Recently in Personal Category

We're so excited that Kat from the amazing Rock 'n Roll Bride blog featured our recent "We Did" session with Jess and Pontus. Rock 'n Roll Bride blog features real weddings that don't fit the mold of traditional weddings. Kat loves non-traditional couples and celebrates authenticity and originality.

We have been so lucky to work with so many creative and independent couples who had unique weddings that were a definite personal statement about themselves and their relationships.

Thanks Kat for featuring our work!

Hey Everyone! This is Lilia's husband and partner Ray, and I wanted to take a quick moment here to let you know about something very important to us, and hopefully to you as well.

A few weeks ago Lilia and I had the pleasure of meeting Stacie Tamaki, who, as you may know, is the brains and beauty behind the oh so fabulous Flirty Guide. While chatting with Stacie she informed us that earlier this year her cousin Tami was diagnosed with Myelodysplastic Syndrome, and will need a Stem Cell Transplant as soon as possible. To help raise awareness about both this disease and how people can become PBSC / Bone Marrow donors, she started HelpingTami.org.

If you have a moment to spare, would you please go over to HelpingTami.org and find out how you can test to become a potential donor? Both Lilia and myself have ordered our kits to test ourselves at home, and have been assured that it is 100% pain free. What you do today may save a life tomorrow. Stacie, Tami, Lilia, and myself would greatly appreciate it.

Last Friday night Ray and I drove down to Belmont for our friend Chung Li's gallery opening. Chung is a fantastic wedding photographer and incredibly fun guy too! It was great to see other wedding photogs there like Alisha + Brook Todd (and their gorgeous little girl Giada), Ricky Wong, Augie Chang, Dawn Stoloff, and Cindy Chen. Nicole Ha created a gorgeous floral tablescape, while Jen from Jen's Cakes crafted an incredibly yummy two tier cake.

Of course my favorite part of the night was meeting other amazing people like Duncan Reyes, Amy Tam, and Stacie Tamaki of the Flirty Guide, and the newly engaged Zach and Mayumi.

This coming Sunday, Ray and I are heading out to Las Vegas for our fourth year at WPPI. It will be nice to get away for a few days. We're excited to get together with our wedding photog friends and of course meeting new people that inspire us. We're always pushing ourselves to learn and grow, and we're looking forward to seeing speakers like Alisha and Brook Todd, Elizabeth Messina, Gene Higa, Ann Hamilton, and Joe Photo.

But the one person that we're insanely stoked about is meeting Anne Ruthmann. Ray and I won her Mentor Auction that benefits Thirst Relief, an amazing organization that helps connect people living in third world countries with clean drinking water. Anne very graciously auctioned her time as a mentor, and we are so grateful and appreciative! We have been fans of Anne's work and we know that we'll learn so much from her.

Last week Ray and I flew down to the OC to meet with the amazing and uber famous Becker for his "Party of 1" mentoring session. Big thanks to Becker for spending the day with us, it was overwhelming and awesome at the same time. If you're a pro wedding photographer, I can't recommend Becker's Party of 1 more! If you haven't already joined the [b] school, it's the best place online where you can network, share ideas, and learn from other wedding photographers.

Becker -- you're fabulous, but you already know that. ;)

I just wanted to wish my wonderful husband Ray a happy anniversary! We've been married for seven years, and I can't believe those years have flown by. Ray has been the best husband ever, and I have to thank him for being so wonderful. I can't imagine being married to anyone else, and I'm so glad that we can share our lives together, on a personal level and in our photography business.