Baby girl

Oh my baby girl. My youngest, my only girl, my little heart-stealer. She loves the camera and the camera loves her. There is not a lens wide enough to capture that smile, nor one long enough to see all the way into those eyes. The frame cannot contain her, it can only hope to capture a moment.

My wife and I traveled half way around the world and adopted not only our daughter but the rich history and culture of Ethiopia. We had decided that if we were going to have a third child we wanted a baby girl. The only avenue that would promise us that was international adoption. We had seen a program some time ago that showed a Canadian couple adopting from Ethiopia and at the time that seemed rather random. Delving a little deeper though showed us the deep love Ethiopians have for their children and their strong desire to give the best to them. As a result of this even the children in orphanages are given great attention and shown love as if they were family.

We embarked on a journey that eventually led us to a orphanage run by an American adoption agency in the country's capital, Addis Ababa.

There, in a city of 10 million, through the deserted streets, down a nondescript alley, behind iron gates, across the courtyard and into a room full of cribs and sleeping babies, we found the baby whose pictures we had been pouring over for weeks and weeks. After all the paper work, and shots, and fingerprinting, and paperwork, there she was; curly hair and sleepy smile.





That day was 8 months ago and there has been great change in our family. Prayers have been answered, dreams fulfilled and new challenges have arisen. We feel our family is complete now, our hearts content. God only knew that the one to complete our family was being born on Christmas Eve, 2005 in a faraway land called Ethiopia.


She joined our family at a time when I was discovering my love for photography and the power it has not only to record events but to move people and express emotion. My children were my initial motivation for buying a digital SLR camera. Their movements and moments of showing their true selves were too quick to be caught by shutter-lagged point and shoots. And though I have found many interesting and creatively fulfilling avenues in photography, none brings me greater joy than photographing my kids.