How it all began… My very first wedding February 26, 2009

I received interview questions for a fabulous website called the Bokeh Pot and as I was going through the questions (keep your eyes out for the interview on April 25th), one sprang out in particular that took a bit of extra thinking.. “Describe the moment you decided it was time to pursue this as a career?”I began to reminisce and go back to that very moment that this journey all began for me. I had begun really taking pictures of my children with a Film SLR that my husband had given to me when we first got married, loved what I could capture through this lens, its almost as if I was seeing a whole new world through this camera. So I would send pics out to all our family on updates of the kidos and such and kept getting feedback as “wow you take such great shots” or “you should do this as a business” and I never really thought more into that then “Thanks for the great comments!”. My Brother in law had just proposed to his beautiful girlfriend and I got a call shortly afterwards asking me to shoot their wedding in April 2007!! I felt truly honored and wanted to help them out anyways I could! By then I had purchased my first digital SLR and off camera flash and Read, read and read some more until my brain couldnt take it anymore! HA! I spent alot of time in prayer and thank God for everything he has blessed me with! Of course I soaked up as much info as I possible could from viewing Blogs and chatting on photography forums!! After the fabulous wedding of my New Sister-in-law and Brother-in-law, I received so much fulfillment from the Love and emotion I captured on this day, that I decided then and there, this was what I wanted to do as a career. My journey began there and it has been a constant reminder of how lucky I am that I have so much support from my husband and family. I have truly found something I adore and am passionate about and truly cannot imagine my life without my camera attached to my eye!During my reminiscing I went through some of the shots I took at their wedding and thought I would share because Blogging is so much more fun with pictures!!

I love how he looks at her in this one!

There was some yumminess up there with these two!

Our daughter was their flower girl and may I say she is super gorgeous!

And ofcourse the Boss man himself, our manly man Chase !

Some may recognize this shot to the right, I won an image award for it a while back and it was also used in marketing materials and such.

Two guess as to what song they were dancing to in this one??

Melanie and Steele LOVE to Kareoke and have awesome voices and shared a little tidbit of that at the reception!

I caught them in a sequence of whispering sweet nothins to eachother and we will never know to this day what they were talking about but it sure looked fun to me!

I cannot Forget this one, He seriously could not find the garter and um well you get the rest….

My daughter the charmer! …

Meet my hubby’s family… Nick, Mom Steele and my hubby in which I think he was trying to figure out how to actually make this face for the shot!

And lastly me and Mel at the end of the evening, Love you Sister!

I know another SNEAK PEAK!! LOL February 20, 2009

So here is dear sweet little Abi whom I have had the pleasure of photographing several times! She is such a joy to work with and thought I would send a sneak peak from our session yesterday!

Wedding Tip for the week February 18, 2009

I ADORE the idea of having a candy bar and fun treat bags or boxes for your guests to scoop up some tasty treats to try NOT to eat on the way home! Its a colorful way to coordinate your colors into the wedding in a fabulously fun way! Also I have shot a few weddings where they have had a cupcake tower rather then a wedding cake, which I think is so much fun! There are some fabulous cupcake shops here in Portland that will design them how ever you would like! Stop in to Saint Cupcake if your in the Portland area and try a bite!! so yummy!

More from my recent session with Meygan! February 15, 2009

Meygan is so much fun and kept me rolling with laughter the entire shoot! She is a huge animal lover and ofcourse my first idea was to take her to the zoo, get her on an elephant and yell “ooga ooga” all the way through the shoot. BUT of course it was raining and we couldnt do that!! HA! So we ran down to the fabulous Hotel Monnaco and walked the boardwalk at the Pearl District and got some “headshots” (truly dont like that word) for her upcoming Mrs. Oregon International Pageant! Keep an eye out for her, you could be looking at the next Mrs Oregon International!

This one cracked me up because right when we started walking down the street we noticed this Odd looking Cement statue of sorts which at the time thought it could actually be an elephant!! so how appropriate we get Meygan up there and ride the elephant! Turns out it was just an odd statue of sorts… go figure

Sneak Peak… Headshots February 13, 2009

I had a fun and fabulous shoot with the wonderful Meygan yesterday! Heres just a sneak peak only because I have to run out but will blog some more tomorrow! Happy Valentines Day!!!

Sunshine and a Baby belly! February 7, 2009

I was stoked to get to meet with Carisa and her adorable little family +1 Thursday! We met up at a gorgeous Nature area in Portland with the most unbelievable view of all the mountains and Portland and Vancouver! with 60 degrees out and beautiful sunshine you can say we were very blessed to have a perfect setting for our session! This was supposed to be just a maternity shoot but I couldn’t resist getting a couple with their adorable daughter! There is so much love between all of them and they are so excited to have their baby boy in just a short while! In the last part of our session, Carisa wanted to get some more intimate shots of her and her husband to show that pregnant women are still sexy if not more with their beautiful baby bellies! She worked it like no other and I love when clients break away from the more traditional style and get a little loose and carefree in front of my camera! Thanks so much for a fabulous session and Im sooo excited to do baby boy’s newborn pics soon!

This was so sweet, she laid down with mommy on the grass and just laid there and was cuddly with mommy’s tummy, I love this one!

I love this one, I saw this tree and the tree actually looked like it had a baby belly

So perfect!

I cant wait to shoot their family pictures when baby boy is born!

And now for the more steamy ones, thanks Carisa for letting me post these, you are so beautiful and you both rocked the camera!

Im sure there will be more pics to share, but I wanted to get these on here first, we shot for almost 3 hours and had lots of fun!!! Thanks again!!

Sneak Peak~ Pregnancy in its best form February 7, 2009

Women are so beautiful and radiant when pregnant, And I absolutely LOVE it when they feel fun and fierce in their pregnancy body! Had a fabulous session Thursday and heres a sneak peak

Keep that Faith growing strong… February 4, 2009

Sometimes I haveto stop and remember that life has those ups and downs, and we ALWAYS get through the downs! I was watching the news last night and they mentioned the unemployment and economy issues currently again. I really praise God each day that he continues to bless us in so many ways and also know even during those tough times that we will get through this and everything will be fine. So to those out there feeling this rapid change in our economy, You will all be in my prayers! God Bless, keep your heads up an keep your faith going strong!

On another note… I have been working on a new blog and it will be here soon, thanks to all my Blog Readers, and remember I LOVE comments! I love hearing from others, so dont just stop and go, take a moment and scroll down to the bottom of the post and comment away

Cheers!!!