Mom-venture: We try out a photo project that gives back

Whenever I have the choice between giving my business to a company that supports a local charity and one that does not, I tend to choose the one that helps me give back. Veridamo Photography's annual project, Kids of Vancouver, attracted me right away.

Kids of Vancouver gives families the opportunity get a complete portrait photography session for each of their children for a $100 donation (for the first child; $25 more for each additional child) to a local food bank program. Your donation, for which you will receive a tax receipt, basically covers what would normally be Veridamo Photography's sitting fee. Each child will then have one of the photos from the session published in a coffee table art book entitled Kids of Vancouver 2010, which will be available for purchase at the end of the year. You can choose to buy any prints from the photo session at Veridamo's standard rates.

My family of four had our photo session this past Tuesday morning at Stanley Park, one of our family's favourite spots year-round. We were met by Veridamo Photography's photographer, Tanya, who quickly won us -- my 8-year-old son and 5-year-old daughter and even my less-than-enthused husband whom I practically had to drag to the session -- over.

Armed with knowledge about my children's interests (garnered from our in-depth pre-photo session meeting), Tanya connected easily with my children and put them at ease. And her photojournalistic style, which meant my husband didn't have to stiffly place his left arm here and turn his chin upward there, brought my husband's guard down completely. And as far as my children were concerned, we were out on a family playdate at Stanley Park, while some nice lady named Tanya watched us with her camera.

We turned over rocks at the beach and found crabs, we searched for pretty sea shells, we played on monkey bars, swings and slides. We just did what we normally do when we're playing outdoors as a family. And that's exactly what we wanted the images to convey...just us, being ourselves, casually doing what we normally do without the self-consciousness that often comes with posed photos and Sunday-best outfits.

And then, just as quickly as it had begun, it was over. "Aww, we don't want to go home already!" my son whined. That's how fun and easy our family portrait session was.

I can't wait to see our photos, which should be ready in about a week's time. I'll write a follow-up to this review on urbanbaby & toddler magazine's blog at www.urbanbabyandtoddler.blogspot.com after I've seen the images. So excited!

For info about Kids of Vancouver 2010, visit www.kidsofvancouver.com.