Up And Away Studios

08/07/2026

Every family I photograph leaves me seeing the world a little differently.

Recently, I have started taking notes after I leave each session. I write down what I saw, what I felt, and what I believe to be true about the people I was just entrusted to photograph. Then, as I edit their images, staring at their faces over and over again, I feel like they continue to teach me. I listen, I notice, and I hope I can share a little of what I see.

This family taught me so much.
While most of what I saw is a story that belongs only to them, there were a few things they reminded me of that I think are worth carrying with us all.

This family knew how to delight in their actual lives.
They knew how to find joy right where they were.
So many of us spend our lives searching for joy, believing it will arrive in the next accomplishment, the next season, the next adventure.

But this family seemed to have discovered something far more valuable.

They knew that wonder isn’t always found by searching farther.

Sometimes it is uncovered by paying closer attention.
They return to the same places, the same people, the same songs. They know the magic isn’t only found in the new and extraordinary, but in the moments we choose to fully inhabit.

The deepest joy isn’t found only in extraordinary moments.

It is found in ordinary moments that are fully lived.

Maybe that’s what we are all longing for.

Not a different life.

A deeper presence in the one we’ve already been given.
Lives that linger.
Lives that notice.
Lives that make room for beauty.
Because perhaps joy isn’t something we have to find.

Perhaps it is something we learn to see.

Where joy lives.

05/20/2026

A celebration of sisters, of time passing, and of life’s extraordinary wonders. So different from one another, and yet bound by a language all their own, a rhythm learned somewhere between childhood and becoming. Their mother, their constant, their sun, and each of them forever orbiting her in their own way. How beautiful and unexpected this life is.

I asked Alison in my questionnaire about the journey of parenting, her response made me tear up. I think it sums up how many of us feel, but don’t know how to express.

Parenting has been the grandest adventure. Like the perfect novel, there have been crushing moments of heartache, heroic moments of slaying dragons, but mostly I am proud that we have created a 3 stranded thread that has been unbreakable through it all.

Thank you for allowing me the gift of capturing this moment in time.

05/16/2026

Pay attention.

Right now, we have the privilege of witnessing nature’s quiet miracles unfolding in real time. What was once grey, dry, and seemingly lifeless will, in its own time, bloom again. No matter how long, cold, or dark the winter, spring always returns. These are familiar truths, almost clichés, but I find I need to be reminded of them more than I’d like to admit.

Multiple times a day I walk my dog around the pond, a ritual I didn’t always choose but one that has quietly shaped my attention in the best way. It asks me to slow down and to look again. The same path, the same water, the same trees, yet never the same moment twice. I get embarrassingly excited by the smallest changes, shifting light, new ducklings, wildflowers pushing through (others may call them weeds, I don’t). There is always something being offered if I’m willing to notice.

I’ll be honest, sometimes I resist it. Sometimes I don’t want to see.
And other times I find myself quietly begging the pond for something, aching for beauty like it’s something my life depends on. One of the lessons the pond and the turning of seasons keeps offering me is this: we don’t all bloom at the same time or in the same way.

Some trees rush into bud, bold and certain. Others hold back, patient, almost private in their becoming. The timing is never the same, but they all unfurl.

And one tree’s moment of fullness does not take away from another’s becoming.

I hope you can find some steadiness in nature’s rhythm. Wherever you are in your own season, the story is still unfolding.

04/29/2026

Not your average grad photos.

We’ve been dreaming something up and we’re so excited to finally share it.
The Graduate Edit is a studio portrait experience designed to feel elevated, intentional, and completely you. Less yearbook, more magazine.
You already have the outfit, why not document it the way you’ll want to remember.

Sessions start at $195 and include 5 edited images.

And if you have a friend who’s also graduating? Get them to book right after (or before) you and you’ll both walk away with images together AND solo shots you’ll actually want to frame. Honestly one of the best ways to do this. Get your friends together and make it an event!

It’s happening May 16 & 17, limited spots across one weekend.
Head to the link in our bios for all the details and to reserve your spot. We’d be so grateful if you shared this post or tagged anyone you know who is graduating.

