You may remember these sweet boys I photographed last summer, and again in the Fall and for Valentine’s Day. I FINALLY got to photograph them with their daddy! Their daddy came home from overseas! It was such a wonderful, emotional, exciting day! It has been about 5 years since I have photographed a military homecoming, they have always been one of my favorite things to capture, because of all the emotions you can capture in such a short period. Daddy left two weeks before their youngest son was born, so this was the first time that he got to hold his little guy and love on him, which he did and his littlest (of 4 handsome, well behaved little men) was so happy to see his daddy, after he woke up from his cat nap he took while waiting. The three youngest boys were with mom at the hanger waiting for dad to come in, while their oldest was in school, not knowing what was happening. The boys were SO happy to see their daddy! It’s so beautiful seeing them with huge smiles on their faces because daddy’s home. Mom, oh man I don’t even know where to start, mom is incredible! Being a single parent to 4 boys under 5 for 10 months, amazing! I’ve gotten to know her through our shoots and she is such a wonderful mother, I don’t know where she gets her energy from! Katie, I hope you’ve gotten to sleep in at least once since Tim has been back, you definitely deserve it!
After we left the hanger we went straight to the oldest son’s school to surprise him, but first we had to make a pit stop to get a motorcycle and police escort, it was pretty cool, not going to lie. We got to go through a bunch of red lights and when we pulled into the school the whole school was standing in the bus circle cheering and chanting “USA, USA” it was awesome! The kids were told it was red, white & blue day. When we pulled up their oldest was holding a sign that said “Welcome Home Daddy” he still had no idea that his dad was actually home, he thought he was coming home in another 4 days. I’m so thankful I was part of such an amazing day in this families life. I’m happy their hero is home safe to them.
I included a couple links at the bottom of the news clips that were on CBS, NBC, & Fox.
News Clips
http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/ponce-gleason-soldier-homecoming_Chicago.html
http://abclocal.go.com/wls/html5/video?id=9087045&pid=9087040§ion=news/local#
http://www.myfoxchicago.com/story/22131990/heartwarming-homecoming-ill-national-guard-soldiers-return-to-chicago
