I’ve started this blog post about 10 times and then deleted it. How do I tell you a story that is full of love and laughter and silliness, but also with a tinge of sadness? It’s a hard one to tell, and to feel like I’m doing it any sort of justice. For me, there’s an ease in letting the photos tell the story instead of words.

The background

It started with an email from Amanda, asking if I could capture some moments of her family at home with their beloved pooch Lucy, before she crosses the rainbow bridge (Amanda’s exact term, which I thought was incredibly lovely). Lucy had been diagnosed with cancer and they knew her time was limited. During our pre-session meeting, we spoke quite a bit about the tone of the session, and so I went into the session, with the goal of capturing the joy this family emanates and documenting what an evening at home as a family, with Lucy, looked like.

The session

Capturing joy wasn’t a hard task at all, as there were so many fun moments in the few hours we spent together. We started the photo session in the family’s Edmonton home with everyone playing action figures, and then moved outside for a quick walk (on a surprisingly chilly April day!). Once home, more silliness ensued and then pizza dough was mixed, kneaded and tossed! Lucy was a lucky dog who was given samples of each topping, and she had the cutest little trick of holding pepperoni on top of her paws.

Making your family photo session unique

Before each family photo session, I send a questionnaire to get to know each family a bit better. One of the questions is, “Are there any unique rituals your family has?”.  Most families have something, even if it’s a small thing like tickles every night before bed. This family however, said they have a funny thing they do each day before they eat dinner, and that I had to see it to believe it. When we met before the session, I asked about the ritual and was treated the most hilarious (and awesome!) dinner ritual of all time. There was a chant, and actions, and silly noises. Right then and there, I knew that their pre-dinner song had to be included as part of their photo session. We talked through ideas and decided that making pizza at home and then sitting down to a family dinner was the way to do it!

A few weeks ago, Lucy crossed that rainbow bridge. I’m honoured that I was invited to preserve these special memories and am so happy this family will forever have these images to remember their Lucy girl.

Below is the slideshow from their session along with a few of my favourite stills.