A Snowy Photoshoot with Mandy Charlton

When I spotted local photographer Mandy Charlton on Instagram stories last Friday offering 15 minute photo shoots in the snow the next morning I couldn’t resist. Mandy has been taking pictures of the kids (and even did a family shoot for us) for around 7 years so the girls are perfectly at ease & love to see her sidekick, the beagle Holly Bobbins. We tend to have photo shoots every few years so have quite a good photo selection! We have done crunchy golden Autumn leaves & summer shoots in sandals & sun dresses but snow is a new season for the feature wall!

The Shoe Tree, Heaton

We met Mandy at Heaton Park pavilion just off Heaton Road. The snow was pretty deep & looked beautiful on the trees. We walked to the Shoe Tree (if you haven’t been-Go!) which is just what its says on the tin. A tree with thousands of random shoes hung from the branches. It’s a very surreal place. As an aside this is one of the best parks in the area with a Italian restaurant Sambuccas serving up cheap pizza & a great kids play area. We need to make a plan to come back once the weather warms up. When we lived in St Peter’s Basin I used to walk up quite often to meet a friend at the Butterfly cabinet so have some great memories here.

Here are some of my favourites shots from the shoot!

Snow Drama!

As we left the park there were a few cars struggling to get up the hill out of the car park in the snow! I started freaking out at one point thinking the car was going to slide back so had to make an emergency call to Alan to dig us (and around 4 other cars out!) and push us up the hill. The girls will not forget this photoshoot in a hurry.

Portrait Safari with Mandy

As well as offering all types of photography from newborns, outdoors & weddings, Mandy has put together some dates for her portrait safari which she describes as ‘part photography workshop, part photo walk’. Mandy will be on hand to help any ones wishing to improve their skills or just to gain an insight into some of the great photo backdrops in the Ouseburn Valley. I’m heading along to one on the 16th March, so hopefully you will see some of the shots on our instagram (www.instagram.com/hcthehoopers)

See www.mandycharltonphotographyblog.com for the next dates and give her a follow on instagram too! She is so close to 10K & her stories are pretty entertaining too.