It’s time for the monthly challenge with my friend, Tara. I twittered it last week–’shoot a stranger. ask permission first.’ This is one of my favorite things to do. I have been known to stop random people and ask to take their pictures. AND…let me say that I have hesitated on more than one occassion and I have always regretted it.

This is Kathy…I met her at the Millarville County fair where she was participating in ‘knitting the world’s longest scarf’. You can read all about that here. See the sweater she is wearing. She knit that when she was pregnant with her daughter(over 20 years ago–can you believe that???). I saw her and thought she had a friendly look about her so I decided to ’shoot’ her. I kept walking by until she asked me if I wanted to sit down. It was that easy. The thing that I love about doing this is it helps you to remember that you need to actually make a connection with your subject in order to get a proper portrait. I know that–no matter what your job is–it is easy to run on autopilot, but if you don’t slow down and take the time to actually make a connection with your subject, the portrait will always be missing something. At least, that’s my experience Thanks Kathy–for letting me shoot you

I know that Tara has been sick with strep throat…so I’m not sure if she was up to participating this month. We won’t hold it against her But–everyone send her good healing vibes because I miss her tweets!! If you did participate, please post a link in my comments section! I do try to get over to everyone’s blog and leave a comment, too!! Thanks for playing!

7 years ago today, I stood in a meadow and watched two of my best friends marry each other. And, I sang–Annie’s Song…badly…because I sang through tears. Happy tears. Two weeks later, I would give birth to my son. And, they would be far away. Time and distance seperates us, but it doesn’t. Seeing them again was just as joyful and comfortable as seeing them on that day. It brings me immeasurable joy to see people still in love…creating love in their children. And, still loving campfires, cold beer and wildflowers in mountain meadows.

It only made sense to me that we would return to that meadow…these 7 years later…and capture their love for each other. Now. They laid down on the alter of their wedding day and reflected. So did I…Reflect that is

with their children…

 …and we played until we were interrupted by two wonderfully friendly people telling us to vacate as a grizzly and her cub had been there only an hour earlier and were still believed to be in the area. Truly a mountain session

Happy Anniversary you guys!!! We can’t wait until the next time…

It has just come to my attention that the form on my contact page had not been working. If I have not returned an inquiry from you, I did not receive it.  ARGH I hate computer issues.

I first saw ‘Planes, Trains, and Automobiles’ in a small run down theatre in Knutsford, England. I was there on an exchange. I was 16 years old. The British girls I was with found it a most curious film. None of them had ever seen a semi truck. It made me miss home.

I remember seeing ‘Ferris Bueller’ in the theatre with my friends in Junior High. There was something wrong with the projector and they kept trying to fix it. Frustrating, mostly cause it seemed they were intent on just giving us our money back, but we hung in there until it rolled for good. I thought Matthew Broderick was totally cute. I wished I was that cool.

I used to babysit a boy who thought it was cool to be like the young MacCuley Culkin in ‘Uncle Buck’…

I had the sound track for ’Pretty In Pink’ and listened to it endlessly. I used to think I was Andy…looking back on it now, I think I was more like Ducky. He was my favorite character anyways.

If you were a teenager in the 80’s, the name John Hughes was just as famous as Molly Ringwald and Andrew McCarthy. If he made a movie, you went to see it. I read this article today and it filled me with glee that he was as cool as he seemed. I wonder who will be the John Hughes of my children’s generation…will there be one???

http://wellknowwhenwegetthere.blogspot.com/2009/08/sincerely-john-hughes.html

One of my favorite things about my job is when I get heartfelt emails from my clients thanking me for capturing the ‘heart’ of their children…or their ‘true selves’. It really is one of my greatest joys…next to capturing the heart of my own children Here’s Georgia’s…from our camping adventures.

 And, my listening pleasure today Katie Herzig…if you like this one, listen to Charlie Chaplin as well! Happy Monday everyone!!!