04/28/2026

This is your reminder to go live your life, to be in it, stay in it, see it all as sacred. And maybe book a backyard session, since eventually the sun will shine, and I can help you see your life as your masterpiece.

Erma Bombeck wrote a column entitled “If I Had My Life to Live Over Again? In it, she wrote:
I would have invited friends over to dinner even if the carpet was stained and the sofa faded. I would have sat on the lawn with my children and not worried about grass stains. I would never have bought anything just because it was practical, wouldn’t show soil or was guaranteed to last a lifetime. When my child kissed me impetuously, I would never have said, “Later. Now get washed up for dinner” There would have been more I Love yous, more I’m sorrys, but mostly, given another shot at life, I would seize every minute, look at it and really see it, live it, and never give it back.

Also go see feed for her video footage from this session. We are always available for collaboration and having both the video and photo documentation is the ultimate!

04/23/2026

We all carry longings. To be seen. To be known not for how we look but for what lives inside us. To have someone look at us and find us beautiful, worthy, enough.

I know those longings from the inside. And somewhere along the way, they stopped being something I carried quietly and started becoming the reason I pick up a camera. It feels like my life’s work now, to call out the beauty in people that they sometimes can’t see in themselves. To make them feel, even just for a moment, that they were truly witnessed.

I’ve been here for a while now, writing into the quiet, sharing images I hope say something true. I’m a photographer. But more than that, I’m someone who couldn’t stop noticing things. The way a parent’s hand rests on a small shoulder without thinking. The bravery of showing up when life feels uncertain or hard. The way love looks when it’s tired. The way a family moves together like a language only they speak. I wanted to find a way to hold that.

So that’s what I try to do. I don’t come to your session to make you look beautiful, though I think you already are. I come to witness something. To sit beside your ordinary life and pay attention to it like it matters deeply, because it does. All of it.

If you’ve ever felt like your family is too chaotic, too broken, too unfinished to be photographed, you’re exactly who I’m here for. There is a gift in being witnessed just as you are, not as you hope to one day be. And sometimes, when you see yourself through these images, you might just find that your right now was even more beautiful than you ever imagined. You just couldn’t see it yet.

04/11/2026

Every story deserves reverence, space for tenderness and complexity, because all of it is proof of life.

This session with Catherine held my heart in a profound way. What a beautiful life she has fought for, showing up as the hero of her own story again and again. I hope these photographs are a celebration of grief transformed, a testament to resilience, miracles, and magic.

09/20/2022

Her words say it so well. Life must be treasured. So thankful for the relationships I've developed through the years.

Family photos are in and I am a puddle 😭. I love how this captures our family of 5 and our amazing city, Calgary that we call home. I love that Lewiston is included….when your kid dies at 6 month old and life doesn’t go as planned these moments can stir up a lot of emotion.

I long to know what Lewiston would be like as a 6 year old boy, what sports he would play and love, would he be taller than his older sister Swayzie? So many questions and unknowns.

Life will throw you unexpected curve balls - expect that. Life will not goes as you planned or dreamed. Expect that. What I know to be true is that the lens and the perspective you choose to see life with will be your reality.

Be where your feet are planted. Embrace these moments, and make them count. Whatever season you are in. Soak it in. Don’t wish it away. Learn the lessons and bring the joy whatever you face. Trust me it possible. In the midst of hard things great joy can be found and brought.

Kristy-Anne Swart] you are more talented then words will describe. You are patient, kind, giving and full of grace. You see and create magic behind your lens. Thank you for capturing our family, all 5 of us. These photos are gifts I treasure and old dear.

📷 Kristy-Anne Swart]
📍CPA 9th Ave parkade
👗

10/02/2019

I will be only taking a few more sessions in October, so if you are looking to get some photographs done, get in touch sooner rather then later. It's always my honour to capture so many beautiful families.

09/04/2019

I am heading to Edmonton this weekend and have time for 1 or 2 shoots. If you are interested email me at [email protected] I'd love to capture your family.

Also I would be open to teaching an iPhone course if someone was interested in hosting.