arizona wedding photography ~ brenda eden photography

{April's daughter}

{April's daughter}

{Aimee and her son}

{V hunting for cascarones}

I love how seriously April and Ed's daughter took this egg hunt.

It wasn't fun and games, it was WORK and she was a champ at it.

The eggs were cascarones, confetti-filled eggs, and after she found them, she cracked them open. And took that pretty seriously too.

{Arizona Blogger Convention at the Saguaro Hotel}

Last night I got to photograph the Arizona Blogger Convention at the Saguaro Hotel in Scottsdale. 

{In a round-about way, it's because of the Valley of the Sunflowers, that I got to photograph the first event for the Phoenix Style Collective and then the AZ Blogger Convention- in a month or two, there is going to a Sunflower Picnic and a Sunflower Dinner Party - if either of those events sound like fun to you, email me at [email protected] to let me know and I will make sure you get invited. :)}

To see my first set of photos from the Conference, go to this gallery here on Dropbox or copy/paste this link into your browser. 

http://www.dropbox.com/gallery/4780490/1/AZ%20BLOGGER%20CONFERENCE%201?h=b4bfdb

You can save the images to your computer and then use them however you like.

When you use my photos for your blogs/online/facebook, could you give me credit by saying Brenda Eden took these photos and by linking back to my facebook page?

Thank you and hugs and kisses to you! This is the link for my facebook page: 

http://www.facebook.com/brendaedenphotography 

 

 The Phoenix Style Collective:

They gave away these bags from Madewell.

These girls pictured below are from Savante Salon - Stephanie, pictured on the left is the owner. The salon happens to be right down the street from my house in Gilbert - I definitely will be going there. They were applying hair color to the blogger's hair with these chalk-like pieces that you can buy at Savante Salon. If you go back and read my blog, you will see that back in February/March I was fascinated with the idea of making my hair rainbow colors. I used spray dye to paint it for a Saint Patrick's Day Parade that I was in and that was fun, but the chalk pieces seem so much better - the color is much more saturated and doesn't seem bad for your hair like the spray dye does.

I love the look of the Saguaro Hotel. I remember wandering in there when it was another hotel and the changes they have made seem really great for getting local people to come and visit the hotel, not just for out-of-town tourists. It's kinda retro, really bright, quirky, not too serious and definitely fun. Which made it pretty much perfect for the bright, fun, quirky, retro-y Arizona Blogger's Convention!

 

Interested in having me photograph you? Go HERE for more info!

{Today ~ Tonight}

Tonight I got to photograph the Phoenix Style Collective/Arizona Blogger Conference. And now I am home editing the photos.

Today was so busy. I started out the day with my friend Jennifer - we went to Aster House, the Valley of the Sunflowers, Jobot and the state capitol for an event about legislation that particularly affects women. At the Valley of the Sunflowers, Jennifer helped out by thinning the sunflowers out. I kinda didn't help out and instead went around putting sunflower transplants in coffee cups to take home and put in my garden. In this cell phone pic, I am sitting outside at Aster House on their back patio.

After all that, I came home to get ready for photographing the blogger conference.

I wanted to stay longer tonight at the conference, but I had go home to irrigate - my dad has passed away - but when he was alive, he planted a hundred trees at this house. I just went outside to turn the water in and while I was out I heard the Great Horned Owls that live in the trees around here - there are at least three of them; I've seen three at once - but from the noise they make at night, I think there are probably more.

Outside the air is so lovely and I am so tired and also a little sad I can't be in 3 or 4 places at once. Now that I am home from the AZ Blogger Conference and I've done the irrigation, I've considered going back out since tonight is my friend Amy's birthday party, my friend Suzie's fundraiser for Aids/LifeCycle and my friend-bride Heather's book club - and this month was poetry month and I was going to bring Mary Oliver poems to contribute, because I love her work. But I guess I will be staying in, because I am more than a little exhausted, even though today and tonight were really, really, really fun.

Here's a photo that Courtney McEntire took of me at the event tonight. Thanks Courtney!

Joanne amongst the hollyhocks

We went from Lux to Idylwilde to across the street from the Ellis-Shakleford Mansion to the Boutique at the Growhouse to the Salt River in Phoenix for Joanne's photos. These are from at the Growhouse. Luckily the Growhouse was open and we got some relief from the heat.

I love the hollyhocks and the light and Joanne's pink dress and how the fabric of her dress catches the light - I have this slight obsession with pink lately - and oh! I love how these came out. :)

Go read Joanne's blog! 

{Egg Hunt}

I'm trying different ways of processing with this image, trying to give it a creamy pink cast. I like the way it turned out.

{Starring this girl!}

Here are a few photos starring the Reece family daughter.  

When I am photographing two and three year olders I know I will be running like crazy. Having to run a lot last weekend was probably a good thing - I had no idea what was coming in the week ahead -  these past few days I kinda knocked myself out with exercise. Not on purpose, it just kind of happened. I went on a really long hike up in Flagstaff with my cousin, and part of it was down into a canyon and back out again. You know, at Flagstaff elevation. And then I played/practiced frisbee for 4 hours. Yes, 4 hours. And then I went to a dance practice for about an hour and a half. This is only the second weekend my mom hasn't had to be at Mayo all weekend long since sometime in February, so I think I am making up for lost time by doing a ton of stuff these past couple weekends.

So, anyways, I ran around like crazy last weekend photographing people, but it was nothing compared to the last few days. I am wondering if I will be dying tomorrow.

