To Protect and Serve

I got to do a quick portrait session for a family who's Son is leaving to serve our country ½ a world away from home for the next 18 or more months. To say their last family portrait was outdated would be an understatement. The boys really don’t like taking pictures but their Mom really wanted a current family portrait to have up while her son is so far from home. Being good Sons (and figuring this covers them for Mother’s Day) they were good sports and by the end even admitted it really wasn’t too bad. The fact that their Dad was going to take them all out to dinner after probably didn’t hurt either.

May the Lord bless this family and keep their (and all) serving our country safe.

Old Wood Boxes

Take a bunch of old wood boxes add four good looking children, mix in two hats and you come up with a bunch of adorable pictures.

On a walk through the hills by my house a couple of weeks ago I spotted these old wood boxes that someone had dumped. They were in terrible shape (all busted up and broken but I just knew they would make a great photo opportunity. We don’t have big open hay fields and such here in Southern California so we have to do with what we can find. It took about two weeks between the rain and being able to get a family there but I think they turned out so cute.

I have a lot more pictures to go through but had to just share a few.

Just as important in the session is being sure the kids have a fun time so that they are willing (and even wanting) to have another “fun time” taking some pictures. Not only did we let them break it up during the session with some silly faces,

but when the session was over they got to roll an old tire down hill and play with the baseball we found. Good times for everyone.

Leah's Senior Session

I got to do a senior session for Leah this last week. Not only is she beautiful and sweet, but smart too! She is her class valedictorian. I got to do a senior shoot this week for Leah and had a great time with her and her mother just talking about her high school interests and the things she has been involved in all the while finding some fun locations to capture some wonderful pictures of her.

This is one of the three samples I designed that she might use for her name cards in her announcements.

Here are a few pictures from our session.

Her Mom said the only negative to the session was that Leah took so many cute pictures it was going to be hard to decide on her favorites.

If you know Leah you can go to www.printroom.com/pro/crphotos and view her whole gallery but you will have to call her for the password.

Looking forward to the two senior sessions I have this next week.

Boutique Bridal Show

Creative Reflections will be here. Come join us!

Free Boutique Bridal Show, this Saturday March 19th from 10-2, rain or shine at Ann’s Classic Affairs 1622 Illinois Ave #14 Perris, CA 92570.

There will be drawings for free items including a Catalina trip and products from vendors, KATY radio will be broadcasting live plus lots of the newest dresses for you to view.

I’m trying to come up with a little handout that’s unique but not too pricy as I hope to be handing out lots. If you have any creative ideas I am open to suggestions.

San Marino Senior Session

So sorry I have been neglectful about keeping up postings on my blog. I will try to do better. I did a fun senior shoot last Saturday in San Marino. Since I am not familiar with the area we drove around and found some great spots for pictures. The area is full of great places to take photos. One of my favorite spots was this home with the wrought iron gates and the aqua shutters that matched her shirt. What a great spot.

The home was for sale and currently empty so it made the perfect location.

We also had some fun with some mosaic in the business area.

Who doesn’t love some great brick work for texture and to add a little grunge.

And what are the chances of finding a tree with blossoms to match her butterfly shirt? I would say for the day we were batting a thousand.

Great day...fun session!

Senior Sessions Booking Now

ATTENTION SENIORS….You’re on the home stretch. Graduation will be here before you know it. If you haven’t done so already, now is the time to set your appointment for your Senior Portrait Session. With session starting at only $150.00 dates are filling up fast! Call now to secure the best session time for you. 951-522-0302

From traditional to artsy, backdrop to beaches let us capture your senior passions with a personal senior shoot. Earn a free Senior Session with referrals, call for details.

You can go to: http://www.crphotosonline.com/portraits/ and click “seniors” for a slide show of senior shoots or see a small album of facebook at Creative Reflections Photography by Doreen.

The Winning Card

I am doing a Bridal show in February and needed to order some cards to hand out. I did two completely different style designs and then I couldn’t decide which one I liked better. I turned to my Face Book page and asked for a vote. Wouldn’t you know it the vote was split almost right down the middle so it was still a hard decision. The deciding factor was that I already had a vertical holder that the Brick red cards would fit in for a display so the brick red card has now gone to print.

Even though the vote was split the great thing was that I got lots of good suggestions, many of which I incorporated into the card designs and now I like them both even better.

Because the votes were split and I like the blue card too I have decided to get a horizontal display holder and I will order these for my next show.

Happy 5th Anniversary to Steven and Candace

I have so much to get caught up on after the holidays but just couldn’t miss wishing Candace and Steven a happy 5th anniversary. Here is a short video I did to remind them of their special day. I can’t believe how quickly the time goes. It is interesting to look back and see how much my work and shooting has changed and progressed in the last 5 years but also to see how this couple has grown and changed.

There are still happily married with two adorable little kids, a boy and girl. If you want to see the wonderful changes to this family you go to the March 12th post titled Abby and Family and you can see some pictures of this adorable family that I got to take about 10 months ago.

Many couples that I have the privilege of capturing their wedding day memories once they have their photos and albums, unless they stay local and contact me for family pictures or something I really don’t know what or where they are or how their lives are going. (though this seems to be changing with Facebook). With Steven and Candace it was different. I have known Candace and her family for the last 12 years and have watched her grow into this amazing woman and mother.

