Hello, World! Newborn photos at Overlake

Hello, World! Newborn photos at Overlake

November 18, 2022

pediatrician listening to lungs of newborn baby in hospital bassinet

I was thrilled to meet and photograph Baby T and his humans Katie and Micah this morning at Overlake Childbirth Center. I haven’t been to Overlake in a while, and they seem to be under some construction, but I must say, the Childbirth Center is so nice and new and beautiful! It’s bright, airy, and the rooms are spacious. A great setting to welcome your new baby into the world!

Can I just say that it was such a pleasure meeting this family and being able to photograph their new addition? Hospital newborn sessions are probably my absolute favorite type of photography sessions to do, and the pandemic completely put a stop to them. This was my first hospital newborn session since pre-pandemic days, and I am so thankful that hospital visitor policies appear to be loosening up!

Shortly after I arrived, the pediatrician came to give Baby his daily exam and make sure he was ready for discharge!

Baby T seems pretty chill thus far! Things mom and dad know already are that he loves to suck, and he makes a lot of funny faces.

Mom is already a professional baby whisperer

These two are already a great team. Adding a new baby can be tough on a relationship, but I can tell they’ve got what it takes to work together and support each other in the crazy ride that is parenthood!

Love the adoring expressions of mom & dad!

Mom says they plan on just staring at him all day once they’re home!

Okay, Micah’s expression here is too adorable.

Love the wrinkly feet. They don’t stay like this for very long.

These are just a handful of the photos I made this morning; I’ll finish editing the complete gallery in a couple of weeks, but these quick highlights are for Baby T’s friends and family who can’t be here in person to meet this guy just yet. This phase of itty bitty newborn baby goes by in such a flash, so I’m so glad I was able to capture all of the details of this special time for Katie & Micah in photos.

personal

How are you?

July 5, 2022

It’s been hard to be a human lately. It seems like the bad news just doesn’t. stop.

It’s hard to know how to respond and how to keep going.

Amongst all the weight of current events, I’ve still been photographing clients and even documenting super important occasions like elopements. I haven’t felt an urgency to share or blog these images except for a few that I’ve posted over on Instagram. In some regard, it seems like I’m waiting for a happier time to share these photos. Perhaps in the back of my mind I worry that things won’t get better anytime soon.

I guess I’m just here to say that if you’ve found it difficult and exhausting to be a human lately, you’re not alone. I do have hope that things will get better, and I do think that tiny beautiful moments can exist at the same time as the shattering news.

That said, here are some photos from a wonderful week I spent in Maine during the summer of 2019, before the pandemic changed our world. Some dear friends of mine spent a week studying photography with world-renowned photographer Sam Abell, who I am also happy to call a dear friend.

sam abell instructing photography students

These final 2 images are the ones I shared as part of the Maine Media Workshops student exhibition on the final day of the workshop.

detail of lobster fisherman driving boat

I hope you are doing well and finding bits of beauty and magic among the stress, grief, and sorrow. It is a complicated thing to be alive right now. Wishing you health, patience, grace, rest, and laughter. Drop me a line to let me know what’s keeping you sane these days.

xo Carrie

Family / personal / sessions

5 Creative Ideas for Home Shoots with Your Kids

August 30, 2021

According to the United Nations, an estimated 1.25 billion children stayed at home at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Undoubtedly, it has been a frustrating experience for all the adults and children navigating this situation — but it can be remedied with a bit of creativity and imagination. One fun bonding activity you can do as a family is to have a home photo-shoot with your kids.

Even if we’re all living busy, strange lives at the moment, it doesn’t stop the clock from ticking. Little ones will still grow almost in a blink of an eye, so it’s important to create good memories and capture them on camera. And with digital cameras now offering multiple shooting options it is easy to take many different types of photos. Plus, home photographs are something you and your kids can treasure forever. Here are five great ideas for home shoots to inspire you:

Day-in-a-life photo-shoot

baby boy sitting alone in high chair at dining table with German shepherd dog looking on

One of the best things about photographing children is how carefree and natural they are. Unlike adults, children aren’t accustomed to staging emotions or situations. They’re often just being themselves in front of the camera. Taking laid-back pictures at home in a photojournalistic style can give you candid shots that convey their personality perfectly. Not only do you get photos of the house you’re raising your kids in, but you also record the sweet moments that often remain uncaptured during a normal day.

Retro photo-shoot

Nostalgia has become super trendy since the beginning of the pandemic, which is why TV show reboots, 90s fashion, and retro video games are all the rage these days. If your kids are interested in going back in time with you, a retro photo-shoot would look really cute in your family photo album — including all the retry items you can get, such as vintage clothes and an instant camera. Modern instant cameras are simple to operate, and the film can even come in several fun colors and designs that your children can choose. Plus, some cameras can even send instant photos online, so you can easily upload and share them with family and friends. For added fun, why not teach your kids a few retro poses as well?

