Meet my wonderful couple Madi, Ryan and there puppies Pinot and Noir! We decided to shoot their engagement session later in the evening so that we could capture the sweet light!! Unfortunately Mother Nature is the boss and it ended up pouring! Regardless we enjoyed our time together and captured some amazing images.

A few words from Madi:

• Q. How did you meet?
  A. Working together at SAIT student residence 
• Q. When you first met what did you notice first?
  A. His eyes were so capturing 
• Q. How did he propose?
  A. Where do I begin on this one! It was an elaborate trick that’s for sure! He went on a “work trip” a few days before I was planning to visit Vancouver island to help my dad pack up his house he’d sold. My dad picked me up in Nanaimo and said “I’ve been thinking about what you said about living alone and I’m getting a dog, we’re going to go look at some puppies before we go home!” Naturally I was BESIDE MYSELF! We got to a small cabin and we parked and he said he would go chat with the lady about the dogs. I waited in the truck until I noticed a small black sheltie running around the driveway, at which time I got out of the truck because hey I have a small black sheltie too! The woman greeted me and said “hi there this is Max!” Max ran up to me and oh boy the way he put his little head in my hand triggered something in my brain that I’ve never been able to put into words. A sense of familiarity but also, that’s not possible this couldn’t be my dog! His name was Max and my dog is a girl! (No I didn’t “check”). So the woman says “follow me we’ll go look at the puppies!” We go up to her house at which point another sheltie comes barrelling out of the door, and this brown sheltie looks EXACTLY like my brown sheltie, she’s stout, has pointy ears, and runs right up to me with that same VERY impossible familiarity. I say impossible because MY dogs are being babysat by Ryan’s parents who live in MEDICINE HAT how on earth could they be my dogs!? My brain went into a complete seizure I don’t know how else to word it, I was thinking “ok what the hell these are my dogs no these aren’t my dogs how could they be my dogs no no no there’s no way” after which I immediately changed gears to “omg this woman has SOMEHOW stolen my dogs from Medicine Hat what the actual f**k is happening right now?????” What REALLY threw me though was the fact that the past weekend (November) I had taken a pair of scissors to my dogs feet to trim them up and try to cut down on the snow, mud, and dirt being tracked into the house. This was my first time ever trying this and let me tell you, they looked like I’d dipped their feet in a wood chipper, it was NOT a well done job. So in my complete and utter brain FREEZE I found myself saying (and yes it was very much an out of body experience at this point) “wow I have the same dogs as you and I also just trimmed their feet……….” At this point my brain goes “wait no maybe you should NOT follow this woman who DEFINITELY has your dogs but CANT have them, into her dark basement door??” And I turned around to make panicked eye contact with my dad. Instead of my dad being right behind me BAM Ryan leaps out from behind a tree (that I had literally just walked past 3 seconds ago) and was on one knee before I could even comprehend what the heck was happening. Wow, my adrenaline is ramped up again just writing this! He pulled out a ring and asked me to marry him and my brain did a complete backflip, I don’t remember doing it but Ryan’s parents were also hiding and filmed me just walking in a full circle with my hands on my head, I. Was. Shocked. Not shocked that he’d proposed, we’d been together for 6 or 7 years by then, but holy moly that was quite the surprise. I’ve never forgotten the dog’s fake names from that day, Max and Juniper, and I don’t think a word exists to describe the bewilderment I was going through trying to logic it all together. And that’s the elaborate story! The cottage turned out to be an air B&B and the “puppy lady” was just the owner. The whole house was decorated and a full charcuterie board laid out with champagne, all in all it was certainly 10 minutes I will never ever forget! 
• Q. Tell me your favourite thing about him?
  A. His ability to always make me laugh
• Q. If you could give one word to describe him, what would that word be?
  A. Caring
• Q. Your idea of a perfect date?
  A. A day out fishing followed by a cozy movie and a bucket of popcorn 

A few words from Ryan:

• Q. How did you meet?
  A. We met working together as CA’s (Community Assistants) at SAIT Residence
• Q. When you first met, what did you notice first?
  A. I noticed Madi’s fun personality first.
• Q. How did you propose?
  A. I bought Madi a flight home to visit her parents. She thought I was going to be away in Houston at a work event, so it was a good reason for her to get away. The morning Madi left, my parents came up from Medicine Hat, and we flew out to the island with our 2 dogs (Pinot & Noir). 
  
  I arranged to have Madi’s dad bring her to the acreage I rented to look at a dog for himself. She Madi arrived at the property, she was greeted by our dogs. She was very confused, knowing that they couldn’t be her pups, but they were identical. 
  
  I popped out from behind some shrubs and popped the question. It was quite the surprise.
• Q. Your favourite thing about her?
  A. There’s not much not to like about Madi, but I would say that my favorite thing is her gentle spirit. She’s a pleasure to be around and makes the day brighter!
• Q. If you could give one word to describe her…what would it be?
  A. Precious
• Q. Your idea if a perfect date?
  A. Either out camping or fishing somewhere together, or sitting around the backyard with a bottle of wine and our pups!