Morning Row

I got to spend the morning & afternoon with two of my favorite people last week canoeing around a beautiful lake. My two beautiful models Anika Shaw & Katie Lambrecht are two seriously talented photographers (Check out the links to their sites here! AnikaShaw.com & Ktlphoto.com). We all graduated from the Seattle Creative Academy Photography Program together & I can honestly say that I've learned more from these two girls and our classmates than I ever could have in school. Having hardworking, honest, kind and talented friends is definitely the biggest advantage I have in photography. There is so much to learn from each other and so much you can learn about yourself by showing, critiquing and challenging each other. I feel so lucky to have these ladies to guide me through my insecurities in my work and jump with me off a cliff when I get too comfortable. Now that I've gushed over these two for a while, I can tell you about the canoe! It was so fun! We rented two (one for them, one for me) so that I could shoot. I should have brought along a designated rower to keep my boat from wandering into trees and becoming submerged in mud puddles as I was shooting and not paying attention to where I might float but I managed to do alright for one person. I packed us some banana bread and hot cider and brought along Katie's beautiful Pendleton blanket but honestly it was so hot! My plan was to take off early in the morning and get a taste of the beginning of autumn mornings but this summer has been so delightfully hot we were really baking out there. The earliest we could rent the canoe turned out to be 10 am so all in all it's more of an ode to the end of summer shoot- but there is plaid!