Newbornish Photo Shoot

Based on my babies adjusted age, they are newborns.

But in reality they are 9 weeks old.

Of course while pregnant, I had already planned out everything that I wanted to do during a newborn photo shoot. I wanted to hire someone local to come out to our place & take photos of beautiful sleeping babes in funny positions.  I wanted professionally edited photos that I would turn into giant canvases and hang on our 24 foot walls. Basically I wanted what every new mom wanted...right?

At first I was really excited to hear about an organization called Pictures of Hope. They link up with local photographers that will come out to the NICU for free & take pictures of your babes.  I quickly looked up their info & was thrilled to find out that one local photographer, Laura Brett participated in their program. Thinking it was too good to be true, I went to her website & she had a button on her site saying she participated!! Woohoo! When you are a NICU mom, lots of things don't go right - so thinking I might get some quality photos of my precious babes was really special. I emailed her almost instantly. However, I woke up the next morning to an email from her saying that she no longer participated in the program. Heartbreaking. I responded that she might want to remove the button from her website that said she participated in Pictures of Hope. I recently visited her site & thankfully she has. Now no other mom will be so disappointed like I was.  I also emailed Pictures of Hope about the situation, but they have yet to remove Laura Brett Photography from their site. Sadness.

Fast forward now.  Hospital bedrest, birth, & NICU bills are all rolling in.  Not fun. Seriously puts a financial damper on my dream "Anne Geddes" like photo session for my babes.

So the professional scenario is now out.

We start researching chains. I know that we won't get the experienced photographer, the editing I want to see & the just the general patience that a pro can offer, but that's the way things go.

We choose the Picture People & scheduled a session for last Saturday morning, right when they open, hoping to beat the rush.

Yea, apparently even if you have the one of first sessions of the day, you still wait 25 minutes before your session starts.  Doesn't make sense to me either.  So now because we had to wait, we are getting closer to the girls next feeding time. Ugh. I can already see what's going to happen in our future.

The photographer was pretty nice, but really had no creative insight for us whatsoever. We brought one outfit to change into & figured the rest would be au naturale...yet there was no place to really change the babes. We basically laid one of our blankets on the hard floor & used the another one to support their little heads.

The babes are now ready to get their pictures taken & here's where that reality sets in. There will be no sleeping baby pictures. It was all that we could do to even keep them still.  My babies aren't newborns, even though their adjusted age says they are.  Ten minutes in and all we could do was laugh in order to keep our sanity.

Hence why this is my favorite shot from the entire shoot:

Once we wrap it all up my attitude changed completely.  These photographers are completely over worked & are in a high stress situation with all these families running around.  They probably aren't paid much & are doing the best that they can.  I have a lot more respect for them now.

We waited another 40 minutes to an hour for the editing & printing.  I was thankfully, during this time, able to get everyone fed.  The photographer took some good shots & for a reasonable price we got a really big/nice framed portrait of the babes, lots of extra prints, birth announcements, & the high resolution copies of all the pictures.  All in all we left pretty happy, much more so than when our day there began!

So would we go back there? Maybe.

Do I still want my glorious dream version with a professional who makes my babes look like beautiful cherubs? Of course.

But until then this will have to do...

{The blankets the babes are lying on were crocheted & donated to them by a local charity for NICU babies.}

{Maddie}

{Amelia}

{Top: Maddie - Bottom: Amelia}

{Left: Amelia - Right: Maddie}

{Left: Madeline - Right: Amelia}