One-Year Celebration

Virginia and Keith, one of our 2006 couples, recently celebrated their one year anniversary and wanted to mark the occasion with portraits. I visited their new house (congratulations, Virginia and Keith) and took great shots of them together with their puppy, Jesse. It was great to have the chance to reconnect with them and to continue their story!

Wallflower Accepted Into Exclusive Guild

We recently received more good news when we learned that this offbeat image that Scott took at a client's wedding this summer earned him entry into the Wedding Photojournalist Association's exclusive Artistic Guild!

The guild, which celebrates exceptional skill in enchancing photographs with the use of Photoshop, is open only to those who have won awards in the guild's international contest. Scott placed seventh with this image of Christy and Mike at Alderbrook Resort in Union, Washington, and is now one of only two photographers in the entire state to be invited into the Artistic Guild. Congratulations, Scott!

Maui

We've been sucked back into the fast lane since our return from Maui and are long overdue on posting our pictures! You can see the highlights on our website (Fine Art: Gallery: Maui) but I'll share some of our favorites here, too. Above is a banyan tree along one of the hiking trails we trekked. They look amazing, and so different from any of the trees we have around here.

Always a sucker for texture and reflections, this is also one of my favorites:

And I can't help but love this wacky spider, which is unlike any other I've seen before.

There are a lot more great shots on our website, including many from Haleakala (by far our favorite spot to go, photographically speaking). Take a peek!

New Awards for Wallflower

We were pleased to learn this morning that Wallflower Photography placed twice in the Wedding Photojournalist Association's end-of-year 2006 contest!



The photo above, taken at Jeff and Amy's wedding at Discovery Park in Seattle in July, placed fifth in the Ceremony category. The photo below, taken at Dustin and Luke's wedding (our Amazing Race All-Star), placed eighteenth in the Scene Setter category.


This international association is jam-packed with talent and hundreds of photos are received for each contest, so this really is quite an honor! Congratulations to all the winners; there were so many excellent photos submitted.

Aloha!

We're back from Hawaii! Thanks to all of our clients and prospective clients who have been patiently awaiting our return. We had such a great time and feel much more refreshed and ready to tackle the next wedding season! Stay tuned for more photos from our trip, including pics from northwest Maui, the Road to Hana, Haleakala, and whale watching. The photo above was taken at a lu'au we attended on our second night.

Our Amazing Race All-Star

We just found out that Dustin-Leigh, one of our brides from 2006, will soon be appearing on her second season of The Amazing Race, airing Sundays at 8:00 p.m on CBS. Dustin first participated in the show for Season 10 — which aired in August 2006, just a couple of weeks after their wedding — and teamed up with Kandice, one of her bridesmaids. Dubbed "The Beauty Queens" because Dustin was Miss California 2005 and Kandice was Miss New York 2005, the girls competed well, coming in fourth place and just barely missing the final stage.

This season they'll be competing in The Amazing Race All-Stars, racing against ten other teams who are also veterans of the show. We are so proud of Dustin and wish them both all the best of luck! She was one of the sweetest brides we've worked with and it's been so much fun to watch her journey. You can read about the girls and check their progress at www.cbs.com/primetime/amazing_race11.

We're about to head off to a much-needed vacation in Hawaii, but don't forget to tune in to CBS this Sunday!

Hannah and Mike's Engagement Pics

Over the weekend we spent a couple of hours taking engagement photos for two of our very dearest friends. Hannah and Mike will be getting married in April and we're can't wait to take part in the wedding!

Hannah and Mike recently moved back to the Pacific Northwest from L.A., so we decided a tour through downtown Tacoma would be a fitting celebration of their return. Mike and Hannah are a very fun-loving, energetic couple, as you can see here. We got so many great photos, it was hard to pick our favorite for the blog (so we went with Mike's favorite) ... you can check out the full set at www.wallflowerphoto.com/aoyagi