Hoyts Cinemas.  That is where it all started.  Hoyts Cinemas in Carousel Mall back in Syracuse.  I was a 16 year old high school senior working the concession stand and box office when I first met Jaimie.  At 18, she was a little bit older than me and a student at Syracuse University.  We immediately hit it off and became good friends.  We stayed in touch while I went away to school and she was a big part of convincing me I *needed* to come back to Syracuse for school and a better partying academic atmosphere.  She was instrumental in helping me (forcing me to) join the marching band with her as well as the sorority that went along with it.  She was one of my best friends and we even lived together for a year as well.  As we got older we went our separate ways geographically but always stayed very much in touch visiting for any and all reasons.  When I started planning my wedding, she was one of the first people I wanted as my bridesmaid and she was one of the first I told when I was pregnant.  Basically, she has been there through it all.  🙂  There is this rule I have in my business that I stole from friends.  If you have seen me pee, puke or cry, your session is free.  Needless to say she had that allllll very well covered hahaha!   No matter how much time passes, it never feels like we have been apart.  🙂  I mentioned in a post last year “The true friends.  Someone that I know calls them “rocking chair friends” – the ones we’ll sit with on our porches when we’re 85 and drinking lemonade on a hot day.  That person.  That friend.”  That is my Jaimie.  🙂

When she and Chris got engaged I was so, SO happy for her.  Their wedding was absolutely amazing and beautiful and perfect.  And then about seven months ago I got a message on my phone asking if I had any availability in December.  🙂  They were pregnant!! I immediately put them on my calendar.  No way would I miss those photos.  Though Kyleigh made her entrance about a week and a half early, I did a quick drive down to NJ for the photos.  Being the wonderful baby that she is she did not make a peep the entire session.   And she is just as gorgeous as her mommy.  🙂

Although I have gotten to do some pretty amazing things with my job, I had never gotten to photograph a birth.  It was one of those things in the back of my mind as a “bucket list” item.  Something I’d love to do if I got the chance but it would be pretty difficult to make it all work.  It’s next to impossible to be on call 24/7 for a laboring client when you have kids and a working spouse!  Thankfully when Dani went into labor two days before Christmas, the stars aligned and I got to photograph my first birth.  Amazing doesn’t begin to describe it.  First, to be allowed to witness a birth at all is mind-blowing.  To have it be your friend, even more so.  And to be the photographer for it???  WOW.  I got home and was just so so excited.  I looked at my husband and said “You get to do this every day?!?!  (he’s an OB-Gyn for those new to me)  How does it ever not get to be the coolest thing EVER???”  And he said that that never happens.  🙂  And looking at the doctor’s face in the one photo after James was born shows just how happy and beautiful and miraculous every birth is.  And Dani??  She made it look easy.  Just a few sets of pushes and she became a mommy for the second time.  She did GREAT throughout the entire process.  It was pretty much a dream birth.  For them and for me.  🙂

The slideshow can be seen below, or scroll down for the individual photos used.  🙂