my maternity photo journey

To be totally transparent, I went back and forth with the idea of even doing maternity photos again. When I was pregnant with my first daughter, I had my photos done at 35 weeks, and while I know most would say I looked fine, I was puffy and swollen, it was close to 30 degrees outside, and I just felt uncomfortable and miserable, which I felt really showed in the photos.

Thankfully, we have a wonderful photographer, who has done all our photos from our engagement to Ivy’s one year, and she was able to work some real magic and salvage the photos enough that I actually ended up being okay with how some turned out.

This time around, I did not want to have the same feelings about my photos, so after deciding that I should do them and would want to be able to look back at them in the future, hubby and I talked and decided we could do photos sooner than last time to try and prevent the same issues. I ended getting them done about 5 weeks earlier at 30 weeks.

Aside from the fact that our photographer was still amazing, everything about these photos felt a million times better. I wasn’t nearly as swollen or uncomfortable. We had beautiful weather (big difference between a December and October baby!), and Ivy was there keeping everyone entertained and smiling the whole time.

As some of you might remember, I was really struggling choosing my dress for my maternity photos. I could blame this on a number of things— pregnancy hormones making overly emotional and self-conscious, feeling uncomfortable with growing body, or just being unnecessarily indecisive… but from the moment I saw this dress, I just had a feeling it was the one.   

However, after sending it and some other options to some of my friends and family, the general consensus was this was not the dress. I ended up getting it and one other, which I featured in an Instagram try on, and even then, the other dress got the popular vote! I went back and forth for quite some time, and even contemplated wearing both for a few photos… but when the time came, I still had the same gut feeling I got when I first saw this dress. This was the one. Ultimately, I’m so happy I chose it. I felt beautiful, yet totally comfortable— I felt like myself.

I say all of this to say: in a world full of people trying to influence one another, sometimes you’re not going to like the most popular options or trend, and that’s OKAY! Don’t ever feel obligated to go against what you feel is best. Do you, do what makes you happy. In the end, you’ll know you made the right choice, just like I did. Just make sure you give everyone the same respect in return.

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Now, for some huge thank yous…

Thank you to Pink Blush Maternity for this beautiful dress, to my bff Sabrina for helping a puffy, uncomfortable pregnant mama feel beautiful (like always), to Hunter Berry Photography for capturing this moment so perfectly, and to my other bestie Bree & my dad for being behind the scenes to help with rambunctious little Ivy.

And the biggest thank you to my amazing husband, for always making me feel beautiful, no matter what.

Have a beautiful day, friends.

xx, the windy city mama

p.s. Unfortunately, my dress is no longer available, but there are a lot of beautiful options available on their site!