pet photography – Jo McVey Photography

Afternoon Shenanigans {Hendersonville, TN Family Photographer}

So many things have happened since my last post! On March 9th, I turned THIRTY!!!! I know, I can’t believe it either. I used to think that thirty was SO old. Like, when you turn thirty, you are a legit adult. I mean, being a wife and mother of two boys had me doing a lot of “adulting” already, but once I turned thirty it’s like I could feel my youth being sucked from me. Haha! Don’t get me wrong, I still feel ever bit as young as I always have, it just feels like I have to be more responsible now or something.

Another big thing was that we moved from our large, beautiful home into a much smaller rental house while we, Lord willing, build our dream home. Our new house is going to be everything we have always wanted in a home, and I will even have my own photography studio separate from our house! That will be such a blessing! I can’t tell you how many times I have apologized to clients because of all the toys that were scattered around, or the dishes that were left out on the counter.

Our puppy, Skye, is now a huge 73+ pound giant of a dog, and is steadily gaining between 3 to 5 pounds a week. It won’t be long before she passes up Kaylee, our St. Bernard. Here’s a snapshot of her growth so far.

Speaking of Kaylee, she and Skye had quite the play session the other afternoon. Here’s a little bit of what went down.

Well that’s just ridiculous. And could Kaylee look any more like a senior citizen? I mean, she is eight years old, but she looks at least twelve in this picture!

Grayson wanted to get in on the action.

Not sure what Kaylee is doing here. Probably gagging on a stick. Don’t worry. She’s fine.

See? What a goober.

Then there’s this precious face. I mean, how could you stay mad at a face like that?

We just love her. She’s been a great dog so far!

Grayson says she’s his dog, and loves her a lot more than Oliver does. Oliver doesn’t like when she comes up to him when he didn’t invite her. He basically likes her only on his terms. Whereas Grayson doesn’t care what she does. He just laughs and snuggles with her and tries to play. It’s so cute to watch. I’ve heard him say on many occasions, “I love you, Skye!”

Then there was the time I told him to give Skye a hug, and he did this. Haha! We’re still working on appropriate positions for hugging dogs. Luckily Skye didn’t take offense.

Oliver would much rather play with a dandelion than take pictures with our dogs. Which is fine by me. It made for some great photos!

Love these boys. I often get asked if they are twins when we’re out and about, and although they are almost 20 months apart, I feel like they’re twins most of the time. The only difference is that Grayson can communicate better than Oliver and is potty trained. Hopefully Oliver will be trained by two and a half just like his brother. So we’ve got three months to work on that. 🙂 So far he isn’t interested.

Meet Skye!!!

Yes, I know. Didn’t we just meet a new pet a couple weeks ago? You did. That was Blaze the cat, who unfortunately left home and didn’t come back about a week after that post. I’m hoping he went back to his original home, or that someone else took him in. I’m thankful that, wherever he went, we were able to get him vaccinated and neutered before he left.

But now I have a NEW adorable fur baby to introduce to you!

Her name is Skye (named by my son, Grayson, after his favorite Paw Patrol character), and she is an 8 week old English Mastiff. Well, she’s 9 weeks old now, but at the time these photos were taken, she was 8 weeks old.

She is one of the sweetest, most well mannered puppies I have ever encountered. She pretty much came to us from her breeder already potty trained. In the almost 2 weeks we’ve had her, she’s only had maybe three accidents in the house. Quite a difference from our almost eight year old St. Bernard, Kaylee, who peed in the house every 5 minutes at this age!

Speaking of Kaylee, Skye absolutely adores her!

I think she reminds her of her own mom, since she’s so big. Skye is always trying to cuddle with her or play with her, much to Kaylee’s dismay. She’s never been much of a cuddler. But Skye knows when enough is enough, and doesn’t torment her too much. I think Kaylee is happy to have a friend to play with, even though she’d never admit it.

Skye certainly loves playing with toys, and this orange stuffy is one of her favorites.

We stopped buying Kaylee toys a while ago, because she never played with them. But now that Skye has toys, Kaylee finds herself drawn to them, and is starting to love playing with them again. She’s never been great at tug-of-war, however, and if you try to grab the other end of the rope, she’ll let go, as if she’s saying, “Oh sorry, I didn’t know you wanted to play with this!”

