I am so excited to share with you another journey I will be adding to my photography timeline. As many of you know I am already a proud and supportive member of Operation: Love Reunited and I love love love it. For a while now, I have been trying to find another amazing photography program to become apart of. I have done a lot of research, found a ton of amazing programs out there, but none of them really tugged at my heart strings the way OpLove did when I fist found out about it...
It wasn't until a good friend of mine (and fellow blogger) Jessica Lynn announced that her brother and sister in law were beginning their adoption process for a baby from Ethiopia. I follow their blog (The Torres 2 Plus 1) and keep up with their process and have donated to the process. I love that they are doing this and I love that I am able to help any little way I can.
That's when it hit me -- "I wonder if there are any photography programs geared towards adoption?!""
And that's where this journey has led me ... I am proud to say that I am now a member of Red Thread Sessions!
Now let me tell you a little bit about this program and what it offers...
"Red Thread Sessions was started in 2011 by two custom photographers in Texas and Maryland, both whom added to their families through adoption. Feeling the need in their communities to celebrate the beauty of adoption through photography, Red Thread Sessions was born. Soon after, many other photographers throughout the U.S. felt moved to donate their time as well. Red Thread sessions not only captures family portraits of new families, it also capture the precious, happy, confusing, exciting, exhausting, traumatic, life-changing time that is so often brief and fleeting in the life of an adoptive family.
Red Thread Sessions celebrates adoptions by bringing together adoptive families and professional photographers from across the U.S. A group of volunteer photographers have enthusiastically agreed to donate their time & talent to adoptive families so that they can receive the gift of professional portraits for their new families.
A Red Thread Session is a complimentary photography session held during your homecoming or shortly after you have become an adoptive family. Participating photographers have agreed to celebrate your adoption by completely waiving their session fee and offering edited proofs from your session at no cost to you. The size & quantity of proofs, as well as whether the proofs will be digital or printed, has been left to the discretion of each photographer. Each photographer sets his or her own policies and product pricing. Travel fees and additional subject fees may still apply, please make sure to ask your participating photographer for details.
Red Thread Sessions is currently looking for volunteer photographers across the U.S. More professional photographers are needed in every state to make Red Thread Sessions as successful as possible.
There are several types of Red Thread Sessions available to volunteer for. Professional photographers may volunteer for one, some, or all types of sessions, depending on their personal skill set, comfort level and time available to donate. The three types of Red Thread Sessions that are offered are:
(1) a family portrait session within the first 3 months of a finalized adoption to capture family portraits of the new family,
(2) a homecoming session where the volunteering photographer meets the adoptive family at the airport upon arrival home to capture the first moments with their family, or
(3) a birth photography session to capture the birth of the adoptive child in an open adoption." -- via Red Thread Sessions' website
I so cannot wait to get started with this program! It means a lot to me to capture such an amazing moment in these families lives!!! If you are in the adoption process of know someone that is I highly recommend that you check out their website and find a photographer in your area!
www.RedThreadSessions.com
