I have been very open with my friends and family about my struggle to achieve my goal of having three children.  Before my daughter was born, my happiness was tinged with a feeling of sadness, a feeling of emptiness.  Like someone was missing from the table.  No matter how much joy my two children brought me, I just could not deny the unoccupied space in my heart.  Every joy was tempered with the tug on my heart; my family is not complete.

Someone is missing.  

Therefore, I know on a deep and intimate level what this mother felt upon the birth of her final child.  The joy, the satiation, the feeling of wholeness.  There is absolutely nothing that can hyperbolize the emotion a mother experiences when she completes her family.  

As this is the second time I was honored to photograph this family during this most precious time of life, and as their mother is one of my very very good friends, these photographs mean more to me than I could express.  The joy I get at looking at them and remembering how I was there just two short years ago photographing the same joyous event, looking at these four absolutely cherubic faces and remember how I rejoiced in the birth of every last one of them.  And I will continue to relish in the accomplishments of every last one of them.  But for now...I relish this mom's joy, because it, too...is my joy.  The joy of a mother reaching her maternal destination.  

The completion of her family.

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