Outdoor photo-shoot

2 kids riding on top parents shoulders among fall leaves

With summer coming to a close, an outdoor photo-shoot can help your kids get some fresh air before school begins. Outdoor spaces close to home are safe venues for a pictorial — as long as there’s proper social distancing and observing health protocols. Experts even recommend taking children outdoors to reduce loneliness, isolation,
depression, and other mental health problems caused by the pandemic lockdowns. One advantage of heading out is that you can take plenty of picturesque photos of your kids sitting in the grass, playing in the dirt, or admiring flora and fauna. Some of my favorite outdoor spots to explore in Seattle are the Ballard Locks, Gas Works Park, the Arboretum and Foster Island, and Fort Casey on Bainbridge Island.

”Favorite things” photo-shoot

father playing train set with toddler son at home

It’s hard to photograph camera-shy or fidgety children, so give yourself a break and help them relax in front of the camera by including their favorite toys, foods, and hobbies. You can be sure to capture big smiles when they dig into something tasty or pose with their favorite teddy bear. You can also take more dynamic photos of your older children while they’re showing off their hobbies. Taking these photos can help them look back and remember what they loved when they were much younger.

Dress-up photo-shoot

two girls dressed up in Frozen dresses whispering to each other

Whether they’re showing off their favorite clothes and accessories, or raiding everyone else’s wardrobes, a dress-up photo-shoot is guaranteed to make the whole family laugh. And with Halloween coming right around the corner, you can even use this time to work on their costumes together before modeling them afterward. Encouraging your kids to express their creativity by DIY-ing their costumes may help them overcome a little bit of the pandemic blues.

Baby / Family / family films / sessions

Oliver’s newborn video

October 6, 2020

I was so happy to photograph this new baby and his people and dogs at home when he was about a week old. Mom had originally contacted me about a hospital newborn session, but unfortunately due to COVID-19, hospitals aren’t allowing visitors to new babies (with the exception of the birth partner and one additional support person who is present during the birth), so a hospital newborn session was not possible.

newborn baby yawning on bed in banana swaddle

We made the best of it and were able to do photos once they got home. That meant I was also able to include grandma in the session, who was visiting from out of town to help out her daughter and new mom. Thank you so much for having me over to document this special time. I’m sure he is already so much bigger!!!

personal

Pandemic update

May 20, 2020

Hi friends. I’m still here.

The pandemic has me all out of sorts, which I’m sure isn’t unique to me, but it’s the reason this is my first blog post of 2020. Oops.

The kids have been out of school since March 12, 2020. Seattle Public Schools delayed moving instruction online for quite a while due to equity issues around technology access. The short story of quarantine homeschooling is that it’s been a lesson in adjusting (lowering?) expectations. I’ve mostly been letting the kids go feral, and I’m thankful for their teachers who are providing some self-directed assignments. I’m also very grateful for my tiger-dad husband who works with the kids on schoolwork a lot and even creates custom assignments for them.

Some of you may not know that in addition to photography, I work part-time in healthcare. I’m a clinical pharmacist in a primary care clinic at an academic medical center, which means I have appointments with patients who are referred to me by their primary care physician. I mostly do chronic disease management which means I help people with diabetes and high blood pressure reach their health goals by managing medications and lifestyle modification. Working in healthcare during a global pandemic (and the initial epicenter of the U.S. outbreak) has been stressful, to say the least. While I’m not a front-front-line worker caring directly for COVID-19 patients, all healthcare workers have been navigating a non-stop rapid-fire stream of information, practice and policy changes, and a general heightened sense of anxiety in the workplace. It’s been like trying to drink water from a fire hydrant.

We spent March preparing for “the surge” which we were told would be coming some time at the beginning of April. I exchanged a string of terrifying text messages from my friend who was working in the ICU one Sunday night.

Soon after there were two weeks in a row where I received emails from my clinic manager informing me that I had been exposed to a clinic coworker who tested positive for the virus so I should be vigilant in monitoring myself for symptoms. So all this time we’ve been continuing to show up to work with the knowledge that we could potentially contract the virus from a patient or coworker. I realize now that I had little time to process what we were experiencing.

So it may not sound surprising that most of my time away from work was spent managing my stress and trying to practice self-care. For me, that meant burning as many of the “should” memos in my life, hence my lowest of low expectations of myself as far as quarantine schooling. If Eric wants to go all tiger-dad on them, great. Not for me.

I also let go of expectations for myself as fas as being “productive” and “creating” during the pandemic. I picked up my camera if and only if I felt like it. Thankfully my last scheduled family session happened right before the “Stay at home” order, though I did have a large job in April that got canceled. It felt and still feels strange to share photos of the beautiful, happy families that I’ve photographed recently, with all the despair that’s going on in the world right now. I’ve not really been able to reconcile those painful realities with the need to continue to spread positivity.

Despite my limited bandwidth during pandemic times, I do recognize that there’s a sweetness to this time. I usually never have my school-aged children home during the day, and there have been lots of tender moments sprinkled in amongst the angst of quarantine. Here are a few of them.

mother with three children on front porch

So all this to say, I’m still here. I can’t wait to photograph your family again, as soon as it’s safe. Oh, and I almost forgot to share that Adobe featured me in a very sweet blog article that was published on Mother’s Day. I’m so thankful to work with such wonderful and supportive companies like Adobe, and having the opportunity to work with talented writers like Christine is just the icing on the cake. You can find the article here if you’d like to check it out.

