Maternity Pictures

Almost four years ago, I found a maternity photographer on faccebook and instantly loved her work. Fox had just been born and I always regretted not finding her earlier, because the maternity pictures I had with him were more than cringe worthy. 

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Flash forward to last December. I had just found out that I was pregnant and I immediately set up a shoot with her

Obviously, in typical Nadine fashion, I stressed about this shoot since the moment I set it up. I don’t enjoy being the center of attention and having someone take pictures of me makes me a little uncomfortable, but I always love the end result, and since this was my last pregnancy, I knew I wanted to document it in the best way I could.

Since the photographer I chose is famous in our area for her maternity pictures (she doesn’t do anything else), I had to spend more money than I could ever justify spending on pictures, which made me even more stressed…what if I didn’t love them? What was I going to wear? Who would do my make up and hair? Yes, I was a little obsessed about this shoot, because I felt like I only had this one shot at it. 

I took the photographer’s advice and ordered a bunch of dresses from two websites she recommended (non maternity). She said it doesn’t matter if the dresses didn’t fit, she would clip me in and I could return the dresses after the shoot. So when they came in the mail, we had a little fashion show at the office and everyone cast their votes. Of course, with so many opinions, I still couldn’t nail down which one of the five dresses I had ordered, I liked the best (indecisive much?). I ended up sending pictures to the photographer and let her choose and luckily she chose two dresses that I liked as well and I think they looked so pretty in the pictures. 

At the beginning of the shoot, the photographer told me that there wouldn't be many pictures of me smiling directly at the camera. I thought this was going to be so awkward, but I guess you get what you pay for, and this lady knew exactly what she was doing. She posed me for every single shot and told me exactly what to do with every muscle in my body, my legs, my arms, my fingers, my belly, my shoulders, my head, my face, everything. All I had to do was follow her instructions. 

My sister in law got married last November and I got some contacts from her for professional hair and make up. This was the first time ever I had my hair and make up done professionally and of course that made me nervous too, because there was no going back if I didn’t like what they did to me…haha. Luckily, they both did a fantastic job in my opinion and I just let them do whatever they wanted and trusted their opinions. 

This is probably my favorite picture, I just love the lighting!

While the photographer said that this shoot was mostly about me, but we could throw in a couple of family pictures as well, Katie has never been a fan of posed pictures and wasn’t really interested in being in any of them. I would’ve loved to have a few couple’s pictures of the two of us, but I also wanted to respect her opinions, so that’s why she is not in the shots. Fox was more easily convinced with the promise of a lollipop after and his participation took maybe five minutes, so I’m glad to have some pictures with him as well! 

Sure, there were awkward moments, like when she would say to stare at a specific tree in the distance and laugh out loud at the tree. Can you imagine? Lucky for me, there was no one there to witness any of this…haha!

The whole shoot took only about 45 minutes, including a wardrobe change in the middle of a field. 

When I got home, I felt like I had just run a marathon, I was so exhausted, physically and emotionally. But I also felt like a huge burden had fallen off my shoulders by getting this done and I was happy to cross off this big stress factor from my list. 

I couldn't love these pictures more and I was so impressed by her and how she captured my last pregnancy so beautifully (even though it was 105 degrees out, I was out of breath and sweaty from hiking through the field in heels and my legs were scratched up...you wouldn't even be able to tell!).

I will treasure these pictures forever and there were totally worth all the stress they gave me.