As I mentioned in a previous post, Ray and I decided to do a gender reveal just the two of us. If we lived in Montreal, we would have definitely done it with our family. But since we are alone in LA, it was just the two of us. Because it was just going to be us, I knew I wanted to have it documented. That way we could show our families the reveal, share it on IG and one day show it to our baby girl. I started brainstorming and Pinteresting our shoot a few weeks before. In my research and trial and error, I came across a few tips that I thought I'd share with you if you are ever planning a gender reveal shoot.
Don't cheap out on the balloons. When I first started researching Oh Baby balloons I found the perfect ones on Party City for only $13! Win! Ha, a joke. They came and the letters were so small. It was not at all the effect I was looking for. But what did I seriously expect for $13? I then called the store I was buying the gender reveal balloon from and a few other stores and they were so expensive (like $20 a balloon, yikes!). I got a bit creative and called the party stores downtown, and they were significantly cheaper (came to like $8 a balloon with the helium). I'm so glad that I didn't settle for the mini Party City balloons (that would have been a bust), but found something in the medium price range. At first, I thought even that was expensive, but after receiving all of the pics from the shoot, I'm glad I spent the money. The pics are everything I wanted and I'm going to blow a few up for the nursery. As for the gender reveal balloon, most places charged around the same amount. I did a lot of research online and some reviews said that the balloon popped in the car (my nightmare)! So I spent a bit more and went to a fancy store in Santa Monica. Worth it since it didn't pop in our 30-minute car ride!
You can never have enough confetti. It was Felicia, my photographer's, idea to add confetti to the shoot. Honestly, at first, I wasn't so sure about it. Would it be too disco-themed, rather than baby-themed? But, wow, it made such a difference in the pictures. We took a few without confetti and then added confetti and the ones before were such a bust! I'm telling you, it adds the best effects (especially against a white backdrop). I stuck with silver and gold confetti and you can never have enough!
Bring props that are meaningful to you. When I was talking with Felicia about the shoot, I showed her some inspo pics/videos. A lot of them had cupcakes in the baby's gender etc. We were trying to think about what would be the best fit for us. Cupcakes? We don't really eat them...Macaroons? Not our thing...Everything just felt disingenuous. That's when we decided to include Luca in the shoot and have him wear a pink or blue bow-tie depending on the gender. It was so us and I couldn't be happier that he's in the pics.
Bring gender color options for after the reveal. For us, this related to the bow-ties. I bought this pack from Amazon and brought all of the blue shades and pink shades with us, so we were prepared either way. I also bought 6 blue balloons and 6 pink balloons, so I would have them in the pics once we knew the gender.
Bring a few outfit options and let the photographer help. I probably brought way too many outfit options, but I really trusted Felicia. I knew she would know what color would look best and what would be the most flattering (especially with my bump...well actually bloat lol). She suggested I wear a white shirt with the reveal part and I'm so happy I did because the pink pops perfectly.
Record it on a phone at the same time. While Felicia took pictures, we had my phone recording the entire thing. It's so special to have. From our nerves before popping the balloon, to our faces (especially mine) when we realized it was a girl, to our reactions after it kind of settled in, it's really nice to get to watch back. Pictures are great, but there's nothing like a full video.
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