Be well. xo Carrie

personal

Decade in review

December 31, 2019

It’s hard to believe that today is the last day in this decade! A few weeks ago I was thinking back to what I was doing the last time we closed out a decade, because it seems like kind of a big milestone yet I had little recollection of what the end of the first 10 years in the 2000s was like. Then I quickly realized it was because I had just entered parenthood at the end of 2009 so the end of the decade was filled with sleepless nights, pumping, bottles, trying to figure out nursing, and general delirium.

12.27.09 How Avery and I were spending the last days of 2009. She was a little over a month old here, surprising us with an early arrival at 36 weeks.

I thought it would be fun to share a photo from each year (okay, or two) of the last decade. I did this exercise quickly, and I’m not the BEST at digital organization, so what I came up with were things that I had actually organized or just jumped out at me. It was also fun to see how my photography has grown in the last decade.

January 1, 2010 – The transition to parenthood was rough for us! Here Avery is about 6 weeks old.

2011 – I picked up a dSLR for the first time and quickly set out to learn how to use it. I purchased it as a reward for meeting my breastfeeding goal of one year.

2012 – After a long and difficult pregnancy, we welcomed the twins in October. Avery quickly assumed her role of “Best Big Sister Ever”

2013 – I made this self-portrait when the twins were 11 weeks old to document the amazing work my body did to grow and carry them. The photo got a little more attention than I bargained for, and has since been published in Click Magazine.

2014 – I began finding my way documenting my family in a more true-to-life manner, and doing the same for clients.

2015 – This year there was so much material to capture. The kids were toddlers and very expressive (read: meltdowns). Little did I know that it wouldn’t always be this easy to photograph them.

2016 – This quintessential summer image is a favorite of mine. This year I had it printed giant-sized on engineering paper and hung it in our family room.

2017 – I’m most definitely a “people” photographer, but every now and then I can make a still scene come to life. I made this photo a few months after I first studied with Sam Abell.

2018 – I spent a weekend in Whistler BC with my photog besties. We’ve been working on making more complex images. It’s very difficult, but I’m so thankful I have company on the journey.

And now for a few 2019 photos…

December – my oldest crushing it at her first gymnastics meet of the season. She has amazing form and it is such a pleasure to photograph her. AND I made her do the culling this time and she enjoyed it! Hahahaha!!!

So there you have it! A decade in pictures. I wish you a very Happy New Year full of adventure, laughter, love, and connection. Thank you for being here, and for trusting me to document the important moments in the life of your family! It means the world to me.

xo Carrie

Hospital newborn / sessions

Baby A’s hospital newborn session

December 17, 2019

I was so pleased to document Baby A in the hospital the day after she was born. I photographed her big brother the day after he was born as well, and it’s always a lovely compliment to have a family ask you back to make photos of their second child.

This mama is amazing. I’ve known her since college, and when she announced her plans to start a family on her own without a partner, I knew she was going to be such a great mom. I seriously cannot even imagine having one, let alone TWO children without another adult to share the load! So I guess it should come as no surprise to me that she had planned out exactly how she wanted her older son to meet her new baby sister.

She had the baby in the bassinet before her son came in with grandma, and he climbed into bed with her. She then had someone hand her the baby so that she could introduce him to her. At this point, he was a bit apprehensive, and he kept saying, “All done! All done!” and wanted to climb down from the bed.

She had a giant stuffed Mickey for him which was a gift from his baby sister to him, and he slowly started to warm up. We began a “gradual desensitization” program where we put baby in the bassinet and kept moving it closer to him.

Eventually he became more curious and wanted to see her. You never know how older siblings are going to react, and this little guy was slow to warm up but then was so sweet with her.

Grandparents are so important, so it’s always a joy when I can include them in a session.

And here is the video I made for Baby A’s arrival! Thank you so much for inviting me in to document such a momentous day!!!

Maternity / sessions

Seattle sunset beach maternity session

November 5, 2019

It’s been a minute since I photographed this fun couple earlier this summer as they were anticipating the arrival of their baby girl. We lucked out with such a beautiful Pacific Northwest summer evening, I mean, we could not have asked for more perfect weather. Plus we had access to a semi-private beach which made for a really beautiful setting.

pregnant woman at beach sitting on driftwood log

sunset silhouette of expecting couple at beach with reflection in water

close up of pregnant belly with couple's arms around it

pregnant woman at beach wearing sheer white gown

Asian couple and pregnant wife holding hands walking at beach

black and white photo of Asian expectant couple at beach

pregnant woman at beach at sunset in flowy sheer dress

It was so lovely to spend some time with this fun couple before I photographed them again in the hospital shortly after the birth of their baby girl for a hospital newborn session. Those sessions are really special, so it was such a privilege for me to document these two important milestones in the life of their growing family.

personal

Fall round-up: Parenting hack, birthdays, etc

September 24, 2019

kids picking candles out of birthday cake

Fall means birthdays in our house. All three kids have fall birthdays, plus both me and my mom, so we eat a LOT of cake between the end of October and Thanksgiving. In an effort to simplify the kids’ birthdays, we adopted a policy of “partying on the evens” which means we will throw a birthday party for the kids on their even year birthdays. On odd year birthdays, they can choose an activity that we do together as a family.

