I had the pleasure of photographing one of my fav little families the other evening! I met Ana over Instagram last year; she was expecting her first child and looking for a photographer to capture this momentous time. We had two amazing shoots; her maternity shoot at 2nd beach at Stanley Park and at home newborn photos a couple months later. It was such a pleasure working with her that I was so thrilled when she reached out for me to take photos for her son's first birthday.

Leading up to the shoot, she would send me pics of her preparations for his 'cake smash' set up. Just check out the pictures, it turned out amazing! The actual cake smash didn't go totally as planned...lol baby wanted nothing to do with the cake and did basically anything not to touch it, let alone eat it! None the less, we still managed to get adorable photos :)

The rest of the shoot was easy and dreamy. They looked amazing and photograph so well as a family of three. Baby M was a little trooper as a cold ocean breeze blew in at the end of the session, but he had no problems cuddling with Mom and Dad.

Dear A + A, thank you for allowing me to capture all of these beautiful milestones in your life. It is a true honor and I love seeing you guys every time! I can't wait for our next session together!

xo P

You may be surprised to hear this, but the job of a photographer is a little lonely. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE what I do! But in reality, 10% of my time is spent with clients and the other 90% of the time is spent editing, marketing and taking care of business. That’s why meeting up with clients to shoot is the highlight of my job and it makes it even more special when they are return clients. It’s so cool to take photos yearly, or in this case, multiple times a year with a family. To see how much a baby grows and learns during the first year of life is AMAZING!

I’ve had the pleasure to shoot with Natalie and her sweet family multiple times in the past year. I first met her at a sunrise photo session at the Abbotsford Tulip Festival. She’s a blast to shoot with and makes my job so easy as she’d comfortable in front of the camera and totally knows what works. We also met up for her Halloween family photos, pumpkin patch photos at Emma Lea Farms in Ladner, Pierces 1st Birthday pics, her Christmas card portraits, the sunflower festival (take a look through my Instagram to check some of these pictures out!) and now I had the pleasure to meet up to take family portraits in Boundary Bay.

When they arrived for their photoshoot, the family looked amazing! Nowadays the first comment from most Moms is how ‘done-up’ they feel after months of not doing hair and makeup in quarantine. What a confidence boost! Natalie’s dress was beautiful and bonus! It was from Forever 21. Pierce had grown up SO much since our last time together in December. He was bigger, WAY faster and a big personality. Just the same way Tom was when he was that age :)

Once we started shooting, I quickly discovered Pierce had his own agenda, which most 1.5 year olds have. I like to call these ‘child led sessions’, which means we let them do their thing and we incorporate ourselves into whatever they are doing. And once you see the pictures you’ll see it totally worked! We were able to get some beautiful smiles and candid moments from our shoot. One cool highlight was it was Pierce's first time seeing the ocean! I loved capturing moments of him walking down to the beach and throwing rocks into the water. What a special moment to have caught on camera.

Thank you to Natalie, Gary and Pierce for coming out to Tsawwassen for your family portraits. It’s always a pleasure to shoot with you guys and I hope we can do it a bunch more this year!

xo Paige