the table, such as the book and flowers.

    I remember that I used the 50mm for these pictures because I was amazed how just using a lower aperture setting could make the almost dark sky around 8pm look like 4pm again. (I love the good half of Daylight Saving!) There was a lot of laughing in this shoot because Squirt kept knocking over the cups and the flowers.

^^ Alana and Cody have the above two photos blown up and in 18" x 24" frames
at their house. Maybe next time Michael and I visit, there will be more pictures framed.
Some from December 2013 perhaps? ;) ^^

♡ ♥ ♡ ♥ ♡

Best in Show!

We planned to get some "professional" photos with Alana in her riding outfit, but ran out of time and the tea party took priority.
Here is some more info about her sweet horses:

Squirt is a 1989 Bay Roan Appaloosa Mare.
(This was taken during her bath.)

Fancy is a 1988 Sorrell Paso Fino Mare.
She was very friendly & liked me taking pictures.

Starpoint is a 2001 Bay Thoroughbred Mare.
We tried to get her to rear up, when she got excited.

Portraits ~ Alana "Ashley Anna" Grace

We had been trying to plan a 3-day get together for ourselves (Alana, Cody, Michael and I) since January, however, our schedules didn't work out until this past weekend. I drove up to Tallahassee on Friday after a lunch date with Michael at Panera. He couldn't come with me because he was working all day on Friday. & I should note that although I called my mom on the drive up "with nothing to say", we ended up talking for over an hour! I felt a calm, mature sensation during our conversation. 
Friday night Alana and I spent a couple hours chatting and picking out outfits for the photo shoots. On Saturday, we spent three hours in the hot afternoon at the barn while Alana got the horses ready, then went back to her house for second showers and lunch, before making our way back to the barn for photos.

Although I took over 1,000 photos, we narrow it down to about 500, then me picking out my personal 60 favorites, these two are my very favorite. In my next posts I will show off photos of Alana and Cody then give her horses their own post.