Tiny Girl Boss 5 Years In The Making

I can’t even with my titles! hahahaha. Cracking up over here editing Rayla’s 5 year birthday photos. I’m so in love with this tiny girl boss!

Long story short if you have followed my work at all you already know this spirited wonderful little human! She’s been gracing my feed for the whole 5 years of her life and even appeared before birth in not 1 but two maternity posts! haha. Amanda has been a FAITHFUL loyal client and friend. I appreciate her to the moon and back. And I’ve just LOVED watching Rayla grow up and Amanda be such an amazing mom.

Rayla directed this shoot and we rolled with it! She had a firm opinion about what we did and how we did it. And we rolled with the punches. Rayla is a tiny girl boss in the making for REAL. I love this quality!!!!! And I rewarded it with a few games of hide & seek post shoot in trade for some compliant pose ideas! haha It was well worth it. Every shot is totally adorable!!!!!!!

I thought it would be a great blog intro to talk about parenting and children and their personalities! Because as a mom and family photographer I work with kids DAILY!

So let’s get real about our children for a minute!

Parenting is HARD stuff.

Our kids form options and end up being tiny dictators and we think “what did I do wrong?”

You did nothing wrong friends!

Did you love them, did you do your best? Did you ask for forgiveness when you didn’t, did you fail forward? (aka when you fail, you look at what went wrong and try something different next time?) Well chances are you did! And then you did everything right.

Kids have their own little personalities and many times what makes them hard to parent is actually a whole bunch of strengths.

I went on a hunt one day to replace the words “difficult” “willful” “bossy” etc because I have always struggled with my child being very hard to parent. And wanting to replace my language before they became habits…

I found this chart once that said a list of positive words for negative words we often use for our difficult kiddos.

For example instead of “difficult or strong willed” I might say spirited! Although I don’t think “strong willed” is a negative word! It’s a GREAT quality to have in a society of brainwashing, crowd pleasing, and going the easy route . haha. And strong willed is such a great quality that will serve them well in thier lives making healthy and smart choices. But it’s seriously hard to parent am I right??? haha.

Some of the other replacement words I remembered were

stubborn = persistent

bossy = leader

hyper sensitive = responsive and empathetic

restless = active

impatient = passionate”

So let’s replace some of this narrative together and embrace our kids and WHO they are becoming.

Find ways to parent them that calls out qualities that will serve them well in their future. Positive redirection and mammas & dads… you have GOT this!

I am so proud of Amanda and the mom she is and who Rayla is! I love how Amanda rolls with the punches and loves on her daughter and allows her to be herself without shaming her. The whole shoot Amanda just lovingly went along with it and helped Rayla feel comfortable and loved.

I am so excited to some day photograph her high school graduation, college graduation, and maybe even a wedding and branding content! hahaha I’m planning ahead to be in this little ladies life FOREVER.

Okay so enjoy these adorable photos!!!!!

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