February is such a special month because it was the month that we were gifted with our son. Therefore, majority of this month was focused on our son Bryden turning O-N-E!!!! Now February is usually a month of snow showers and icy roads, but we were fortunate enough this year to see blue skies and warm weather! Having had such great weather we did a lot of wagon walks around the block and play dates at the park. We didn’t always do these things by ourselves though. Throughout the month I got to babysit the most adorable and sweetest little girl- McKenna. The wagon rides and park time became more fulfilling with McKenna along for the ride. My favorite part of being outside with Bryden is literally seeing the joy from his face from embracing the outdoor air. He could be outside all day if we allowed him to be which makes me so excited for when he is a little older to take him on adventures and camping!
Because he loves being outside so much I knew I wanted to take him up to the mountains for his 1-year photos and with sunshine, his dog and open terrain to go anywhere he wanted was perfect. It wasn’t until this session that I realized just how big he really was. Makes me sad to know that my baby is growing up so fast, but it truly has been fun to watch him grow over the past year. Chinook Pass is the backyard to Yakima and I know we will have many more trips that way; plus I could watch Bryden and Sadie (our boxer dog) all day long. Sadie is so protective of him and always has to be close by to him and well of course he just adores her! Always gives her lovin’ as we like to call it. You will see some real good smooches from Sadie during his birthday party and yes it happens quite often throughout the day.
For Bryden’s first birthday we decided to throw one big birthday bash with friends and family. I was so thankful to have had my sister-in-law take photos for me during the day because if not I wouldn’t have had any of those photos. I thought for sure I would have been able to take some photos here and there, but let me tell you people, first birthday’s are NO JOKE! I barely had any time to relax, so having her take on that task makes me very appreciative. Now I am not sure how every other parent is on their kids first birthday, but I was so excited for the cake smash! He loves throwing his food and messing with it, so I was certain the cake smash was going to be great. Well I sad to find out that I was most definitely wrong 🙁 Bryden was gagging before he had even stuck his finger in any of the frosting ha-ha So what did I do? I took his hands and shoved them into the frosting to show him he could be messy. What did he do? Yep, you guessed it….cried. Maybe next year we can try a cake smash or maybe even at 18 mos we can try it again. Aside from all the chaos it seriously was a special day having all of those people that are a part of Bryden’s life in one area. We are SO BLESSED that Bryden has such amazing people in his life.

It was quite a busy month with organizing Brydens party, but I was able to slip away one weekend and venture to Deception Pass. Visiting this beautiful place just confirms why I love living in WA. There is so much beauty in this state. I love photographing water + travel + adventure all of which are a big aspect in my branding. I will be posting more from Deception Pass in a later post because majority of the photos are from the stylized shoot we did at Deception Pass State Park. Next month I will have a handful of more adventure/travel photos to include in my month in review post, so stay tuned!