madisen & jeff: married
April 14th, 2013 by sharaleep | 5 Comments »
madisen and jeff. i think they’d be okay with me just saying it: things happened pretty fast for them. it seemed like i had just found out they were dating when i heard they were engaged. i’m sure they’ve had their fair share of sideways looks when people heard their entire relationship can be dated back to less than a year ago.
but here’s the thing: who cares!!!
you can’t tell me it’s too fast when you see this man’s eyes well up with tears as his bride walks down the aisle toward him (even though he just saw her 5 minutes ago!!). or when you see the look between them as they grip each other’s hands while it’s described what those hands will mean to them in the years to come. or when you see them give each other a hard time or laugh themselves silly while they beat the crap out of dora/diego pinatas (long story). or when you hear the affirmations from friends and family that the two of them together was so. clearly. right. it just was.
so cheers to you, my sweet friends…this is just the beginning!
thankfully the guys were super boring and always just stood there doing exactly what i asked them to.
jeff has spent the last year apprenticing a violin maker. as a surprise, his mentor had a professional violinist come to the reception and play the violin jeff made. it was pretty special.
jaime & jon: engaged
April 4th, 2013 by sharaleep | 4 Comments »
the first time i met jaime and jon was at their engagement session and i don’t know if i’ve ever encountered such enthusiasm at a first meeting…especially from the future groom! they are clearly so excited to be taking this step toward marriage, their joy is positively contagious. i’m definitely looking forward to their summer wedding! 
sukhi’s getting married
April 2nd, 2013 by sharaleep | 6 Comments »
i love our old neighborhood! we lived right across from the sikh temple and that first year we found ourselves swept up in the beauty of the surrounding community. there’s a huge sikh festival in the fall where they celebrate their holy book and we were so eager to participate, but at that point no one knew us so everyone was curious about the “gori”(white woman) in the salwar. i embraced the strange looks and began to make friends with our neighbors. when the same parade came around the following year, i got the inside track as i was allowed to come and watch some of the morning food preparations on our street and get taste tests of all the best punjabi delights.
i was so ecstatic to hear of sukhi’s engagament in the fall and even more pleased when she invited me to attend and photograph some of the pre-wedding celebrations. she and her family had lived next door and we had spent hot summer days hiding in the shade of the lane between our homes while she let my kids douse her with water. best neighbor ever!
the week of the wedding, it’s customary to signal the beginning of the maiyan(a period of separation between the engaged couple) with a celebration at the bride’s home. sukhi’s family joined together the night before the wedding to prepare her for marriage by performing the vatna and chuni ceremonies, which involve giving the bride an intricately embroidered veil as well as applying a special paste to her body.
it was such a beautiful thing to be a part of…to watch previous generations bestowing blessings and gifts on this woman who was about to start her own family. thank you so much for welcoming me into this evening as one of your own!
sukhi’s mom is one of the most beautiful women i’ve ever met. her smile is contagious and she is so warm and generous.
the cools: family
March 6th, 2013 by sharaleep | 3 Comments »
if there’s anything that i know about 2 year olds, it’s that they love to share the spotlight.
see what i mean? i got to meet oren when he was a brand new baby and his mom was, to this day, the most laid back first time mom i’ve ever laid eyes on. pictures outside? sure. on the ground? sure. in the leaves? sure. it was awesome. fast forward two years and i was driving out to harrison to see this family that now consisted of four. what a sweet addition their little girl is. i think she fits in so well – let’s just say she’ll never be short on entertainment.
rebecca & jordan: engaged
March 4th, 2013 by sharaleep | No Comments »
“we met a bar”. giggles. sheepish looks. i loved it.
if there’s one thing i can say after being involved in a number of weddings over the past few years is that you can never judge a book by its cover when it comes to love. whether you met on-line or at a star trek enthusiast conference or in the produce section of the grocery store…it doesn’t matter!! what matters happens after that and i love hearing people’s stories of where that initial attraction (or sometimes lack thereof!) led them.
jordan & bethany: engaged
February 28th, 2013 by sharaleep | 2 Comments »
“please sir, i promise if the car starts to slip we will turn around”: my final plea. the mountain was closed because of a power outage. and it was snowing heavily. and i didn’t have chains. thankfully, he took one look at my minivan and my pathetic “i haven’t been out of the house without my kids in two weeks and i really need to make this engagement session happen today” face and let us through. and check it – so glad he did!
thanks for trusting me to get you up and down the mountain safely – and for trusting me with your wedding in june! so looking forward to it.
2012: a year in pictures
February 23rd, 2013 by sharaleep | 19 Comments »
i was so conflicted about how to encapsulate an entire year of pictures into one blog post. all business? all personal? some of both? none of either? and i don’t like picking “favourites” because the reality is that there are beautiful moments in every.single.session and to decide one is “better” than another…just doesn’t sit right with me. so what you’re going to get is a little bit of everything. a whole bunch of moments bundled up into 4 minutes of your day you will (hopefully) be happy to have witnessed.
