If you know, you know.
May is not a month. May is a fever dream disguised as a calendar. Recitals, performances, end-of-year parties, field days, teacher appreciation weeks, spring sports playoffs–the list goes on. And it happens Every. Single. Year. I don’t know who approved this schedule, but I have questions.
By the time we hit the last week of May, my color-coded calendar is less a planning tool and more a cry for help formatted in Google Sheets.
But then something magical happens. Summer.
Slow mornings with nowhere to be. Breakfast at 10am that nobody is eating over a sink. Days that don’t require cross-referencing three different apps just to figure out where everyone needs to be and when. Summer is the exhale after a very, very long held breath.
And honestly? It is my absolute favorite time to photograph families.
Here’s why: everyone shows up differently in summer. The kids are loose and laughing. Nobody is tired from a full school day, nobody is antsy to get to practice, nobody is wearing a uniform they’ve had on since 7am.
Parents aren’t mentally running through tomorrow’s to-do list. There’s nowhere to rush off to. You can just…be together.
That kind of relaxed, unhurried energy shows up in photos in the best possible way.
Add in long golden-hour evenings–that warm, glowy light that makes every outdoor setting look like it was designed specifically for your family–and summer sessions have this quality that’s hard to replicate any other time of year. We’re not squeezing into a 45-minute window before soccer. We’re actually watching the light change together and just enjoying it.
Some of my favorite sessions I’ve ever shot have happened on an ordinary Tuesday evening in July, in a field or a park or someone’s backyard, with kids who were sunburned and happy and completely unselfconscious about it.
That’s the magic of summer. No back-to-school stress looming. No holiday pressure for the perfect greeting card. No matching pajama energy. Just your people, a lot of sunshine, and light that makes everyone look like the best version of themselves.
Maycember will end. Summer is coming. And it is going to be so good.
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