A Little Birdie

I have a photo shoot today with a lovely family who I had the pleasure of photographing last year when their daughter was just a few months old.

Seriously, how cute are those cheeks! And those eyes. Gorgeous.

I love the tenderness of this mother-daughter shot, so sweet!

In preparation, I crafted this lens birdie. If there's one thing I've learned from previous experiences photographing little ones, it's that they need a reason to look at the camera. I'm hoping this guy does the trick! What's especially fun is that when you use the autofocus, the birdie does a little dance. Hehe.

It cost me very little to make, since I had the scrap denim from another sewing project. I just had to purchase some felt, elastic and puffy paint (~$4 total). I honestly can't even remember how I made it, so I'm not going to try to explain it here. If you're interested in making your own, I suggest looking at sewing instructions for making a hair scrunchie (be sure to measure the elastic to fit around your lens!) and then just get creative when you go to cut out some felt for wings, eyes, feet, and a nose. I stitched on all of the felt, but if you have a hot glue gun, that would work too! I used the puffy paint to make the dots in the center of the eyes. Et voila!

Now if the sun would come out today, that would be icing on the cake!