One of the features I’ll be running on the blog while I’m on maternity leave is called “Why I Love This Photo.” Guest writers submit their favorite photos and the stories behind them. Anyone can submit a photo and story – it’s a fun way to appreciate photography and what makes it so important. So feel free to send your story to me at kerryrailey@gmail.com. I can’t wait to hear it. It's been a few weeks since we've had a "Why I Love This Photo" submission. While many people have said they're sending one in, sometimes it takes time to get these kind of things together. I get it; it's also been a few weeks since a Motherhood Mondays post, which I intended to contribute to more often. Let's face it; we're all busy. Most of the people submitting happen to be mothers - the busiest people I know. So, both of these features will continue even after I return from maternity leave, but have no pressure to be weekly. If you happen to submit a story, it'll be posted! That simple. No pressure. I like no pressure situations. Let's move on to this week's awesome submission from Joyce. You might recognize Joyce and her family from these photo sessions: This one in Plymouth and this one in Newton!
Name: Joyce Silvia
Occupation: Employee Communications
Children: Amelia, 17 months
My age: 33
Where I live: Sherborn, MA
Fun facts: I'm an Army brat that grew up on Army bases in Korea, Japan and Hawaii for most of my childhood.
Here is her beautiful Photo Submission:
And why Joyce loves it:
"This picture was taken at Amelia's first birthday celebration at the end of October 2013 (thank you to my college roommate Amy for manning the camera), and I love it for so many reasons.
First, it's one of the few occasions where I have a picture of all three of us. I'm often behind the camera, documenting what's happening in our lives, and I realize that I need to remember to stop and ask people to snap a picture for us. This holds true for all mamas, make sure you get some pictures in front of the camera with your families! Or hire a talented photographer like Kerry to snap some beautiful family memories. :)
Being half-Korean, it's important to me incorporate as much of this culture into Amelia's life (lucky girl is not only a quarter Korean, but also Irish, Swedish, Portuguese and Italian as well). Knowing that Koreans have a number of wonderful traditions for a baby's first birthday (called a doljabi), I knew right off the bat that I wanted to make sure Amelia's birthday incorporated some of these elements.
In the picture, she's wearing a traditional hanbok that my mom bought for her just for this occasion. As a part of doljabi, babies participate in a Korean fortune-telling tradition where items are placed in front of them representing future careers or life traits. What a baby grabs is supposed to tell their future and for fun, families vote on what the baby will choose. In Amelia's case, she had a soccer ball (being athletic), string (long life), stethoscope (doctor), money (wealth), and pencil (scholar). And as you can see, she ended up grabbing the pencil.
Which brings me to the final reason that I love this picture. I love that it's an action shot, and captures so many of the wonderful feelings from that moment and that day. Our whole family gathered around Amelia to see what she would choose. We were wondering if she would even crawl to an item. There was a hush of anticipation, and when we let Amelia go, she crawled without hesitation to the pencil and grabbed. What you see is the joy in the moment—everyone in the room was clapping out of excitement, Amelia's looking back to show us what she has, my husband Andrew's looking down encouragingly at Amelia and I'm just thrilled beyond words to have witnessed a moment that I saw play out in my head for months in advance. Pure joy."
***
Oh how I love this photo too! I "liked" it on Facebook the minute Joyce shared photos from sweet Amelia's first birthday. As Joyce said, it's just pure joy. And that is the best kind of thing, isn't it?!
So many of your submissions have included Mom in the photo - and each of you talk about why that's so special. It's true! Get yourselves in those pictures! Your children will cherish them always! Think about how Amelia will just LOVE seeing how happy (and youthful and good looking) her parents are in this picture! I've become a broken record on this subject but I don't care. GET IN THOSE PICTURES! And, like Joyce so awesomely and unexpectedly shouted out (thank you Joyce), I'm happy to take those pictures for you. ;)
Other than the joy and the whole family aspects of this photo, I LOVE the culture in it. What a fun tradition - the fortune telling idea. I could totally see Amelia being a scholar, too. How adorable does she look in the hanbok she's wearing?! I've met Joyce's mother and I love that she incorporates so much of being Korean into the entire family's experience. What traditions and connections to your own ethnicity do you celebrate? I'd love to hear. Maybe the next person to submit can share their traditions with us as well! Looking forward to it. In the meantime, thank you so much to Joyce and your lovely share.
-Kerry:)
