When people gift photography it always brings my heart happiness.  I have known Valerie for years and I was so happy to hear from her just before Christmas when she had an idea.  Her sweet baby grand-daughter was going to be in town and she wanted to do a secret surprise photo session.

Little Claire lives with her mom and dad out of state.  Her mama was going to be at a ballroom dancing competition so Claire was lucky enough to spend the weekend with her grandparents here in Colorado.  Valerie wanted to do a photo session with Claire to surprise her daughter for Christmas.  So we schemed to make the session during Claire’s weekend visit to Colorado.

Can you believe that Claire’s mama is a REALLY good ballroom dancer.  She even won second place last year while she was 8 months pregnant.  Isn’t that amazing!?

Now let’s talk about this beautiful little girl.

She is older now but at the time of these photos she was about 10 months old.  She was starting to crawl but not super fast yet, which made my job easier.  Mobility always makes the babies happier, but harder to photograph!

At this age babies can sometimes be a little wary of ladies with big black cameras so it was no surprise that Claire was a little bit stoic for our session.  Even if she isn’t smiling, Claire is an absolute beauty!

Those baby blues are unbelievable.

It was a little chilly that day but that wasn’t anything an adorable leather and fur jacket couldn’t fix.

The cutest thing about this session.  Claire had JUST learned how to wave the day before from her grandpa.  So it was perfect when she started waving during our session.  A great memory of her Colorado weekend with her grandparents.

I am sure that Claire’s mom and dad were completely shocked when they saw these pictures on Christmas Day!  I wish I could have been there.  If it would have been me, I would have bawled my little eyes out.

Thanks for allowing me to be in on the best Christmas gift ever Valerie.  I hope your daughter (and someday little Claire) cherishes these photos!  And I sure hope that I get to photograph this beauty again some day!

Are you dying to see more cute babies this age?  I have you covered!  Check out my 8 month session Ezra with or my sweet session with Adelaide.