Catch my Party!

Yesterday we got a phone call from a lovely lady named Jillian who wanted to feature our business on her website!  

We got talking, and it turns out her website is actually pretty awesome!  The website it called Catch My Party and it is a sweet little spot where people are free to post photos and details of their birthday parties, weddings, and other great events.

It goes beyond sharing and tagging photos on sites like facebook... it actually allows people to share their events with tons of friends or anyone browsing the site.  

Anyone can sign up to comment, browse or rate their favorite party favors, wedding dresses, etc, etc.  (a great idea for people wanting to get ideas for their own events!)

A great way to document your event, share it, and get some fun feedback too.  Who doesn't want to recall the memories of the big events in our lives!

Check out what she had to write about SNAP on her blog, and feel free to create your own party page too!  

Visit Catch My Party here

S.A.B.C Photography

Photo by Esther

This past week Mike and I packed up the car and office yet again and drove down to Southern Alberta to teach kids about Photography!

In the spring Melissa asked us if we were available to come to Southern Alberta Bible Camp and we were excited when we realized that we didn't have any weddings during that week! Mike used to work at S.A.B.C before we met at Camp Qwanoes, so he has lots of fun memories of the camp. It was fun looking through old photo albums and seeing lots of our Calgary friends as youngen's at the camp!

Southern Alberta Bible Camp is situated right on Travers Resevoir and in the middle of desert land! Mike and I didn't get a chance to get out in the lake, but it was so pretty! The weather was hot and then rainy then hot and then... you get my point! When it rained it poured! The lightening storms were so awesome to watch.

There was a Juniors camp and a Senior High camp both running at the same time and we were in charge of teaching 12 Senior High students about photo's. They each brought their own camera's and we had about 4 hours a day with them every day! It was a ton of time, and we didn't ALWAYS stick to photography- we got in some great slappy slaps competition (Egyptian Rat tail) and showed off Mike's mind reading ability with some different card tricks.

We didn't have a lot to work with- many of the campers didn't even have manual modes on their point and shoots, but I was really proud of what each of the students seemed to learn! It shows just how awesome photo's can be when you compose them properly! We played with picnik (an online and FREE editing program) a little on the last day to spice up the photo's and here is how some of the favorites turned out!

Photo by Christine
I LOVE this one.


Photo by Caitlin


Photo by Amber


Photo by Megan


Photo by Lana
AND this one! Lana can I hang it on my wall?! ;) It's sort of horror-film esque!


Photo by Katie



Photo by Helen


Photo by Alyssa



Photo by Emma


Photo by Nick

(Some of the photo's aren't displayed because there are faces in them -and we don't have contracts/rights to show faces of minors from that particular week.)

For one of the sessions the group was given the task of posing the entire group and being responsible for lighting, posing and location! There was lots of room around the camp and here is what they came up with! Once they had it all figured out they would jump into the photo and I would click the button! I think they did quite well! Again... you'll have to imagine their beautiful faces/images! Haha... Oh how things have changed! The creativity was great. Kat came up with a shot where Amber was holding the entire group in her right hand. Or so it seemed...
I think that this was the funnest session.

Good work to all of our students! You all learned so much in such a short amount of time!!

The Redwood forrest and some cute little rascals.

After a night stay at the lovely Honey Bear campground on the Oregon Coast we continued heading down the beautiful coast line. We had been contemplating whether to take the coastal route or the interstate and decided it would be a lot more interesting driving by the ocean!

Unfortunately it was really rainy and grey and we had our fill of the same view after about 3 hours. The ocean was really pretty, but getting stuck behind slow moving trailors and driving around crazy cliffs just wasn't really all that great! I think it would have been a TON better if it were sunny and we would have been able to get out at the beach and soak up the sun!

We wanted to head back the interstate since (apparently) it could have shave about 6 hours off our trip... but we had already gone so far out of the way to get to the coast so we thought we better commit.

Two big highlights of taking Highway No. 5 [coastal route]-

-We went through Dune City which wouldn't you know it was named for their massive sand dune national parks! We got to play in the sand dunes and read awesome bumper stickers like : JUST DUNE IT! and IT'S A DUNE THING. Apparently the people that live in Dune City are serious about their sport. It was still overcast and a bit rainy so the dunes were a bit messy- but still a lot of fun! I can only imagine how much fun it would be DUNE it dune buggy style. We were just running and jumping around and it was STILL a good time.

by dfinnecy on flickr

-On our way into California we got to drive through Redwood National Park. It was awesome! It actually reminded me a lot of Cathedral Grove on Vancouver Island. It was so quiet when we drove through the park, when we parked our car on the side of the road everything was still- not a sound. It was almost creepy.



That's a really big tree!

Near the end of the highway through the redwoods there was a touristy museum with this creepy Paul Bunyan statue. The creepy part was how he would talk to you as you got out of your car... like actually talk to you- have a conversation. He even winked at me. Hmmm...

Mike and I were planning on camping at the Clear Lake State Park in California and we arrived just as the sun was going down. We ate our dinner by candlelight and set up our tent in the dark! It is incredibly easy to set up our little tent EVEN in the dark! We lurve our tent.

When we woke up in the morning we went for a walk. The campground was incredible! There were three different areas to the campground and we were at the top of a huge hill overlooking the lake. There was a ton of wildlife! I saw turtles on one of the boardwalks! So crazy...