2012 was full of “feeling”. i grieved this year. a lot. i cried alone and with others and alone again. i was conflicted in my spirit over why this life is the way it is and wondered how beautifully good people could suffer so much.
at the same time, i rejoiced. like there was no tomorrow. i got to witness the very first breaths of a sweet new life and be present as another was released back into the hands of her creator. i got to see a million first steps as married couples bounced down the aisle and see the tears of joy as their parents freed them to start their own families. i saw my own kids eager to start school and comforted them when they returned to me with scrapes and bruises of all kinds. i got to cuddle warm little bundles and wiggly toddlers and watch as moms and dads reluctantly let go of their child’s hands so they could take a few wobbly independent steps. maybe not all of that sounds like rejoicing to you, but to me it represents joy of every kind…what moulds us and shapes us and challenges us and gives us hope for the future. in a word: life. what a year.
(the song is paper house by lisa hannigan)
if you watch this and are stirred; if you see these people and wish it was you in those pictures; if you trust me to walk alongside you and the ones you love while you dance and play and enjoy each others company, then you are my client. you are the one i want to serve. call me. email me. just don’t be a stranger. i can’t wait to meet you.
what if.
February 21st, 2013 by sharaleep | 11 Comments »
as the plane began its descent into rainy, gray vancouver, i looked through the window at the beautifully clear sky with only the tip of mount baker protruding through the thick wall of cloud. all i could think was, “if only everyone down there under those clouds knew what was up here.”
i was on my way home from dominican republic and the what if conference. and i was looking at the world a little differently than i had in a long time. maybe ever.
my time there didn’t necessarily change the way i think, it just made me more aware of those thoughts and the consequent choices i have been making based on them. case in point: i have lots of ideas. dreams even. but when reality hits, i am often the first person to leave those things on the backburner for seemingly more important “tasks” in the moment. i have come to assume that dreams will likely remain just that: dreams. and maybe for the first time, as i had a thought of something i would really like to do, i wrote it down. that’s something i had stopped doing. in some way i thought that if i wrote it down and it never happened that i will have failed. so instead of ever starting anything big, i just let the ideas come and go and waited for doors to open to me.
which is another thing i started to come to grips with: the reality of failure. i care a lot about what others think of me. i try not to. i even say i don’t. but i do. and failing is, well, failing and it freaks me out. it’s not fun, people think…well there i go again, now don’t i. but what if failing wasn’t that bad after all? what if failing was just leading me closer to my next success? what if failing helped me learn in the process more about myself and others and made me a better fit for a success i never thought i would enjoy?
you’re probably sitting there thinking, “well…duh, sharalee”. and maybe i am super slow and these aren’t really revelations and they are things everyone else already knows. but maybe they are things we “know” in our heads, but don’t believe in our hearts. maybe things we’ve been told have led us away or even blinded us from the truth. maybe very few of us live up to our full potential because of fear of judgement or failure or even fear of success.
so as i looked back on my experience at the what if conference it dawned on me that it was the literal and figurative jet plane that had rocketed me through the cloud only to discover how beautiful it was on the other side. a literal world of possibility and hope that has always been there…it was just waiting for me to discover it. and unfortunately, only a select few are dwelling up there in the sun, but there’s so much room up there, friends, come join me!! it’s not going to be easy; there are going to be days when there’s turbulence or motion sickness or even when you dip below that cloud line back into the gray (i may or may not be there right. now.) and feel like it will be impossible to push back through to the other side. so go, take a rest on the snowline of the mountain, regain your strength, restock your supplies and make the trek back up. you’re so much closer than you were when you were starting on the ground (p.s. i’m a pastor’s kid = i like a good metaphor).
and if you need a plane to jet you through those clouds, go sign up for WHAT IF!!! they’re hosting one this summer in australia (or thereabouts)and another february 2014 in california (which is sold out, but GET ON THE WAIT LIST).
and don’t even get me started talking about the people. the people.were.amazing. people i now call friends, teachers, contacts, motivators, hopeful dreamers, likeminded leaders, inspiring and groundbreaking world changers…i could go on. they got me thinking outside myself and how i can serve others. serve you. thank you, sweet what iffers, for continuing to challenge me to dream. knowing that they WILL be more than just dreams.
melanie
February 15th, 2013 by sharaleep | 3 Comments »
meet melanie.
we just met last week, but i already love her. who wouldn’t? she approaches the world with a child like sense of wonder, so ready to learn, to experience and to enjoy. she’s an encourager, an optimist, a dreamer. the kind of person who is oozing with potential and beauty and laughter. the best kind.
hoping that you go home with a renewed sense of hope for the future, knowing that you are an amazing woman who is capable of SO much. thanks for putting up with me and my 6:30am camera happy self! you’re beautiful.
mika & rebecca: engaged
February 14th, 2013 by sharaleep | No Comments »
i know these two are spending today, a day to celebrate love, apart. so as my gift to them, here’s a little reminder of a day they were together. keeping each other warm, making each other laugh, reminiscing about first dates…a good day.
i loved rebecca’s story of how on their second date, he picked her up in what she determined to be a “junker” car and wondered why someone with a steady job couldn’t afford a more reliable vehicle. it was only after a few months of dating that she began to notice all the stares and compliments that “junker” car got and realized it was actually what one might call a “classic”.
Find me on Facebook!