Sometime, about a year ago, I signed up with The Gold Hope Project to be a contributing photographer for their amazing organization. This is a non-profit organization that donates photography sessions to families being affected by childhood cancer.
This is such a special project for me because I truly believe childhood cancer needs more research, which means more funding to get that research. The hope of the project is to try and help raise awareness. I think it's beautiful and I want to help however I can to help get the word out about them.
A couple months ago, I was contacted to see if I could take on my first Fighter Session. While I'll never be "happy" that we even need to have these sessions, but I was excited to meet Kaavya and her family.
Kaavya is a 3 year old little sparkler. She's full of sass and spunk and my goodness is she smart! She was diagnosed with Wilm's Tumor and has gone through surgery and chemo. Thankfully, she has great odds that she will beat this and live a full, happy life. Kaavya is an empathetic little fighter. She hates seeing others in pain, but she's so strong when it comes to dealing with her own. She LOVES Peppa Pig. She's also a big fan of Catboy and Owlette. You'll see a couple photos of her "gearing up" to run SUPER fast like Catboy, and also one of her using her Owlette eyes to look for daddy.
We had our session in downtown San Juan Capistrano. Which worked out so well because there's a train station there, and she loved watching the trains go by. She even tried convincing her parents to go take a train ride.
During our session, I quickly realized that it was I who was being blessed with this session. While I was doing it in hopes of shedding some light on Kaavya's situation and other's like her, and also to bring some happiness to her and her parents through these memories I was capturing, it was me who left feeling happier and more blessed than before I had arrived to the session. It was truly and honestly my pleasure to be able to photograph this beautiful family and such a lively little girl.
You can also learn more about Kaavya from the blog on the TGHP site: Meet Kaavya
If yours or a family you know is being affected by childhood cancer, please reach out to The Gold Hope Project for a session. You just need to fill out the application here: Gold Hope Fighter Application