This is a really special art project that I've been working on since April. I first met Laura through another art project (breastfeeding body art) and told her that I was looking for a model to get adorned every month of her pregnancy. To my surprise, she contacted me as soon as she knew and we began in April to honor her pregnancy - due in December. She chose the design idea of a seed to a blooming flower, with the design getting bigger and bigger each time. This month's session took 4 hours an involved adorning her belly, breasts, hands and arms up to past her elbows. As you can see, this flower is blooming in front of the Boulder Flatirons, because Laura is a long time Boulder resident. Just like me, she attended Boulder High School. It's really rare to meet someone who is native to this area!


Each henna pampering session is followed by a photo session a few days later when the henna is peaking in color. We decided to meet at sunrise so we could see the morning's first light hit the mountains each time. To our surprise, the first time we met for these sunrise photos, the moon just happened to be setting over the mountains. It was gorgeous! We decided to time the rest of our photo sessions with the moon setting.

(below is the same location but 7 months later:)

In addition to monthly henna sessions, we are incorporating monthly silhouettes, so you can see the belly bloom over 9 months. For this session, Laura's daughter (nearly 3 years old) came along and loved on her mama.



For the November full moon photo shoot, I watched the full moon come up and I drew my rendition as a doodle. (for more doodles, check out my Instagram feed). I was incredibly excited to photograph with the full moon setting, but also very nervous - because you never know if it will be cloudy. The day came and we got some great shots of Laura with the moon! I love how pink and purple everything gets at sunrise.





This art project isn't done! Next month we will do it again and catch one more full moon before Laura's due date. I can't wait!
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