Last fall, when I first made the announcement that I would be resuming my photography business, I got a message from Mary…

“I’m so happy and excited for you getting back into photography! Please keep me posted on how everything works. Would love for you to do another newborn session for us in March :)”

and my response…

“OH. MY. GOSH!!!! So excited for y’all!”

I can’t even explain how affirming it is to me as a newborn photographer when amazing clients come back to me when they have another baby. Corrine was such a joy to photograph during her first year and some of my all time favorite photos came from her first year baby package sessions. I have no doubt that I will feel the same way after Rhett’s first year too.

Another reason I love working with this family is their HOUSE! Mary has such great taste when it comes to putting together nurseries. I know I gushed over every detail of Corrine’s nursery when I first saw it.  I was anxious to see Rhett’s nursery since they weren’t finding out the gender ahead of time. Let me just tell you, it is PERFECT. I love all the tones that were used and the sweet animal prints above the crib! I want them for my own house! This sweet gender neutral nursery just screams to be in a magazine somewhere. It’s just so cozy and warm.

During this session, it was also important that we took time to take some photos of just Corrine. Lifestyle newborn sessions are a great time to also get updated photos of the big kids too! I just love the playful photos that we were able to get. Corrine’s bedroom gets a ton of natural light which makes for some beautiful and timeless images. If you love the idea of a lifestyle newborn photography session, please make sure that your photographer is going to plan on getting other special family photos too.

To see all of the images from this lifestyle newborn photography session, just click on this link : Rhett | newborn

To see a beautiful newborn baby girl session, just click here: Sadie James | lifestyle newborn session

And here is Corrine’s newborn session : Corrine | newborn photography session

OH. MY. WORD!

So, I got to be a part of something super exciting and fun! I was contacted a few weeks ago to photograph an engagement party at one of my favorite venues, The Belle Hollow. Little did I know… it was a SURPRISE WEDDING!! I arrived at the venue early and when a man walked in, dressed ready for photos, I asked if he was the “groom-to-be” and he said “shhhh, it’s a secret.” I think I had a little look of confusion on my face because he then said “nobody knows”. I think the next thing I said was “but they know you’re engaged, right?” and he said “yea, but they don’t know we are getting married”

I’m pretty sure, that at this point, I was making the classic stupid-confused face. It seriously makes me laugh out loud to think about it. Chas, the groom to be, then went on to tell us that they were going to surprise everyone and get married at their “engagement party”. HOW FUN!!!

I’ve never been involved in a surprise wedding and it was just an amazing night! Their parents didn’t even know!!! I got an amazing photo of the moment that Casey’s mom found out that she was about to see her daughter get married!

Their ceremony was so so sweet. I had to hold back sweet tears for them a few different times. I may have just met this couple tonight, but I felt that this type of wedding fit them so well and was so perfect for them. I can’t wait to show them all the photos, but for now, I hope they enjoy my favorites that I was able to edit tonight.

Casey and Chas, I wish you long and loving lives together!

If you would like to see the rest of the images once I get them edited, just head over to Facebook and like my photography page because that’s where I will post the first update!

www.facebook.com/byjphotography 

UPDATE
to see all of the images from this surprise wedding, just click here!

I’m so glad that I got to take sweet Fenn’s 12 month photos. We kept getting delayed by weather so I was afraid he was going to be 2 by the time we got to take photos! One of these days, we are going to build me a studio so that I don’t have to worry about this stupid Tennessee weather. Oh how a girl can dream! I do think that these turned out so so cute. The photos of Fenn with his sister are so adorable. I hate that he was in a weird mood and wouldn’t let his momma hold him for a few photos. It was almost comical how he would freak out anytime she tried to get a photo with him ….(and you can maybe see a photo or two of a freak out if you click on the full gallery link)

To see all the photos from this session, just click on this link: Fenn is ONE

I wanted to write this post to somewhat explain why you may not see a lot of weddings on this website.

Since I started my business, I made the personal decision not to pursue a lot of weddings. This is because it was just too hard to shoot and edit weddings while working full time as a civil engineer 45+ hours a week. Last year, after the birth of my daughter, I jumped back into shooting families as soon as possible and it. was. hard! I ended up neglecting my husband and felt constantly stressed from trying to balance being a new mom, being the wife my husband deserved, working 7-5 as an engineer, and then owning my own photography business. It was too much and I decided that it was just best to not pursue photography anymore. Being a good wife and mother were more important in the long run and I thought that photography was the reason I wasn’t being able to do that anymore. So I started referring out all sessions to photographer friends of mine that I knew could make my past clients happy. It was so so hard to say no to the clients that I so much cared for, but I thought I was doing the right thing.  Fast forward to this past August when my very good friend died. Shea was an unbelievably talented photographer and someone that I looked up to so so much. She was entirely way too good for this earth and it’s still so shocking that she isn’t here anymore. She was most definitely one of the best persons in my life and I truly mean it when I say that I feel honored that I was her friend. When she passed away, we photographer friends made sure that her clients were taken care of. Shea had employed an amazing assistant, Kathryn Mitchell, who managed her business through the end of last year and made sure that her weddings were photographed and edited. Below is just one of the weddings that I helped photograph. I wanted to share some of the images that I took at this wedding and say I AM TAKING ON WEDDING CLIENTS! After helping finish out Shea’s remaining wedding clients, I realized how much I absolutely missed photographing weddings and needed it in my life. Even though I was working more, I was such a happier person to be around. My husband noticed a huge shift in me and we had a long hard talk about me pursuing photography again. This time, we put pen to paper and we made a plan together. A plan that both of us are happy with and believe will work. I have some huge goals for 2017 and those goal include a lot of weddings. I will be rolling out a referral program soon and sharing some more amazing plans very soon. This post is already entirely way too long, and if you’ve made it this far, you are a true friend. So I will now stop talking and let you see this gorgeous wedding…..

But first, one more really important thing, please note that with the exception of the self portrait directly below, these were all edited by Shea’s assistant to match her style of photography. These are not my edits, but I wanted to showcase some photographs that I took and absolutely love to show potential brides my skills as a wedding photographer.

You can see all of the images from this gorgeous wedding over on Shea’s client gallery website. Just click here to see them all: Cox Wedding

My sweet cousin Makenzie is pregnant with her third baby boy. I am so so unbelievably happy that this baby boy will be here soon. This sweet boy has been prayed for so much. He is such a blessing.

The weekend of this maternity session, it was freezing in Clarksville, TN! I was so glad that Makenzie and I were on the same page for her maternity session. I love the intimacy of her cozy, in-home, maternity session.

So funny story: it was feeling too quite in the house when we were taking these, so I decided to open up Spotify and I clicked on the first acoustic album I saw.  Well, we were shooting some of these photos on the bed and her husband walked in right when a slow jam was on. I just couldn’t help but say “ok…so this is awkward”.  We all started laughing and I think he was just relieved that I knew it was just as awkward as it felt for him.

I really do love how sweet these turned out!!! The link to see all the images from the session is at the bottom of the post.

To see all of the photos from the session, just click here: Makenzie’s Maternity