Throwback: Maternity

Good morning, and Happy Monday to you!

It's my birthday this week and I'm feeling nostalgic. I'll be turning 34 incase you're curious... Happy Birthday to me <3

I'm old now, so I decided to go through my hard drive and find some of my favourite maternity images. Pixie is three and a half, so these images were taken nearly four years ago.

It's crazy for me to look back on these pictures, because the life I was dreaming about isn't the one I ended up living. I guess that's always the case in life, but there are a few instances where this is so obvious to you. Seeing pictures of yourself in a particular state you can really think back to how you felt at that time, and being pregnant is an obvious one.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm so grateful for the way my life turned out and I wouldn't change one bit of it. I have a beautiful, happy, healthy daughter who I absolutely adore and I'm getting back to the job that I am beyond passionate about (with the added bonus of spreading the love through the workshops I'm doing). But that doesn't mean it's not a little weird to think about how differently I imagined this whole parenting thing playing out while I was pregnant. Life is a wild ride, for sure.

Anyway, you wanna see some pictures, right? I've chosen three images from each photographer in this blog post, and you can click on the pictures to see the full version. I've chosen them all to be black and white too, because that's just my thing at the minute. I hope you enjoy looking through these images as you indulge me on this nostalgia trip.

1: Karen Boyle

Let's start with some images taken by a female photographer, Karen Boyle. This shoot was really fun because I always enjoy working with other women. I feel like the whole vibe is just different. That may seem a bit sexist to say, but I do think that when women shoot other women, they're paying attention to things that only a woman would. To me, this shows in the final images as they have a more feminine feel to them. This is one of the first actual maternity shoots I did when I started to actually look pregnant rather than fat. Before this I was trying to not look pregnant... I just looked like I'd eaten too much cake in lockdown. Here's some of the pictures we got from my time working with Karen in her home studio:

2: Dave Edkins

Let's move on to some images by someone you'll have heard of if you follow me on social media. He's the person I've shot with the most in my modelling career, and he's the guy I'm co-running those workshops with that you keep hearing about... Dave Edkins. When I shoot with Dave, I feel like he captures a bit more of my personality, and that's why we work so well together: we get on as humans and that comes across in the final images. If you have a model that's 100% comfortable, happy and having a good time... then the magic happens! Here's just three of the lovely images we got from our shoot at his pop up studio in his local village hall:

3: Mick Szabo

Next up is Mick Szabo. I've shot with Mick a lot and actually worked with him the other day, which was the first time since he took these maternity photos. Mick is a very talented photographer and he's a lot of fun to work with because he has a great energy. On top of that, I love how he edits his images. Here's a few from our shoot in Chester at a Pathways Studio studio day I did:

4: Brian Cooper

And last, but not least, here are some images from Brian Cooper, another favourite to work with. Although he doesn't shoot anymore, I'll always remember the fun we had on our shoots with all of our crazy off the wall ideas, and the absolutely random and silly things we shot! This shoot with Brian was one of the lasts shoots I did before I gave birth, in December 2021. I was due just after new year (although Pixie decided not to make an appearance until nearly a week after, but babies work on their own schedule, not ours!) Here are the images:

It's crazy to think that inside the belly on all of these photographs is a person that became my absolute best friend in the whole world. Even if there are days where I tell her I'm going to chuck her in the bin, I love her more than anything and getting to be her Mama is the thing I'm most grateful for in the whole world. As nice as it is to be back modelling again as Misuzu, nothing will ever compare to being Mama <3

I hope you have a wonderful week, and I look forward to writing another post for you next week!

As a finishing note, here's a picture taken by a photographer Derek, who goes by the name Glasgowboy, at Dave Edkins' pop up studio. I've included it because I love the fact that we used a rainbow piece of material, and the tiny human I was still growing in my belly ended up being my beautiful Pixie Rainbow <3

Thank you for reading <3