YOUR MOTHER'S DAY RESOLUTION
I'm on a bit of a mission. To get MUMS to be in more photographs. You might wonder why a baby and child portrait photographer wants to encourage mums to be in photos. Where's the big sell?
There's no sell. I don't care who takes the photos nor how badly composed or exposed they are. I just want you to be in some. Preferably with your children.
My mum died 8 years ago. In our old family home, we had shelves of albums. How others might keep books. With photo after photo of my parents' teenage years, the early years of their marriage, of our little family, during my childhood. And my goodness, do these photos bring back forgotten memories. I might not remember each moment, but I can remember a top I knew mum had knitted for me, and a painting of a fireplace which we did together and stuck on the wall in my room, of the third birthday cake she made me. So many memories and feelings come flooding back when I look at these pictures. It's bringing tears to my eyes just writing this.
I want my little boy to have these same memories of his childhood and his parents.
I'm becoming more and more aware that that my husband and I shy away from the “right side” of the camera. We have very few images of all of us as a family. We have tonnes of photos of my son. But they are for our sake more than his. What are the memories we will leave him with of us when we are gone? I don't mean to sound morbid, only to encourage you not to shy away from being photographed. I know why we don’t want to be in the pictures… we want to lose the baby weight, get a hair cut, put some make up on, straighten our hair, wear something more flattering… But please, don’t think of your hang ups; think of what we can leave our children. These pictures will not wait… one day, the moment will have passed and we will have missed these priceless images with them at a week, 6 months, a year, 2 years or even 10 years old. It is so important not to wait. We don’t know what will happen tomorrow and when our moment will come. This is the heritage we leave our children.
I am so, so grateful to my parents for having album upon album of prints for me to look back on. Without them, so many of my childhood experiences and memories would be lost to the passage of time.
So, for this reason, I beg of you, make a pact. It is almost Mother’s Day. Make this your Mother’s Day resolution. Have a family photo taken every few months. Anyone can take it. It doesn't need to be artistic. It doesn’t need to be a professional portrait. It just needs to capture a memory of you all for your children's sake. PLEASE, do it.
Sara
xxx
