{the new generation...}

Hudson: "I'm a PC {on mommy's mac!} and Windows 7 was my idea!!"

{rockabye baby...}

For my Hudson...
The littlest rocker in my life...

{nocturnal happenings...}

I had read not too long ago about how pregnant women are prone to some rather vivid and unusual dreams! Of all the many changes that women go through while experiencing the various stages of pregnancy…I found this one to be the most hilarious!! Mostly because, for as long as I could remember, I have always had pretty wild dreams to begin with so the thought of them exceeding their current state of descriptiveness was rather amusing to me!!!

For starters, I almost always remember my dreams when I wake up. I’ve never needed to write them down and wonder what the heck was going on in my head during the night because they are always as clear as day when I wake up in the morning. I also dream in colour and mostly in English (if I’ve spent a lot of time that day around my French counterparts…then I have French dreams…like the good little bilingual girl that I am!!)!

Sure enough though, I have found that in the last month or so, my dreams have become so vivid and ongoing that sometimes when I wake up in the morning, I actually have to take a minute to decipher what was real and what wasn’t! On top of that, I find that my sense of humour in the night has gone up a notch and now rest on borderline ridiculous! Apparently there is no end to the delirium that comes with pregnancy!!

Let’s take a couple of weeks ago for example…

For those of you who aren’t keeping up on your entertainment news; Mike Fisher and Carrie Underwood recently got engaged over Christmas. This is rather exciting news for those of us living in the Nation’s Capital because Fisher plays for our NHL hockey team, the Ottawa Senators (though this was far less exciting news for many of Ottawa’s single girls as he was also one of our most adored bachelors!!). Since our town is usually plagued with nothing but political news, a celebrity wedding of sorts is always a wonderful distraction!

{I think this would also be an appropriate time to mention that our little man has lovingly been named ‘Lil Fisher while in utero and has since been betrothed to ‘Lil Underwood who’s due to be born in May!!}

But alas, I digress…

So anyways, I had a dream that Fisher and Underwood called me to ask if I would be willing to photograph their wedding (riiiiiiiiggghhtt!!) and I, always aiming to please, was more than willing to shift around some scheduling conflicts to accommodate them! We decided to meet up at their house to discuss some of the details and when I arrived, the lovely couple was eagerly sitting at their dining room table in all of their beautifulness just waiting to talk about their big day! But before I even got the chance to sit down, I noticed three little kittens scurry across their dining room floor! I immediately dropped everything (both literally and figuratively) to go over and play with them! I just sat there on their floor, like the five year old that I am, happily playing with their little bundles of fur and completely disregarding my reason for being there in the first place. Meanwhile, Fisher and Underwood continued to sit at their table patiently waiting for me to get all of this feline fun out of my system so we can get on with our meeting (they were so polite!).

THEN {I know…can you believe there is more to this horror story?!?!}…

Jason Spezza arrived at their house (a fellow teammate that got married in Ottawa last year) with tile samples for the kitchen renovation that he was overseeing at his Mother’s house! Now, the only thing that I love as much as baby animals is home improvements…so it wasn’t long before Spezza and I parked ourselves on the floor (with the kittens, of course) while we discussed the best colours and textures for his Mom’s new kitchen. Jason totally became my new BFF!! All the while, Fisher and Underwood just sat there, completely perplexed and wondering when I was going to start paying attention to them!! They were actually totally adorable considering all of the neglect that I was imposing on them! By the time my alarm went off, I had yet to utter a single word to the happy couple!!! Oh, the shame of it all…

I actually woke up from this dream laughing out loud! Being pregnant really does provide a certain amount of comic relief!

Just for the record though, to any potential brides and grooms out there who might be reading this…I swear that I’m not that easily distracted by kittens and kitchens!!!!!

{kenlan's closet...}

Everyone has a past. Everyone has their stories, their journeys, their tales to tell and for some reason, whenever people find out my political past…their first inclination is to ask whether or not I miss it! I’ve always found this quite interesting because in many ways, working in politics was just like any other job but to the outside world, it clearly held a certain mystique that others wanted to know more about.

I got asked this question again last week and it compelled me to think long and hard about my time roaming the halls of Parliament Hill. “There’s got to be something that you miss about it” I told myself, even if it was just the amazing spaghetti that they served on Thursday afternoons in the cafeteria! But the honest truth is no…I don’t miss it. It was a great time in my life but when I made the choice to leave, I was more than ready to do so. And then just yesterday, it hit me…the one thing; The one thing that makes me wish, that for one day, I was back in that one place…the annual Christmas party!!!