This year our oldest daughter is turning TEN, so she decided she wants to have a pool party. We love using Paperless Post for creating beautiful yet easy electronic invitations with no annoying advertisements like the other popular electronic invite site. I’ve been happily using Paperless Post for many years and plan to continue to do so. They have several free designs, but you can upgrade to beauties by designers like Kate Spade and Rifle Paper Company for a nominal fee. On my list of to-dos for today is to enlist my daughter’s help in choosing her invitation design and have her write her guest list.

Parenting hack: SPECIAL TIME

SPECIAL TIME, the cure for what ails you. I recently read about this parenting hack called “special time” and started practicing it with my kids. They LOVE it!!! What is it? It’s fifteen minutes of undivided attention with your child, where they can pick the activity. It’s where you put that phone away, stop multitasking, and spend a small chunk of QUALITY time with your kiddo. I will admit that this was initially difficult for me. I’m so used to multi-tasking, and being “around” but not really present with my kids. I think that’s the default in how we spend the majority of time with our kids. But “special time” has revolutionized the way we interact. The cool thing is that kids can ask for special time when they need it. I’ve had some pretty neat conversations with them during special time. It left such an impression on my son that he wrote a whole book about our special time last week at school!!!! I was so excited when he gave me that book. It totally melted my heart.

Book rec:

I recently finished “Lab Girl” by Hope Jahren. People. It was sooooooo good! It’s a non-fiction memoir about her life as a research scientist, and also it’s a lot about plants. It’s really beautifully written. It consumed me for the whole time I was reading it, and I didn’t want it to end!

“A beautifully written memoir about the life of a woman in science, a brilliant friendship, and the profundity of trees. Terrific.”—Barack Obama

What to eat this fall:

We (and when I say “we” I actually mean “my husband” hahaha) have been making this recipe for over a decade, and it’s a family favorite. It’s linguine with butternut squash, bacon, and goat cheese. The creaminess of the squash combined with the saltiness of the bacon and slight sourness of the goat cheese create such a delicious and hearty meal that even my kids love. When using a whole butternut squash (instead of the pre-cut and bagged cubes), I will steam the whole thing for 5 minutes in my instant pot to make peeling and cutting easier. Do you have a family favorite recipe for this time of year? I’d love it if you shared.

Hospital newborn / sessions

Why you might want to hire a professional photographer to photograph your family in the hospital after delivery

September 18, 2019

The first baby who I shot a Fresh 48 session for in Seattle turned 5 recently! After that first session over five years ago, I immediately knew that these sessions were really special. I mean, is there anything like meeting a baby to capture his or her first professional photos just hours after birth? It’s such a magical time for families, often exhausted from labor but still basking in the afterglow of meeting this new human. It’s an honor for me to be invited into that space.

I get a lot of questions from prospective clients so I thought I’d take some time to answer the most frequently asked questions.

SCHEDULING: Usually families are curious how to schedule this type of session when they can’t exactly predict when baby is going to arrive. I understand that, being a mother of three myself. I will put your due date on my calendar, then block off a five-week period starting at 37 weeks through 42 weeks, when I will be “on-call” for you. Since I’m not photographing the actual birth, I won’t be available 24/7, but it does mean that I won’t leave town during this period, and I will maintain flexibility in my daily schedule in order to be able to photograph you and your baby in the hospital on the day or day after your baby arrives. As long as give me a heads up when you’re headed to the hospital and again after the baby arrives, I will be able to arrange a time (preferably during daylight hours for the best light) to meet you at the hospital for photos within the next 48 hours.

THE SESSION. I’ll join you in your hospital room to document your new baby. Feel free to have other siblings and grandparents join in on the session. I use a documentary approach, which means that I photograph whatever is happening at the time. It may include a vital signs check, nursing, swaddling, diaper changes, and of course cuddling. Feel free to attend to anything your baby or other kids need, and I will document all of these moments. I’ll be with you for about 60 minutes; just enough time to create a great gallery and allow you to get back to resting and bonding with your baby.

HOSPITAL PHOTOGRAPHER OR ME? Many local hospitals offer a photographer who will come around and photograph your baby for you in the hospital. It’s a wonderful service for families who haven’t been able to plan ahead. The main benefit of hiring me is that you know exactly what you’re going to get. You can view my portfolio ahead of time and know my style and quality of my work. With the in-house photographer, you never know who you’re going to get (they usually have several photogs who rotate) and you won’t be able to view their portfolios ahead of time. I aim for these photos to be relevant now and in 30 years, so I steer clear of any trendy editing styles (I mean, do you remember sepia?!) and prefer a clean, true-to-life edit.

