I get asked often what got me into photography. It’s an easy explanation….my kids did.

Like a lot of moms, when my kids were babies, I couldn’t take enough pictures of them. My phone could only do the job so well….I mean, I’m pretty sure I had the original iPhone at the time, being that it was 2008. I bought my first camera, (a Nikon D90) when my daughter was 7 months old. Then I had to teach myself how to use it! It was a learning curve, for sure…but I remember trying to soak up as much information as I could from online tutorials, and a fabulous community/website called, Clickin Moms. Once I finally figured out how to take my camera off manual, I was hooked! In fact, if you want a little laugh, you can see the very first pictures I took while off the automatic setting here. That was 11 years ago!

I loved sharing pictures of my kids to our family blog. That was back when almost every mom had a blog and it was more of a lifeline to the outside world than social media has now become for many of us. After a few years, I had a neighbor ask me to take her daughter’s newborn pictures. I was terrified, but also overjoyed to try my hand at something I loved. You can see that very first newborn session from almost 9 years ago here. And so began Melissa Parsons Photography.

When I look back at that first newborn session, I brace myself a little bit if I’m being honest, because….there is so much technically with those pictures that was “wrong”, but what I do love is that I can see those candid sweet moments I was seeking out even then…not really having a clue as to what I was “supposed” to be doing, but knowing what made my heart leap.

Nowadays, my business is primarily made up of newborn clients, and young families. My kids are well into school age, both tweens now. It’s rare that I take out my camera to capture them now, outside of a sports game…I mean the phones have improved quite a bit over the last 10 years! A few years ago when I would ask to take pictures of them (for holiday cards, etc), they would groan a bit, but after a bribe could be usually brought around. This year, they asked me….”mom, when are you going to take our pictures again?” I realized it had been so long since we had done that, that they actually wanted them! We joked the whole time through it.

Tween photos can be tricky. Gone are days of tickle wars and even fart jokes to get them to laugh, but a good ribbing…and sometimes even dropping something inappropriate does the trick…anything to get their real smiles and smirks. These are the photos I love.