Fairy Tea Party: Before and After

This past spring, we created a fancy little tea party for our 3 year old. We dressed her up, got out our favorite tea set, bought a strawberry cake, and set up a sweet little soiree for her to enjoy outside. We told her that if she could enjoy playing with her tea set, Mommy would take pictures, and when she saw the finished portraits later on something magical might happen! 

We invited a few fairies to her little tea party! She was soooo excited. 

Not only did our little one have fun “playing” (with few directions lol) while I captured the moment, but afterwards she got to go inside and have cake too. Win - Win!

We’re lucky to have a lovely, shady alcove in our side yard, with a row of beautiful magnolia trees growing in a canopy beside our deck. It was the perfect spot for afternoon tea.

Here is the before, and in and of itself, it is a super cute image!!

As much as the above “before” image melts this momma’s heart, I promised my girl MAGIC.

Sooo, after about 10 hours of Photoshop later, here is the after:

And once I saw the look on her face as we showed it to her,

it. was. WORTH. IT.

Every single bit of layering and blending in Photoshop, color tweaking in Adobe Camera Raw, pixel painting and outright effort was absolutely worth every second. I can’t wait to print this out on a canvas or heritage wood print for her room.

Oh, and edit the other 150 images I took that day too….