One thing in particular from this past summer that has me wanting barbecues, lakes and sunshine is Amelia and Adam’s DIY backyard wedding.

It was such a fun day, with beautiful scenery, delicious food and the sweetest bride and groom. These two put so much heart into their wedding day, from making all of the decorations, right down to arranging their own flower bouquets. Everything was DIY’d to perfection.

Amelia even broke down all of her wedding expenses on her DIY blog, which is super helpful for all brides to be who want to do things a little differently! Check it out!

I know I say it every time, but we were so thrilled to be a part of their day!

I’ve been helping Alison plan her wedding since they got engaged last New Year’s Eve, from help them pick out colours, to designing the invites. When it came down to picking the photographer though we had a bit of a hard time. Since Adam and I were both going to be in their wedding we didn’t even think about us to shoot it. . . but after browsing other photographer’s websites for pricing and portfolios, we realized we had left out Cherakee from the equation!

Since Cherakee Photography and I work together for weddings, it didn’t matter so much if I wasn’t going to be shooting the ceremony, because Cher could handle it! I’d still be able to help shoot the photos of the bride and groom, their families, the reception and anything else I wasn’t going to be in.

Long story short, we are just as honoured to be a big part of their day by shooting their wedding, as we are to stand with them!

Here’s some photos from their engagement shoot we did back in October at a beach in Hubbards, Nova Scotia.

Paula had contacted us about wedding photography. Her and Eric were living out west and were planning their wedding from several provinces away. When they visited the city to meet with vendors and iron out some wedding details, I was very busy with work and couldn’t attend. Long story short – my charming wife did a great job and we earned their business. We took care of deposits and contracts and then Paula and Eric were gone again.

With no way to do the complimentary engagement shoot until they returned for the wedding, Chelle and Cherakee arranged to do a quick shoot just two days before the big day. Once again, I was stuck at work in my windowless office. That day was particularly hard on me because I knew that the photo shoot was taking place in the cemetery right across the street. I was wondering how things were going.. when the phone rang.

Adam: “Hey Chelle, how is the engagement shoot going?”
Chelle: “Something isn’t right..”
Adam: “..What?”
Chelle: “Do you know anything about zombies?”
Adam: “..What?!”
Chelle: “There is a squirrel in a tree..”
Adam: “Uh-huh”
Chelle: “He’s eating another squirrel! We are all freaking out!”
Adam: “Holy crap!…hold on a sec!”

Then I googled ‘squirrel eating squirrel’

Adam: “Don’t worry babe, its right here on page one. Squirrels are opportunistic cannibals”
Chelle: “Gross!”

Excited to do the engagement shoot, we decided to book for spring of 2011, as Adam and I had our wedding to look forward, and winter wasn’t what they were looking for.

With my business booming, and teaming up with the talented Cherakee Photography to do weddings, mixed with the cute couples busy schedules, planning a day for a shoot with Amelia and Adam proved more difficult than we imagined.

Fast forward to 2 weeks ago, and had finally had our engagement shoot (just shy of a year later). But the best part? Their wedding is tomorrow!

Although we had a hard time getting out there for their engagement shoot, I’m glad we got to squeeze it in. They’re a beautiful couple, and it was hard to get a bad photo of them! We’re super excited for their wedding tomorrow.

Check out Adam’s band, Glory Glory August 7th (the day after their wedding) @ MFest with Broken Social Scene!

These two are so sweet, and they have the most adorable little boy, so instead of the traditional engagement shots, Cherakee and I did a family shoot for them!

Here are a select few…

I was thrilled to be a part of such an amazing event, and hoped I would have the opportunity to do something like it again.

This past April, Chris asked me to shoot the View Finders Festival. I couldn’t say no! Like the Atlantic Film Festival, celebrates film and video, but is oriented towards kids, and even features films made by kids!

Here are some of the shots I took during the weeklong event.

A friend of mine noticed a beautiful long hair black and white cat outside of her house. He was there more frequently in the span of a year and she noticed he had become quite emaciated so she started to feed him. She knew I had been in the market for a cat, and told me about him. I went by her place one evening to meet him and it was love at first sight!

When we got him, he was so skinny and so timid. We thought he must have been abused. After living with us he is no longer shy, or skinny! Although, maybe a little camera shy… hehe!

Even though the cold winter days had us hibernating, we could still show our bicycle love with these matching “his & hers” bike necklaces.

We had these pendants engraved for each other as wedding gifts, and sported them all winter long.

Charlene, a local real estate agent with Exit Realty Metro, got in touch recently about taking some photos of this lovely home:

The session took about an hour and the photos were in Charlene’s hands the very next day.
She says that it looks like this one will sell fast!

You can check in with Charlene at her website: Click Here
If you want to see the rest of the photos: Click Here

You can go to the Red Cross Volunteer Market and submit something that you’ll volunteer to do if someone donates a certain amount of money to The Red Cross. It works in reverse too! You can post a request for someone to do something for you, if you promise to donate.

I decided to volunteer myself for a free 1 hour photoshoot to the person who donates $150! So if you’ve been aching to have me take some fantastic photos of you, your pet, your family, or you and your special someone, then quickly click donate! These offers have been going fast!

It’s for an awesome cause, it’s super fun, and I hope it catches on quickly!

xo
Chelle