ALBERTVILLE, Ala. – A Marshall County family is embarking on a journey in life they never thought they would experience.
Eric and Courtney Waldrop have been together since the eighth grade. They got married in 2004 and they always wanted a family. “I knew I wanted a houseful,” Courtney said.
A few years later, the couple welcomed their first child. “Then we had our twins in 2012,” Courtney added. Now their house is full of the sound of nine little blessings.
They’ve experienced every feeling imaginable, but with the support of their community and their religion in front of them, they’re ready to face anything.
The process of taking family pictures might be intimidating, but imagine doing it for eleven people. Ashely Sargent, a photographer, says she and Courtney began planning the first session months in advance.
Sargent said: “It was a lot easier than I ever expected, I went into it knowing that whatever game plan I had, may not exactly go that way”.
The photographs of the bundled-up babies took about three hours from start to finish, according to Sargent. The shoot was a team effort, she says, and there were about a dozen volunteers—made up of stylists, assistants, friends, and family—who helped out in different aspects of the project.
“I’m used to wrangling with kids—kids are my strong point, so I can get down on their level and be silly and goofy,” Sargent says. “It wasn’t bad, but it took several people to get the whole thing together.”
Fortunately, the infants fell asleep just as Sargent was photographing the elder brothers and parents holding all six of them. (With so much going on, they also had a white noise machine playing in the background to help keep the infants sleeping.) Despite this, Sargent needed to work swiftly to complete his tasks.
“By the time I wrapped up each baby—and then finished with the individual shots—the first baby was then waking up because they had been asleep for an hour,” Sargent recalls. “So that was kinda the struggle, getting all the babies asleep in one shot.”
After photographing the babies so many times, Sargent noticed some of their personalities, especially in the third baby born, Rawlings.
When it came to naming the babies, Courtney says it was important to give the babies names that were as unique and special as they are. The three boys are named, Blu, Layke, and Tag, and the three girls, Rawlings, Rayne, and Rivers.
“They’re like nothing I’ve ever met. Courtney is literally the most positive person you’ll ever meet,” Sargent says. “She just has a heart of gold. She’s definitely the perfect mom to handle all of this craziness.”
“So many prayers had gone into Courtney and these beautiful babies,” said Sargent. “So much uncertainty and anxiousness… so to see them in my arms and the babies perfectly healthy is just proof that God is good.”
