All you moms out there know that being a mother surely has it's glamorous and not-so-glamorous sides to it. You are carrying life. You are creating a human being! It's amazing, it's beautiful, it's like nothing else on this planet. In my opinion, it is pretty much the coolest thing you could do with your body.
Glamorous.
Of course, there's that other side of being a mother. The part that's messy, the unknown, the complete loss of modesty (thanks, mom, for the heads up on that one!). The cleaning up spills and wondering if you're being a good parent or not.
Not so glamorous. But still gorgeous.
Photographing this stage of a women's life is something I adore doing. Pregnancy is a time to be remembered, capture it, it goes by in an instance. Whether you've had two or twenty, capture it.
1) 7 months. Get your photos taken in the 7th month. Generally the baby hasn't dropped yet and the bump has a beautiful shape at this stage. Any time in the 7th or 8th month is perfect.
2) Your belly is perfect. Let go of the worry over your stretch marks. I'm sure many people have told you that your stretch marks are your hard-earned tiger stripes and they totally are!! But at the end of the day scars can make us self-conscious just like anything else, no matter how you got them. When I photograph you, unless you want to, you'll never see them!
3) Trust yourself first. Never put yourself into a pose that feels uncomfortable or straining.
4) Display your memories. Hang your maternity photos in your nursery! Plan your newborn session with your newborn photographer so that your baby's photos and your maternity photos stylistically work well with the colors and themes within your nursery. When you find yourself rocking a crying baby to sleep in the middle of the night, looking at those priceless memories on the wall will give you comfort.
5) Take it off. Remove any tight bras or straps at least 1-2 hours before your shoot to make sure there are no imprints in your skin. This one is so easy to forget!
6) Trust me. Most moms-to-be don't enter my studio moving in slow motion with wind blowing through their hair while wearing the perfect belly-hugging dress and stilettos. Let's be real here. I know how to wrap your body in timeless fabrics and pose your body so YOU and your belly and the center of attention. Don't avoid a maternity session because you feel too big or too tired. Trust me.
7) Bring special items. I'll be the first to tell you that I won't balance a pair of booties on your belly but do you have a special necklace that's been in your family that you plan to pass on to your baby? Or a special piece of cloth or fabric made by your own grandmother? Something that inspired your baby's name? Think about anything you'd like your baby to remember when she looks at these photos in 18 years.
8) Include Hubby. Bring in the hubs for the last 20 minutes of your shoot to get something timeless together.
9) Your baby will want these photos when she grows up. Do you have photos of your mother while she was carrying you? If you do I bet you treasure them and if you don't I bet you wish you did. If you're not going to do a maternity session for yourself do it for your baby's memories of you.
10) Exist in photographs for your children. One day you'll be gone and your baby will want to show her baby what her grandmother looked like. Do it now, don't wait.