Maybe I will, maybe I won't. Either way, if I took Easter egg hunt/portrait session pics of you and your kids the last couple weeks, you will be getting them very soon. :)

This first image is processed so differently than how I normally process. Usually I try to go for a very natural look - ideally I would like it to look like 35 mm film images. But to "save" this image I had to over process it and over saturate it to get the image. I love how it turned out. I think it looks like a poster for this girl's life!

The next one is of her collecting eggs. The light was so perfect! 

The final image is of her and her whole family and it really didn't take anything to get her dancing so cutely, just me saying Dance, Dance, Dance!

{After the Easter Egg Hunt}

Happy girl.

Later that night, her mom texted me to tell me that this girl's favorite part of her day was when I chased her with my camera. :)

More photos soon of the egg hunt and confetti eggs.

{Helen + Kent + kids}

I met up with Helen and Kent to get photos for them and their kids.

Here's their daughter crawling.

Intense glowy winter morning light - I love it.

I was a little concerned the light would be too bright, but we went to this place where cottonwood trees grow and it was beautiful and worked out perfectly.

Their son loves numbers and was making them out of blades of grass. Here's the number seven.

And here's the number eight.

Momma's!

I try to make you laugh when I am taking pictures of you. And sometimes, if I have had a LOT of coffee, I'm pretty good at it.

Thanks Helen and Kent!

{Kent and his daughter}

{Helen + Kent's daughter}

She was crawling towards me and my camera and I had to keep moving back. Usually I have to chase babies when I take their photos, but it felt like she was chasing me. 

{The Bickford Family}

 I met up with Bonnie and David Bickford and their daughters one shimmery, golden December day to get photos for them.

I first met the Bickfords at these community dinners that I go to. David writes two blogs, one about hiking and one about restaurants along the Light Rail Line. Since I both love the Light Rail and I love food, I find his food blog delightful. It's fun to read about places that I have never heard of and also fun to read about places that I have visited and see his take on them. I need to read his hiking blog more this year, especially since I would like to go hiking more in the new year. They are both such good resources if you live in the Phoenix area.

Here is David's guide to good eating along the Light Rail Line:  PHX Rail Food 

And here is his guide to less traveled hikes in the Phoenix Metropolitan Area: PHX Trail Dude

You can follow David here on Twitter: @exit2lef

*********************************

This is how blue the sky was that day.

And this is how cute this family is.

Oooh, those sparkly eyes!

Beautiful momma, beautiful daughters:

I love getting images like this one. Eyes closed or cast down. Not sure why.

I think it's because of something like this: it takes me, the photographer, out of the equation and it becomes just an image about the two them.

I absolutely-absolutely-absolutely love how the sunshine falls and floats into this one. Did I say I LOVE it? I really, really do.

This one (below) is almost an outtake, but it cracks me up. Look at her cute little face!

This is one of my most favorite photos that I have ever taken. I love how the shimmering trees frame Bonnie and her daughter. And I just love the sweetness of the image, how her baby fits into the curve of Bonnie's neck.

Another one of my absolute favorites:

More shimmer. See her batman shirt? She was going to a Batman birthday party after the photoshoot. Actually it sounded like they had quite the weekend ahead of them, I seem to remember hearing about swimming and about Christmas parties and a show at a local theatre and even a stop thrown in to go to a picnic amidst sunflowers.

My FAVORITE image of them as a family. I think this one really tells a story for the youngest daughter about what it's like to be the little sister and the baby of this family. 

This is the type of image (the one below) that I always try to get for holiday and Christmas cards. Everyone looking at the camera and all so adorable. When I review all the photos I've taken it's a total sense of relief to realize I got one like this. 

One of my tricks to get babies to look at the camera is to start (literally) yelling Here Kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty (as loud as I possibly can). I have no idea why I started this, but I did it for one baby one time and it worked better than any other trick, so I do it for all the other babies I come across and it works more often than it doesn't. So if you are a photographer, I highly recommend my trick. You just have to be prepared to say Here Kitty, Kitty realllly loud and reallllly fast in order to get their attention.

Turns out the Bickfords have cats like I do. I got the girls to tell me their cats' names and I seem to remember there was a Pineapple, a Mango and a Nutmeg, and some others but I could be getting those names wrong. The Bickfords and I have the same number of cats and no, I won't be telling you how many that is. LOL.

UPDATE: Not Pineapple; Peppercorn. All of their cats have food names. There's a cat a named Vanilla and the names do correspond with their appearance.

I use that piece of cardboard as a reflector for light, but the girls found it to be a fun toy.

Flying baby:

Girl in the woods:

Thank you Bickford family for having me create photos for you guys! It was such a pleasure and delight! :) :) :)

{Kim and family}

Christmas portraits on the ASU campus for Kim and her cute family. :)

{The Monroe Hotel in downtown Phoenix}

Walking around in downtown Phoenix the other day using the tilt shift lens that I rented, I came across this old building that is being turned into a boutique hotel. From reading about it online, I found out that it was a bank building constructed in 1931. I wish so much that there was a way to sneak in and explore. While I would love to spend the night there when the beds are covered with sumptuous comforters and the walls have been plastered with the swankiest wallpaper and there's mints on the pillows, I would just as much like to climb up to the top floors where the pigeons roost and explore room to room. Across the street from this old building is the glass and steel Chase Bank building. The sun hits the Chase Bank building and reflects it back on the Monroe Hotel in the most beautiful way. I would love to photograph people in front of the Monroe Hotel when the light is shining off the bank. It could be super-glamourous and lovely looking! :)