My good friend Jo had a little visit over the weekend from her son Aaron, his wife Pamela, and their 3 month old daughter Andie. Aaron is an Alberta farmer and was taking a mini West Coast vacation with the family before seeding for the season, so we decided to squeeze in a portrait session during their visit. Andie decided to nap for most of the session…growing is hard work!

Each year when I go home, I put time aside to stay with my long, long, longtime pal Bonnie Jean. During my visit last October, Bonnie Jean and Michael invited me to their appointment when they found out that they were having two little girls. Rowan and Riley arrived a few months premature this year, but to see them now, you’d never know. Bonnie Jean and Michael make it look easy juggling two active, teething, on the verge of crawling babies. I guess it helps that the girls are very much like their parents. They’re easy going and they love to laugh…I can’t wait to see the people they become. Oh, the stories I have to tell them!!

Grace contacted me to take some family portraits during my stay in New Glasgow. They had a beautiful barn in their back yard complete with a collection of homemade bird houses.

Shoshanna Fraser is a Cape Breton photographer who contacted me after I returned to Victoria last fall from my visit East. She was pregnant at the time and was hoping to have some maternity photos taken and since I usually head home for my annual visit in October, that shoot wouldn’t work out. We managed to make plans for a shoot during this trip and planned to shoot rain or shine. Her daughter Finley (in Shoshanna’s words), is a ‘tough Cape Breton girl’ and at 7.5 months old, she tolerated the wind, rain, and chilly temperatures on our early morning shoot at Little River Wharf. Thanks to Merrill’s shack, we were able to still shoot and get some shelter from the elements.

Bhreagh and I met way back in the days when we were both students at the Gaelic College. She’s a great fiddler and played many gigs with those of us in the Gaelic College Pipe Band at the time. We met for our session at her Aunt’s house in St. Ann’s, just around the corner from the College. Bhreagh’s brother and sister came along to the session, and although everyone was pretty tired from the Celtic Colours Festival Club the night before, we had a pretty good time kicking around the property. Speaking of kicking, Bhreagh’s daughter Ainsley is quite the Irish dancer and showed us some moves on the shed step (aka trying to stay warm). Stay tuned over the next while for another post featuring Bhreagh and her band, Woven.

It makes sense to put the past two blog posts back to back. Not only were they shot on the same morning, the moms in these two families are sisters. Kelly’s sister True contacted me to take some photos of her two kids, Owen and Olivia during my visit home. We met at Petersfield Provincial Park on the Northside and Kelly and her family met us at the end of True’s session for a few photos of the cousins together.

I have been coming home for three consecutive years in October, and each year Kelly is the first person to book her portrait session. It has been pretty special for me to see her daughter Drea grow up and compare the photos year to year. This session turned out to be a bit different since it was the first time I was able to convince Kelly and Michael to hop in front of the camera with their girl for a few frames….it’s pretty clear that Drea loved that idea! We lucked out with sunshine for their session, lots of wind, and even a heart-shaped cloud. Quite suitable if you ask me!

After the Sound Advice school in Regina this July, I stayed a few extra days and spent the weekend with the MacDonald Family. I’ve already taken photos of Barb and Eilidh during their time in Victoria at the Canadian Highland Dancing Championships, but it was time to take some photos of the whole family together. Iain organizes the Sound Advice school and Eilidh (also a piper) and Ruaridh (a tenor drummer) both attended. After catching up on some much needed sleep, we had a quick visit with Iain’s mother then made our way out to a great red barn for the rest of the session (as recommended by Eilidh).

I was hoping to get these images edited for this week as Iain and Eilidh are over in Scotland to attend the World Highland Dancing Championships in Cowal where Eilidh will be competing…best of luck!! You may recognize superhero expert Duncan from my blog post a few weeks ago over on the Photographer Network blog. The entire family plays in the City of Regina Pipe Band, and they’ll also be part of the upcoming installment of Photographing the Art for pipes|drums. Stay tuned!

My cousin Bethany contacted me in the early spring to see if I’d like to come to Boston to shoot her wedding at Newton Presbyterian Church on May 30, 2009. Bethany recently graduated from photography school, has since started up her own business in the Boston area, and trusted me to document her day. It was a trip I couldn’t resist! Like many Maritimers, my grandmother’s sister Anna moved to Boston to work when she was young, married my Uncle Lester, and ever since my family in the ‘Boston States’ has been growing in size. I stayed the week with my cousin Rob and his wife Becky and was treated like gold the entire time. On the wedding day I was reunited with cousins I hadn’t seen for 20+ years and had a great time catching up on the years between frames.

Bethany and Jeff were entirely laid back. Bethany arrived back from having her hair done and fired up her espresso machine and began to make lattes for all the girls at her home as if it was any other day! They planned a ceilidh for the evening festivities and after I was finished shooting, my cousin Don and myself hopped in the square set and tore up the floor! A wonderful day full of wonderful people and I can’t wait to return. Congratulations Bethany and Jeff….thanks for including me in your day.

I was in Boston at the end of May for my cousin Bethany’s wedding. On the Thursday afternoon before the big day, we went to cousin Dottie’s to make 200 cupcakes for the wedding ceilidh. Did I mention Bethany’s ambition? I brought along my camera since my baking skills are slim to none…in fact, the one bit of batter mixing I did, I managed to burn out the motor in the mixer (smoke and all) and shortly after, I was put on frosting duty. After many hours, 200 cupcakes were made and packed up for the wedding…and I was just about crashing from all the sugar. If you can’t bake, the least you can do is taste test!

I haven’t seem many of my Boston family members in years and years, so I was meeting some new wee cousins for the first time. They were super cute and entertaining and all on hand to help.

Photos from Bethany and Jeff’s big day coming shortly…

To celebrate their parent’s anniversary, the Anderson kids came home from their travels for a portrait session in East Sooke Park. As I was shooting, I realized that it was almost a year to the day that I had photographed Trevor and Brianna’s wedding. We had a beautiful sunny day with loads of wind that kept me semi-distracted from the fact that we were in the long grass…home to thousands of snakes (at least that’s what my imagination was telling me!).

On 05.05.2009 Ashley, Sean and their daughter Gracie made it official at a small ceremony with family and friends at the Fairfield United Church! It was a very soggy Tuesday and we met up before their ceremony for some photos on the beach.

Just a few images from my session with Paul O’Brien. His son Fintan came along during the shoot so I took a few of them at the end. Check back in a little while for the images for Paul’s upcoming album he just finished recording in Germany.

Sunday with the Spires family in Tsawwassen. More to come but until then….head over to Photographer Network to see one more!