amazing. miraculous. beautiful.

I already posted Susanna's newborn images quite a while ago. But well before that, I visited the lovely family for my first experience with documenting maternity. I was very excited, because mommy-to-be is just an infectious and beautiful person, and I hoped to get some amazing artistic shots. I was soooo ready to experiment, play, and be challenged. When I arrived for the shoot, however, mommy-to-be surprised me by requesting NOT to have any belly shots.

I'll admit it. This totally threw me for a loop. I mean... to ME, that's what a maternity session would BE about. All about the belly!!! I kind of wish I had a picture of what MY face looked like when I made this discovery that morning at their house!

It's been nearly two years since I had a pregnant belly myself. I'm still just in utter awe of the beauty of it. It's so amazing. Miraculous. And beautiful. I wanted very much to document my belly artistically the first time around. (Tina Wilson did it for me and those images are priceless to me. They rock!) Part of the driver for that was the problems we had getting pregnant in the first place -- I didn't know if I'd ever get to experience it again and I wanted to soak in every possible second of it. (the second time, I didn't feel quite as beautiful... I'll admit that, too. so I didn't want it documented quite so much. hehehe)

But this beautiful woman? She's very modest. Plain and simple -- that was why she didn't want images of her belly. I respect that. I don't relate, but I respect it. But, man, was I disappointed!

Before the end of the session, her husband finally convinced her to show me her belly. So I did capture some absolutely beautiful shots that I'm quite proud of. I hope that in the end, years later, she will be so glad she did this. That this precious, precious fleeting time in her life is at least preserved with beautiful images that she can refer back to and remember. Every curve. Every freckle. The belly button. The line. I so appreciate her willingness to step WAY outside of her comfort zone for me -- to let me experiment artistically. I know it was super hard for her and I'm thankful she allowed me to try.

Unfortunately, she's not quite comfortable with letting me show them here on my blog. And I'll admit too that I'm SUPER bummed about that. But I do have some less revealing shots to share. If you're reading, do comment and let this mama know how gorgeous she is!

I shot these with my Nikon D90 and my Nikon 50mm f/1.8D Lens.