taisia gordon photography

Laura + Corey. Jefferson City wedding photographer.

After their engagement session I was looking forward to Laura and Corey's wedding.  They did not disappoint! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Father's Day

I'm lucky enough to meet a lot of caring, fun Dads - both at photo sessions with young families and at weddings where fathers give their daughters away.  It makes me realize how quickly it all passes and how important father's are to their children.  Here's to my Dad and to my husband, the amazing man who makes my daughters some of the luckiest little girls in the world...

 

 

 

 

For Father's Day the girls helped me create a crazy little video of them in action.  Set to one of my favorite songs - "I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz.

Father's Day Dance from Taisia Gordon on Vimeo.

A recent favorite

I wanted to share some images from a recent session.  With a newborn and independent 3 year old this session could have gone a lot of ways.  The children were marvelous and we ended up with so many great images.  It's one of my new favorites.

I want to sit in this chair, in this window-lit nook, with a good book and that sweet baby on my lap.  Doesn't that sound like a perfect afternoon?

 

I think this next image should be in a Pottery Barn Kids catalog. 

 

 

 

Every room in their house had great light and colors.  Anywhere I turned could literally be a perfect spot.  That includes their bed.  I love bed shots particularly for families.  For my own family we spend a lot of time with the girls in bed reading books, telling stories, tickling, snuggling, and just staying close in general.

 

 

At the end of the session I was standing in the kitchen getting ready to say my goodbyes when little "H" crawled under the table.  I gasped and swung my camera around.  She's full of dreams and sparkle. 

 

Hot Mamma.

I was lucky enough to photograph Blair and Jesse last year first for their amazing engagment session and then their wedding.  Now they're expecting a new addition to their family and I was lucky enough to see them again at this exciting time in their lives.  It had been a rainy morning but as Jesse reminded me so was their engagement session.  It may have been wet but sparks were still flying between Jesse and Blair.  Those two just know how to work it.

 

Isn't Blair beautiful?  They make this so easy for me.  P.S. Blair, please teach me how to put on makeup.  I'm 34 but still don't know how you can do that so perfectly.

 

At the end of the session Jesse suprised Blair with an early Mother's Day gift.  He's going to be a good dad.  Beyond the fact that he already seems to know he must pay proper attention to Mother's Day he's just going to be good dad.  A really, really, good, good dad.

 

This next shot is my most favorite maternity shot ever. 

They wanted their fur-babies in some of the images and this was one of the first shots I took that day.  Look at that sweet dog's face!  It's like she realizes that in a few months her gig is up, a new baby will rule the roost, and so for a short while longer she'd like to be the center of attention.  Or maybe she just knows how to work it too.

JJ + Julie. Jefferson City wedding.

 

As much as I love off-the-wall images I also love simple, traditional portraits.  And this is one of Julie and JJ that I love.  Julie and JJ were married a few weeks ago during a slightly blustery and overcast spring day.  It didn't dampen the mood at all.  Julie is exuberant...

 

JJ is more subdued and during their marriage ceremony the priest spoke of how they were a perfect compliment to each other. 

 

The thing that impressed me most about their wedding day was how much thought they put into the happiness and comfort of their friends and family.  Yes, it was a day for Julie and JJ but it was also a day for them to show the people they love how much they care about them.  That is what made their wedding so unique, elegant and heartfelt.

 

JJ works for Jefferson City Parks so it was very fitting for them to head to the Capital and Governer's garden for some portraits.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The OTHER cool thing about Julie and JJ is their story that began way before they were even born.  I hope I get this right... 

 

 Julie's dad (pictured above) worked at MoDOT for over 40 years.  One day about 40 years ago a guy came in to work and Julie's dad knew just the right girl who was a little quiet and shy to set him up with.  This new guy and this cute, shy girl hit it off (pictured below), got married, and ended up having JJ.  Years later, Julie and JJ meet only to discover that her dad introduced his parents to each other.  Isn't that crazy and wonderful and romantic??!! 

