Memories Portraits {blogged} » Peeks into Memories | Knoxville Photographer, Nancy Belden

Hey guys, just wanted to pop in for a quick minute to wish everyone a Happy Labor Day weekend! Sorry for the lack of updates on the blog lately… we have tons to share but have been so busy with the new birth website and other various new projects (I think we aren’t happy unless we’re overwhelmed, haha!) We are, however, taking the weekend off to recoup and enjoy some family time… so we will be out of the studio tomorrow and will return calls and emails on Tuesday. Enjoy!!

wrestling matches on the living room floor,

muddy shoes,

hiding frogs in their pockets,

catching bugs in the backyard,

Yep, that’s right, we found out yesterday that we are expecting THREE BOYS!! Three boys who will make a mess of the house and yet have already made such a special place in our hearts. I couldn’t feel more blessed at this moment…

Remember this? The contest with Regal was a smashing success, and we are so excited that we now have winners to announce! Babies Eva, Sawyer & Kaori’s parents have all been contacted and will be enjoying their prizes soon. And thanks so much to everyone who entered, we had such a great time with this contest (and, from what I hear, Regal had a verrry difficult time deciding… all of the babies were so adorable and so full of personality!) We can’t wait to get Eva & Kaori into the studio for their sessions (and, Sawyer, enjoy your movie themed birthday party!)… see you soon girls!!

I had another ultrasound yesterday, and had to share the images. Can you believe how much they’ve grown?! It’s amazing just how quickly this is going for us. The hormones have definitely kicked in this week, if you know what I mean… we’re hoping the icky will go away within another week or so. The babies were all moving for us yesterday during the ultrasound, Dr. Donesky said they were doing the ‘Noodle Dance’ LOL!

Some of you may or may not be aware of the fact that my husband, Bill, and I have been trying to get pregnant for the past four years.  We had many obstacles to overcome with a vasectomy reversal, stage four endometriosis, and then later finding out my husband had a sperm antibody which prevented sperm from penetrating the egg naturally. With all of that being said, my doctor suggested that in vitro fertilization (IVF) would be our only hope. This was our second attempt at IVF (the first pregnancy in February, sadly ended in miscarriage at just four weeks) but we are THRILLED to announce that I am happily nine weeks pregnant!!!

This is the very first picture of my little fertilized eggs (taken by the microscope of the embryologist):

Under our infertility doctor’s recommendation, we implanted two healthy embryos. Due to my age (yes, I know 44 is old, LOL!) my doctor monitored me weekly, and my initial beta/hcg levels were through the roof. At our first ultra sound at four weeks, we immediately saw two gestational sacs… yup, you guessed it, twins! Oh, but wait!!!  Here is the crazy part… one of the eggs had gone ahead and split. Meaning….OMG! TRIPLETS!! This means we will have two identical babies and a third fraternal triplet.  Michelle went with me to the ultrasound and took this photo (with her little point and shoot camera) right after the doctor gave us the news… haha, can you tell that I was definitely shocked?!

We are sooo very excited and scared to death at the same time. This has been a long, hard, emotional roller coaster for the past four years, and I am so thankful to my family and friends for their love and support through out this time. You do not realize the emotional heartache that goes along with infertility. Month after month, year after year, disappointment after disappointment… which is why I am so thankful to God for sending me to Dr. Barry Donesky with My Fertility Center. He has a satellite office here in West Knoxville, but their main office is located in Chattanooga. The entire staff, from receptionist to doctor, are absolutely amazing. These people all went above and beyond my expectations of kindness, sincerity, and love. Basically, they were all wonderful! I would recommend them to anyone who is having any sort of fertility problems. These people go out of their way to make you feel like you are not alone on this incredible (and sometimes heartbreaking) journey.

Some of you may be wondering why at my age and the ages of my children, would I want to start a family all over again? All I can say is that I am finally at a place in my life where I have true honest to God love from a man who is the kindest, most loving man I have ever met. He is my best friend, he means everything to me and I am totally madly deeply in love with him. Oh, and the fact that he adores me and treats me like a princess isn’t bad either! One of my friends had said to me “Why would God put this desire in your heart if it wasn’t meant to be?”  So, my answer to the “why’s” is, who says you can’t have everything?! Did I mention that I surprised him with our midnight wedding? I will save that story for another time….

Thank you to all of you dear wonderful friends and clients who have become friends, for your prayers and support. I have the BEST job in the world, where I get to work with and meet the most amazing people! And now I am truly BLESSED x 3!!
Can you tell I’m a big bucket of love these days? hormones…..

Oh and by the way, there is only a 1 in 30,000 chance of this happening. I think I need to start playing the lottery

xx,

For those of you who’ve been asking for a copy of your images, now is your chance… Memories is testing the waters this summer with Digital Images on Disc! For a limited time (until August 31st), you can purchase a disc of your recent sessions at the prices listed above (of course, this includes previous purchases to meet the minimum requirement in order to qualify for the CD).

