Category Archives: Cavalier King Charles Spaniel

Client Session ~ Lexie and Chloe the Cavalier King Charles Spaniels

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Carla (a fellow photographer) and I had been mutual admirers of each others work for a while, so when she heard I was coming to Adelaide we began discussing the idea of me photographing her two pups. Lexie and Chloe are almost-two year old Cavaliers who are greatly loved by their mum and dad. Carla tragically lost her first Cav, Lucy, when she was hit by a car at only 9 months old. She been due to have a new baby sister (Chloe) arrive in just a month, so when they lost Lucy they started looking into getting another baby to join the family as well so Chloe wouldn’t be all alone. Lexie was found and turned out to be the perfect match, named ‘Heaven Sent’ by her breeder. Chloe was born on Valentines Day which also happens to be Carla’s birthday so another little sign there too!

So, although the family had lost one precious pup in very sad circumstances, the heavens had aligned and sent them two gorgeous girls instead. Meet Lexie (left) and Chloe (right).

We started off our session at a local dog park around mid afternoon. There were a few other dogs around at the time who were very interested in what was going on, espcially when they realised there were treats involved, but we managed to find a lovely little spot down the back on an old log. Getting the girls to stand and balance on the log proved to be somewhat of a mission, but with lots of practice, encouragement, treats and some pretty crazy noises from me, we got there in the end!

The afternoon light coming in from behind really shows off their gorgeous soft hair, framing Lexie with a halo of light. Heaven sent indeed!

I thought this shot deserved some extra special processing to accentuate the late afternoon light and show off the mood of the place. My favourite bit of this image is Lexie’s little back foot in the air, in the middle of taking a step along the log.

When the other dogs at the park became just a bit too distracting, we headed off on a walk around Mawson Lakes to see what we could find.

The perfect little family! How cute are these guys.

Lexie was very interested in the edge of the water and if she wasn’t on a lead, I have no doubt she would have been in there in an instant, splashing about in the reeds.

Not content with just looking, she decided that eating them would be the next best thing!

Chloe was a bit calmer and quite content to stand and have a look around at all the goings on by the edge of the lake.

I love this shot of Lexie with her big tongue!

The boardwalk we found a bit further along provided a great background for some ‘walking on the lead shots’ – love the girls’ expressions – stoked to be out and about!

Soon enough it was time to head back home for some photos in the girls’ backyard. From Carla’s descriptions of the two, I thought Chloe would be the harder one to photograph as she’s a bit of a nature girl, always off chasing bugs and poking around the garden. This wasn’t the case though when there were treats and attention involved, I love her expressions in these shots!

Gorgeous Lexie in the rock garden.

Out of the many, many attempts we made at getting the two girls in a photo together, we managed to get them sitting beautifully next to each other for this shot. It certainly helps to tire them out first!

And I couldn’t resist a shot of their gorgeous feathery legs, I just loved Chloe’s little curly chest hair.

What a pair of hams!

Carla thanks for letting me spend the afternoon with you, it was so lovely to meet you guys and your gorgeous pups. I can’t wait to see what you do with the photos!

Client Session ~ Maggie and Jessie

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These girls were the subjects of my very last session in Townsville and have the amazing privilege of living in doggy paradise! With the best doting parents a doggy could wish for, along with a gorgeous beach on their very back doorstep, life doesn’t get much better than this. This was another very early morning session and although slightly cloudier at times than Vash and Riley’s session, still came through with some wonderful light.

Jessie the German Shepherd is 11 years young and the fourth of the same breed for this Shepherd-loving family! She really has no concept of her age and although might not hear and see as well as she used to, still cuts a striking figure on the beach with her stick of choice, racing around like puppy.

Maggie is a bit of a first for this big dog loving family. Kylie and Jon were having Christmas drinks a couple of years ago with their then-neighbours, who had a gorgeous little fluffy puppy that Jon fell in love with. It turned out that the rest of the puppies from the litter needed homes too, so Kylie and Jon quickly decided to bring the only girl left into the family. Maggie the Maltese x Cavalier King Charles Spaniel is now two and a half years old and very much part of the family!

She is very much loved by her Dad and gets snuggles at every opportunity, as well as these special belly rubs. So funny to watch! She will just stand there as Jon puts his foot under her chest, and goes all the way along her belly and up her back legs. Maggie loves it and will stand there for as long as it’s on offer.

Although at the time of booking it was just a two dog family, there was a third little dog hanging around when I arrived to do the shoot. Buddy is a 6 year old Maltese x Poodle, advertised in the paper as a giveway. He was originally intended for a workmate who loves Maggie. I’ll let Kylie continue this story…

“When we saw him we all fell in love with him and he was so quiet and well behaved, we thought he would be perfect for Brian. We got him home and noticed he had really bad breath and when we looked in his mouth we were horrified to see how bad his teeth and gums were. They were so infected and dirty, the teeth and gums were grey. We took him to a wonderful vet in Townsville who looked after him but unfortunately his teeth were so bad, most of them just fell out once they started to clean them. Not to worry, he still manages to chomp his way through life. The longer we had him the more we fell in love with him. He is so gentle and loving and after what we put him through at the vets, we felt we couldn’t give him away, so now we have to find another dog for Brian!”

