Christina McGuire | Novi, Michigan | Portrait & Lifestyle Photographer

(almost) seven

2016-02-08T11:30:00.001-05:00

A part two of two in a way, just a couple years apart. Otherwise known as the shoot before the leaves fall and the baby teeth fall out. Sniff, sniff, sighhhhh..

She chose the outfit, the park, and pretty much every single pose ;)

Happy 7th birthday, my sweet valentine. You are as beautiful inside as you are out, and you make my heart so full. xoxo

♥ ♥ ♥

merry christmas

2015-12-23T15:47:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas from ours to yours!

drink the wild air

2015-12-08T11:31:00.000-05:00

Live in the sunshine.
Swim the sea.
Drink the wild air.
-RALPH WALDO EMERSON

gotr girl

2015-11-22T15:50:00.000-05:00

happy halloweekend

2015-10-29T15:10:00.000-04:00

dear tooth fairy

2015-10-26T16:19:00.003-04:00

★ ★ ★

the most wonderful time of the year

2015-08-05T22:24:00.000-04:00

Summer swim season: our Christmas in July. ♥

I swear I do occasionally photograph my kids' other sports ;)... they just rarely make an appearance here. Soccer, I'm forever a couple seasons behind in editing. Dance, by the time my OCD has mastered the perfect recital bun x 2, there's little time left to document them. And basketball? Two words: fluorescent light. Ick.

So summer swimming is where it's at: my camera + my heart. An every-day-for-6-weeks-rain-or-shine throwback to my own glory days. I'm so grateful they love it too.

This year was my youngest's swim team debut. Two months ago, I wasn't certain she'd make the length of the pool without stopping. Bwahahahaha, silly mommy. She showed me...

first holy communion

2015-05-13T10:15:00.000-04:00

✝ ✝ ✝

fall has sprung

2015-03-27T09:07:00.000-04:00

As the snow continues to fall, and we (impatiently!) wait on spring...
Thought I'd catch up on a few from last fall.

Even though I'm no longer taking on family clients, I will forever have a personal bucket list to shoot -- and a mommy/daughter session is now checked off, thanks to 2 beautiful friends. ♥♥

you can't win em all...

2015-02-09T20:30:00.000-05:00

Daddy-Daughter Dance 2015. One "just one more picture!" too many.

my kind of town

2015-01-15T08:47:00.000-05:00

(at my kind of pace, 8 months late...)

My New Year's resolution is to chip away at my backlog of editing + get photos off the computer/into albums. Same as it was in 2014. And 2013. And... well perhaps my resolutions are better suited for Groundhog Day. At any rate, today while chipping, I stumbled upon the girls' first big-city getaway last spring, and realized I never blogged back then. So let's pretend I just returned from this superfun windy city weekend, k?

from our (extended) family to yours...

2014-12-23T11:49:00.000-05:00

sick day

2014-11-12T10:24:00.000-05:00

happy halloweekend

2014-11-01T21:47:00.000-04:00

little girl, big world

2014-10-10T13:30:00.002-04:00

Better late than never... her kindergarten portraits.

Somehow, two years have passed since her big sister's shoot.
New home, new school, but the same level of excitement from a 5-year-old ready to take on the world...
She's so proud to call these grounds hers (the hands in the air, this-all-belongs-to-me-now pose? all her doing).
And I'm so proud to call this girl mine.

game face

2014-09-19T18:52:00.001-04:00

bye bye baby, baby goodbye

2014-09-04T10:32:00.000-04:00

< insert here: any-and-every-cliche-about-the-baby-of-the-family-starting-kindergarten >
But by 6am, she was excited enough for the both of us...

Yep, I ugly-cried. Intermittently, for 4 hours.
But then...

Not only did she come back to me (still smiling!)...
But she came back with a flower that she'd picked for me at recess.

She'd thought about me.
Even if only for a teeeeeny tiny fraction of the time that I'd thought about her.
It was enough. ♥

the faster they fly

2014-08-28T00:33:00.000-04:00

Summers--
How is it that the older they get, the faster they fly?
Soaking up every last minute...

the clearing

2014-08-13T17:26:00.000-04:00

glory days

2014-08-05T13:57:00.000-04:00

Anatomy of a Swim Meet: the recap is pretty spot-on and makes me smile. A crazypants kid swimmer myself, I went on to coach during my college years, and this summer I've finally made the transition to swim mom -- hands down, the best role yet. Not only because she's now the one in the water on those chilly mornings (while I cozy up poolside... in a warm sweatshirt... with a hot coffee). But also because I get to be her biggest cheerleader, watching her hard work pay off meet after meet. And most of all, because I have this daily reminder of the childhood I was blessed with... the fun I had both in and out of the water all those years with my summer friends... and I'm beyond grateful that she seems to love it just as much. It kind of brings tears to my eyes. And makes my husband roll his, as he hums "Glory Da-ays". Whatev, there's volumes of VHS-taped football highlights where that came from ;)

tenacity

2014-07-31T12:22:00.000-04:00

all she wants for christmas

2014-07-14T21:44:00.000-04:00

voice

2014-07-08T10:54:00.000-04:00

Thrilled!
A couple months back, I took the leap and entered my first print competition.
Word is finally out, and I'm so honored that 3 of my images were selected as semi-finalists in the 2014 VOICE collection...

post-recital parking-lot-light

2014-06-30T22:33:00.001-04:00

Oh lovely golden hour, I've missed you.
Might just have to drag them back to this same place, same time... minus kitty whiskers.

class of 2027

2014-06-12T21:30:00.001-04:00

At least one of us is ready for kindergarten.
Sniff.
Sniff.
Sob.