We’re also offering a special for our Baby First Year clients… discs are only $500 each AND buy 3, get 1 free. So, you could get your entire Baby’s First Year Program on disc for only $1500!

And, to give everyone the opportunity to purchase their images, we’re going back into the archives. So, also until August 31st, clients can purchase a CD from any digital session… sorry, not ready to go back into our medium format film days, lol! So, any client from 2003 – 2008 can purchase a disc of your session for only $500!

We know it’s vacation time… so don’t worry, we offer payment plans too. This has never been offered before, and we may not keep these prices… jump on this bandwagon while you can!

And for our longtime clients, call us at the studio for your special pricing… we appreciate you and are happy to show it!

This little goody has actually been up for a little while on our Products Page, but I wanted to make sure to showcase it here for those of you that haven’t seen this yet. I came up with the idea to do a custom hairbow holder when I was shopping at Hobby Lobby one day looking for supplies to make one for my daughter… fast forward after a frustrating day with paint, tape, and a cheap wooden plaque, and I discovered that I am just NOT crafty with my hands. This little wooden plaque was a gobby, painted mess… forget about cute polka dots or painting her name on that… it went straight to the garbage. BUT it just made me realize that I was not working within the confines of my creativity (lol, which would be, what else — photoshop!), then I realized that I knew just what to do. Since she’s two-years-old and full of spunk, I wanted to dress her as gaudy as possible to go along with this fabulous quote from Coco Chanel. I made this to match her room (and it does perfectly!), then I chose ribbons to compliment the design and stitched them up as a place to hang her bows and barretts. No more messy hairbow basket. Problem solved.

By the way, I never have posted about our Products Page before. This is a great place for clients to go and see all (or most!) of our specialty products in one place… I know that it can be confusing when deciding just how you want to display your images in your home, and this is a great resource to reference before coming into the studio for your Ordering Session!

The bunnies are coming back to Memories, and they’ll be here from March 6th – April 10th! I can hardly believe that this will be my 10th year photographing with bunnies… what a trip! And I am happy to say that this many years later, Easter is a very busy season for me. There’s just nothing sweeter than seeing the wonder and excitement in these kiddos as they hold and play with the bunnies. We’re discounting our session fees by $35 so times will book quickly, especially if you need a Saturday session, so be sure to call us at 357-5800 and schedule yours soon!

Hey guys, just wanted to pop in and say that we’re taking a snow day today. The kids are out of school, so we are too! Providing melted snow and no ice on the roads, we’ll be in tomorrow (don’t worry, no sessions were scheduled for this week!). After tomorrow (Saturday), Nancy, Michelle and I will be in Nashville for a few days attending Imaging USA. We’ll be back in the studio on Wednesday.  We are sooooo excited to go and catch up on all the latest, you’re gonna love our new products this year!

Till then, enjoy the snow and be safe!!

HOLY. COW.

That pretty much sums us up right now. 

hmm… where to begin…  Well, we’ve been busy.  Which is great. Really, we’re not complaining.  Then, we decided to splurge and get a couple of new computers (and they are gorgeous!).  Woohooo!  Then, one very important computer bit the dust the night before all backups and switching were to take place.  Not so great.  Now we’re having a heck of a time with some of our processes (credit cards to name one).  Just when we’re almost completely restored, I get a phone call that my daughter has a fever of 102.  The next day, I take her to the pediatrician and she is diagnosed with the flu.  They’re pretty sure it’s H1N1 but not positive.  Poor thing has been miserable since Thursday and doesn’t look any better now.  And now I have it… I think.  I actually feel fine but I do have a fever.  So, I’m not coming back into the studio until the fever is gone for over 24 hours (don’t worry, I haven’t even been in at all since last Thursday).

Did you get all that?  Yeah, so now you know why I say HOLY. COW.

Thankfully, my non-infected husband went into the studio a couple of nights ago and picked up a bunch of stuff for me, so now I’m working from home.  Proofing newborns out my yin-yang, and loving all of these so very much.  I’m also working on a surprise.  Some of you know about it…  Hopefully, if all goes well, we should be ready for the big announcement in time for Tinsel and Treasure.  This is something we are very excited about.  Maybe this is why I don’t feel so bad, having the swine flu and all… it’s that good.

I’ll leave you with one of my faves from yesterdays editing.  This new mom and dad were completely convinced that they left with nothing at all.  See Megan, we told you we got it (plus, oh, about 19 other equally fabulous images of your little guy!)

And, I’d like to thank all of our clients for being completely wonderful while we are a bit overwhelmed. We’ll be back to normal soon… I hope!