I also provide the option of adding on a video fusion (photos weaved in with video clips) which hospital-based photographers don’t offer.

WHAT TO WEAR: It’s a good idea to give this some forethought so that you don’t regret having something nice and comfortable to wear for photos. It’s completely up to you what you wear. I’ve had new moms stay in the hospital gown while others choose to change to a robe, nursing camisole, or comfy dress for photos.

WHEN WILL WE RECEIVE THE PHOTOS? I know you’re excited to share the first professional photos of your new baby! Within 24 hours of your session, I will create a blog post containing about 10 photo highlights which you can share with family and friends near and far. You’ll receive the full gallery to download about 2 weeks later.

mother interacting with newborn baby in hospital bassinet

newborn baby in hospital being held by grandmother

And I just may sneak in a snuggle with your new little one while you take a break or tend to your other child!

Do you have more questions about hospital newborn photography sessions (or “Fresh 48″s)? Please feel free to contact me!

Baby / family films

Welcome, Baby M!

August 26, 2019

I was so happy to meet Ann and Kevin and their newborn baby girl, Baby M, for an in-home newborn photo session at their home yesterday. We had originally planned to shoot the session in the hospital, but there were many factors that conspired against and after scheduling and rescheduling at least two times, I ended up meeting Baby M at 5 days old after they were all finally home from the hospital.

I’m happy to share just a handful of the photographs we created yesterday so that family and friends near and far may join in the excitement and joy surrounding the much-anticipated arrival of this sweet girl.

mother sitting against bed talking to newborn baby

asian father holding and kissing his newborn baby girl

newborn baby girl sleeping in grey crib with floral sheets

mother looking lovingly at newborn baby girl in home nursery

black and white photo of newborn baby in mother's lap with mother's arms around her

mother swaying and talking to newborn baby in nursery

asian father relaxing with newborn baby on couch

asian male and red haired caucasian mother with newborn baby girl in home nursery

Does a baby have a personality at only 5 days old? I certainly think they do. Baby M seemed calm and pretty relaxed, and I hope that foreshadows the kind of babyhood she will have, especially after all that her parents have already been through to bring this little one Earthside.

Here is the film I cut together from our session. I love the way it turned out, and mama exclaimed, “Happy tears!” when she watched it the first time.

Baby / Family / sessions

Perfect the way you are

August 7, 2019

I might say this about almost every session, but this one was for real one of my most favorite sessions to shoot in a long time. Mom and dad purposely searched out a family photographer with a photojournalistic style (me!), so when I arrived at their home on a lovely Sunday morning during spring, they were hanging out in the living room with the front door open.

They greeted me and invited me in, then I proceeded to get out my camera. Dad was milling about in the kitchen preparing breakfast while mom was entertaining their baby & nursing.

dad hanging out with baby in sunny living room at home

I said, “So you know, just go about your usual day and I just photograph you as you do your thing.” They said, “Yup!” and proceeded to tell me how they had a photojournalist document their wedding so were looking for something similar for family photos. They both had a super chill vibe, as is required to allow a photographer to hang out with you for several hours.

mother playing with baby on baby gym on kitchen floor

baby playing on baby gym with bright sun

Dad cooking in kitchen while spending time with baby

Their home was being lovingly renovated and was filled with an abundance of houseplants. I always say that houses come and go in the life of a family, so it’s special to have photographs that document the first house you brought your baby home to.

Mom and dad are both culinary wizards, with dad whipping up the most delicious breakfast I have seen of sauteed vegetables, scrambled eggs, and other goodies. Baby J’s breakfast was also homemade; blueberry and kale, if I remember correctly. They are avid gardeners, harvesting many edibles from their own sunny garden.

dad changing baby's diaper on changing table

husband and wife relaxing on front porch

They both agreed that one of the best parts of their house is the sunny enclosed front porch.

mom nursing baby and dad organizing baby dresser drawer

After a short nap and more milk, we were ready to venture outside for a walk to nearby Gas Works Park.

Dad photographing mom with baby in Ergo with his smart phone

family walking through wooded neighborhood

family walking at Gas Works Park Seattle

Family walking up kite hill at Gas Works Park

parents playing with baby on top of hill at Gas Works Park

Dad kissing mom on hill at Gas Works Park

baby falling asleep with parents at Gas Works park

After the short adventure, it was once again time for a nap so we all headed home.

baby falling asleep in crib under mobile

One thing that struck me about these parents was that despite how tired they may have been during this season of life, they were really enjoying their baby and had an awareness that this time was fleeting, in a way that I’ve found to be rare when you’re in THE BLUR, and to be honest, in a way that I couldn’t appreciate my babies when I was in the thick of it. So that made me even happier to make the sweet collection of photographs I did of their little family, and I hope they will treasure the book we made as well. For the cover text, they decided to imprint all of their nicknames for their baby girl, which I thought was so original and creative.

