Blog Archives

A Romantic Evening

7/21/2024

The two of them spent a wonderfully romantic evening together.

It had been love at first sight for both of them from the moment they had first met...

They had been married twelve years, and their love had only grown stronger.

But with all of Lawrence's duties and responsibilities it was sometimes challenging to find some special alone time with each other...

"This was such a wonderful idea of yours."

"We should do this more often."

"I'd love that."

the Royal Suite

7/20/2024

Monica kicked off her shoes and made herself comfortable. She had booked the Royal Suite at the Prince of Wales Hotel, and it was a beautiful set of rooms.

Lawrence sat down in a comfortable armchair, and started leafing through one of the books on the side table.

"This book is full of stories of Kings and Queens, dragons, Wizards and fairies. Basically all stories about us and our world."

"Really?"

But Monica had other ideas...

She hadn't booked this weekend away just so her husband could catch up on some reading...

...so she passed him a goblet of champagne.

Monica got up. It was her and Lawrence's twelfth wedding anniversary....

... and she had really been looking forward to spending some time alone with him...

"I can think of something far more interesting for us to do right now."

Lawrence smiled....

...and took her in his arms...

'Happy anniversary, my love."

Niagara on the Lake

7/19/2024

Monica and Lawrence arrived at Niagara on the Lake. It was a beautiful Spring day

...and the trees were in full bloom.

They booked into their hotel...

..and then went to explore the historic town.

Monica couldn't resist doing a little shopping...

"This is a beautiful town."

"It certainly is." she agreed.

"But what do you say, we go back to the hotel?"

Monica had promised Lawrence that if he'd pose for a special portrait for her, she would arrange a special, second honeymoon trip for just the two of them. She borrowed the magic time-travel jewel from Miho, so she and Lawrence could go to the future to visit Niagara Falls, the Honeymoon Capital of the modern world.

On their way to Niagara Falls, they stopped to take a look at all the painted houses in Grimsby beach.

Monica found all the colourful houses fascinating...

"I can't even imagine how much work it took to paint them all like this."

"Can you imagine if the houses in our village were painted like this?"

"And maybe our castle?"

But Lawrence wasn't too thrilled with the idea. "What, and cover up all the beautiful stonework? I don't think so."

"I can't see our people spending their precious time and resources turning their homes into a tourist attraction like this. Plus, we'd become the laughing stock of our enemies.
I love our kingdom just the way it is."

Beauty and the Beast

7/17/2024

A set of photos portraying Yvette and Winston as Beauty and the Beast....

Pacific Rim

7/16/2024

We finally reached one of our favourite places on the west coast of Vancouver Island, Pacific Rim National Park....

The Visitor Center at Long Beach...

Tide pools at the base of the rocks filled with sea urchins...

Winston found a new friend there; Byuri, a little native girl....

Together they sat watching the waves as the tide started to roll back in....

Hilda Ridge

7/15/2024

After taking doll photos at Bow Lake, we continued heading north up the Icefields Parkway. My goal was to take as many sets of photos for the story started in 2012, and not in any particular order. So I was keeping my eye open for suitable, uncrowded photo locations. Like the parking lot at Hilda Ridge, just south of the Columbia Icefields....

In the story, the three main characters had come across a lost little native girl. So, they interrupted their quest to go out from camp with the horses to look for the girl's people.

It was very cold and windy, and the sky was filled with massive storm clouds, and they'd occasionally get pelted with snow, so it was a good thing that they'd brought along some warm 'bear skins'....

Special Days in Spring

7/14/2024

Back in 2013 I started a new doll photo project - A Year of Special Days. I spent an entire year taking photos to illustrate all the special days that inspired me. Then over the years I'd revisit the theme and photograph even more, like in 2015, 2017, 2021, and again this past year. Well, we thought the series would make a great book, but there were so many special day photos that we decided to divide the year up into four seasons, and create a series of books each covering three months worth of Special Days.

The first volume - Spring - is just about ready to go out for it's test print. It covers all the special days I've photographed for March, April and May over the years, right from the very beginning. And because it's about special days in Spring, we chose green as the theme colour....

I created special monthly cover photos to illustrate as many of the special days that month as I could. I'm sure you'll be able to recognize many of the Special Days represented.

The March section has 41 photos illustrating 23 different special days...

April has 72 photos illustrating 28 separate special days....

...and May has 48 photos illustrating 29 special days....

Then there's the front cover.

...and the back cover....

It's a really fun book, and I can't wait to see the first copy.

the Rockies

7/13/2024

With yesterday's photos taken at Bow Lake, I thought I'd share some more photos of the Rockies taken along the Icefields Parkway, which is considered one of the most spectacular roads in the world. The Parkway is part of Canada's National Park System, and follows three separate river valleys through totally unspoiled wilderness, for 230 km up through the heart of the Rockies from Banff up to Jasper.

Bow Lake from the south end...

Approaching Bow Lake from the north...

Bow Lake reflection, first thing in the morning before the wind ripples the surface...

The Saskatchewan River...

Approaching the Columbia Icefields...

The Athabasca Glacier at the Columbia Icefield....

The Icefields Parkway is always a highlight of any trip out west. We went up to the Icefields Center and back down again on our way out west, then travelled the entire length north a few weeks later, then took our time coming back down a few days later.