children

Mazzei Family | Lifestyle by Suzanne Price

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Although I love our life in the city, my heart will always be grounded firmly in the forested countryside where I grew up. My sister and her husband decided to purchase a beautiful old century home (it was once a school house) just a few miles from my parents. You pass through a covered bridge, by fields of golden hay bales shimmering in the sun, and turn into a gravel driveway along which you will find a white guardian goose and the happiest, friendliest dog you ever will meet. 

Lindsey and Chris are true homesteaders, cultivating hops, pears, plums, peaches, and apples. Raising chickens for their eggs and soon, milking goats. My nephews, their beautiful children, run around the property barefoot, learning the names of flowers, helping in the garden, and picking fruit as it ripens. It seems to me they are receiving such a precious education in their pre-Kindergarten years. I'm always up for a visit , especially when it involves photographing this lovely bunch.  

Elias | newborn by Suzanne Price

Elias is the third boy for my sister Lindsey. Her first two children were delivered with the help of an epidural and she labored quite long, but Elias had a different plan. We all watched anxiously as her due date slipped by. Our brother and sister-in-law came into town from San Francisco just to see the baby, and it was looking more and more like he was content just cooking away for a few days longer.​

Yet in the wee hours of Sunday morning Lindsey started laboring. . . quickly. With contractions two minutes apart they fled for the hospital, 30 long miles away. As they pulled into the emergency room driveway, Lindsey's body was ready to push. Her husband Chris went in to alert the staff and grab a wheel chair, and returned just in time to catch little Elias as he wimpered his first little cries. Chris put Elias on Lindsey's stomach, ran back into the hospital, and the initially dumbfounded staff burst into action. He's completely fine and so utterly gorgeous. ​

​Fast forward a few days. Elias is all settled into his new life on the outside. He loves to be held, and putting him down for peaceful little sleeping photos just wasn't in the cards. No matter, though. In real life kids don't always do exactly what you want or expect. But if you've ever found yourself chuckling at something you should be punishing, you know that these moments are personality definers. They are true. 

Meet Samuel, Owen, and Elias. ​