Loving HAITI for real

In 2013, when a typhoon devastated the Philippines, my heart broke. But knowing individuals on the ground, already mobilized to make things happen, I was propelled to do something concrete. I collaborated with my friends over at LostBumblebeeGraphics and JustMEprints to launch what would be a successful fundraising campaign. Now here we are again. Haiti needs our help.

Haiti needs immediate assistance. And we know people on the ground ready to make real things happen now. A team has already been mobilized and is waiting on resources to rebuild homes, remedy pending starvation, and consequently respond to the cholera epidemic. 15,000 people are without shelter, and even more face a lack of food. We need to act today.

We've all been frustrated with reports of funds mismanaged after Haiti's last natural disaster. But this frustration is not a reason to throw our hands up and do nothing. It is a reason to become wiser with our generosity. I've long believed that the most effective way to help in times of crisis is to empower legitimate indigenous labourers, both using resources on hand as well as stimulating the local economy.

Because the first convoy leaves this weekend, for every dollar donated by tomorrow, Friday, October 14th, at 2 p.m., your donation will be matched by an anonymous donor, up to $200. Not only will each dollar go further in the hands of workers on the ground, already invested in Haiti even before this devastating event, but your dollar is doubled. You will receive a tax deductible receipt for any donation over $20.

As a special THANK YOU, Lost Bumblebee, JustMe, and I would like to thank you by offering a free 12 month printable calendar of your choosing for a donation of any amount.*

I have compiled 12 fine art images of newborns, and coupled those to some of the most endearing children's book quotes...

Elena over at JustME gathered 12 of her best paper-crafting creations from the last year for you to enjoy...

Melissa from Lost Bumblebee applied her talents in graphic artistry to bring you 12 months of gratitude...

Please don't delay in donating, and please share this effort, and these calendar images!

*Printable calendars: Printers such as VistaPrint will print, bind and ship you the completed images. Keep your eyes peeled, as I've seen those full size calendars go down to as little as $5 each! Amazing for Christmas gifts!

*To receive your calendar images, please include your email address in the "add special instructions" section.

TO DONATE, please click button below and comment HAITI in the "add special comments section".

The heart of the home - Montreal's South Shore photographer in Jackson, MS

I've been a portrait photographer for nearly a decade now. And I choose portraiture (or it chooses me) because of the life. The light that dances in the eyes. The skin, either brilliant with newness or a measure of leathery-with-age. Curves, body language, emotion.

People are important. We have inherent value. I believe we are all loved. We were all made with purpose. Destiny. I buy that. I believe that each one of us is "fearfully and wonderfully made." When I photograph someone, I desire to convey to them their own beauty. I see it there even when they do not. I am every time stricken with appreciation for each individual's great worth. I am in that moment so grateful that they are alive.

In short, portrait photography is, for me, a deep exercise in loving others.

Never in my life did I think I could experience these things through any other form of photography. That is, not until I went to the Farish Street Historic District in Jackson, MS. There, the houses spoke loudly to me. But then again, never had I met a group of people so devoted to an entire city that they loved even the abandoned homes in that place. Never, until I met my new friends from WeWillGo.

The Eve of Restoration (Joel 2:25)

In the Shadow (Psalm 91:1)

The Lovely, Hidden Face (Song of Solomon 2:14)

She Has Loved Much (Luke 7:47)

Love is a Seed (Mark 4:31,32)

The Fallen Shelter (Amos 9:11)

The Old Gate (Nehemiah 3:6-10)

The Old Gate With Verse

So now I see these abandoned homes. And because of the deep, sacrificial love of my new faraway friends, I see something loved. And because they are loved, they are beautiful.

It reminds me of only the most lowly and forgotten people on the planet. Those many have deemed hopeless cases. Those judged too far gone. Perhaps, reading this, your mind has wandered to the people of a faraway country. Or perhaps you know someone befitting of that description not so far away from you. Perhaps, actually, that describes you.

But just as these houses are not too far gone to restore, neither are you too far.

"Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save." -Isaiah 59:1

If you know very little about Jackson, MS, you may not know that many of its people can sometimes look like these houses. Imagine for a moment the hopelessness that could set in. But imagine watching your neighbours be loved back to life, one at a time. Imagine watching once abandoned homes restored to a former glory. Imagine daring to hope again. What could that do to one community? To a city? And beyond those borders? What could that do?