The videographer for their wedding put together a slideshow of images and footage and showed this at the reception.  In the slideshow Julie and JJ talked about how they met, what they meant to each other, how they became engaged.  It showed images from their engagement photo session that we did a few months ago along with other pictures of them growing up and the time they spent together. The reactions to the slideshow were priceless...

 

If anyone is in the market for a videographer I highly recommend Jordan Berry.  I've worked with LOTS of videographers.  Most are fine.  Some I'll admit I groan inwardly when I see I have to work with them again.  But Jordan was a complete breeze to work with.  I could tell he genuinely cared about the couple and wanted to make the best video he could for them.  You can see Julie and JJ's slideshow and their same day video that he created here http://www.berrygoodvideo.com/julie_jj/.  You can even see me bossing everyone around.  Just ignore the part at the very end where I'm flipping my hair to gather into a ponytail.  I'm not doing this for anything other than to note that Jordan's the first videographer I've actually enjoyed working with although between him, his assistant, me, and Katie (my assistant) all dressed in black I kind of felt like we were going for the Men In Black tryouts or something.  mental note: I've got to start wearing some other colors to weddings.

Ok, finally...  At the reception they had this great idea to hand out glo-sticks to everyone and play techno music.  The guests loved it and it really got everyone moving!!

 

Julie and JJ, thanks for the smokin' hot time! 

this is my legacy

I can only hope that as my girls grow I'm able to teach them things they couldn't learn from anyone else.  Things that I learned as a child and that have stayed with me through the years.  Things that I hope will shape them and influence who they become as people.   

A few days ago I fulfilled this dream when I taught them the fine art of sticking whirlygigs to your nose (aka helicopters, or samaras if you're lucky enough to have a forester for a husband).

 

Falling behind

I've been falling behind on my blogging.  I have so many great sessions to share along with fun pictures of life in general.  I'm often short on words though so I think I'll just keep it short and sweet and hit the pictures.

First, these kids were so adorable and fun.  They made me smile.  I could have played with them all afternoon.

 

 

 

 

 

I'll be shooting Laura and Corey's wedding next month and I'm really looking forward to it.  She's the perfect combination of gorgeous and sweet and I can't wait to take her bridal pictures.  Corey's cool and will let me pose him however I want to even though I can tell he'd rather be somewhere, anywhere else ;-)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

fun family

This is one of those great families from Boone County.  People like this are why I can't stop making trips to the Columbia area - fun, cool, and open for anything.  *sigh*  I love that town.

Two little guys.  Sooooo stinkin' cute.

  

I love this next shot.  I can't even say for sure why but it just feels real and happy to me.   

  

  

Here's another reason why I miss Columbia.  All the good running trails.  Beth here is training for the Chicago marathon this Fall.  Go Beth!!! 

     

Oh, the eyes!

Hey!  I'm finally back.  Actually....I've been back from my glorious vacation for a couple of weeks but am finally BACK into the groove of normal life.  I'm no longer cursing the fact that I can't still wear my flip-flops outside and have finally shed the 5 pounds I gained thanks to eating dessert every day while on the beloved vacation.  At some point I'll post some pictures from the trip but there are so many and I haven't even started to go through them all yet.

In the meantime, I couldn't get over this little guys' eyes from a session this past weekend.  They were so big and beautiful and caught the light perfectly.  There are huge catchlights and his eyes just shine.  And he's a total sweetie so a fun session!

 

  

  

  

  

  

  

 

Warm weather here I come!

The Mr. and I are heading away for a little warm weather fun.  I am sooo looking forward to this get-away.  While the girls hang out at Auntie's house I will be sleeping uninterrupted for 6 straight nights!!  I am giddy with excitment at this prospect.  Combined with warm weather and fresh sea air I imagine I will feel like a brand new woman when it's all said and done.  The perfect thing before wedding season picks up in March! 

I'll be out of the office until Saturday the 14th.  I'll be sure to respond to all my emails as soon as I get back.  If I were savy enough I would set up an automatic "out-of-office" message.  I tried to do this and I think I emailed everyone in my inbox.  So clearly I didn't know what I was doing and I gave up.  And sorry if you emailed me two years ago about something and just received a random "I'm away from my email" message. ;-)