This is my life | Mom. Wife. Daughter. Sister. Photographer.

Some of you may know that my dad was diagnosed with lung cancer last month. It was a huge shock to our family. My dad is 58 and more full of life than any other person that I know. He still single handedly runs a landscape company, he works out nearly every day, and loves to ride his Harley. However, what he loves more than anything is his family. My dad is everything to me...he is my protector, my advocate, and someone whom I truly can't imagine my life without. I know that someday we all have to lose our parents, but this is too soon. My dad is going to fight (and has already been fighting) but the prognosis is not good. Cancer is an ass hole and cancer is never, ever fair. I looked around my home and realized that while I have beautiful portraits taken by other photographers hanging on my walls, I'm missing a lot of what truly makes me happy - the small things. So, I decided to start a little project, a project to print any and all photos that mean something to me, and obviously, those things are my family and close friends. I'm missing a few (I realize that I don't have many photos at all of my in-laws or my brother) but the great thing is that I can keep adding. When I look at these photos, I realize how full and complete my life is. I am the mother of a beautiful, wonderful little boy. I am the wife of an amazing, inspiring man. I am the daughter of courageous, loving and selfless parents. I am the step-daughter of amazing people who have chosen to accept me as part of their family just as I have chosen them to be a part of mine. I am the sister of inspiring and strong siblings. I am the friend of funny, spirit-lifting individuals.

So, I wanted to share the start of my photos with you. I'll also show you the final product if it turns out half-decent.

My other half and I on 4th of July 2010. A day by the pool with friends and you get a very rare "Bre with zero makeup" photo.

My beautiful older sister and I. I feel like we look like such "adults" here - when did that happen?

My step-dad, Doug. I don't know why this makes me smile. Maybe it's the baseball/golf combo?

My mom. My best friend. My other half. Christmas 2010.

My son will always know how much his grandpa loves him - whether he is here with us or not.

I can't help it. It makes me smile, therefor it made the crack- I mean CUT (sorry, Reid!)

Will and his siblings at Disneyland, 2010.

My mom, my son's biggest cheerleader...delivering the cake for his 2nd birthday, 2010.

My dad and step-mom, Rene. There is no faking that look. God, they love eachother so much.

My beautiful cousin, aka sister, Kailyn, who has overcome more obstacles than anyone I know and has grown into a wonderful young woman.

That face. Oh, that face.

Blackmail. It had to be done. My niece and son just last month.

Ice cream kisses with grandpa. This was right before my dad's diagnosis and he was very sick while he was visiting, but never too sick to share a bowl of ice cream with his only grandson.

I included this one because I think I look pretty in this photo, and I think it's important to have something like that to look back on, you know?

My princess niece on her 1st birthday. This girl has the best smile. Ever.

Reid's first ice cream cone. BRAAAAIN FREEZE!

The most important job of my life- being his mommy.

How lucky are we to have Ganner? Ganner is my husband's grandmother and Reid's great-grandmother. Coming from someone who no longer even has grandparents, she is so special to me.

Just another day at the park.

Moments like these can't be staged. Disneyland 2010.

Every kid needs to do this once. Or 20 times.

Melissa, Michelle (+ baby Welyn!) and I - my girlfriends. My buddies.Women who have shown me what true friendship is.

Thanks to my dad's good taste, these two women will forever be a part of my life. They prove that family isn't always born to you.

This winter by brother in law taught Reid how to play the drums. He's hooked.

A typical day in the Thurston household. Will had just recorded Reid playing ball on his iPhone and Reid, ever the narcisist, wanted to see.

The best friends that anyone could ask for. Our best man and maid of honor. The friends you feel most comfortable with.

The Gem State | A Family Vacation up North

....Huh? The Gem State? Idaho!

Will, Reid and I visited Coeur d'Alene, Idaho a couple of weeks ago to see my in-laws. Idaho is beautiful. For a week. Then I was ready to come back to the 80 degree Southern California spring. I didn't get nearly as many photos as I would have liked because honestly, the cold weather scared me off. haha. I'm such a wimp.