Steven and Candace got married in January at 4PM coming out at 5) which if you looked out your window today you know that didn’t leave much light. You will see that after the family and group photos I got to really test my skills and we were shooting in very low light. Not bad except we didn’t want to shorten up the depth of field as we still needed shots with the temple in focus. It was a lot of changing setting but I got some of my favorite shots of them as the sun went lower in the sky. In the pictures at the end with the golden windows behind them, those are the window of the celestial room at the Redlands Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day where they got married.

Because this is a couple that I have known for years and love them and their families I had to take a picture of myself with the couple just for me.

I hope I’m around to wish them a happy golden wedding anniversary.

Jared and Kelly's Wedding Day

We had such a great time capturing this fun couples wedding day. They had lots of family and friends to share in their special day. You can tell from the pictures that she was one radiant bride who just couldn’t stop smiling the whole day.


I just love how this short video captures a little overview of their wonderful day.

Below are just a a few of my favorites that we couldn’t include on the slide show

Beyler Family Photo Shoot

Here is a short 4 minute video of our fun family session.

I have so many great photo things I need to blog about but as you can expect this time of year I am getting lots of family orders taken care of but I just had to share this short video from a November Family shoot I did. I brought along a second photographer and added some short video clips of the session into their slide show.

Such a fun little family. Both the kids were so cute. Little Lilia reminded me of the Dog in UP that was always going ‘Squirrel” “Squirrel” except with her it was “Duck” Duck”. She loooved the ducks. She even caught one (and luckily we caught her before she when into the water). At one point if you watch closely when she’s on the bridge she dips her foot into the water and her Dad keeps a tight hold of her hand.

When their kids viewed the slide show and remembered the fun with the lake, lady bugs, ducks and dogs they wanted to go back and take some more pictures. I think this really adds a wonderful way to remember your fun family photo session and will start offering it as an option.

The wedding date I always remember

Julie was one of the nicest brides ever! Anyone that knows her can confirm this. I was so impressed with how she wanted everyone to really enjoy the day. Both she and Brian wanted so much for this to be a wonderful celebration for everyone, not just for them. I could go on and on with examples of how some things didn’t go as they planed but they just rolled with the day and truly had an attitude of gratitude for all the friends and family that had made arrangements to take time out of their lives to share their day.

On of the things they “rolled with” was when we realized that everyone had taken off from the church to the reception and taken their car keys with them. They just jumped in with me and let me chauffer them and it allowed for this cool sunset pictures when we were going back after the reception

Julie and Brian were also the first couple that I had that did personalized albums for their parents. Even though it is less expensive for them to just have duplicate albums of their album, for their parents they wanted to really personalize them. Exchanging out photos for one they knew each parent would want and adding a personalize letter printed on the front of each album. What a special and thoughtful touch for their parents.

I remember that after the reception their whole bridal party was going to play miniature golf and Brian and Julie were going to change and head over to spend a little extra fun time with these friends. As you can see any of these things would have made this couple memorable to me, but the date…ah that sticks with me too. Why?

As I’m dropping the Bride and groom off (remember the missing keys) and leaving I get a call from my eldest daughter, she doesn’t sound good. She informs me that she is at the Hospital they are about to take her in for emergency surgery. Chris (her husband) took her in to the ER that morning very sick and she had a hot appendix that had to come out, stat! WHAT!!!, Why didn’t you call? “Well, I knew you had a wedding and there was really nothing you could do for me.” She was right. “Chris has been here and taken care of everything.” I headed over to hospital to spell Chris so he could eat and run home and shower. He was back before she was even out of surgery and I was on my way home after a long day, never even seeing my daughter but knowing she was in good hands. So November 10^th is a date that I will always remember. It is the date of a wonderful wedding and the date I found out just how wonderful my son-in-law really is.

My Two Favorite Brides

I have shot some amazing, beautiful and wonderful brides but if I had to make a choice these would be my two favorite brides of all time. Now, I am a little prejudice as these two are my own daughters so they do have a slight advantage over all you other amazing brides that have allowed me to be a part of your day.

As I was finishing up Rebecca’s wedding photos and moving all the files to the back up drive, I was reminded that we had done a very quick bridal shoot and I needed to get those on the disc to her too. On the day she had made plans for her hair and makeup to be done we had an unplanned medical situation with a family member and were going to be very short on time. Instead of going to an outside location we just put up the back drops and did a mini session so she could check out her look. She’s as gorgeous as ever and we might even send a few of these to the bridal store where she bought her dress.

I went back and pulled a few from Elizabeth’s bridal photos. When she got married in March 2007 I had neither a blog nor a facebook page and missed the opportunity to share any pictures from her bridal photos. So here a just a few of her.

These girls have many things in common but they are also so very different. They are their own individual selves and have been since the day they got here. May they love and lean on each other long after I am gone.

Back on a protography thought. I recommend to all brides that they do a “dry run” of their wedding day. Make-up, hair, and dress with the underclothes they will be wearing that day whether or not they plan on having any bridal pictures done. It gives them a sense of long it will take them to get ready (so many brides underestimate this). It lets them see how everything looks together and if they really do like their hair that way. I had a bride who wanted to wear false eye lashes. She had been told by many that they really look good in photos (and they usually really do), but she had never wore them before so her eyes felt very heavy and she just didn’t feel right. Her own lashes were so long that they actually overpowered the false ones and it just wasn’t working. She took them off and her whole smile and facial expressions went back to their natural beautiful look. She was so glad she figured that out before the day of her wedding. I had another bride that underestimated the drop in the back of her dress and realized that she needed different underclothes. So my advice is to always do a pre-wedding day “dress rehearsal” just to be sure your wedding day is as you picture it.