If these houses speak to you, or if you believe in the rebuilding of a city -- one person at a time and one house at a time -- please consider a donation of any amount which will go towards the restoration of a house in Jackson, MS.

In return, I will email you a hi-resolution image file (without logo/watermark) of your choice from the above photos displayed. Be sure to click "add special instructions to recipient" and include your image selection as well as any special instructions. I will email the desired file to you via the email address provided through PayPal unless otherwise indicated. 

Here I Go: Gift Certificate Promotion - Montreal's South Shore photographer

"2015 has dared me. So here I go..." begins my heartfelt write up, as I describe the adventure I've embarked on. You can read all about it by clicking right here.

I've started packing, and I leave in less than a month. This is getting real.

Starting now until I leave for a week-long adventure, I'm running a Gift Certificate Promotion.

I know many of you are thinking about family photos once the weather starts warming up. Or you are expecting a new wee one, and were just about to contact me. Now is a great time to plan the session you've been thinking of.

Here are the details of the promo:

For every $100 in gift certificates you purchase between now and April 3rd, 2015, I'll gift to you an extra image selection from your session. That's a $35 value! Yours free.

Pour chaque tranche de 100$ de certificats cadeaux dont vous achetez entre aujourd'hui et le 3 avril, 2015, je vous donnerai un coupon pour une image additionelle de votre choix. 

For anyone interested in supporting WeWillGo Ministries, I'm conducting a couple of fundraisers. You can read all about them here and here. Those fundraisers are only to raise funds for WeWillGo, and not to pay any of my personal expenses for the trip. If you feel so inclined, I'm grateful for the support you would be willing to bring so this Canadian can bless the socks off the missionaries of WeWillGo as they rebuild an entire community.

FREE back to school minis - Montreal's South Shore child photographer

Yup. Free.

Usually you're in it for at least $60 as soon as you're in front of my lens. But this time around, FREE. Well, with a donation of any amount to a cause dear to my heart.

Evangelina, my 9 year old, is an absolute bookworm. This brought to my attention a serious need within her school's library. Knowing everyone involved is doing their best at every turn to give the kids everything they need, it's obvious that more funds are needed. So guess what? Fundraiser.

I'm a big believer in doing whatever you are good at to give back. I'm no baker. So when it's time to organize a bake sale, they don't call me (unless it's to run the table). I don't sell much at those famous chocolate bar drives, seeing as I don't have a populated office to tempt with the well-meaning goodies. (Nope. It ends up being me, my cramped office desk, and way too much chocolate within arm's reach.) So today I'm not selling you mint-chocolate squares (man, those things are good) or cupcakes or brownies. I'm peddling a Back to School photo session.

*click image to enlarge

Mother's Day, this time last year - Montreal's South Shore family photographer

Next week is a very busy week. Between 40 and 50 moms, and their kiddies, of course.

I honestly can't remember if this will mark my 7th or 8th year of photographing the beautiful new mommies of L'Envol. I'm sure if I rifled through my stuff, I would have my answer. Years of capturing the connection between mother and child. Years of shy smiles and grateful moms.

2013 looked like this:

Philippines fundraiser efforts

You may remember this post about our combined efforts to extend help to the Philippines after Typhoon Haiyan devastated them.

News on how much was raised, and a small peek into where your donations have started to go are the topics of this blog post.

Received recently by Destiny International Ministries was this email...

I am sending pictures taken from Bohol and Leyte Islands who had been victims of the latest tradgedy (sic). These two islands are in great need and badly afflicted. They live now without power ,not having enough food supply, no drinking water supply, live in very simple house and still experiencing after shocks. I am sending in separate email with more information [soon].

The Leyte Islands are about 80 km from Tacloban (the major city you would have heard mentioned so often on the news). It obviously would have suffered major devastation. Bohol, a little further out (300 km from Tacloban) was not only affected by the typhoon, but had also suffered a severe earthquake just a couple of weeks prior. (This is why the mention of after-shocks.)

Here are a few of the images sent our way...

For all my 2013 clients - Montreal's South Shore photographer

As you may all know, this happened:

This calendar is just one of three available for your donation of any amount to Destiny International Ministry's Philippines relief fund. More details by clicking here.

