Back in 2016 when I had Elliott, my family got us made a beautiful bespoke illustration by Alexandra from Alexandra Ball Illustrations. It truly took my breath away. It was so so personal which is what I love. To me, emotional value of an item is worth so much for that the physical. I’m so sentimental I’ve actually STILL got Gary Lineker till receipt from when I served him at Woking cinema back when I worked there in 2004… but the less said about that the better 🙂

What was so special about this, was that our family helped design it with Alexandra. They gave her photos of Rich and I, plus told her what we liked (The Northern Lights, Dragons, Mountains), then informed her what I call Rich (my bear ;). What resulted was just the most beautiful and personal illustration I had ever seen. We now have one signed copy hanging up in Elliott’s room and another much bigger version framed in the hall. This is our Family of 3 illustration. 

You may have noticed a few cheeky little characters around my website that look in a very similar style to the ones in our illustration. Well, as a special treat to myself, when I made my eBrochures, I approached Alexandra, asking if she would draw me some things for my website. This is what she came up with (in case you haven’t already seen).

It includes our little family of 3 for my ‘About‘ page. I had joked to her that I will come to her for a new illustration if we are lucky enough to have another baby. Well last year (2019), we were blessed with our second boy. Our lovely family had actually already been in touch with Alexandra about a second illustration. This time we were all involved. I spoke to our family about ideas Rich and I have had. The big debate was that if we had a girl, would she be a Dragon or a Bear with a bow? Throughout my pregnancy I was convinced I was having another boy. We found out we were having a boy during our 20 week scan. If I had been told otherwise I’m not so sure I would have believed them! 😉 We send Alexandra various photos for inspiration. Both my hubby and I are Lord of The Ring geeks, we had a LoRT inspired wedding, plus we had the time of our lives when we went to New Zealand for our honeymoon, so we really wanted to include it here.

This was the signed print my little Sister-in-law got Sir Ian to sign for us as a wedding day present.

These are some of our favourite images from middle earth.

Alexandra, got to work on a rough draft for us which she sent for approval. It was just perfect, we didn’t change a thing. Then was the final version. We got send the high res file and the print. To say we love it is an understatement. 

A really lovely touch was that Alexandra used the mice from our first illustration. The story of the photo is that Rich and Elliott have just been out for a walk, coming home to Aidan and I greeting them on their arrival. The story has special significance as in Lord Of The Rings, the end scene, Sam returns home to be greeted by Rosie and their children.

If you are looking for a family illustration please have a look Alexandra’s work (no she is not paying me for saying this haha). You might wonder why I am highlighting this being a photographer. I love art and think both illustrations and photos can be so beautiful and really compliment each other. We are in the process of getting this framed for our living room. Our living room has a mixture of photos I took of New Zealand on our honeymoon and photos of the boys. It will fit just perfectly. I will share the framed photo when it arrives, so excited!

To Alexandra: Thank you so so much for all your hard both with out family illustrations and my website illustrations. I will treasure them all forever xXx