He was the quintessential newborn: squishy, furry, peely, wrinkly, and cute to boot.  He made me work for it, but we ended up coming away with so such varied, dramatic, and fun images!

(Re-posting this one because I love it so).

(love.)

See? Fuzz, wrinkles, *and* cuteness!

I am not thrilled to report that we are not out of the woods yet, which means it may take even longer for me to respond to calls/e-mails.  Thank you again for your patience and understanding while we try to get everyone back in good health.

To say the past #???? days have been miserable would be an understatement. More than 1/2 of our household was hit with the flu…and hard (including a 2 a.m. trip to the ER). I honestly don’t know if I’ve ever had the flu before, but I can tell you that next year, we will *all* be getting flu shots. My boys have finally recovered fully, but I still feel like I’ve been run over by a train…a couple of times. Oh, handy tid-bit: trash bags make great pillow protectors when you’ve run out of options ;-).

So, needless to say, I’m behind.  On everything. (You don’t even want to see the laundry pile at this house.)  If you’re waiting on an e-mail or phone call from me, I will start tackling that tomorrow.  THANK YOU to all of my clients for being so understanding and willing to reschedule our missed sessions.  I really appreciate that and it helps me not to fret so much.  And to the mother of this stunningly beautiful redhead above, I am almost done with her proofs and will send them your way very soon.  Thanks for waiting so patiently.

Back to collapse in bed. Again.

ETA:

1. I’m sure I’ve said this before, but my husband is definitely going to win "Husband/Father of the Year" this year. I love you bee bee and thanks for taking such wonderful care of all of us.

2. Also, I have THE best clients, photographer friends, and online friends in the world. Seriously. Thank you all so much for thinking of us. I know there are people out there with much worse troubles than ours, but you still took the time to send along notes of encouragement and that means the world. (That includes you, Lyndsay.)

About a year ago when her mama called me for the first time, I was giddy. Even over the phone, we just seemed to click. I was so bummed that I was booked and getting ready for maternity leave and couldn’t arrange a session for her.  :-( But not too long ago, she called again and lo and behold, this time, we were able to make it work. I was *thrilled* when she said that even though she’s got 3–yes, three–older boys at home, this session was going to be all about her baby girl. Giddy.

I’ve been sitting on this location for a while now. When I realized *this* would be the perfect place for her session…again, giddy.

Giddy.

When mom said she’d be up for some mother/daughter shots? Giddy.

Giddy.

When mom pulled out this AMAZING dress? Giddy.

Giddy. Giddy. Giddy.

But this? THIS? Immediately, when I saw this shot in my teeny, tiny preview screen on my camera, I was beyond giddy. I was jumping up and down, running over to mom, practically drooling over what I had just seen ECSTATIC!!!!  I don’t know why, but this last image just really spoke to me.

Looking for fairies at sunset…sigh. This session was such a joy!

This last shot was quite literally the last shot of the evening. Doesn’t it always happen this way?

It is sooooooooo lovely to see you!

(I’m going to take advantage of having a willing model for as long as I possibly can.)

Some of you may have seen this image I tweeted from the San Antonio Zoo the other day. It was taken with my iPhone and the quality is well, iPhone, but I LOVE this pic! I so wish I could blow it up and hang it in our house.

I’m out for a girls’ weekend with my mom, sis, and baby girl.  I’ll get back to messages, etc. when I return next week. Evidently, the boys have big plans while we’re away. I’m pretty sure those plans involve Kraft Mac ‘n Cheese and movies that feature robots and monsters.

Loved walking into this house for her newborn session. Mom has a great sense of style and the decor is so vintage and chic. When I saw those suitcases, I couldn’t WAIT to use them!

Thank you sooooo much, H, for a GREAT session and congrats on your new baby girl!

All in all, I’d say the first-ever round of Pinkle Toes Xpressions sessions rocked my world. Such BEAUTIFUL families and such patience—you wouldn’t believe the kind of heat and Texas-sized mosquitoes we were dealing with here. So sorry we didn’t get to do the morning sessions this weekend (thanks to the threat of storms and a bad radar map), BUT that works in your favor because…

I’m adding a NEW Xpressions date! If you’d like me to notify you of the new date and times available, please fill out the form here.  Also, we’re going to make another exception this round…I will accept families up to 5 members (extra fee over 3 subjects), but babies still must be at least 3 months old.

