Motherhood sessions: the everyday scenes

“I’ll have two more pretzels and then I’ll be full.” Those are the words my five year old said this morning as he leapt over the couch towards the kitchen.

There’s pretzels on the floor around the breakfast nook, milk splatters on the table, an empty bag which once held heart shaped cheerios on the chair.

The house is quiet but there are signs of life everywhere, and it makes my heart ache with joy.

These motherhood sessions were inspired by two things. A photo of my as a wee little one sitting on the floor of my living room with my family. My father laying across the floor, I’m cuddled up with my blanket looking gruff, my sister has a mischievous look in her eye (she just looks up to something) and there’s my mom with her arms around my brothers.

The rug underneath us is now in my bedroom here, a rug my diapers were changed on. The coffee table was in our family almost as long and is one that inspired me to get my round table so my kids wouldn’t get hurt on the edges. The TV has those buttons I can still remember pressing in to change the channel and a panel that would open up to adjust the color and other neat things.

Behind us is my sister and my bedroom. We still have that comforter, now made into two twins and she has her’s. I still have my blanket I’m holding.

There’s so much about this picture that brings back memories, and yet I do not have any memory of actually being there. But every time I look at this photo I see something more, like how I still have pigtails in though it seems like it’s evening. And best yet, I feel so much love.

Now that I’m a mother of three I realize so many of these moments are the ones I treasure the most. The ones where we are just being us, in our everyday. Where we eat breakfast together, be it pretzels or scrambled eggs or cereal. Where we color and laugh and snuggle up on the couch.

This is why I love capturing mothers being mothers. Spending time with their children in the way that they do. With frustrations, with silliness, with fashion shows, with all the little nuances that only they get to see.

There’s no wardrobe requirements, you don’t have to meet a “brand” standard. You just have to be you. So that when you look back at these pictures you’ll remember that stage in your life. The couch you couldn’t wait to get rid of, the chore chart on the fridge, the color of their bedrooms and the stuffed animals they loved.

These sessions are to celebrate mothers or any parent in the way they are because that’s what our children treasure the most about us.