July 2019: Huge shout-out to Daron Jackson Photography for the new portraits she did for my family (& my website)!

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Here’s my family portrait from 2009 —10 years ago!

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You may have noticed I have been using the same family portrait on website posts and in the news for a very long time!

Why? Finances, for one (it’s not always possible to set aside $ for this sort of thing when feeding your family is the priority). Also, it’s hard to wrangle all of my boys for a photo (a process often compared to “herding cats”).

I posted on Facebook a month or so ago asking if anyone would be willing to donate some time (and skill) to take new/updated photos, so I would have them to share whenever I needed them (here on my site, with the press, etc.) and Daron Jackson generously offered to help support my advocacy work in this way! This is one of those moments where I truly feel like one of the luckiest people on the planet, and I am so incredibly thankful for the support of my community!

Scroll down to see all of the new photos!

Please also check out Daron’s website, and if you have a chance to show your appreciation by hiring her (she’s local in Portland, Oregon) that would be amazing.

Her photos of my family show her skill and her artistic eye. I mean really you cannot imagine how hard it is to just get ONE kiddo with disabilities to look at the camera, let alone TWO in sync with everyone else in the family. Plus, frankly I think the photos she took of me look like I really haven’t aged at all in the past 10 years, lol… except for the color of my hair… and that shows MAD SKILL!

A separate note from my notoriously “photo shy” husband, Len: “I avoid the camera; I don’t want to frighten children! I have a face only my mother and Picasso could love! I don’t want to see the photos… HEY, I look almost NORMAL there — wow, she’s GOOD!”

Keep scrolling, because the photos below include new headshots for me and solo pics of each of the boys.

And without further ado, here’s our new portrait taken by the magnificent Daron Jackson (Daron Jackson Photography) on July 21, 2019… just about 10 years after the one above (and taken in the very same spot (note: the tree trunk in the background!), with my husband sitting in for my missing 23-year-old son who is off in Boston for college!). Note: ALL the boys are taller than us now!