It was the Watson wedding weekend at last, and it could honestly not have been at a better venue! A place where horses roam free, the dams are fully stock and the sheep bellow on the surrounding hills! Cranford Country Lodge is something special when it comes to wedding venues! Amazing views everywhere you turn, and with Lindsay and Brendan's wedding decor, it looked like a little paradise filled with wooden swallows and bouquets of Baby's Breath.

One of my most favourite wedding photographers, Thea Cogill of Tink Photography, captured the most important moments of the day for Brendan and Lindsay... Naturally,  I hovered around and caught several of my own moments too! Here are a few of the moments caught on my lens.

Earlier this month I was lucky enough to photograph the ultra-cool Stallion Stitched hiking boot with my two models, Bruce and Rowan. Rowan is my husband, and Bruce is a really good friend of ours. I think both of them are still wondering how I managed to twist their arms and rope them into being my models for the day. Regardless, they agreed, and we set off along the Midlands in search of hay bales and scenery. I suppose I should say "Thank you, you two".

A couple of other thank you's are also in order: Thank you to my father-in-law for lending us his most-treasured possession: his Land Rover, and thank you too for letting us fill it with hay. Thank you to the Gibbs family in the Midlands area who graciously lent us hay bales for use in the shoot. And lastly, thank you to Old Balgowan for giving us permission to use the surrounding farm and farm roads for the shoot.

These are just a few of the shots we managed to get for the Stallion Stitched Footwear marketing material. The finished poster will be in Tekkie Town stores come November. The creative concept in this campaign was to portray the Stallion Stitched boots as good strong working boots for farmers.

Don't you just love Christmas? And surprise Christmas gifts?

Last year Kendall and Avril wanted to surprise their mom with a Christmas prezzie unlike that of other years. They decided to have a "sister photoshoot" with me, and as we ventured into the Mondi Forest in Hilton, their excitement for their Christmas surprise was contagious.

We laughed and joked and very quickly lost track of time. I just loved photographing Kendall and Avril mostly because it reminded me of the times my own sister and I laugh and joke together. Maybe I envied them a little too.

The Marwick sister shoot was very special for me as I remember being so in love with their clothing coordination and how they just fit in perfectly with the rugged woodiness of the forest. Two beautiful blonde fairy-like ladies dancing and prancing around in their cute little dresses, and just generally having fun. I remember them saying "this is how a photoshoot should be"... and I agreed! We could all do with a little relaxation sometimes! And that is exactly how I felt photographing the Marwick sisters.

Since we have updated our site, several older blog posts were lost. We have decided that instead of forgetting them forever, we'll occasionally re-post the old shoots on the blog in our "Flashback Friday" segment. Just a nice way of remembering the photography shoots of the not so distant past.

I don't think I ever even posted the Eggersglusz family photoshoot to the blog... so this week's Flashback Friday is dedicated especially to them. Lance, Mel, Becks and Trev made their way up to Pietermaritzburg for the morning almost a year ago... Trev was almost a month old and we decided it was high time to show him off to the world. We enjoyed some time in the Hilton Mondi forests playing hide 'n seek between the trees, and then we moved onto the Hilton Train Station where we played hopscotch over the train tracks.

The Eggersglusz's are very special friends of mine and I so enjoyed being able to meet Trev for the first time! It is so hard to believe that he is almost a whole year old already. Time for a catch up I think.

No words! I honestly don't know what to tell you other than: "this is just so cool"! I stumbled upon a really great trend where artists are combining illustration and photography. Not to say this hasn't been done before, but it's always refreshing when people reintroduce the trend to you again purely because of their approach.

I would also like to take this time to thank my art teachers from school for forcing us to write artistic reviews. I now understand that it was never their intention to punish us but rather to inspire. It all makes sense now: letting other artists inspire our own work.

Johan Thornqvist, a Swedish illustrator, is one such artist who has made me open my eyes again to this combination of realism and imagination. Something I haven't done in a while because I've probably been so caught up in simply making a living!

Thornqvist's approach is somewhat unique in that he takes photographs with his cellphone after which he draws over the image using his tablet and adjusts colours and effects on Photoshop. It's really quite special this ability of his to see things in what we perceive "just ordinary".Page through a few of his illustrations below, you'll see what I mean. To see more of his work click here.

Wouldn't it be nice if the world was chocolate? Surrealistic expectation, I know... But if it were, would the world be a happier place? Sometimes thinking out of the box can lead you into a creative whirlwind of a million and one ideas making it hard to choose just one. I am doing a bit of surrealist photographic research for a client and I stumbled upon a certain Canadian creative genius this afternoon: Joel Robison! Needless to say, after several minutes of flipping through his manipulated-photography portfolio, I have been left creatively inspired. I sometimes wish I could thank people like this in person! Here's a little gallery of some of his beautiful work I found in an article written about him on 123 inspiration: More Surreal Photography by Joel Robison. Thank me later.