The Frawleys’ First Family Portraits
Over the last four years I have had the joy and honor of photographing a number of life milestones for Evan and Mike beginning with Mike’s sweet proposal amidst the rows of fruit trees at Blake’s Apple Orchard in 2016 in Armada, Michigan. Last fall I captured their photographic announcement that they were expecting their first child, Hunter, who was born this past March. In late August we got together once more on a bright Saturday morning in Washington, Michigan with Westview Orchards’ sunflower fields as a backdrop for their first ever professional family portraits. We loaded up the stroller, baby carrier, diaper bags, my camera equipment, the whole nine yards onto the tractor-pulled train ride out to the sunflower fields and had I started clickin’ away. This little family was so much fun to work with, they are just the sweetest. This session yielded so many new personal favorites of pictures I have ever taken, I cannot help but smile looking at them! Here are just a few:
On this particular day it was already 90° and 85% humidity by the time we met that morning and the sun was intense, but you would never know it looking at the photos because these three are straight up pros, including Baby Hunter. Not sure what black magic Evan uses on her hair and makeup but my face was melting and my hair was frizz-city, while she looks like she just walked straight out of the hair and makeup trailer on a movie set.
Evan has a solid eye for fashion which shows in the so very well coordinated outfits she pulled together- wonderfully simple and summery allowing the bright sunflowers to pop in the background against their crisp white clothing. Normally it is best to avoid the same solid color on top or bottom for multiple people in portraits because variation is more visually interesting. That said, the Frawleys’ outfits are a great example of how texture, seen in the lace and woven detail in Evan’s dress, serves as a pattern that breaks up the recurring color perfectly. Because Evan was so in love with the sunflowers and we wanted those to be rather visible in the pictures, the simplicity in color palette and lack of heavy competing patterns in their clothing balances everything out for a visually pleasing look.
Evan and Mike just love their “Hunter Bear” to pieces as is evident by not only watching them care for him during our time together but the smiles on their faces and loving embraces in their portraits. When they wanted him to smile they would both sing “Old MacDonald” to him as we stood amongst the flowers and he would just light up- so cute!
Once again, I loved my time with this adorable family in front of my camera- I suspect it is not the last time and am very much happy about that!
If you have never been to visit the Westview Orchards when the sunflowers are blooming in August, do yourself a favor and put it on the calendar for 2021. You can visit their website to find out more about all of the events Westview Orchards offers by clicking here. For a couple bucks they will drive you out to the fields on a train ride, you can explore the fields and each visitor gets to cut a sunflower of your choice- they even provide the pruning shears and package them up with water for the trip home! I took my tiny humans out a few days prior to my visit with the Frawley family and we all had a blast. To see more images from the Frawley Family’s portrait session, click here.
As autumn starts to settle in, I find myself looking at these photos longing for summer all over again. What a perfect reminder these portraits are of the beauty of the season and more importantly the joy and adventures new parenthood brings.
