Lethbridge Weddings & Portrait Photography by Tanya Plonka

It gets a little harder getting your kids together for photos once they start becoming adults and moving away, so it’s an extra special occasion when everyone can actually get together! Sarah and Mark had all of their boys together and took the opportunity to do Pavan Park late summer family photos.

The brotherly relationships quickly started to show once they were teasing each other behind the camera during their individual photos and we started interacting with our surroundings more. All it took was a good race to get everyone out of their shells!

Photos are such a great gift to give and I do so many family sessions like this one from gift certificates! Marion and Darrell were gifted photos by their children for Christmas and got everyone together over the summer for their Pavan Park extended family photos. We had such a gorgeous morning in the Lethbridge river bottom for our session.

As happy as Marion and Darrell were to have their family all in one place, no one was as excited as the kids! They loved this reunion with their cousins and we had lots of fun opportunities to climb trees and have races (minus the baby, of course!).

I’ll be travelling out of Lethbridge for Erin and Jean’s wedding, but for now they came to Lethbridge for their stunning Pavan Park golden hour engagement photos. Erin and Jean wanted a country feel for their engagement photos to match their upcoming wedding, and I love the horse trails in Pavan Park for that vibe. The day they picked was so perfect in the river bottom. The entire park was already full of rich golden tones despite it being so early in autumn.

Erin and Jean have a beautiful quiet calmness with each other. They are both such sweet people, and I can’t wait to spend their wedding day with them!

Michelle, Claire, and Andrey had a summer solstice polyam wedding at Pavan Park with nearly every rich, colourful detail handcrafted by them. This was the first polyam wedding I’ve had the opportunity to photograph and it means so much for it to be for friends I’ve known for well over a decade! Claire fully became a part of Michelle and Andrey’s lives during the pandemic when their friendship blossomed into love. It’s because of the pandemic that I haven’t had a chance to get to know Claire yet, but I know that if they love her, she is truly amazing – and spending the day with the three of them only served to enforce that.

Another first for me was witnessing a ceremony performed by a drag king! (I can still find new things to photograph after doing this for so long!). Calgary drag king Brad Diesel was both their officiant, MC, and a reception performer.

Their aptly titled “lovebirds handfasting ceremony” took place in a fairy ring they created under their favourite tree on the grounds of the John Martin Recreation Area. Everything took place in Pavan Park on this perfect long summer evening.

Congratulations, Michelle, Claire, and Andrey!

Graduations may still have been smaller in scale for another year in a row, but there’s nothing in the way of still having a fun session to celebrate! Teddy had his Pavan Park spring grad photos with his parents and brother right after all the green came out in the river bottom. Pavan Park was gorgeous that evening. Even the new, loud swarms of bugs left us alone.

This family has such great energy together and made each other laugh through the whole session.

Teddy and his younger brother love mountain biking, so they brought their bikes along to use in the photos. This was the first time either of them had tried biking in formal wear, and it went surprisingly well! The true question is whether that will be the last time they bike in suits. :)

Lauren had her Pavan Park high school grad photos in the daytime before her grad ceremony. She was one of the few lucky high school grads who still got to have a ceremony, thanks to the small size of her school. This meant her whole day got to be a celebration!

Lauren chose a powder blue dress with a fun poofy skirt. She really personalized the look by adding cowboy boots! She left no detail forgotten, even having a manicure to match her dress. Lauren was a natural in front of the camera and I appreciated her willingness to climb through and sit in all the coulee brush I asked of her :)