The boys certainly love her! They’re always so excited to help me get her out of her crate, or to give her her hotdog treat when she goes into her crate! She’s still a little mouthy, you know, from being a puppy and all, so whenever she starts trying to bite on them, Grayson will yell, “No Skye! No bite!”

Another super adorable thing Grayson will say to her is, “Hi Skye! It’s me, Grayson!” And he’ll say it over and over to her, looking at her like, “Why aren’t you responding?” Haha! Maybe it’s just me, but I think it’s the cutest thing. 🙂

I’m going to try to remember to keep taking growth pictures of her every 1-2 weeks, so we can see how much she changes over the next year. At 8 weeks, she’s already 20lbs! She could get up to anywhere between 150-200lbs! Her mom is 160lbs, and her dad is 230lbs, so she’s going to be a big girl! She’ll definitely pass up Kaylee, who weighs around 95lbs.

And, of course, you knew it was coming! I couldn’t have a new baby in the house without giving her a proper “newborn” photo shoot! Doesn’t she look adorable and hilarious at the same time? I doubt she’ll even be able to fit inside this basket in a month! Maybe I should try, just to see the difference.

Here’s a closeup of her face. Isn’t she just so smushy and squishy? I even put one of my newborn headbands on her. Hehe! Ok, enough photos. I’m going to go squish that cute little face before bedtime. Stay tuned for more Skye posts, and to see how she grows!

Kitty Photo Shoot

So I was uploading some photos that have been on my camera for a while, when I look over to my left, and my cats are all gazing out the window to a beautiful sunny day. I couldn’t help myself. I had to start snapping pictures with my Sigma 30mm lens. Love that lens! It takes the best pictures ever! I don’t use it as often as I should because it has no zoom, so it’s really only good for photos where you can move your body quickly to zoom in and out as needed. Which, for me, means that I mainly only use it for portraits or close ups of objects or food. That being said, here are some of the photos I took of our kitties today. Hope you like them!

Oh, and if you like what you see……I’m available to take pictures for you too! Well, as long as you’re in the Nashville area that is. 🙂 Or in CA when I happen to be visiting. Since I’m just starting out, I can offer you beautiful pictures at next to nothing!

Lacey has such beautiful eyes.

I love this one because the green from the grass is reflecting off of her blue eyes, so it looks like her eyes are green toward the top and blue at the bottom. Such an awesome effect.

Lacey is my little poser. The other two kitties don’t cooperate with me very well and get annoyed if I have my camera in their faces for too long.

Finally got Lazarus to look at me. I had my aperture set so low that only his nose is in focus and the rest is out of focus. For those of you who don’t know many photography terms, aperture has to do with how much of the picture you want in focus. The higher the aperture, the more in focus the entire picture will be. As you can see with this photo, I had my aperture set very low so even though his eyes are only a fraction of an inch further back than his nose, they are still slightly out of focus. If I had focused on his eyes, then his nose would slightly be out of focus. Hope that makes sense.

BIG yawn! See how Lazarus’ upper canine tooth is not very sharp? I’ve always wondered how that happened.

Such a handsome boy.

Fancy wanted to get in on the picture taking action…..or so I like to believe. She is the least photogenic out of all three cats. She hates having her picture taken, and never looks at me when I want her to, but I find ways to make her do it anyway. 🙂

All three kitties looking out the window. Of course Lazarus has to ruin the picture by turning his back to me.

Fancy is beautiful when she finally lets me take her picture! She has such pretty eyes, and they reflect the green grass so well.

Hello pretty girl.

It’s like she knows she’s having her picture taken. “Here, Mom. This is my good side, and I’ll even gaze upwards for you so that my eyes are looking into the light.”

Seriously. Have you ever seen a more photogenic cat? Of course, I’m a little biased since I’ve raised her since she was 8 weeks old. And now she’s already 4 years old! Where has the time gone?

When my parents were here, my dad was playing with the kitties by shining the light that was reflecting off his watch onto the walls. The above and following pictures were captured during that time.

What are you looking at?

Oh, you’ve got your camera out? Okay! Let me just lay right here and pose for you!

Fancy is staring at the light on the wall across the room. She pounced right after I took this photo.

Here’s Lacey, copying Fancy’s last pose. And oh look, my parents made it into the photo! Ironic since they were actually in the room while I was taking these pictures. 🙂

Ok, I’m open for business!!! Great photography at a very cheap price, or maybe even free if you’re lucky! I need to expand my portfolio! I can only take so many pictures of animals before it starts getting redundant.