I have the most exciting, amazing, wonderful, mindblowing news for you all…………The Kelly’s are off to the US at the end of September!!!!!!!! YAHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.
Now it might not be exciting news for all of you, but my oh my, it is a dream come true for me. I have always wanted to visit America and most especially to visit “The Happiest Place on Earth”, of course I mean Disneyland. I have wanted to go to Disneyland since I was 7 years old, have dreamt about it, talked about it, hoped upon hope that one day I could go and meet “the mouse”. So to now have the opportunity to take my babies there too, and see the whole thing through their eyes, well life does not get better than that my friends.
We leave on September 28 for 3 weeks and will be visiting LA & Anaheim, San Francisco, Las Vegas and New York. We only made the decision a week and a half ago and The Singing Chef and I were sitting having a few drinks later that night, talking about how excited we are to go on this trip, and after a few more drinks, and maybe another couple, we somehow managed to buy Bruce Springsteen tickets for his concert in New York in October. So the next day it dawned on me that we might need to buy some flights and organise some accommodation and now the whole trip is being planned around Bruce, hahahaha. Trust the Kelly’s to get things the wrong way around, but that is just how we do things.
The most exciting bit was trying to find a fun way to tell the children. I wanted to make it exciting so that they would always remember when they found out. They had been home sick last Thursday and Friday and so I decided to do a treasure hunt with cryptic clues, with the clues all printed on Disney character cards (see below).

I had everything ready and was anxiously waiting for The Singing Chef to get home so I could surprise them with this little game. It’s funny how slowly time moves when you are waiting. They were just so cute, squealing and running from one clue to the other. I made the clues a little tough actually so many hints were needed. Finally the last clue led them to a Hangman Game that spelled out “there is a present under your pillow”:-

Once they found the present, it had another clue on top:-
Inside the present was a Disney t-shirt and their passports. I must admit they were still looking a little bewildered so I then handed them a scroll with our itinerary on it telling them all about where we would be going and what we would be doing. I swear Olivia jumped around for an hour (just like Tigger, hehe) and Fraser was really excited too but maybe not as crazy as Olivia. Their faces when they read that there were only 101 more sleeps (we are now down to 96) were just priceless. I swear watching them enjoy that game and their excitement once they found out was so perfect, I barely need to go on the holiday, it really was one of the most wonderful moments ever. The trip will just be the icing on the cake.
Here they are in their new t-shirts…




Whew, I got tired just reading all of that myself, haha. It certainly is not an itinerary for the faint hearted. I am sure we will be dragging those kids around near the end but you just gotta pack as much in as you can right??? I can’t wait.
So that is my news. So much to organise and do and decide and stress about, and juggle this great business of mine and my family and friends, the next 3 months sure are going to be interesting. I don’t have to tell you what this trip away is going to do to my schedule in September/October. It will really limit how many sessions I can offer from September until the end of the year so if anyone reading this was considering booking a session before Christmas, please do it soon because I really will only have limited spaces this year. But I’m not going to stress about it, I can only do what I can do, and in the mean time, I will be having Disney dreams, hehe.
Sweet sweet babe. Gorgeous images.
Gorgeous work lisa, what a beautiful looking baby. Love them all could not pick a favourite, they are all gorgeous, Mum and Dad will be thrilled!!
Thanks Lisa - the shots look amazing - can’t wait to see them all!!!!
You captured everything that is wonderful and precious about a newborn. Fantastic images!
These are adorable Lisa. I love the closeup shot of the hands and the little legs.
Love her sweet perfection! 2nd to the last peeking shot is divine. Beautiful (as always) Lisa!
ooo, love the rug shot (beautiful work, Mom) and that hint o’ smile from the wee one. Your black and whites are so yummy, Lisa.
You always capture such pure raw emotion when you photograph families. I love that I feel like I am there so to speak as you can feel the love with them, especially with mom.
such a sweet lil bundle…perfect lighting
These are all perfection!!! Love the first one and the hands/feet/belly shot is so cool!! Beautiful baby!
Sigh the one with mom is just perfection. The love she has for her newborn baby is just so visible in that portrait. Just simply beautiful portraits ………..as always!