family – Anthem Photography

Meet My Beautiful Nephew!

June 4, 2017July 21, 2017Posted in children, personalTagged baby, family, in home newborn session, kansas city family photographer, newborn, newborn photos1 Comment

Is there anything more magical than adding a brand new member to your family? It’s quite a phenomenal event. I mean, there’s a person where there wasn’t a person before! It’s madness! Whether through marriage, by adoption, or birth (my family is fortunate to have experience with all these great ways to make a family), the growth of a new connection or branch on the family tree is a spectacular event. My family tree was fortunate enough to sprout a new branch recently – on my husband’s birthday, actually. I think getting our first nephew was a most perfect birthday present. Also, gifts are not my love language, so I didn’t get my husband a proper birthday present anyway.

Adorable little Evan greeted the world with a head full of hair and the most chill disposition of any tiny human that I’ve ever met. He is really quite wonderful. He instantly raised the world’s cuteness level.

My younger son, Sam, and I went with my parents to visit him in the hospital, so of course my camera came along. Hospital lighting is not my favorite thing, but sometimes – and especially days like this – moments matter far more than lights.

A week or so later, when Evan was all moved in to his home and had a chance to get to know his fur brother and fur sister, I went to their home to capture some moments of their first days as a family. Seeing my big brother as a daddy makes my heart do all kinds of wild fluttery joy things. In the parenting world, Eric and Nisha are naturals. They seem to be instant pros. And Louie and Cloe, the adorable pups, are being quite helpful with their new baby brother as well.

And he continues to raise the cuteness level in the world. Every day.

http://www.anthem-photo.com

Nisha and Eric’s Maternity Session

May 1, 2017July 20, 2017Posted in maternity, personalTagged anthem photography, blue springs, blue springs family photos, blue springs photographer, family, kansas city maternity photos, kansas city photographer, lee's summit, maternity, outdoor maternity photos, www.anthem-photo.com2 Comments

For a while I was pretty sure that my brother Eric and his wife Nisha were the corporate-ladder-climbing couple who would spend their whole lives traveling every corner of the world, eating dinners at all the fancy restaurants, and always looking like they fell straight out of the pages of a style magazine. You know, doing all the things that people with young children rarely have the time or expendable income to accomplish.

But to my nearly-spitting-a-mouthful-of-food surprise, they announced at Thanksgiving dinner last year that they were expecting their first child. Aside from their good news that day, I was thankful that I didn’t do a spit-take in that moment. It was a close call.

I learned that day that I wasn’t wrong about who they are. But I was wrong in my assumption that their career accomplishments and lifestyle were the only goals and desires they had. Building a family is important to them too. I was wrong to think that those options are mutually exclusive. I think they’re simply the type of people who have figured out how to have it all, which is pretty incredible.

But pretty incredible things are to be expected from pretty incredible people.

For their maternity session, we explored an area in Blue Springs that has some very simple but very beautiful natural backgrounds just off a fairly busy road. I drive by this area all the time. I watch it transform from bare gray sticks and dead grass in the winter to vibrant pops of color in the fall. In the late spring, it’s lush green with tall grasses and kaleidoscopes of sunlight bouncing through the leaves. As most areas are, it’s gorgeous at sunset. And even more gorgeous with a beautiful couple on the verge of being a beautiful family…

Special thanks to my oldest son for allowing me to use him as a lighting assistant for this session!

http://www.anthem-photo.com

Protected: New Year’s Eve at the Lake

January 9, 2017January 9, 2017Posted in lifestyle, personalTagged adventure, family, friends, lake, lifestyle photography, new years eve, personal work, road trip

What I Learned on the First Day

August 21, 2015December 1, 2015Posted in personalTagged anthem photography, day-in-the-life, family, first day of school, kindergarten, lifestyle photography, personal work, school1 Comment

We knew this day would come. For years, we counted down. We would walk or drive past the school in our neighborhood and say “Nathan, that’s where you’ll go to school next year… next month… tomorrow.” Secretly, I had been looking forward to the little bit of freedom of having one of my boys in school. I had been thinking about what it would mean – having more time to get work done, or more time to spend with my younger boy who has never really had much time alone with me.

But then the countdown reached zero. And everything changed.

I was so proud of him as he walked confidently to the school bus stop. He was excited for new adventures. He was ready to make new friends. I realized that he wouldn’t have any problems. He would be just fine. This eased my anxiety. At least slightly.

He’s such an incredible brother. So loving and thoughtful. So protective and kind. How will Sam feel without him around to play all day?

Shortly after I shot this frame, he blew us two kisses. And my husband and I both broke down crying. For reasons more numerous than either of us could identify, I’m sure. Maybe mostly because we’ll miss him. Maybe mostly because we’re so proud of the young man that he is. Maybe mostly because that’s what he is now: a young man. Not our future plan, not our heartbeat on an ultrasound, not our swaddled baby, not our half-naked toddler dancing through the hallway.

We watched that plan and that heartbeat, that swaddled baby and that half-naked toddler ride away.

Ok, but we also drove to the school to take a few more pictures (or that’s the excuse I use for making sure he survived the ride and found his classroom).

One of the hardest parts about your child leaving you is simply not seeing what he’s doing. Not seeing him laugh, or knowing if he’s being friendly and selfless like you hope he’ll be, or being able to stand up for himself if someone is mistreating him. But I never realized what having him leave us would mean for us.

It meant a quiet Lego table that wasn’t facing epic battles of robots and bad guys with hilarious names whose legs and ship wings would randomly fall off, and all the corresponding sound effects.

It meant a placemat with no new crumbs to clean (woo hoo!). And a spot at the lunch table that wasn’t giggling about the silly things Sam was doing that I couldn’t see.

It meant a dark and quiet room. No radio playing. No feet crashing to the ground with thuds that can be heard two floors below as he is being an American Ninja Warrior jumping off his bed while he is supposed to have quiet time.

No new construction paper creations.

It was a weird day. I didn’t know what to do with my time. My routine was thrown off. I was bored. I watched what must have been the world’s slowest clock as it creeped toward 4:00.

He couldn’t pinpoint his “MOST very, very favorite thing” about his day because there were just too many. He loved it.

He survived. We survived.

And I once again had a greater respect for my parents and everything they silently endured as I raced my way through childhood without any desire to slow down time.

http://www.anthem-photo.com