 Soooo…the lovely Brittany invited me to tag along at an evening engagement session at the Stampede grounds in early July. I have been dying to shoot at night with available light and with off camera flash, so I jumped at the opportunity. The willing couple was Luke and Alyssa who I would like to say were up for anything, but the truth is…well…it’s the first time someone said ‘no’ to me. It was good for me, really, to have someone deny one of my silly requests. Humbling. But, somehow, Luke talked himself into it and the resulting image is…well, honestly…one of my favorite images of all time. So, Luke…thank you for getting past your fears and having the courage to make out with your woman sitting on the grounds of the stampede in amongst the throngs of carnival goers. It made the whole evening worthwhile for me!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There is lots of light happening at night on the grounds, so the next four images were explorations using that light. They were so great–holding as still as possible for my slow shutter images…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are the rest of the images from that night. It’s a LARGE number of images but I simply could not narrow down my favorites…these two are just too cute!! Congratulations you two!!! Enjoy this time in your life as much as you enjoy each other…

Look at me blogging about this!!! I didn’t think I would actually have time to do it ha! So, this one’s for all the photographer’s out there–this weekend’s challenge is to take 1-3 self portraits this weekend. Images to be posted on Monday and then your blogs can be linked in my comment section if you like.  Let the games begin!!

I promise…an actual blog post with images is on its way…

Recently, I was asked to participate in a maternity session for the incredible Ashley Skjaveland … incredible because she is absolutely gorgeous, but also because she is one of North America’s premier newborn photographers. Her work is so simple, so pure and so emotional. It is always an honour to photograph another photographer, but this time it was even more so because I was asked by another photographer–the fabulous, Andrea Hanki from Pink Sugar in Edmonton to come join. Rounding out the group was the incredible Alicia Price. It made for an incredible day(yes, an entire day) of running around Central Alberta looking for places we wanted to shoot. We even had a major location fail…there was a particular trailer in the middle of an open field that took quite a bit of effort to get to…and once we got there we found it was…well…it was full of poop. Yup. Seriously. I mean FULL OF POOP. Piles and piles of it. It was totally worth it as I still laugh about it when it comes to mind

We did find two awesome spots…the first of which was an old car.

When Bob saw this image, he commented on how amazing it was to see the scene like this…as a snapshot…and to realize the importance of looking beyond the obvious to find the beauty. It is not the most flattering picture of Andrea or Alicia, but I think it is interesting to look at and then to look at the images that we have all created.

The second location we saved until the sweet light of early evening graced us…an abandoned school yard. Ahhh…the beauty of Central Alberta. Ashley was such a trooper in that slip. It really wasn’t all that warm and she toughed it out like only another photographer would so that we could all get the shots we wanted.

So…thus ends the longest post in my blog history-ha! It was a LONG day, but worth every second. I was totally tired after shooting a wedding the day before, but we passed the time in the car rocking out to ‘Beat It’ and ‘Billie Jean’…thanks to all my lovely friends for letting me tag along that day!!! When are we going to do it again???

I have a feeling this is a somewhat anticipated blog post. I got so many comments, emails, message board posts from other photographers regarding the motorcycle maternity session I did, that I think many are interested to see what came of the newborn session!! Well, their beautiful and CALM baby boy arrived(a while ago now), and I got to meet him before he was even one week old! We did, indeed, get back on the Harley for some family images. Even their gorgeous, wonderfully behaved dog made appearances in the images. The first color image is actually the baby  lying on the dog!!! Better than any fur blanket you could ever buy! This was one of the largest galleries I have shown in awhile, so I figured, why not show lots of them on my blog!!! I love these as they are so specific to this family. They so capture their personality So in love with each and with their little boy. What a pleasure it was to capture this time in their life. They are getting a large album–I’ll have to post pictures when it is finally done and here!!

Summer time is here and that only means one thing–family sessions are filling up my schedule!! And, spots are flying off the calendar almost as fast as I can put them up. Sooo…if you are wanting a session with me, don’t hesitate. My fall schedule will be up on Canada Day. My newsletter subscribers got first dibs at the spots and they are snapping them up…Thank you all for your continued support! I’m looking forward to revisiting some of my favorite families from last year(one just booked their August session today–yay!!) and meeting some fabulous new ones!!

You know how I know spring is here? Well…today you could say it’s all the rain…but here in Pughville when spring arrives, we get out our bug houses and hunt for bugs. Jack has long been called ‘The Ladybug Tamer’ at our house. He is exceptional at tracking them down and bringing them home. He would, however, like to keep them in the house…I have convinced him that they need to live outside…