Welcome baby Ansley! David + Sarah are dear friends of ours and it just melts my heart to see their joy in bringing their newest baby girl into this world. Birth stories might be my very favorite event to shoot. I’m completely addicted to shooting the most joyful/emotional moments in life and births are by far THE MOST emotional I’ve found. These images are full of so much joy.. you can’t help but smile when you look at them.

Meet.. baby Ansley

i’m going to try to hold back the tears while typing out this post… but I’m certainly not making any promises. i’m a big fan of the TLC show A Baby Story.. the moment of truth comes when the mom is ready to have the baby.. i cringe, i squirm, i bite my nails and gasp [!!!!] riiiiiiiight up until the moment when the baby is out and the parents see that precious little face for the first time and that’s the very moment i absolutely LOSE MY MIND and cry harder than that little baby. i need a nap following that emotional rollercoster. so i thought i knew what to expect rolling into the hospital for the birth of our close friend’s first baby “Jack” on October 14th. yeah.. friggin.. right… one can never be prepared for all those tears and all those smiles. hearts were exploding all around that room.

we have been so excited for the last 9 months [i think my husband mentioned his name once a day for the entire term and how excited he was to meet him]. without going into too many dramatics this was THE most emotional day for me as a photographer in my entire 3 years of biz. Julie asked me to photograph the birth pretty close to day 1 of the pregnancy after talking to her about wanting to get into the Birth Story game. one of my favorite photographers out west [Amelia Lyon] whose blog i stalk shoots birth stories from time to time and they floor me. i was so pumped when Julie told me she was interested.. and i’m so thankful she did!! knowing and loving this family so much made me feel so honored to be a part of this day.. gosh i loved everything about it and just can’t wait to be a part of this little man’s life.

here is little Jack’s birth story…

I’ve found it. I’ll always remember this session as the day when I found it. I found.. my very favorite thing in this world to shoot. I love weddings, I love love engagement sessions.. family sessions [eh].. but Birth Stories… that is it. I can’t tell you how much joy it was to go through these images.. I even had a hard time typing my web id on them because I kept thinking… I didn’t do that… I didn’t make that.. I just snapped an image of it. He is just too precious to be labeled with “lorihensley.com”. OH! The anxiety while watching the long, slow moving, blue Facebook line I had to watch while the images were uploaded! It was pure torturer!! I seriously couldn’t wait to get these images in front of Sheena and Kydon.

But seriously.. enough about me. This day was such an amazing experience! I can’t say enough good things about these two anyway.. and then meeting their families and getting to know them was a blessing on top of heaps of blessing. One of my favorite moments was seeing Sheena’s grandfather’s face when he first caught a glimpse of little Pryor… he literally lit up and then said one of the sweetest grandpa things in the whole world.. “he’s a dandy”. I melted.

Sheena and Kydon thanks for not only being one of the most awesome couples I know… but to also have allowed me to shoot your day. I’m truly so full of joy because of it and might just hang out in the “family waiting” area of the nearest hospital to try and recreate that awesome experience. So thankful and so ready to shoot more Birth Stories! Meet little Pryor..