I first met Sara Berry in 2001 at the University of Hawai’i in a photo lecture class.  We both were majoring in photography, loved dogs (she had a Doberman at the time named Sampson that I adored), her husband was in the Navy and my husband (boyfriend at the time) was in the Army, so Sara and I quickly became great friends.  Sara has a great blog and you can see a photo of Sara at my wedding here (she’s the one holding her adorable son, Hunter).  Ever since I have known her, her husband has been almost constantly deployed to the most dangerous areas around the world for almost a year at a time.  He is able to come home for a short while before leaving for another long deployment.  I still don’t know how they do it but I am so grateful to them and all of the families that make these tough sacrifices to help keep our country safe.

I’m sure you have heard many wonderful and touching stories on the news about soldiers befriending sweet doggies in Afghanistan and Iraq.  Sara’s husband has an incredibly close bond with a dog in Afghanistan named Aslan and they need our help to get him to the US.  It is an incredibly complicated and expensive task to get a dog out of Afghanistan and can cost around $4,000 per dog, you can read Aslan’s story here (Sara’s husbands face has been blurred for his protection because he spends a lot of time in very dangerous places all across the world and it’s just safer for him this way).

Sara and her husband are good, hard working, honest and such kind people – the type of people that you know would always be there for you no matter what.  If you have it in your heart and can afford to help donate, you can do so here by clicking on the orange Chip In button on the right.  I have been racking my brain trying to figure out how I can help them and decided that a special was definitely in order!

For one week only (1/21/12 – 1/28/12) if you book a session with Photography by Sara Riddle (which can take place anytime within the next year) I will donate 100% of your session fee directly to the fund to help bring Aslan home.  If you book a session during this time I will also include one high resolution digital negative and four 8×10′s of your choice for free.  That is $425.00 worth of products that you will get completely free.  I have never done this before and most likely will never offer anything like it again so take advantage of it while you can!  Any session fees/ donations that exceed the amount of Aslan’s needs will be donated directly to the Afghan Stray Animal League to help bring other soldier’s dogs home.

Photos courtesy of Sara Berry.

Several weekends ago I attended a workshop by one of my favorite photographers, Shannon Sewell, whose style has always been an inspiration to me.  The subjects we photograph and the way we photograph couldn’t be more different but I believe it’s important to push yourself beyond your comfort zone and try new things – I am constantly pushing myself to learn and grow as a photographer.  Shannon photographs stylized and posed children, which is a 180 degree difference from candid pet photography, but I have loved her work for years and holy cow did I learn a lot from her.

I met lots of great local children’s photographers and the most amazing thing happened.  While watching the other children photographers attending the workshop, I saw just how passionate they were about what they do.  You see, I’ve always loved pets, I’ve always known I want to photograph pets and pets with their people.  But this drove home for me that I really am doing what I love because watching the other photographer’s faces light up when they spoke about what they do – I know I feel the exact same way about what I photograph.

At the shoot I was taking photos and watching Shannon work with the models, but out of the corner of my eye, I couldn’t help but see the cute doggies that kept walking by us on the trail.  Then I saw a baby goose by the lake, so I decided to step away from the workshop for a few minutes to photograph the baby goose.  And in that moment, I knew my heart is in the right place and that I am exactly where I need to be photography-wise, niche-wise and career-wise.  This by far is not my best image of the day, but it sure is my favorite.

This past week my husband and I celebrated our 6 year wedding anniversary.  I had just graduated college before we got married, then almost immediately after we moved 5,000 miles away from our little island home to Northern Virginia in the dead of winter – where we didn’t know a soul.  Two very sweet puppies entered our lives soon after moving.  Looking back it all seems like a whirlwind.

We always have strange things happen on our anniversary.  I won’t divert into the story from each year, but one of the more recent ones was spent with the entire Redskins Football team – inadvertently of course (I’m not exactly the biggest football fan).  The entire Redskins team was dining right next to us at one of our favorite restaurants.  I think I was almost blinded by all of the bling they were sporting.  My husband is 6’5″ and they made him look like a shrimp, they were gigantic.  It was definitely a distraction from the celebration at hand because Matt and I couldn’t help but watch them – it always makes for a fun story to tell.

The day before our anniversary this year I found out that my grandmother had passed, I hadn’t seen her since my wedding.  I will always remember my summers with her in the beautiful Pacific Northwest – they were truly some of the best memories of my childhood.  I will miss her dearly but I am glad she is finally at peace and out of pain.

Since I met my husband, I have honestly had the happiest years of my life.  I love and cherish our little family with Tot and Kiki and I can’t wait to see where we will be in another 6 years!