The loveliest baby in Vancouver, I swear

Baby H came in to see Jane Photo last week with her loving mama and I wanted to share a few of her images with everyone.

Oh my goodness, what a sweetie. She just charmed me. It's not very often one can cajole a 7-month-old into a series of strange hats without complaint, but H was a little trooper no matter what we asked her to wear. Course we got loads of perfectly ordinary photos too, but the hats are a definite favourite of mine. Her parents just loved her images, and I do too. Thanks, L family, for choosing Jane Photo, and please bring your little cutie back to see me again. H is just a doll.

The wife and I grabbed a few moments yesterday in all the hubbub of a busy client season to take some portraits of each other. Sooo long overdue; I haven't had any portraits of me made for years (although some nice ones were captured by Janet Rerecich at our daughter's wedding this summer), and I love taking photos of Joy. She is so adorable. The trees were gorgeous. I think I can safely say that we've never seen such an eastern fall in Vancouver. The weather has been stunning all September and now all October, and there haven't been any of our usual wind storms to tear the leaves from the trees before they change colour. It's really red and yellow and even orange. We had fun playing in the leaves during our "fall in an hour" drive. I really hated being on the receiving end of the photographs, though...which is a good lesson to have every once in a while as I subject my clients to it nearly every day. We ended up at MountainView Cemetery where, on Saturday, they held the first Vancouver version of Day of the Dead. Such a great Mexican festival, and every year I long to go back to photograph its wonders and sorrows. Here is my tiny piece of it from yesterday. We lit incense for our moms and said a word for all our lost friends and family members.

The photos of me were taken by Joy Masuhara, as was the photograph of the closeup of the tree in the composite. She's great behind a camera, isn't she?

Okanagan Wine Festival

Such a sweet little getaway Joy and I had last weekend. It was great to leave the city, and great to be around all that nature. We stayed at the Summerland Lakeside Resort, where the suites were unexpectedly beautiful and sooo comfy--just right for curling up with a special squeeze and a book. I loved all the vineyards, and kept snapping pix to get just the right ones--who could go wrong at such wineries as Dirty Laundry and Therapy? I didn't drink, because I don't like to, and this has its benefits, of course, as I was the easy designate for driving, for instance, and had no hangovers. But I wish Joy had had someone to tipple with...but co-tippler or no, she was happy to play, and we had a delightful time together. She was very impressed with the quality of the wines, btw, and came home with 12 bottles--and oh yeah, I'm pretty sure she saw the Ogopogo.

And there are some very very lucky newborns upcoming. In Ollala (oh la la!) I bought the coolest dough pan which I'm itching to use for baby pix.

Evangeline Grace

On the subject of Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep and parents who will be having a rough time this Thanksgiving, I wanted so much to share these images captured just last week of tiny, adorable Evangeline Grace for her grieving parents, S and R. She arrived much, much too early, at 20 weeks, suffering from Trisomy 18. There is so, so much love evident in these photographs. Her sorrowing parents just sent me this email:

I meant to e-mail you and let you know that we received the dvd. The photos are absolutely beautiful! It was such a relief to receive them because the photos we took with our own camera in the hospital are very dark and it is very difficult to make out Evangeline in them. When we saw the photos you took it brought such relief to me that I will be able to see her forever now. The NILMDTS organization and you are such a godsend. I don't think most people realize how important it is to capture these special "angel babies' on film for the parents to be able to look upon them and spend special moments thinking about their babies. We are forever grateful to you and the NILMDTS organization for making our situation just a little bit easier. My husband I are were commenting earlier how it takes a really special and caring person to do what you do and to be so kind with a warm heart and warm words; we can never thank you enough. You are a true inspiration. ...We would love to share with others the photos of Evangeline.

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts,

S and R

Please, as always, feel free to leave a comment below about this or any other blog entry.

Before Canada's Thanksgiving holiday arrives this coming weekend, I wanted (again) to mention the great organization Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep. Jane Photo has volunteered for them for about two and a half years, and it has been my honour to be with many families as they go through an early infant loss. There are several Vancouver area photographers--and we can always use more as the service gets more and more known in our area. I am one of Vancouver's Area Coordinators, along with Gael Noel from Noel Photography; we organize things for the area, and help to arrange photographers for families.

A few weeks ago, Mary Frances Hill, a reporter for the Vancouver Sun, approached us to write an article, and it appeared on the front page. What wonderful coverage. They featured a little tyke I photographed for the organization earlier this year whose name was Noah Neufeld. Though his prognosis was dire, Noah was born alive and quite alert, as you can see from the featured photographs here. We were all pretty happy and celebratory that evening in the hospital, then saddened when Noah died 28 days later.

I know for a fact that this incredible family has helped Noah touch many, many more families as they have told their story again and again.

As families celebrate Thanksgiving this weekend, please take an extra second to give thanks for your kiddos, and to remember the families who have lost theirs this year. Our thoughts and hearts are with them.

You can find NILMDTS at .

The Vancouver Sun story, without its photos, appears at

Such sweet words in the twins' newsletter

Jane Photo photographed the most adorable twins this spring. I didn't have any experience with multiples, and I wanted some. It was such a pleasurable session, and I have a permanent soft spot in my heart for those little gals and their mama.

Here is what the mama wrote for the North Shore Mothers of Multiples newsletter this month:

More of beautiful Becky

Woo-hoo, baby-to-be! Becky and Jane Photo got together for our second maternity session just to switch up our scenarios and try a few new things. I was longing to get out into an industrial area, and Becky was game. So after doing a few more pretties in the studio, off we trundled. So fun. We stopped at a park partway, and then headed down to the nitty and the gritty. Within a block radius, we had all the yummies we could possibly long for.