Sahana Leah Thilagam | Milwaukee Newborn Photography

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I’ve always been fascinated by names – their meanings, their sounds, how it feels to write them in cursive versus block letters. Names are forever; they can honor important people, celebrate lives long past, announce the cultural origins of a person. They can be sweet and fun or strong or frilly. When Sahana Leah Thilagam’s father wrote me to set up her newborn session I was instantly in love with her names and felt excited to meet this little girl who’s names add up to more than just first, middle and last. Sahana’s dad knows that to be true, as well, writing:

Baby Sahana Leah Thilagam was born at 12:10 noon Central USA on October 19, 2011 with all ears, fingers and toes…

Sahana is of Indian origin, and it means patience, powerful, strong, and enduring.

Leah is pronounced LEE-ah. It is of Hebrew origin, and the meaning of Leah is “delicate; weary”. Biblical: Jacob’s first wife, the mother of Dinah and six of Jacob’s twelve sons.

Thilagam is my Mother’s name; honoring her recent passing. {Sahana’s last name} is the same last name as Anne’s; an attempt to keep the last name alive.

I photographed Sahana’s parents’ maternity session back in fall when I was very pregnant myself. Mom Anne was due just a few days after me but Sahana had different plans. Arriving nearly two weeks after her due date, Sahana already embodied the meaning of her first name – strong, but perhaps a little too patient to come into the world. She’s almost 3 months old now and has already traveled to her mom’s native Germany, but in these photos she only a few days old – delicate but powerful in her own way.

Sahana lives on an upper floor of one of Milwaukee’s taller buildings. Most of the rooms in her home look out on the city so I couldn’t resist capturing some of her urban, yet painterly surroundings.