Adoption Photography. This is a thing.

There are a lot of multitalented people in this world. Sometimes I find myself getting irritated when I read through somebody’s beautiful blog and then realize they ALSO took the beautiful pictures. I am not that girl. I know my gifts and any kind of visual art falls well outside that scope. Painting, drawing, photography— no, no, and no. Brian and I had to do this personality assessment test when we were applying to work at the group home and part of it was drawing three things:  a person, a tree, and a house. We were sitting across the table from each other while completing this process. After I drew my person I knew it was bad, but I was hoping maybe Brian’s was bad, too. I showed him my pathetic attempt that was kind of like if you put boxy clothes on a stick figure (hands in the pockets of course because there was no way I was attempting to draw proportional fingers) and he held up a beautiful picture that I could easily identify was me sitting at the table drawing a picture. Stupid Brian.

What’s an adoption party without cake?
Photo by Rebecca Tredway Photography

So what’s a girl to do if she knows she isn’t good at something, but that something is important to her? Delegate! This is why I love adoption photography. There are many ways in which adoptions are like weddings. It’s the uniting of people who aren’t blood related. It’s the creation of a family. It’s a legal ceremony. It’s a party! And you want this all documented. Can you imagine if the bride was responsible for photographically documenting her own wedding? That’s a lot of extra stress and you probably wouldn’t get many pictures that included the bride at all. In this analogy the new family is that bride and they really should be able to just experience their beautiful day without worrying about being sure they captured every moment. 

Bethany snuggling the teddy bear the judge gave her.
Photo by Renae Morehead

We’ve been blessed to work with three different photographers for our three adoptions from foster care. Each one has brought their own perspective and talents to the table. When I was meeting with the photographer for Carolina’s adoption to talk about what we wanted, I pulled out Danny’s adoption book to show her what we’d done before. I went to get Bethany’s but I couldn’t find it anywhere. I finally asked Bethany and she said, “I keep that in my special place.” She has a little hide-out where she keeps her favorite things safe from her brothers and her adoption book was one of them. These books get looked at probably more than any of their actual storybooks and we retell the story of that day again and again. I’m telling you— this is a big deal to my adopted kids.

Our beautiful baby girl on her big day.
Photo by Renee Welstead of Love Equals

So I just wanted to encourage you families who are thinking about adoption or planning an adoption to consider hiring somebody to document it for you. Less pressure for you and beautiful images for your kids to hang on to for life. Win win!