The Road To Baby Madsen: Our IVF Journey: Maternity Photos

A while back I decided that I wanted to have maternity photos taken for two reasons:

I always think pregnant women look so pretty in maternity photos
This is the last time Ryan and I will have family photos as a twosome

I ended up emailing two different photographers that were referred to me by friends and neither of them got back to me. So I sent out a request for photographer recommendations on a private mommy group I am part of on Facebook and got about 40 different recommendations! It took me a while to sort through them all. I visited their Facebook pages and websites to look at portfolios and check out prices. I narrowed it down to my top three that were in the price range I wanted, had professional websites and had pictures in their portfolios that matched my style.

Then I started shopping for a dress...which took me longer than expected. It's not a very pretty time of year outside and I prefer spring colors. I looked for something in a navy blue or green to go with the dead trees of winter, but ultimately decided to go with a spring color anyway, choosing a pretty coral colored dress. Surprisingly my spring dress and Ryan's coordinating shirt look great against our wintery backdrop we ended up with.

Next I decided I had better email the photographers (probably should've done that sooner). I was to the point where I wanted to have these pictures taken in the next week, so it really would come down to who could get us in when I wanted. Time was running out because I was 32 weeks along and wanted the pictures done while my bump was still cute and before my face started to swell (which I hear happens as you get further into the third trimester).

I emailed Makira Rackham first. She emailed me back within 24 hours. She was so easy to work with! She was always quick to respond to any questions I had, recommended several outdoor places for me to look up and even offered a discount for doing both my maternity photos and newborn photos after the baby is born. Ultimately we decided all we needed for a maternity shoot was a 30 minute mini session, which included 40 edited photos on a CD. With a 90-minute newborn session, which will include about 60 edited photos, our total cost is $225.

We ended up going to Tibble Fork, just a few miles up American Fork Canyon. With her directions we found the spot easily and met up with her right away. She was very friendly and easy to work with. She posed us, and had a very good attention to detail, telling us when to lift a chin, bend a knee or fix my sweater. She took pictures of us in several different places and poses, from different angles. The timing was just when I wanted too...I was just 2 days short of 33 weeks!

In less than a week she had our pictures edited and sent them to me on Dropbox so we could see them right away rather than waiting until the CD arrives in the mail (usually she does one or the other, but I asked her if she could give us the pictures both on Dropbox and a CD). I am so happy with our final edited images! She did a great job and I am happy to say that I now have a photographer I can recommend! Here are a few of our pictures: