our day in the spotlight

I have always loved photos and the moments in time that they capture.

Having children really awakened a passion for photos

in my bid to record and remember every single one of their quirks and charms.

This year the Me & Mine project was started

and I've noticed my mindset change,

and instead of just recording my beautiful babies,

I've been making more and more attempts to record us as a family.

So when Julia Boggio of Julia Boggio Studios fame

(and also of I Carried A Watermelon fame

and 'that' Dirty Dancing first dance fame)

contacted me to ask if we would be interested in coming into the studio

to have a family shoot,

I took a deep breath, excitedly typed a response

and then waited a while to send it so I didn't look like a total geek.

In August, the kiddos, the hubby and I

travelled to Boggio Studios in Wimbledon

ready to have our shoot.

Excited, and a little bit nervous.

I was keen to see how the shoot was going to work,

but completely unsure what to expect at the same time.

Within seconds of coming into the studio

it was clear we were going to be in safe hands.

After a brief chat about what we wanted

and the kind of props we might like,

the beautiful boy promptly started the shoot

by running into the shooting space

with a vintage tennis racket.

From that moment on it was quite clear that the kids were going to run this shoot

and it honestly could not have worked better.

Our photographer Stefan chatted with both children constantly,

he sang songs with them, played games, used puppets to keep their attention.

He took their lead with regards to set ups to try out,

moving from one set up to another really quickly so they didn't get bored.

He let our slightly over-excited toddler play,

encouraging him to have fun

and photographing the results.

He gave my husband and I just enough direction,

that we knew what we were doing but still felt relaxed.

Our hours shoot was over so fast,

which is surely a good sign that we had a good time.

A week later we were back at the studio

(without children on this occasion)

to look through the photos which he had captured.

With music playing

and our beautiful children up on a big screen,

I was actually stunned at how many lovely photos there were

and at just how gorgeous we all looked.

The whole experience was absolutely awesome

and we are so thrilled with the results.

We can't rate our experience highly enough.

The kids had a blast

and we have some beautiful photos to show for it.

But then I think the photos speak for themselves really . . .

Photographs of my beautiful family

just being together and being us.

This photo just makes me so very proud!

Photographs that capture this exact moment in time.

A crazy, cheeky toddler . . .

. . . and a cuddly, smiley bubba.

Images of my best boys

and their amazing, playful relationship.

The little lady, future photographer getting in some practise.

(I could have spent all day playing with the huge variety of fun props they had.)

My beautiful boy, the rockstar.

(I mean, seriously, I can't even tell you how much he loves his photo of himself.

And the whole scene was created in post production . . . WOW!)

The girlies . . .

and the boys . . .

. . . just doing what we do best;

being together.

And having an artist with a lens capture it all for us.

Thank-you so much to everyone at Julia Boggio Studios

for the super star treatment that we received

and for the absolutely flawless service we got.

Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you.

We received this shoot and five hi-res images free of charge for the purpose of this review,

but all words and opinions are our own.