Kristina

Today the rain poured down as I contemplated two afternoon shoots: maternity and trash the dress. I panicked a little. My heart raced as it always does. I sketched pages of ideas as I always do, stick men, concepts, where I want the light to fall, that sort of thing. Not so easy when there's seemingly no light, save the trinkets of light from the ferris wheel.

I have 1000 images still to review and Kristina's outtakes are a hoot! I made an initial start on the maternity shoot and this of Kristina trashing the dress. Why should a wedding dress be confined to a closet, a dusty attic box when it can be given a gorgeous new lease of life and a second showing in a unique environment which often runs contra to a typical wedding venue (if such actually exists anymore come to think of it). That's the essence of trash the dress for me; it's about the juxtaposition of beauty and grunge, here, the softness of the bride against the opposing texture of the weathered pier. There are too many images of Kristina being beautiful and Natalie being radiant, but whilst sitting in PF Changs together drinking a glass of something bubbly, Kristina defrosting from her feet running through the frigid water, and me shaking off the sand from crawling around in it for the perfect angle, we happened upon this series. I like... I can't describe how much joie de vivre and go get Kristina has to have made this possible. For a year she was home nurse to Reuben before leaving us to study as a Registered Nurse. It's not easy to spend every day, day in day out with another woman now is it, but we made it through with laughs mostly geared towards Kristina's appalling lack of rock musical knowledge, her processed microwave meals and doing everything we could during the day to make Reuben's life easier. I know most families migrate from having day nursing to accompany them to appointments and help out, for me, during pregnancy when I couldn't walk and beyond and as soon as the trach came out, it became possible for me. Having to train a nurse to an exacting standard each time was time consuming in itself but I hope she learnt so much on that journey with us and we had fun along the way. Kristina was there at the birth of Callum too and would help me for weeks afterwards post-op with breathing exercises.

I am glad of one thing in my photography: things always turn out better than I'd envisaged as if some little bit of magic dust comes my way and helps me out.

Note: this is very subtle on my big colour calibrated iMac so I envisage it'll look more so on certain monitors. Although quickly processed for lack of energy left at 1am, but a faint imprint is exactly the impression I wished to leave.