I am so grateful to all the moms and dads who replied so speedily when I sent out a request for rights to use their precious family moments. Included in this calendar are just some of my favorite moments of late 2012 and 2013.

I truly did have so many favorite moments, though! One from every session over the last year, for sure!

I wanted to love on all my clients from the last 13 months a little bit, as you love on the Philippines. Therefore, if an image from your session (yes, even if it was a miniSession) did not make the final, widely distributed calendar theme, I am happy to announce I can customize one page just for you.

If you had a session in the last 13 months (October 2012 until now) and you make a donation of any amount to our Philippines relief efforts (as little as $1) I will provide you with a calendar page header from your session. Makes this calendar a little special for you, doesn't it? (This image prepared for you will not be made available at large, but will be for use by you as you print off your own calendars or other photo-gifts).

So head over to the Philippines fundraiser blog post, and donate a little something!

Then email me and request your special custom page!

Thanks for your generosity. And thanks for trusting your family's faces to me.

Our hearts indeed are big enough - Real relief for the Philippines

We have seen the images. We have heard the news. We know that the Philippines, this country that's on the other side of the world, has been hit by tragedy. Typhoon Haiyan tore apart many of its regions a week ago.

I love the Filipino people. My best friend growing up was my window to these amazing people who are called Filipinos. Smiling. Laughing. Contented, Industrious. Generous. Hospitable. I thought perhaps it was just my bestie's mom who was like that. I figured it couldn't possibly be some sort of cultural norm. But, well, it is. And you don't need to look at many images of the devastation to spot people helping one another, smiling, and even laughing. ~Tanya Zaleski

We're going to help. Here's the long and the short of it.

'Cause you were all yellow - Montreal's South Shore child photographer

This is her song, here.

And this is her dress, here...

BC boarders - Montreal photographer in Vancouver

SK8ers as young as 5 years old came out for a perfect day in Abbotsford, British Columbia. And I got to be witness (and official freeze-framer) to these kids doing things I'm too chicken to do. 

Chicken and proud.

But way WAY more proud of these guys and their incredible devotion to the extreme sport of skateboarding.

Starting from somewhere - Montreal's South Shore child photographer

I love this image of my little girl...

And it all started from here...

Well, actually, it all started by me coaxing her to lay down in a wettish field peppered with perfect, yellow flowers. That's my good sport...

Eight seems impossible - Montreal's South Shore child photographer

She's been asking me more and more to tell her funny stories about when she was "little." I suppose when my daughter figured out she was once younger than she is at this very moment, she decided she'd grown up.

So I tell her stories. Stories about her as a baby. Stories about how well she ate. How well she slept. How early she spoke. And all the things she'd say.

Like when she was two --and had been watching Charlotte's Web on loop -- and touted, "No, I will not eat them [carrots]. It's unfair and unjust." At two.

Or when she was five, and I remarked to her that she had my knees. "You know what?" she pondered, "I think Daddy has my nipples."

But now, at the age of eight. I have only one observation. It's impossible. She can't be. And yet, there she is, a little lady before my very eyes.

Back from vacay - Montreal's South Shore child photographer

A week away does anyone good. A peek of my little one to tide you over until I catch up on some serious editing!

What seems to be turning into an annual tradition - Montreal's South Shore child photographer

These pics have been under wraps for a little while now. Again this year, we got the grandkids together to gift photos to my mom (AKA Grand-maman, AKA Kamou) for Christmas.

The first post of 2013 goes to these beloved faces...

Super-posers. Super-nuts.

My girl with a bestie. Posing. Zoolander-posing. Magnum.

There we go. Now I know who you are.

Happy Monday!

Family of posers - Montreal's South Shore family photographer

I've been hanging with this family since their eldest was a newborn. My lens has seen them more than almost any other family.

And I love these posers. ;)

Picture day - Montreal's South Shore children's photographer

Today is my daughter's school picture day.

I have a certain sentimental attachment to school photos. Maybe it's because we all had our awkward annual pics posted about the house when we were growing up. Despite the odds that the photo will be, in so many ways, not-so-hot, I believe it's a public school right of passage.

And annually, I content myself with the print-screen plastered with the watermark PROOF - PROOF - PROOF -  PROOF - PROOF... And I do cherish it. I love all photos. They are moments in time, and to hate them is to hate the frozen instants themselves.

