Aside from my own children's, this was hands down the most special newborn session I have been able to photograph to date. Let me tell you why.
Between my two brothers I have five precious nieces. I have always lived at least hundreds if not thousands of miles from them ever since we all got married. This has meant that when our babies were all born, the soonest we could be there to meet each other's children in person was at least days, and in several cases months, after their births.
With six girl cousins in the family (including our own daughter) and our two sons being the only boys, we were thrilled when my younger brother and his wife announced months ago that their third child on the way would be a boy!
A few months later, my family had a wonderful excuse to go visit my parents and brothers' families in California when I was hired to shoot a wedding in the area. The wedding just happened to be two weeks before our nephew's due date! Naturally, we pushed our trip out a little longer than we had originally planned, in hopes of getting to be there when our sweet nephew was born.
Lo and behold, my wonderful sister-in-law was in labor by the time we arrived in California, and little Caleb was born less than 24 hours after we had landed! We didn't just get to meet him, we got almost two weeks to hold him and love on him and watch him grow! And of course, I was there in the perfect window of time to get to do his newborn photos. My heart was absolutely bursting through the entire thing, and now as I am so far away again and don't know when I'll see Caleb next in person, I have cherished each moment of editing and then just staring at these photos of my handsome, adorable nephew! I am such a proud aunt!
Sweet Caleb, cousin number 9 in the line, you have fallen into incredible hands! Even though your daddy is my little brother, he and your mommy are a couple of my role models and they will be yours too. They love Jesus with everything in them, they love each other in a beautiful way that will make you excited to be married one day, and they love and adore you and your sisters with humility and selflessness. One day you will realize that being born to the family that you were is a sheer gift from God. I pray you will never take your incredible parents and sisters for granted, and that you will grow to know and love the Lord and to love others like your parents do. I love you, my sweet nephew!
