What kid doesn't like playing dress-up? Around the International Home Office of RyKie Images & Events, we have our short, future partners running around in all variety of interesting attire. You just never know who's going to join us during the course of any given day. We've entertained princesses, pirates, ladybugs, monkeys and famous superheroes like SpiderMan (well, SpiderGirl, as she calls herself) and SheZow!
What could more exciting than meeting a real, live princess? How about hanging out with said princess AND receiving a custom-made dress to match!
​WOW! Let me tell you, we had one excited six-year-old here at the Office!

Young Aleta is accustomed to her Dear Old Dad taking pictures of her. The poor kid has had a camera in her face since Day One! However, she didn't mind when it meant having the chance to meet up with Princess Ariel aka Analeigh Cosplay. In fact, the two hit it off so famously, it was difficult to say 'goodbye'!
Now Analeigh has a bit of a promotion going on right now whereby she wants to build her stock of images, promoting a new line of custom-made princess dresses for the younger set. Over the next little while, expect to see more lucky local youngsters gracing her Facebook page as Analeigh works with a few local photographers (and their kiddos) on more sessions like this. She has a list of famous princesses to emulate, with mini-sized dresses to match.
It was a great day to hit the beach at Kinbrook, and Aleta's dress held up to some fairly rough play. She climbed rocks, treaded through the sand in search of crayfish pieces, and hit the playground without a single stain, speck of dirt or loose thread. Analeigh's dresses are tough as nails - and they look great, too!

We even had time for a bit of yoga, with Aleta showing Princess Ariel proper form for the Balloon Pose!  
*Added bonus, when we arrived home, Aleta's little sister had organised a tea party, which began just as we came through the door. Undoubtedly, this may have surprised our neighbour, who was over to retrieve some mail! 
Just another day in the life when you're six, I suppose.
Thanks again to Analeigh Cosplay for having us shoot the first in this series - we look forward to working with you again soon! And, if you haven't checked out her Facebook page via the previous link, just click here!

For the past few weeks, you may have noticed a social media campaign involving picture frames. If you haven't, check out the March 21 Eliminate Racism page or #diveristyBrooks on Twitter. The campaign all led up to the main event, a Unity Walk, on March 21.
That date marks the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. Locally, March 21 events have been ongoing for the last few years as a result of a partnership with Brooks & County Immigration Services, the Francophone Society of Brooks, the City of Brooks and the Brooks Public Library.
"It is a day to rid our community of ALL forms of discrimination," said March 21 Committee Organizer Heather Kazimir before the walk. "The reason we're all here today, is because we all know the right thing is to end discrimination."
Strathmore-Brooks MLA Derek Fildebrandt also walked with the group, and credited the community on its diversity and acceptance thereof.
"Most small, urban centres like this do not enjoy the kind of diversity that Brooks has," he said.
Brooks Mayor, Barry Morishita, also reflected on how Brooks is an example where people unite and prosper - no matter what their ethnic roots.
"We have changed so much in the last 15-20 years," he said. "But the amazing thing is that we can walk up and down our streets and see the people that live here appreciate the diversity of our community."
He added that the "City of 100 Hellos" has been an example for the rest of the province, and the entire country.
"This can happen all over the world, because it's been successful here," Morishita said.
County of Newell Reeve Molly Douglass - a longtime rural resident and former educator at the Bassano School - expressed how pleased she is to call our area "home."
"I'm extremely proud to live in our Newell/Brooks community," she said, adding "it's a wonderful community."
BCIS Service Manager Mohammed Idriss brought another view, noting how sometimes the focus is on the negative aspect of discrimination.
"I think we should somehow have this day officially proclaimed as a Celebration Day," he said, expanding that it would be "a Diversity Celebration Day where we all represent our community and celebrate the diversity we have."
The walk began at the Brooks Public Library, stopped briefly at City Hall for a group photo, then traveled north on 1st St., turning onto 2nd St., and ending at the Brooks Junior High School. A police escort was provided as the group made their way through the downtown core.
​For more images from the walk, click here. Be sure to check out our video below to see the walk, and hear the dignitaries speak.

At some point in time, we've all experienced it. Going to retrieve a file that was on a storage device, only to find out that the particular file is corrupted, or not even there at all! Or maybe you've lost a huge amount of images....gone...forever....
Data devices from the past fail also. I wanted to obtain some images from a session about six years ago, only to have the photographer we hired back then to tell us that those images were on a disk. That disk had succumbed to rot, therefore our images have been lost.
We don't want that to happen to you.
Images are a magical thing that preserve a moment in time. To have those lost is surely terrible. With all our client files, we back up the images in a few different places, and on cloud storage as well. Now, we would like to offer that service to you. For a limited time, clients of RyKie Images & Events can get a free month of cloud storage when they sign up for a one-year subscription. 
Even if you're images were not from one of our sessions, or maybe you're not even a client yet - we want to preserve your memories. 
For more information on how to sign up for our cloud storage service, contact us here!