My in-law's dog, Rudy, is old and sick so I wanted to take him outside and get a few photos so that someday when he's gone they have something nice to look back upon. Isn't he a sweetheart?

They also have a brand new 4 month old chocolate lab puppy. My father in law mentioned that I should take photos of her, but uhm...that sounded rather difficult because she is a rambunctious young puppy. I figure that I'll have plenty of time to take photos of her once she gets a tad older and calms down ;)

I did get a quick snap of their sheep that would make me jump every time I walked outside because they neigh so loudly. Neigh? Is that what you call the sound that they make? Baaa?

My in-laws have a full room deticated to music. Reid was in love. Hopefully he gets some musical ability from his daddy's side of the family because he's certainly not getting any from me.

I was also able to do a quick little shoot with my gorgeous 16 year old sister-in-law, Shelby. All of these were shot on their property or right off of the road. Nice, right??

This is NOT one of their dogs. In fact, he was barking at us from the road but then after we sweet-talked him he came over and showed his true colors - a friendly old boy! He squirted his way into a photo.

I grabbed Ian (who's 13) for a quick shot. This kid has major musical skills. While we were visiting we got to see him sing a solo during his choir show and he also played Aerosmith's Dream On on the piano - played and sang, which is basically taught himself by ear. Impressive.

Some before and afters

I've had a couple of people ask me what my "trick" is - no trick, just a lot of hard work and practice. People were curious to know what my images are like straight out of the camera (SOOC) so I figured, hey, why not just show you? Actually, I have a good reason for not wanting to show you. I'm a wee bit of a perfectionist and I don't even like my husband seeing my photos until I am done and can show a truly final product. I really don't do much editing in the grand scheme of things, so it's odd that I feel that way I suppose. However, I think it's important to show a) the importance of getting things as close to correct as possible in camera and b) how sometimes the most minor adjustments in Photoshop can take a photo to a whole new level. So, here goes nothing! Get ready for a little photo nerd talk.

I shoot in full manual, obviously, as well as in RAW. Shooting in RAW allows me to not really worry about setting a custom white balance. I've purchased and tried to use gray cards but found them unreliable and difficult to use. It's not uncommon for most of my photos to come out looking too cool SOOC, but it's an extremely easy fix since I shoot in RAW. Honestly, warming up my photos is the main edit that I do and it's quite easy. We live in Southern California so "warm" is a necessity!

I normally don't run a lot of actions, but I did play around with this session. Using actions is a slippery slope and it's important to be able to create a technically clean and correct image before you start to play. Also,  it's important that the action match the photo. The action that I used on these would NOT look good on a photo taken inside or in a different setting (well, maybe, but this is totally a "beach" action in my opinion).

Nothing like a good black and white!

A simple warmth adjustment took this photo from nice to wow.

This is an extremely stylized shot and I knew exactly what I wanted to do while I was shooting it. Sometimes you have to do things wrong to do things right. That totally doesn't make sense, but yeah....haha.

Sorry Kennen...but it happens to all of us! I loved this shot. I loved Jessica's smile, the hair in her face, and the fact that as I was sitting on the ferris wheel I leaned slightly to the left to get that awesome sunflare from behind the pole that was in front of me. However, I obviously don't want Kennen's eyes closed. Head swap time! Sometimes it's easy and sometimes it's not, so if you're a client of mine, please don't expect this! haha. I only do it to save a really awesome shot.

Last one

Okay, I played a bit of a trick on you here. I didn't do a single thing to this photo except for crop in a little closer. I'm riding high on life when I can get shots like this SOOC. So, why is this one so great as-is whereas the others needed a couple of tweaks? The answer? Perfect, beautiful light. This was one of our last shots of the day and the sun was just dipping into the horizon over the water. The light perfection - warm and glowy. Right before sunset is my favorite light and I found it to be especially magical at the beach with nothing to obstruct it.

The end!