It was a drama-filled beginning.
I first met the Montgomerys when their friends gifted them a family portrait session before William’s deployment to Iraq. I loved them immediately.
Just weeks after Williams’s deployment, Annie discovered she was pregnant with their third child.
I couldn’t imagine what it felt like to be either of the parents in that story: the mom at home with two little girls, a baby growing in her belly, worrying about and missing her husband. Or the dad, sent into the fray, trying to remain safe, absent for a monumental chapter in his family’s story.
I offered to do pregnancy portraits so William could experience it somehow. The letter he wrote me about what that meant to him was something I carried in my purse for a year. A prayer for his safety as much as a reminder of why I do what I do for a living.
He made it home with 12 hours to spare before baby Ella was born. We made portraits of them snuggling together before he left again. Happily, he eventually returned home safely, but it was an incredibly dramatic start to Ella’s life.
Fast-forward 17 years.
Now, can you understand why I was a giddy little kid at the prospect of making Ella’s senior portraits?!
It’d been five years since our last session, and reconnecting with Ella was so much fun. She is engaging, intelligent, beautiful, talented, patient, graceful, strong, delightful.
Nothing deterred her. Not fighting off the last of a cold, some hair-mussing wind, or some seriously questionable rutted roads into the middle of the forest.
Ella’s crew, mom Annie, and sister Grace were the dream team. Montgomerys are get-it-done people. If you want something done, ask a Montgomery!
We talked about Star Wars and Disney, horror movies, poison brownies (you had to be there), Texas, Batman, Halloween traditions, ballet, and sushi. We tromped around the mountains through meadows, rocks, and aspens. Ella was lovely through it all; her stamina as a dancer clearly an advantage. We even recreated one of her baby pictures, trying not to giggle.
As the sun set, bathing her in a warm glow, I felt so grateful for this moment and everything that led up to it.
Flagstaff Family Portrait Photographer • Flagstaff Maternity Pregnancy Photographer • Flagstaff Newborn Photographer • Flagstaff Child Photographer • Flagstaff Senior Portrait Photographer • Flagstaff Couples Photography
Kristen Dacey Iwai of KDI Photography is a full-time professional portrait photographer based in Flagstaff, Arizona with decades of experience. Making portraits of families, pregnancy, newborns, babies, children, and high school seniors in her downtown studio and on location, she serves clients from Flagstaff, Sedona, Tuba City, Winslow, Payson, Page, Williams, Prescott, Mesa, Scottsdale, Phoenix, Arizona
