Boston Family Portrait .:. Adopted

By witnessing and recording life as a Boston family portrait photographer, the photographs I make reinforce and value life experiences and celebrate milestones. A fair amount of what I am asked to document is somewhat traditional. Weddings, maternity portraits, newborns, graduations, etc.
I was thrilled to photograph an adoption earlier this month.

Years ago, these new parents and I lived in the Bay Area together. It was a time of loft parties and art openings and trekking out to the Connecticut Yankee for playoff watching. We all ended up leaving the west coast eventually, for various reasons, and resettling in Boston.

A. and M. weren’t planning to have a family. ?On this point they seemed certain. ?And one Thursday they received an unexpected phone call, and a twenty month old boy. ?A.’s nephew needed a home. ?They stepped up. ?Over an intense last eighteen months, these three have formed a fierce and loyal family. ?In early May, the final court date was set, the papers signed, and they legally adopted this child. ?Then at the party to celebrate the adoption, they decided to say vows and get married. ?Friends and family came in from the west coast, from Puerto Rico, from Spain, from Bermuda to eat, dance and toast their union. ?From the cheering at the courthouse to salsa dance party that night at Bella Luna, it was an emotional and profoundly beautiful day.

I still tear up when I think about the fourth floor of the courthouse that was all children, wearing their best dresses and tiny suits, getting adopted by joyful families. It is an amazing thing to witness. ?