Believe me, I get how ridiculous it sounds to say that the single thing you miss about an old career is the party, but it really was a great party! All of us who had spent months upon months running the halls in our most professional attire with blackberries in hand, chasing after rogue politicians while attending committee meetings and making endless travel plans, were finally being given the opportunity to cut loose and paint our political town red! And party we did! We partied until the cows came home…the sun came up…and until, eventually, we had to go right back to work with streamers still caught in our hair!! It really was a truly great party!!

There was a downside though and it’s the same down side that plagues every girl hoping to look her very best when entering a room (preferably with a handsome sidekick not too far off in the distance!); the dress! The perk of being the estrogen dominate ones of society is that we are entitled to a plethora of truly gorgeous creations to help make our already beautiful selves twinkle and shine that much more. The challenge here is that such beauty doesn’t come cheap!! The dress, the hair, the make-up, the accessories…before you know it, you could end up with a mortgage payment worth of an outfit. Lovely? Yes. Ideal? Not so much.

This is where one of my brilliant brides has stepped in to save the day…

My December bride, Suzanne, and her sister Josée, have come up with the ultimate business idea to help out those of us who want to look amazing for the occasion but still have cash left over for our morning Starbucks; Kenlan’s Closet is the long overdue answer to many of our fashion prayers!

In the same manner that men have long been able to rent tuxedos for their big event, these sisters have now come up with a way of providing women with the opportunity to rent designer dresses for their own star-studded evenings. And I think that this is, by far, the best.idea.ever. Kenlan’s Closet is offering the likes of Nicole Miller, Alexander McQueen, Badgley Mischka, Vera Wang and oh so many more designers that will make your heart beat faster and your Manolo Blahniks dance with joy!

So ladies, I highly encourage you to not only check out this amazing new business but I encourage you to take full advantage of it! Whether it is for a night out on the town with your girlfriends or to simply bake muffins in your kitchen… either way, Kenlan’s Closet will help you do it in style!

Check out their website here and read a fantastic article about them in the Ottawa Citizen here.

Happy Designer Dreams ;)

{so long...}

About five and half years ago, I sat in my doctor's office crying about how I hadn't slept properly in three months...how I was always feeling sick to my stomach...how I had a constant headache...and most of all, how I was having difficulty breathing. I was convinced I was dying. After listening to my hysteria for ten minutes, he handed me a note giving me the next three weeks off of work and asked me to take part of that time to consider if the field of work that I was currently in was something that I wanted to pursue long-term. "If not" he said, "now would be a good time to make a change."

I was in politics at the time. I had been hired as a political assistant on Parliament Hill shortly after graduating from university and while I enjoyed the experience of it all, over the course of my three years, it had also managed to systematically suck the soul out of me. At the age of twenty-five, I been put on stress leave.

Ten days into my three week leave, I got offered a new job in the field of the fine arts doing marketing and communications. I quit my political job that same day, started my new job the following Monday and swore that my life would never experience that kind of imbalance ever again.

As strange as it may sound, that change of direction in my career was one of the most "divine" moments of my life. It was one of the best and most spontaneous decisions that I have ever made and no part of it had anything to do with prestige or money or even advancement. It had to do entirely with the pursuit of well-being and the proper alignment of my priorities...for what may have been the first time ever in my life. I had surrendered myself in that doctor's office and God had taken over the reigns from there. And He did an amazing job!

In five weeks, I'm going to be leaving that job to become a full-time Mother, a full-time photographer and hopefully, an even more genuine version of myself as once again, God takes the reigns in a whole new direction. And just like last time, I can feel God's presence in this transition as things slowly fall into place; the gentle hand guiding into new and unfamiliar territority but all the while, reminding me that it will all be okay. I've never been more scared and excited all at the same time!

This is why I didn't mind spending my entire New Year's Day in front of the computer putting together my "best of" slideshow for 2009; because it was - in essence - giving some well deserved reflection and acknowledgment to the first of many steps that would change the course of my life. I've always considered it somewhat cliché to do the whole "look back at the year...", but in this case, I felt as though I owed it to myself to take a moment (or an entire day!) to recognize how far I've come in this area of my life...which ultimately, has affected every other area of my life as well. It has also proven that God is far better in the driver's seat than I could ever be (even with the new GPS we got for Christmas!)!!

So 2009...I bid you farewell! 2010...let's kick some ass!

To view my "Best of 2009" slideshow, click here.

{making an entrance...}

To all of my brides...perhaps you want to consider this for your ceremony!!!!
{thank you Paper Moon Photography!}