This family... I don't even know where to begin. Getting to know Angie, Christine, and Esme over the last two years has been such a golden light in my life. From the day we met and they told me the incredible story of Esme's adoption, I was hooked. Can you IMAGINE what it would be like to go from zero idea that you were going to be a parent to having a newborn baby in 24 hours? These moms are a beacon of what parenthood and love is and should be, and Esme is the gregarious, confident, hilarious force that she is because of it. Watching all of this is a joy. Getting to document it, a true privilege.

“Have you hired a photographer? You’re going to get baby photos, right?” We were just a few weeks in to being moms and starting our family. When our sister-in-law asked those questions, we were still holding our breath after the completely life-changing event of the birth of our daughter Esmé was born on 9/11/2016; we had tickets to see Leon Bridges at DPAC that night. It had been a long and emotionally draining summer. It had been 18 months since we started the adoption process. We were starting to have difficult conversations about whether expanding our family was going to happen. But that evening we were going out and let all those feelings take a back seat to a little fun. We never made it to the concert. Our phone rang before we walked out the door that our daughter was born.

A photographer? Baby photos? We were busy falling completely in love with Esmé, trying to figure out how to be moms, and doing it all on little to no sleep. But we did want photos! We just needed someone to remind us before we missed capturing those earliest days. Thus began the search. We knew what we didn’t want. We weren’t looking for our baby to be placed in a bowl or staged in cute little outfits. That’s perfect for some folks and exactly what they want, but it’s not for us. We found Annemie online and once we saw her gallery, we stopped looking for a photographer and signed up for the Baby Plan.

When we met Annemie, we loved her from the start. She was calm and friendly and immediately put us at ease. She was a person we’d be friends with. She was (after all) at the Leon Bridges concert we were supposed to attend, so we knew she had credibility. Those very early days of motherhood, when you are feeling ragged and tired, questioning every decision, and defining success as getting to shower for the day – you need someone you feel comfortable with to witness and capture the most intimate of acts of your family. She’s it.

We were hoping to get one amazing photo of our daughter that first session. What we got was a whole gallery of photos we love. We didn’t think the second session could top the first, but it did, and the third session was even better than the second. We have a
perfect collection of photos that capture the little human we get to call our daughter. They capture Esme’s spirit and our absolute adoration of her.

We recently had a remodel done in our home that removed several walls. We originally had art and things all over. When we finally got to move back in, we started from scratch decorating, there was one painting that made its way back to a wall – everything
else is Annemie’s art of our daughter. Our house looks so happy and full of love.

Annemie is taking another round of photos of Esmé (the fourth set) and her grandmother in just a few weeks. My mom is nervous about how she will look for the shoot. I told her to relax. Annemie will handle it and she’ll deliver exactly what you
didn’t know you wanted.

Her images capture life, not staged, but beautiful and real.

Angie and Christine

So happy and full of love