Lauri Stumph Photography Blog » Minneapolis, Minnesota based natural light newborn and children’s photographer

I’m honored announce my partnership with Lenses of Love: Hearts for Haiti, a national non-profit endeavor dedicated to helping the people of Haiti recover from the recent devastating earthquake.

I will be offering my support to organize relief services by offering both my weekend and weekday session fees for $150, of which, 100% will be donated to relief causes and support for Haiti. Funds raised though Lenses of Love will be sent directly to Kentucky Adoption Services (KAS) who will assist in relief efforts and care of the many-orphaned children of Haiti. KAS works with Brebis de Saint-Michael de L’Attalaye (BRESMA) orphanage in Port au Prince, which was damaged during the earthquake.   One-hundred percent of funds donated to KAS as ‘humanitarian aid’ is used for humanitarian aid and all Lenses of Love donations will be marked as “Haiti Relief”.    This offer is available for families that book their session by Sunday, February 14, 2010 and complete their session by April 30, 2010.

My amazing friend Sally, who is a photographer in Colorado, started Lenses of Love and I was so happy to be able to join and help out.  Everyone in a time of disaster feels the need to just ‘do something’ and thanks to Sally, I’ll be able to help out a little bit more than if I were doing this on my own.   Lenses of Love is important to me because as a parent in the process of adopting from China, it was comforting to know people cared and were so willing to help the orphanages after the devastating earthquake in China in 2008.  Although many orphans in Haiti did receive humanitarian parole and are home with their parents in the US and other countries across the world, many, including a fellow adoptive parents little boy (please view the story here) still remain in Haiti.   The orphans who remain in Haiti as well as those children who have been recently orphaned due to the earthquake are the littlest ones who need support from agencies such as KAS.

Gloomy January days don’t seem quite as dreary when some time is spent with a little one.  Thanks to Baby ‘C’’s mom and dad for stepping in for some photos too.  At this age, the interaction between baby and parents is so precious when captured…

Ok, I’m starting another photo project,  this time with a group of photographers to keep me on track!

I met some amazing women from across the country at a photography workshop last April and a bunch of us have kept in touch.    We have  weekly chats where we can run photo and business ideas past each other and our own little forum as well.  They are all so inspiring and I’m so grateful to know them all!

So, we all decided to start Project 52 (a photo a week) together with weekly challenges for each other, both creative and technical, to keep our photography fresh.   Plus, because we are all children’s photographers, it also will give us a chance to get out and shoot things other than our favorite subjects.

On with Week 1 - I’ll call it ‘chasing the light’ because I was literally chasing the light as in running down the frozen boardwalk to get some backlighting before the sun went down.  But I was too late for the effect I was specifically looking for.  Although the sun hadn’t set quite yet, the pond was a bit too low for me to catch any sunflare.  But even without that, I like it because of the warmth it has even though my hands were about to fall off.

You can follow my Project 52 here on my blog (subscribe too!) and I’ll start a folder on my facebook business page as well!  Facebook Page

1/160 @ 2.8 - ISO200 - 70mm

I am SO excited about a new product I found late last year and am now offering -  Bamboo Mounts!

I love them, I love them, I love them!  In fact, I’ve convinced Jase that we’re decorating our newly remodeled basement with all bamboo mounted photos.  (Ok, a couple canvases too because I love them *almost* as much).

Your photos are mounted on 3/4″ bamboo which is ready to hang right when I deliver it to you!  I love that it’s green, I love that’s it adds a very organic look to your space and I love the quality!