I love this shot of Buddy and Maggie, looking into their future together.

As the session was originally intended for just the two dogs and Buddy was still a bit sore from his dental work and desexing, he doesn’t star as much as the other two in the photos. I am glad I managed to get a few of him for the family though, it was great to hear they’d decided to keep him! So, back to Maggie and Jessie.

Maggie was absolutely hilarious on the beach. She alternated between racing madly around in figure of 8′s in a blur of white fur and violently displaced sand…

To digging holes and burying herself…

There wasn’t really a lot of middle ground, it was either flat out, or, well, flat out!

After spending a while on the beach, we retired to the ‘beach shack’. I just loved this place. It has been in Jon’s family for 50 years with Jon’s dad building the original beach shack way back then. Since then, it’s undergone some pretty extensive renovations with an extra floor added and a lot more room, including the best man-cave shed I’ve seen in a while. It’s still managed to retain a lovely relaxed beachy kind of feel about it though, it was so nice to relax on the back deck with the dogs, I’m sure they appreciated it just as much as I did!

Before posing the dogs on a comfy wicker chair for some shots, I asked if it was ok that the dogs be up there. I don’t think Miss Jessie especially is allowed up there often, but they said it would be fine for the photos, so up they went.

Jessie made herself quite comfortable.

A little too comfortable perhaps. I was later told that for days afterwards, the dogs thought it was well within their rights to jump up on the chair and make themselves comfortable whenever they liked! It was worth it for the photos guys, I promise! Oops!

Little Buddy was content to just hang around and observe the proceedings. Doesn’t he just have the sweetest face? And a gorgeous temperament to go with it, he really deserves this new life he’s found for himself.

From the deck, the view over the backyard and to the beach not far beyond was just too inviting, so we moved into the garden for a few more shots. As long as there were treats and interesting squeaking things involved, Jessie was a keen model.

What a beautiful girl, how’s that wise expression.

I get the feeling Jessie spends long hours in this garden, observing the goings-on, and of course sleeping!

With all the beachy mischief well and truly behind her, Maggie had her serious modelling pants on.

And who could resist those big brown eyes!

I love this one of the two girls.

That was the last of my Townsville sessions! As all the photo sessions were from the same family, I felt like I got to know them over the few days that I was there. Such a genuine, caring, down to earth and especially dog-loving family would be hard to find anywhere else! Thanks for the awesome coffee, the amazing breakfasts (how lucky am I), the fantastic stories (even if I had trouble remembering them all) and local knowledge and most importantly, thanks for inviting me up to photograph your doggy family, it was a pleasure!

Client Session ~ Macca and Baxter the Cavalier King Charles Spaniels

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It was so hard narrowing down images for this post! There were just so many that I loved, I may as well have just posted the whole session. Macca and Baxter are two very well loved family pets. They usually reside a lot further west (their family is from Roma in Queensland, about 7 hours west of the Gold Coast) but lucky enough to be brought on holiday with their family. How lucky are these two!

Our session was at The Spit dog beach on the Gold Coast. It was a rather windy afternoon! We started off with some shots of the dogs and their human siblings.

Then moved to the shelter of the dunes where we were blessed with some calmer conditions and lovely late afternoon sunlight, perfect for candids! This is Macca, he’s the older of the pair and just loves chasing his ball and being with his people.

The younger of the pair is Baxter – he just loves to head off and introduce himself to potential doggy friends!

Together they make a lovely matching pair – alike in looks but actually pretty different in personality.

Their human sister just loves them, I’m sure they get lots of cuddles like this when they’re at home.

While Macca was quite happy to hang around and play ball with his family, Baxter was much more interested in exploring. I love the shots I did get of him though, what a sweet face. And yes, those ears really as as soft as they look!

Here’s Baxter scoping out his next potential doggy friend further down the beach.

Macca was quite content to just sit around, hoarding his beloved ball.

Then Baxter joined him for some fun and games.

After I was sure we had enough nice ‘dry dog’ shots in the dunes, we headed down to where the dogs were dying to get to – the water!

Being spaniels, these two were right at home in the water, even if this was only their second time at the beach in their lives! They were soon racing through the whitewash, chasing balls and having a grand old time.

As we were leaving the beach and walking back to the car, the sun came out from behind some clouds and provided some beautiful sunset light. It was almost a pity they looked so wet and bedraggled looking, but hey at least they look like they’d been having some fun!