We have the most wonderful news, our baby girl Albany is here!

We have some really wonderful news to announce!

On January 6th, 2018 we welcomed a new addition to our family. A beautiful baby girl and we named her Albany Emerson Lilyanna Keyes. She was born just 6 hours shy of her big sister’s 10th birthday.

We’re all so happy to have her here with us. A dear friend told me that babies are good for the soul and that certainly is true.

Our home has been full of so many smiles and laughter and it brings great joy to us as a family to share in all of these precious moments of new life.

Since our daughter Madison was 4 years old she’s been asking for a baby sister. We so wanted to give her a sister or brother.

After four years of trying we lost hope that we would ever be able to make this happen. The month we gave up trying I became pregnant only to suffer an early loss. Due to advanced maternal age, I never thought we would conceive again; however, the following year, we conceived again. This time the pregnancy lasted a little longer. 12 weeks to be exact. This pregnancy was a blighted ovum and ultimately ended in loss as well. There’s nothing sadder than attending for your first ultra sound only to discover there’s no heart beat on the monitor. I went to different ultra sound clinics for both pregnancies. At one clinic they gave you a print out of the results right away and the other clinic we had to wait for days to receive the information from our family doctor. There’s really nothing worse than not knowing what’s going on.

Although I didn’t know it at the time, only 6 short weeks later, I conceived again. I remember photographing a newborn and being so tired. In fact, I was so unusually tired that I sat on the floor to rock the baby to sleep for pictures. After the newborn session I thought I should go to the pharmacy and purchase a pregnancy test and it was positive!

I was more filled with worry this time than happiness because unfortunately I had learned that every pregnancy doesn’t always result in holding the baby you dreamed of having.

The pregnancy was confirmed with a blood test and I went to see my family doctor. Due to having a very high HCG level (22,000), the doctor believed I was one month farther along than I thought I was.

A few days after that doctor’s appointment I started having symptoms of loss again and I headed to the hospital this time instead of waiting things out at home. I cried in the waiting area and was certain it would be bad news.

Lakeridge Health Hospital in Oshawa is an amazing hospital with wonderful support. They’ve always taken good care of me there. When it was time for my ultrasound, we discovered I had a sub chorionic hematoma 7 cm long. The ultrasound technician told me she had one with her own pregnancy that went on to be a healthy baby girl and that she didn’t know the future but I was definitely not suffering a loss. I remember seeing little arms and legs moving on the screen and seeing that movement just made me cry. I was filled with joy and happiness. I was also shocked because I thought I was only between 6 and 7 weeks pregnant. It turns out my doctor was correct and I was 10 weeks 5 days pregnant.

I took time off work while the hematoma was healing and it did completely heal around 5 months. After that I photographed newborn sessions and maternity sessions but after 6 or 7 months of pregnancy the sessions became too hard due to the heat during the sessions (80 to 85 degrees) and the long length of time spent sitting on the floor hunched over the babies. My last newborn session was with a beautiful baby boy named Greyson. Christina came to assist me that day for my newborn session. Greyson had the most beautiful newborn session but at one point during the session I got a charlie horse in my leg and at that point I decided it was time to go on maternity leave.

Our baby girl just turned two months now. She’s just over 12 pounds and is such a happy smiley baby. She was born with a head full of dark hair which has now lightened and looks like she will have her daddy’s blonde hair and she for now has his blue eyes. It’s the cutest thing because her individual features look like me and my oldest daughter but when she smiles or cries or makes faces, her expressions look just like her daddy.

Albany’s name came from the city where my husband and I first met just south of Perth in Western Australia.

Madison has been the best big sister and it’s beyond wonderful to see the two of them together. Albany smiles a ginormous smile every time she sees her sister and in fact, Albany gave her the biggest smile moments after she was born and they had an instant connection right from there.

Of course, I had to photograph my own newborn and although I was exhausted coming home from the hospital I made time to capture these fleeting moments. We know how hard it is to get sleep at the hospital or at least for me it is. On day 4 as soon as my milk came in I began photographing Albany. Her dad assisted me and did such a wonderful job soothing her to sleep and spotting her for pictures.

Each day I focused on one or two things to try with Albany. I spent 8 days in total photographing her and spent 2-3 hours each day. Most of that time was spent nursing her to sleep for the picture. It certainly isn’t easy to photograph your own newborn but thankfully Albany is the most calm and relaxed baby I’ve ever seen. She hardly ever fusses and since coming home from the hospital she would sleep through the night. First for 4 hour stretches and now at just over two months she sleeps right through the night. Last night for 7 hours 🙂

I couldn’t be happier with how the images we captured together turned out and I look forward to putting my own album together to cherish forever such as I have done for so many of my wonderful clients. We will finally have our own album to cherish forever.

Here are some of the images we captured. My favourites are of course the one of Albany and Madison together melts my heart completely and the images of Albany in her daddy’s hands.