But, yeah, I do have a preference for what goes a little something like this...

My lovely, and moving things indoors - Montreal's South Shore child photographer

I hate being cold. So hate. I'm the girl who never complains once in the summer...You may hear me utter, "Ooh, it's so hot today!" when the humidex drives us up to 40 Celsius. (That's over 100 Fahrenheit, friends. And yes, it does get that hot 'round here.) But I'm happily free of air conditioning, soaking up the heat like nobody's business. 

Then there's my love for photographing children outdoors. Here, where winter does not lightly tread, that love can only truly be practiced (at most) 7 months out of the year. Sure, I can shoot in the snow and cold. But I'll be capturing far more snowsuit than child. And really, who needs their kid's snowsuit immortalized?

And yet, with all that, I love my Canada. And I'll never move away from it. No, never.

There's no use denying it any longer. My outdoor shooting season is quickly coming to a close. Just over a month left, really. And then indoors we go...

The frugalista in me

It's been back to school around here. Maybe you can relate.

And as I help my 2nd grader get herself dressed every day, I'm getting a pretty good sense of some elements she's lacking in her wardrobe. I learned last year that I can be such a smarter shopper just by waiting a couple of weeks into the school year before picking up new clothes.

Today, I got the bulk of our new back to school wardrobe snapped up. Thank you online shopping. Thank you Forever21 for girls. Thank you 'buy 1 get 1 free.' Oh, and thank you free-shipping-on-orders-over-60-dollars.

I shopped it all  up for $36 (plus tax).

How'd I do it?

SALES. Listen, with a constantly changing kid, from the length of her limbs to her personal tastes, I'm not about to pay regular price if I can avoid it. And I can. Plus, when shops pull out their really fabulous promos, like Forever21's Buy One Get One Free event (on until this Sunday), it's time to jump. The only exception I made this time: a pair of teal houndstooth tights, which I paid $5.90 for. 

FREE SHIPPING. I know, on orders of $60 or more. But why pay for shipping? And why buy much more than you really need just to get it all shipped free? What I like to do is find a friend or family member and combine an order. So after I found for $36 worth and my BFF found for $24 worth, we were in the clear. (If I can't come up with a shopping buddy, I think ahead to Christmas and birthday gifts.) And here's the thing. Buy less, not more. I buy what I really need. A sale is not an excuse to go crazy. It just means it's time to buy. My goal was to keep our order as close to $60 as we could.

MIX & MATCH. I am a huge fan of being able to create as many outfits as I can with what I have. A versatile piece is a total bang for your buck. I can create way more than 6 outfits from everything I bought for $36. Do the math: that's less than $6 per outfit. I keep in mind what we've already got in our closet, too. So. many. outfits.

HAVE A PLAN. Shopping online is a little tough at times. How can you be sure it will fit? What if there's an itchy fabric you didn't anticipate? (Itchy = end of the world, by the way.) What if sale items are non-refundable? I know what I'll do in all these cases. If you don't think ahead, you may end up spending more than you bargained for in order to make an exchange, or waste your money buying something that won't get used. And really, if you do that, well, what's the point?

Total retail therapy.

(By the way, the price of all those items at regular price? a few dimes shy of $120. Yup.)

Adventures in copycatting - Montreal's South Shore newborn photographer

I was recently approached by a sweet set of parent expecting their third child. They wanted me to photograph they're newborn, but had a special request.

A pretty intimidating request, actually.

Their first 2 babies had been photographed by Leino from Esto Image. Once located in Saint-Lambert, here on the South Shore, he has recently picked up and moved to Milton, Ontario. (Something about falling in love...*awe*) So gracious and respectful of my individual style, this couple was. But they did want a handful of shots that resembled what Leino had accomplished with their first two.

Here's where the intimidating part comes in. Leino is a master at his craft. He's photographed thousands of newborns, and his style is so completely signature to him. Not to mention he works in studio and has a particular lighting technique, while I use natural light. Etc, etc...  Have a look at his blog.

I agreed to take on the challenge, of course. But I made it clear that I'd have to work in such a way as to honour my own style and not try too hard to copy Leino's work at the risk of stunting my creativity. And here's what we came up with...