Adventures with kids in PNW / Children / personal

Adventures with kids in PNW: Denny Creek hike

July 22, 2019

Summer is finally here in Seattle! We went on the best adventure this past weekend and I wanted to share it with you so that you can enjoy this with your family too. We hiked the Denny Creek trail in the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest to the natural waterslides. It was SO FUN! Our kids are 9 and 6 years old, and this was the perfect hike for them. Keep reading all the way to the bottom for my tips to make it a great day trip!

The super-fun destination is the Denny Creek natural waterslides, which are about a mile in from the trailhead.

The creek passes over these large rocks and creates “slides” which are slick from some algae growth in the water paths with lots of small, shallow pools to play or wade in. The large rocks are also a great place to rest and eat lunch.

Bubble tape for the hike back to the parking lot makes all things right in the world. 🙂

Keep your eyes open to the beauty of Mother Nature!

GETTING THERE: We love the Washington Trails Association website for info on parking and directions to the trailhead.

PARKING: You need a Northwest Forest Pass to park in the parking lot at the trailhead. Single-day or annual passes available.

TOILETS: There are 2 toilets at the Franklin Falls trailhead which is right next to the Denny Creek trail. Use those before heading over the concrete bridge to the Denny Creek trail, as the toilets at the Denny Creek trailhead are closed due to lack of funding.

WHAT TO BRING: We bring the 10 essentials, even when day hiking. Each kid carries their own backpack with a jacket, water, and food. LOTS of snacks, since water play makes the kids ravenous!

FOR WATER PLAY: If the kids plan to play in the water, I have them wear their swimsuits under their hiking clothes. They pack water shoes & dry underwear in their backpack. I bring microfiber towels which are absorbent and pack small. We love these from Amazon.

NOTES: The water is melted alpine snowpack, so it’s clean but ice COLD! Stay close to the kids and make sure they don’t stay in the water for too long! I’ve read that the water levels vary depending on the time of year. Earlier in the season the water levels may be too high/fast for safe play. Always use discretion around water. We went in mid-July and it was perfect.

The hike doesn’t end at the waterslides. If you continue 0.7 miles beyond the waterslide rocks, apparently you get to a beautiful waterfall. It was a hard sell for my kids and they decided they didn’t want to go any further which I was totally okay with. We enjoyed this hike much more than Franklin Falls (also beautiful) because the kids just loved the final destination and could appreciate playing in the water a lot more than they appreciated looking at Franklin Falls. Plus we thought getting down to the bottom of Franklin Falls was pretty treacherous on the wet rocks which are constantly wet from the falls’ spray. We would definitely do the Denny Creek hike again! What are your favorite kid-friendly hikes in the Seattle area?

Hospital newborn / sessions

Baby E’s hospital newborn session

June 7, 2019

I was so happy to take Baby E’s first professional photos during her hospital newborn session at UW Valley Medical Center today. It’s been a little over 2 months since I last saw her parents for their maternity session with that glorious spring sunset (see Instagram for some of the photos!). Baby E was born last night, so today was the perfect day to capture her during daylight hours, at under 24 hours old. She was pretty calm throughout our entire session, and mom said she barely cried when she was first born. With my oldest being 9 and the twins being 6, I’m pretty far removed from the new baby stage, so it was fun to see new parents getting used to this new little human and their roles as mom and dad, and all that swaddling!

Each birth story is unique, and this baby took a while to get here. Mom told me she had been up for over 24 hours, and last night was already the second night they spent in the hospital! I know the feeling because my first baby wasn’t born until over 48 hours after I first arrived at the hospital! This sweet girl was born a good size, at 7 pounds, 13 ounces, if I remember correctly. She already has quite the chubby cheeks and doesn’t have the skinny chicken legs like some newborns do. Her dad has a fantastic sense of humor, and when I took some photos of her next to the hospital birth certificate with footprints, he referred to it as her “manufacturing certificate”. So funny, right?!

“Look, you guys made a baby!” 🙂

I love the expressions of joy and sheer exhaustion all captured in this one photo. Thank you for allowing me to document this very special event in the life of your family! I hope you treasure the photos for years to come.

Family / sessions

Seattle family photos at home and the park

April 5, 2019

I was excited to photograph this family again this fall, after first meeting them in the hospital on Baby H’s birth day at Swedish Ballard. It’s always so fun to see returning clients and how their kids have grown. Baby H was now almost a year old and full of personality. We played a bit at home before venturing outside to walk to their neighborhood park. I love how relaxed in-home sessions are. I’ve been thinking about this a lot and realized that I can hardly remember many ordinary details from my own childhood. I don’t recall what our house looked like on the inside when I was under 10, I have no idea what kinds of toys I played with, and I have absolutely no memory of my parents reading to me! I spend a lot of time reading to my kids (every night, in fact), and I’m sure my parents read to me as a child, but I can’t remember any of it! So now when I see parents reading to their kids, something that seems so ordinary, I make a photo of it because it’s likely the kids won’t remember it when they’re adults.

They are a musical family, so there are musical instruments all around the home!

It was a beautiful, sunny fall day to head outside and walk to their favorite nearby park.