There were also crazy amounts of THESE:
Lizards are so awesome... I wonder if people in California consider them pests? They really are everywhere! When we got back to our campsite we found some new enemies...
These two little guys had gotten into one of the bags sitting on the picnic table and stole a little container that we filled with olive oil and were gnawing through the lid to try to get to the oil! I didn't know that squirrels liked olive oil? Hmm... we put a couple of raspberries closer to us to get photo's of them. Haha... if you look closer at the photo above the squirrel with the berry is NOT happy sharing with his buddy.

Then we gave them a few more and they seem to be a lot happier.


cute little rascals.

The First Stop

Summer is slipping past SO quickly and I have so many summery adventures that I wanted to share! I can't believe I STILL haven't written about the highlight of my summer... I think it's probably because there are just SO many pictures that it is just a tad overwhelming! Haha... for now I will just write about the first bit of our trip...

As most of you know Mike and I packed our bags and headed down South on a roadtrip to California back in May! It was awesome... so random and so wonderful! We drove through Idaho first and planned to camp the first night in Spokane, Washington -but it turns out we got into Spokane just a bit too late. The campground closed it's gate 5 minutes early and we missed our chance! We decided to drive through the night and get to our destination SOONER. After Mike drove all that he could drive I would take over and drive all that I could drive. We found a nice rest stop on the side of the road that made for a great quick sleep.

When Mike woke up, he drove us all the way into Oregon where we finally got out of the car around noon the next day at a Safeway. We picked up some dinner rolls and a roasted chicken for breakfast/lunch and ate on a picnic bench in the parking lot. I know I know... we live the high life! Lol... (we went on our trip with the challenge to spend less than $500 for our entire 10 days!!)

While walking through Safeway and getting pumped about all the foreign brand names, Cherry Coke, and wine in the grocery store... I picked up one of my favorite bottles from Oregon and suggested we buy it for our first night at the camp site. It was Sokol Blosser's "Evolution" . Mike reminded me of our strict budget (which he often has to do) and we were excited when we noticed just how cheap they sell wine in the states for! We picked ourselves up a bottle of Cabernet/Merlot from Argentina for $4.50. Yes... that's right. $4.50. We were pretty proud of ourselves. We also filled our cooler with all of the basics- milk, eggs, bread, angel hair pasta, tomato sauce, and peanut butter.
(along with a few other random items we pulled from our cupboards at home.)

While I was looking at the label of Evolution I noticed that the wine was made in Dundee, Oregon.

When we got to the cashier I thought I'd ask about Dundee and see if the winery happened to be along our route to the west coast. We really weren't expecting much. When the cashier responded "just take a right at the next lights." I think my jaw dropped. We were only minutes from one of my favorite wineries!!

The vineyard was beautiful. The rows of grapes went further than I could see! Hills and Hills full of little grapes. We got to the tasting room and shared a flight and shared our stories of serving evolution to customers back in Calgary. The lady helping us mentioned that they just happened to be bottling that day and took us on a little tour.

The bottling took place in this tiny little trailer out back of the warehouse. I couldn't believe how small the space was that is used to bottle hundreds of thousands of bottles!

Boxes and more boxes of Evolution


I think that I would enjoy living in that little red house on a gigantic vineyard.

Tiny little grapes. They aren't harvested until late summer.

Well it turns out that Mike and I DID get to enjoy that lovely bottle of Evolution on the first night of camp after all.

We stayed on the first stretch of the Oregon Trail at the Honey Bear Campground. Just across the street from our campsite was a gorgeous stretch of white sand beach and roaring waves! I could hear the sound of the waves collapsing from our tent. Ahhhh.... relaxation.

Happy Birthday Canada!

The last few days have been FULL of editing photo's and learning new programs.  Mike and I have decided to test out RAW vs JPEG since many of our photographer friends have been saying the only way to shoot is in RAW! 

We were skeptical at first... it meant spending a lot more money on memory cards and hard drive space too!  As if our computers aren't already jam packed with stuff as it is?  Why don't we start making each individual file size 6 times bigger?  GAhh!  We've also been learning to use Adobe Lightroom instead of Aperture.  It's designed for photographer's so it seems like it'd make a bit more sense than using Aperture.  Kim's probably shaking her head at us right now going I TOLD YOU SO!!  Haha... YES!... yes you did.

 Yesterday was an AWESOME day... Canada's BIRTHDAY and the birth of Sonia Faye Dawn Blenkin!  I am SO excited to meet her.

I've felt the baby kick and squirm and now it is now a SHE and she is now an adorable little blenkin.  Awww... I hope everything went well for you Barbie!  

For Canada Day Mike and I had some friends over for a bbq! Some of our friends brought friends which I think should be the new BBQ standard! It was great meeting some new people!

 We were a little busy making blue cheese burgers, white chocolate covered strawberries,white chocolate brownies,homemade guacamole and salsa to snap photo's of the delish food but trust me when I say it was DELICIOUS!   

My sister and I still manage to show up wearing the same thing even though we rarely shop together OR live in the same building!  What can you do?  We both have brilliant minds ;)

Thanks to everyone for coming! Thanks especially to Shan and Jay for helping us mash hard avocado's and mush ground beef!  Haha... "Just pretend it's cookie dough Shannon!"  haha Eww... I hate touching raw meat too. 

I love fireworks!  It was rainy by the time the fireworks started so we didn't hang out on the roof for very long... or take the camera up for snapshots!  BUT fortunately for us we have a spectacular roof view of the stampede grounds as well so there will be many more opportunities for fireworks photos AND roof parties during the Calgary Stampede which is coming up VERY soon!