10/22/2026
A little personal update from behind the camera. ❤️
For those of you who have followed Blessed Touch Photography over the years, you know how much documenting families, births, and all those beautiful little moments means to me.
What many of you might not know is just how much has been happening within my own family over the past year.
As some of you know, I'm a mom of ten and also a grandmother! Over the last year, my husband Jeff and I have been raising our beautiful granddaughter Aurora full-time, since she was just eight weeks old.
Aurora is now almost 15 months old, and she's had quite the medical journey in her short little life.
She's experienced multiple hospitalizations, respiratory complications, developmental delays, significant low muscle tone, and difficulties with her airway and swallowing. After months of appointments, testing, and advocating for answers, we finally received a formal genetic diagnosis.
Aurora has an extremely rare deletion on chromosome 17, involving approximately 20 genes, including DLG4, which causes a condition called SHINE syndrome. There are only around 135 known cases worldwide, and her particular deletion is even less understood.
We've also recently learned that she's been silently aspirating when swallowing, meaning food and liquids have been entering her airway without the usual signs of coughing or choking. Because of this, she now has an NG feeding tube and can't safely eat or drink by mouth.
There's still so much we don't know about what her future will look like, and we're just beginning to process what this diagnosis means for our sweet girl.
But I also want to tell you a little about Aurora beyond her medical needs.
She's such a happy, curious, expressive little girl, with a personality that continues to surprise us. Just recently, she learned how to clap, something that has taken months of physiotherapy and hard work to accomplish. Those little milestones are absolutely enormous in our home!
Between caring for Aurora, her hospital stays and appointments, and navigating some significant health challenges of my own, I've had to step back from photography quite a bit over the past year.
It's been difficult because I genuinely love what I do. Being invited into your lives to document your growing families has always meant so much to me.
Thankfully, as things have begun improving with my own health, I've slowly started taking on sessions again. I'm still figuring out how to balance everything, but it feels wonderful to be getting back behind the camera.
I also wanted to share something that has been a little difficult for me personally.
With Aurora's growing medical needs, repeated hospitalizations, specialized equipment, and the impact all of this has had on our ability to work consistently, our family has been facing some unexpected financial challenges.
We've been working toward accessing available funding and support programs, but unfortunately, those things take time, and not every expense is covered.
After receiving an incredible amount of encouragement and support from friends, family, and even members of Aurora's medical team, a dear friend of mine, Christina, offered to organize a GoFundMe to help our family navigate some of these expenses.
Asking for help has never come easily to me, and sharing something so personal on my business page is definitely outside my comfort zone.
But I've also been incredibly touched by the kindness people have shown our family, and I'm learning that sometimes it's okay to let others help.
I wanted to share this here because so many of you have supported my photography journey over the years, and I felt it was time to share a little about what's been happening in my own life.
If you'd like to read more about Aurora's journey or share the fundraiser, I've included the link below. There's absolutely no pressure to donate. Even sharing her story or sending a little love our way means so much.
Thank you to everyone who has continued to support Blessed Touch Photography, especially during a time when I've needed to take a little more time away from my work.
I genuinely appreciate this wonderful community and the families who have welcomed me into their lives over the years. ✨❤️
https://gofund.me/2380795d9