Mom told me that their older daughter has been in a phase where she doesn’t like to be photographed, so she was glad to have me make some authentic photos with the two girls together and all of them together as a family. I’ve noticed that my children have become more particular about being photographed as they get older too. I try to honor their wishes and thus I have less photos of them in general.

Lastly, a photo of just mom and dad together, which I viewed as a visual celebration of their surviving the first year of parenting two children!

Baby / Family / family films / sessions

In-home newborn session for Baby H

April 3, 2019

I love it when returning clients contact me to let me know they are expecting again, and they’d like me to photograph their new baby! This session was supposed to be a hospital newborn session, but Baby H was a pretty hefty baby at birth so had to spend some time in the NICU for blood sugar monitoring. Because he was born during the winter when there were high levels of influenza circulating in the community, children (including siblings like his big brother) were not allowed into the NICU. We instead did a session at home once they all arrived home.

He was a pretty chill little dude, and nicely adjusting to life with an active big brother. I love big brother’s shirt here, that says, “Everyone loves a big brother” 🙂

Mom and dad said he was doing an amazing job adjusting to sharing the spotlight, and I must say, they did a really good job of tag-teaming and still making him feel important.

This little guy made the cutest reflex smiles during his sleep! He didn’t seem to mind all the chaos around him, with his older toddler brother playing with lots of toys.

And he was quite alert for part of our session, giving us the cutest, most curious expressions!

This is one of the newborn photo sessions I did last year, and I am finally getting around to sharing the images as part of my backlog of sessions that I’m now sharing. I’ve since photographed this little dude two more times; once for a six-month milestone session (the cutest!!!!) and also for family photos last fall. I will eventually get around to sharing those photos too, but it may take me a while. I’m so so grateful for clients who return over and over for photos. It is such a joy for me to watch their families grow, and to watch these kiddos get bigger. In case you’re keeping track, I’m going to try to alternate between sharing older sessions with newer sessions, because I am so far behind with sharing, that it will just totally demoralize me if I continue in chronological order. So I may share this family session next, and then I’ll go back to mom’s maternity session….at some point! Stay tuned and thanks for being here!

And finally, I also made a fusion film as a part of this session, and you can check it out here:

Welcome Hank from Yi Li Photography {Carrie Yuan} on Vimeo.

Baby / Family / sessions

Newborn baby Q’s photos at home in Seattle

March 29, 2019

What a joy for me to photograph this family for the third time, this time as they settled in at home with their newborn baby girl. They already have a precocious two and three-quarters year old who is growing into his role as big brother. I joined them in their home on a sunny Monday morning just under a week after Baby Q was born. Mom and dad are both home on leave, and were enjoying a morning with big bro at home to participate in the photo session before delivering him to daycare for the day. Oh don’t you remember thinking that your older kid definitely needed to be at daycare MORE after your new baby arrived? I sure did! In fact, I think we even signed my oldest up for MORE days of daycare than she was previously attending! They told me they were both looking forward to enjoying March Madness while on leave!!

Since I’m no longer in the baby season of life, it’s so fun for me to meet families that are still growing. I love hearing about the personalities of these little people, amazingly already apparent after being Earth-side for less than a week. Mom and dad say baby girl is pretty chill, and I’m so happy for them. That’s exactly what you need in a second child, and I hope she continues to be a laid-back kiddo.

What baby girl doesn’t have is her mother and big brother’s distinct shade of red hair. She has more of a dark brown hair color similar to dad. I asked if big brother’s hair was his current shade when he was born, and mom said yes! He came out with bright red hair! I like to think that she’s waving “Hello!” in the photo below!

I made this photo of mom sitting in the chair feeding her baby girl a bottle because when I saw her sitting there, I was suddenly transported back to my rocker and allllllll of the hours I spent sitting in it feeding my first baby. I told her, “I’m going to make this photo of you because you’re going to spend a lot of time in this exact position doing this exact thing,” and one day it will be fun to show the photo to her daughter when she is grown up. Big brother seems to be adjusting really well to his newborn baby sister. I can tell he’s going to be a really great brother, and as he gets older will be super helpful!

The purple knit blanket and yellow/aqua blanket were made by mom and dad’s late grandmothers, so they are quite special. It’s really nice to be able to incorporate meaningful items into photos for families.

Thank you, Meg & Paul, for allowing me to document your growing family in photos! Baby Q is beautiful, and I hope you got your fill of basketball this month, as well as naps.

personal

How I quit my Facebook habit (and other random thoughts to ring in the New Year)