To these beautiful families that had their Xpressions sessions this weekend…I’ve already got your disks burned (everyone ended up with around 70+ images!) and prints on order! It won’t be but a few more days and you’ll have everything in hand!  How about that??? And by the way, these previews have only received the basic edits for contrast/color…no additional retouching, etc., so this is exactly the kind of stuff you’ll see on your disk.

I have to admit I’m a little bit emotional blogging about this birth. What an incredible honor to have been invited to photograph this birth! It was such a quick and beautiful event.  Peace. The room was filled with peace. As much as I try to approach a birth experience from a purely professional and objective point of view, it’s difficult at times to not get wrapped up in the emotions of it all.  I teared up quite a few times that evening. So much love. So much support. To be honest, I had to keep reminding myself that mom was indeed actually in labor…she was so lucid and smiling almost the entire time…there were times I doubted that she could possibly be giving birth ;-). And her eldest daughter? The way she cared for her mama during the labor process and the way she looked at her new baby sister for the first time…wow!

I’ve posted the full birth slideshow below, but first, a few notes:

- A confession – I know I was on call for this birth, but I was totally caught off guard on this one. I had a newborn session that morning, worked all afternoon, put the kids to bed, and had settled in for a nice evening with the hubs when my phone rang:

Notice, this call was only 51 sec. long. For whatever reason, I had just assumed I was going to be woken up in the middle of the night with THE call. I have to admit that I panicked when mom told me she was already 7 cm.  I wanted to be there SO badly to capture this incredible event and I was soooooo scared I wasn’t going to make it there in time. But I did. The timing couldn’t have been more perfect. 

- Here’s a pic of her eldest daughter on the phone while mom was in labor. She was talking to her grandmother (mom’s mom). Baby girl said this (and I kid you not): "Mom’s a little busy right now." I hope mom heard this quote.

- She made this whole labor thing look ridiculously easy. How beautiful is this mom-to-be? Wow!

- Notice how the shape of her belly changes as baby girl gets further down the birth canal:

- And the attentiveness of her children. (I see a future midwife in her older daughter, I swear).

- It always amazes me how mom can fall *completely* asleep in the middle of labor, as in completely unaware of anything except yourself and the baby still inside. It is quite a beautiful thing and it usually happens right before pushing. I know it’s nature’s way. I know I did this myself with each of my kids. But it just still impresses me after all of that work and build up, mom’s body knows exactly what to do and when to rest and gear up for the task ahead. The whole process makes so much sense, it’s insane.

- How quickly baby girl is actually born. I swear, it was only a few pushes and she was here!

- How mom looks holding her baby for the first time. That’s the part that really gets me:

- How cool it is that all of that post partum stuff takes place right there in front of her new family. At no time is baby whisked away from mama’s sight. That, to me, is one of the most wonderful things about a birth at home…you’re never apart from your new baby. You’re always present and aware of everything that is happening after your baby is born, which for a new mom, is an immensely important thing.

- Whenever a baby is born, I like to try to give mom at least a few minutes of privacy with her new baby without my shutter clicking in the background. So once I’m sure I’ve gotten all of the important stuff, I’ll steal away for a couple of minutes to let mom and dad look at their new baby alone. This is always my favorite time because I get to share the good news with my husband. Somehow, he’s always just as excited as I am when he hears that a new baby has been welcomed into the world:

- The slideshow features original music by the *very* talented husband of a photographer friend of mine. Photogs…you should check out his music for sale. PT4P v3 members actually get one of these songs as part of v3 and a special offer.

Now for the slideshow. Mama…thank you again for inviting me to capture this event for you and for letting me pass along this birth story with the blog readers. It gives me so much joy to share the magic of a homebirth and the power of birth photography! If you are in the Austin area and would like to see more information on birth photography or want your birth photographed, please contact me as soon as possible. FYI: I do not have any more birth sessions available for 2009 and 2010 is already booking up.

 (Can’t view this or want to view larger? Click HERE. You may want to let the video buffer all the way through before watching).

I am in complete denial that she’s going to be 1 year in a couple of months. I think it’s just too much for my little mommy heart to bear. I genuinely, truly, absolutely do not want her to grow up. This has been one of the best years of my life and I don’t want it to end. When will I come to grips with this?