I may not specialize in photographing a brand new baby, but I like to think I still know what I’m doing (and I’ve got the pictures to prove it!).

Over the last 5 years (wow, has it really been 5 years?!), I’ve photographed for hundreds of families and couples.

I’ve gotten the chance to document their families, and watch as they grow.

But last week, I got to document a milestone for someone very close to me, my sister Marian and her husband Jon as they welcomed their first baby into the world.

We started out at Marian and Jon’s house, and then headed over to Sentara Obici in Suffolk, where the baby would be delivered via scheduled c-section. But I made sure to get one last picture of Marian and Jon together before the baby made her grand appearance!

Everyone was in great spirits while we were waiting for Marian to be taken back for surgery… everyone, that is, except for the photographer.
I’m not quite sure what was going on, but I wasn’t feeling that well, and at one point they made me leave suggested I go take a walk to get some air. I was definitely not trying to steal her show, and ended up recovering enough to do my job (document all the craziness that was going on in that room!).

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These three lovely ladies were so stinkin excited about the birth of a new grand baby, they could not contain themselves.

They were literally giddy with excitement, and were laughing and giggling like schoolgirls.

It’s pretty bad when I was the one acting the most mature 😉

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Another thing I thought was really neat was the fact that Jon brought a giant cake.

He wanted to celebrate the birth of his daughter with everyone in the hospital!

He was so proud of the fact that his little girl was being born.

The hospital staff, and everyone there, ended up singing happy birthday to the baby.

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These are the last shots I got of Marian and Jon, right before they took her back to have the baby (yay!).

They did one last check on the baby and then took her out of the room.

But not before Marian and Jon were able to have one more moment together before the (officially) became a family of 3.

Brand New Baby: Talara Melody

When Jon left for the operating room, the two mothers, one grandmother and I waited in the recovery room for news of the baby.

We figured we would be hanging out for a little while, and tried to get comfortable.

It was lunchtime at this point, but no one was thinking about eating!

We were all very surprised when Jon came back about 20 minutes later and asked if we wanted to see the baby.

I tell you what, you’ve never seen a bunch of women move so fast!!!

Talara Melody was born at 12:14pm on Tuesday, August 20th, 2013. She weighed 6 lbs 5 oz and was healthy in every way.

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I was the first person to know Marian was pregnant.
I still remember her calling me at an un godly hour in the morning, asking how she would know if she was really pregnant. (I told her to wait 9 months and it would be pretty obvious!)

So for me it was so unreal to be filling the support role, and being there for Marian.

We had to wait a couple of hours for them to get the baby cleaned up and back to us, but when Marian first laid eyes on her baby, you knew it was love at first sight.

And really, who wouldn’t fall in love with this cute little face?!

Once Marian held Talara and was able to nurse her, the grandmas were finally (finally) able to get their hands on the baby and give her some lovin!

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And then of course Grammy had to show off all the hair that this sweet little princess had!

At the end of the day, after being at the hospital for almost 8 hours and documenting these and so many more pictures, I finally got to hold the baby and get my picture taken with my newest little niece. She was so tiny!

I loved being able to capture something so special for Marian and Jon. It was so wonderful getting to document their journey and I know these pictures will mean so much to them. That’s it for now, but be sure to watch the blog in the coming weeks because I feel like there’s going to be a newborn shoot in the near future!