January 11, 2019

Hello, 2019! I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season. We stayed close to home in Seattle and enjoyed time with family and friends at home. As we welcome a new year, I’m sharing my experience with how I recently drastically reduced my social media usage. I’ve been thinking about how much time I spend on social media a lot lately. Like many of you reading this may be able to relate to, I’ve had a sense for a long time that I had an unhealthy relationship with Facebook. I was accustomed to checking it on my phone multiple times per day, and often would sit down at my desktop at home to do some work, only to be lost in my newsfeed for minutes that turned into hours. Frankly, I’m embarrassed to think about how much time I spent on Facebook. And was it bringing more joy to my life? Usually not. In fact, I believe my first-ever panic attack was a result of a video (that Vice documentary following one of the guys that participated in that white supremacist rally in Charlottesville) that I watched on Facebook about a year ago. But Facebook is not a habit designed to quit easily. The FOMO, little dopamine hits from each ‘like’, the networking groups, the undeniable fact that it’s the place where it’s easiest to keep in touch with soooo many of my friends, and where at any given moment of the day, I can find at least 20 of my “friends” also online, are all reasons it’s been tough for me to reduce my Facebook usage in the past. Oh, and add to that the fact that I am a business owner who maintains a social media presence on Facebook. Granted, I’ve never tried THAT hard in the past to develop more healthy boundaries for myself. Occasionally I would take a “fast” from Facebook or delete the app off my phone, but that never really led to long-term change. That is, until now. I believe I’ve finally developed a new relationship with Facebook that I’m much happier with. I’m sharing this story in case you’d like to attempt this for yourself.

This blog post specifically refers to my Facebook usage. I’m still using Instagram! And because any blog post is BORING without photos, I’m sharing some photos from inside the Amazon Spheres in Seattle. A big thanks to my friend Wenmei, who works at Digital Photography Review, a subsidiary of Amazon, who got us insider access!

This story begins at the end of September 2018. My Facebook account was one of the nearly 50 million affected in the security breach which led to Facebook logging me off. I changed my password and attempted to log back in, but then a notification popped up informing me that I had two-factor authentication turned on. In order to log back in, I needed to enter a code that would be texted to my cell phone. I waited a few minutes for the code to arrive on my phone, but it never did. Over the course of the next two months, this code never arrived! Facebook gives you a few alternatives to bypass two-factor authentication. They say you can submit a photo of a government-issued ID with your sensitive information blocked out, or you can submit a photo of yourself holding a piece of paper with a hand-written numeric code. I tried both of these methods at least three times each over the course of October and November. Facebook doesn’t tell you when you can expect a response from them, or what the next step is in trying to recover your account, or even what kind of timeframe you’d likely hear back. And as you can imagine, it’s impossible to reach a real person at Facebook. I’d submit a photo of my driver’s license and just wait, figuring there were millions of people like me who were also trying to regain access to their account, so Facebook might be kind of busy.

In the meantime, I felt slightly disoriented without access to Facebook. I tried informing my close friends that I was Facebook-less via text, email, or Instagram messenger. Overall, I did not miss the absence of the news feed in my life. I did, however, miss a small handful of photographer friends who live on the east coast who I primarily communicate with via a private Facebook group. And a few other select Facebook groups.

I spent October and November focused on client work, delivering my galleries faster than usual, and rediscovering new ways to spend time. I read more books! I read the newspaper. I found new artists and creative inspiration on Behance. I traveled to LA for the Adobe MAX creativity conference. I added to my stock portfolio. I connected with friends in real life for coffee dates, drinks, and birthday dinners. I was never able to log back onto Facebook in October and November.

By the time December rolled around, I hatched an idea to rejoin a small handful (about 5) Facebook groups. I created a new Facebook account using a different email address. And for my profile photo, I took a selfie holding a handwritten sign that reads “I’m just here for the groups. If we’re in a group together, I’ll see you in there. If not, let’s meet up for coffee IRL!” I had a few of my friends add me via my new account to the groups, and voila! I now have a very trimmed down Facebook experience. I don’t accept friend requests on this new account which minimizes my newsfeed. It’s been really been amazing. What’s super funny is that several of my friends saw that new profile of me and messaged me to ask me if I’d been hacked. 🙂

Curiously, when I opened the new for-groups-only Facebook account, it asked me to enter a mobile number, and then verify the mobile number via text. I completed that step, and ironically, doing so turned off two-factor authentication on my original Facebook account (since I added my mobile number & verified it with the new account). Now I was able to access my original account! OMG!!! But it had been two plus months without Facebook, so I had to ask myself if I really wanted to jump back on.

Honestly, I’ve been so much happier with lessssss Facebook in my life. I’ve discovered JOMO or the “joy of missing out”! I realized that I don’t really need to read every single detail shared online, and people don’t really need to hear about all of my everyday crap either. I hope that I won’t miss out on the BIG things happening in my friends’ lives, but this has given me the push to be more intentional about making connections offline. Sure, I still occasionally feel a bit of FOMO, but overall there is way more joy. I will log into my old account every other day or so, take a peek at my notifications, but mostly the draw to mindlessly spend hours scrolling is no longer there. I know how to connect with the most important people in my life, and for me, that’s enough for now.

I’m still on Instagram, which I find mostly fun and not as invasive as Facebook. And I’ve been loving the app Marco Polo for exchanging video messages with friends. The connecting feels way more genuine and real, which I totally dig. What is your relationship with social media? The start of a new year is an excellent time to contemplate this and make a change if you feel so moved.

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And now for a few 2019 photos…

Parenting hack: SPECIAL TIME

Book rec:

What to eat this fall:

Let’s Keep in touch!