Maternity Pictures

Alright, here are the results of my fruitless attempts at taking my own maternity photos! I actually would have preferred to hire someone to do this, but our last few months were just so busy I didn't get to, and ended up having to do a few snaps here and there whenever we got a few minutes. Unfortunately, with the combined total of five hours and six different brief sessions, there are really only a couple of shots I'm happy with--and the best one of them was taken by my two-year-old! LOL As it turns out, being very pregnant, setting up backdrop stands and running back and forth while trying to handle two hyper children and operating a camera and flash blindly from afar only results in...a VERY tired subject!!! So yes, I look quite exhausted in all of them, and eventually gave up altogether. Oh well, at least they are realistic then, eh? And I can definitely pride myself in the fact that my camera and flash do NOT operate well without me--woohoo! I will now be happily returning to my spot BEHIND the camera where I can make sure it does what it's supposed to. :) Being the good sport that I am though, I will share some of what we did get...along with my editorial comments of course!

These were taken by hubby, but we didn't realize until later when I looked at them that my flash had not been firing right on most of the shots. Here are the ones that turned out the best:










Having fixed the flash issues, I found some time to redo the shots with my youngest daughter since they hadn't turned out. This time though I had to rely on the camera set to self-timer, because hubby wasn't around:


This one is more for memory preservation than anything...this is my daughter's rocker where I used to nurse her as an infant and now read her a story and rock her every night. It's here that she has really bonded with the baby, who kicks her throughout her story, hehe. :) So, I set the camera on the stool and put it on the timer to get a shot of us in the chair...she got a bit too comfy and her hair is all over, but that's how it always is. Like I said, at least these are realistic!


I then got both the girls together on another evening to get a shot of them in their "big sister" shirts. Unfortunately we had rearranged our living room during the interim, so I could no longer use it for photos and had to use my daughter's room instead. We had to put the camera on a tripod all the way up against the wall, and being not-so-skinny by this point, there was no way for me to check the shots...so we had to just wing it and hope it worked. Hmm...


(as you can see, this was taken during the timeframe that my oldest daughter forgot how to smile...she thinks she's smiling; really she does! I can sympathize with her though--I'm not photogenic in the least!)


And just for fun, I let my oldest push the button while my youngest--who metamorphosed into a butterfly somewhere during our mini session--posed with me.


Here are a couple that I attempted on my own...these are probably the most pleasant, as in the rest I am either glaring or yelling at the camera just about the time the shutter clicked...suffice it to say we don't get along when I'm not in control!

Just an attempt to get some color with my new curtain fabric before it became curtains, hehe


And probably my favorite maternity outfit


And my favorite shot of myself, taken by my little girl, who apparently is going to be a genius with the camera! This is the only shot of just me that was along the lines of what I had hoped; so proud of her!


One more try with the girls, for some serious black and white shots...


And this one just about sums it up...do I look exhausted or WHAT??? At least one of us was having fun though!