A Mother's Day Surprise

After a 6 month hiatus, we are finally back! The book is still a work in progress, but I have missed blogging, so today I'm covering something not mentioned in the book. While this may not be about traditional event planning, it is about a life event and a special photo shoot that went along with it.

Though my fiancé and I are getting married in just over a year, we are not planning to have children until a few years from now. My mother has repeatedly expressed how much she would like grandchildren, and she is not thrilled about having to wait so long. After we made the decision to get a dog, I started telling her that she would soon have a grandpuppy, which led to an idea. While our intentions for this photo shoot were to have fun and be totally ridiculous, we wouldn't be surprised if it became the next big trend in photography.

Since I had been telling my mom that our pup would be the closest thing she will have to a grandchild anytime in the near future, I decided that maybe this could make for a fun Mother's Day gift. You may be familiar with the current trend of maternity photo shoots. My idea was to do parody this, but make it about our puppy instead of a baby. I ran the idea by Olivia (the officially LBBPG photographer) and she was immediately on board. Thus began our Pinterest search for inspiration.

We found multiple maternity shots that we liked and began brainstorming ways to shift them from puppy to baby. This included substituting dog bones for baby shoes and instead of a clothing line with baby clothes, using a leash to hold up dog toys and accessories. To see the photos that inspired us, check out our Pinterest board of ideas here.

In preparation for the photo shoot, I made a list of everything we would need and then did what I do best: find the cutest things for the lowest price. Fortunately PetSmart was having a sale on their Martha Stewart Pets collection and I got the most adorable leash, harness and collar for a fraction of the retail cost. All of the toys and accessories seen in the photo shoot were less than $60 total (though they have a retail value of over $100 combined), and I made sure to only buy items that would definitely be used by our puppy. I also picked up a calendar and chalk at the dollar store for $1 each, and the Starbucks cups we got the day of the photo shoot for free.

A few weeks before Mother's Day, my fiancé and I met with photography partner, Olivia, for the photo shoot. It turned out even better than I had imagined! Olivia brought my idea to life with her photography skills, and her quick turn around time with the edited photos was perfect for ordering my mom's gift. After trying to decide what to do with the fabulous photos, I ultimately chose a collage card. Since I had credit and coupons from Snapfish, I was able to get three prints of the card (one for my mom, one for my future mother-in-law, and one extra for us to keep) with free 2 day shipping for only $6 total. Since we utilized things we would have needed to buy for the puppy anyway, the additional cost to create a completely custom Mother's Day card ($2 each) was less than buying one from a retail store and so much more personal.

We brought out goldendoodle puppy Penny Lane home the day before, not onlydid my mom get to open her special card on Mother's Day, but she also was able to come over and meet her new grandpuppy that afternoon. I even gave her a "Dog Grandma" magnet to make it official. Though this was a small event to coordinate, it was a very special and my mom loved it.