Deluxe Session ~ Kiah, Dakoda, Alaska & Amber the Siberian Huskies

These four beautiful Siberian Huskies aren’t just incredibly good looking, they also do dry land gig racing with  Northern Exposure Gig Racing Club Inc. Soon after our session, they all headed off down south to the snow where they had a ball sled racing at the annual Sled Dog Challenge – enjoying the cold white stuff, totally in their element.

Upon their return, I received an email to say that Laurel and Kevin’s beloved Kiah had tragically passed away. She was just 5 years old.

Accompanying what I can only imagine as a super cute puppy photo, Kiah was described as “playful, loving and funny” by her breeder. She immediately captured the hearts of her new parents and after the long wait for her to be old enough to fly up from Victoria and join the family, she has led a very loved existence as a member of the family.

A loving and cuddly girl, Kiah was always a hit at her local dog park. Always excited to see her canine friends, there were lots of kisses and cuddles bestowed on her human friends too.

I feel fortunate to have met Kiah and experienced her beautiful loving personality, a very special girl indeed. RIP gorgeous girl, you were so loved and will be missed by all who were lucky enough to meet you.

Four year old Siberian Husky Amber was Kiah’s original puppy playmate. She was advertised in Victoria and after falling in love with the beautiful little apricot puppy in the photos, flew up and joined the family on Valentines Day, just in time for Laurel’s birthday the next day.

When they picked her up at the airport she was so excited to see them, she gave Laurel a big kiss and snuggled in her arms all the way home. Not sure of letting Amber sleep with Kiah the first night (as Kiah was still a pup herself at only 8 months old and very boisterous) they eventually relented. Kiah was so good with her – very gentle as she knew Amber was a tiny baby.

When it came time to add another dog to the family, Laurel and Kevin deliberated between adopting through rescue or getting another puppy. Turns out, the right opportunity fell in their lap when they heard about a 3 year old male Siberian Husky who needed to find a new home.

Neglected, filthy and overweight, kept alone and tied up in the back yard, as soon as Dakoda  met their girls at the dog park, he ran and played and had so much fun that he never even looked at his owner when she left. A two week trial was agreed on, but proved almost unnecessary, as Dakoda made himself at home straight away.

He can be aloof and needs some alone time now and then, but he is always first to the door to go out on the next adventure. He loves cuddles and his favourite girl is Alaska.

With three Huskies already, Laurel wasn’t really looking for another dog. But sometimes when the planets align in these matters, you just have to go with it.

Named Turbo by her original owner, as soon as this beautiful bi-eyed black and white 8 month old pup met the rest of the Husky pack she was overjoyed, as she’d never played with other dogs before. Dakoda especially took a real liking to her! She wanted so badly to be part of the family and they couldn’t leave her behind, so they promptly changed her name to Alaska and adopted her.

Amber finds her annoying sometimes but Kiah and Dakoda adore her. She has brought much love into the family.

Since these guys are so used to being next to each other on a day to day basis through gig racing and their many adventures, they were almost too easy to get group shots of – we ended up with lots to choose from!

With the formal portraits done and dusted, we moved onto an open track next to the pine forest, where Kevin and the pack gave me a private gig-racing demo! Having never seen this in person before, I was impressed with the speed of the team, it almost made me want to have a go myself! These dogs obviously love to run and it shows in their willingness and ecstatic expressions.

I seem to have a habit of arriving at my shooting spots to find they’ve been the focus of a controlled burn. The orange tones of the burnt-out paddock next to the track literally glowed in the afternoon light, so we had to take advantage of it for a few more photos. There’s something about white fluffy dogs and backlighting in the golden hour that’s just magical.

Laurel and Kevin ended up with a gorgeous 12×12″ album filled with all the photos from the session, along with a custom canvas wall art collection of four 20×30″ canvases and one large panoramic canvas. Here’s the canvas collection, don’t they look amazing?

Here’s what Laurel had to say about her pet photography experience:

“We have four Huskies and was not sure how our session would go or how Charlotte would get the shots we wanted. But she was great with the dogs and managed to get some absolutely gorgeous photos of our fur family. The wall art and album we got are exceptionally special to us as one of our fur babies unexpectedly passed away only a couple of weeks after our photo session. We now have these beautiful pictures as a lasting memory of all our wonderful fur family. We will always be grateful to Charlotte for this experience and for doing such a beautiful job with our fur family photos. Thank you just does not seem enough for what these photos mean to us.”