When my daughter was just 3 years old and becoming more and more aware of the world around her, she began to learn of her Great Grandfather, who had passed away long before she was even born.
We had spoken fondly of Great Gramps. He was a large personality and very much missed in the family. We spoke fondly of him and remembered the fun stories and memories we shared about Great Gramps. And naturally, as three years old’s do, my daughter began to ask lots of questions.
There is a photo of my husband and his grandfather together, that sits on our buffet in the lounge room and it is a really beautiful photo of them. It captures both their characters and relationship with one another to a tee. She would look at the photo and ask us about Great Gramps.
Now, my son was barely 5 months old when Great Gramps passed away, but we did manage to get some photos of them together in those short 5 months, but as my daughter was not born yet, we did not get any photos of her and her Great Gramps together, which of course she also noticed.
No matter how much we tried to explain to her why that was the case, she would still get upset that she hadn’t met him or that she did not have photos with him.
We had a hard time explaining to her how death worked and why we couldn’t get a photo of them together. She was barely 3 after all!
As mums, we always want to help our kiddos and I wanted to help her and take a away some of her pain, but how could I do that? I couldn’t bring Great Gramps back to life.
So, I turned to my love of photography and I began to look back at photos that I had of Great Gramps and photos of my daughter and see how I could create a beautiful photo of them together.
A photo where they connected, where it looked like he was smiling at her and waving at her and watching over her, just as we had told her he was doing, oh so many times.
It wasn’t long before I found everything I needed and started creating a magical photo of my daughter and Great Gramps.
Would you like to see it? Here it is….
As I mentioned earlier, I wanted to create something for her that reminded her that her Great Gramps was always around and he was always watching over her, just as we had been telling her he was. It was important for her to connect with Great Gramps and to know that he saw her too and having them wave at each other was the perfect way to do that.
But most of all, it had to be magical, because it was something that was not real, but something that I had brought to life for her and something that she could use in her dreams and in her imagination to feel closer to him, whenever she was feeling sad about never being able to meet him.
My daughter loves this photo. She has one in her little family album and we have one hanging in her bedroom on the wall. I feel so privileged that I was able to create this for my baby girl and provide her with a little bit of comfort when she was feeling a loss that I didn’t know how to heal.
It still amazes me the power of photography, over and over again.
This portrait sparked a fire in me and I have been creating magical images like this one ever since.
It may not be a loss that your child has felt, but your child may just need a portrait like this one where they become the star of the show.
It could be that your child needs to build their confidence, feel stronger, deal with an issue at school, feel brave, or just feel happy.
I believe these beautiful portraits give children the little piece of magic they need to bring their dreams to life and escape to a world of imagination and freedom, whenever they want to!
If you would like to capture some magic for your kiddos, then give Julie a call on 0417 549 653 and lets start chatting about what they dream about and how one magical portrait can make them feel on top of the world!
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