The holidays and New Year’s 2016 were upon us. Reuben is an extrovert; he is always energetic and a true lover of life. He loves to be around people and his closest friends, but he also knows that I am very much an introvert. Somehow, we bring out the best in each other. For New Year’s Eve, Reuben had come up with the idea to do a night hike on one of our snowy local mountains. I was thrilled, it was a perfect idea; just the two of us, doing something we had been wanting to do for some time. We bundled up with layers of sweaters and winter parkas, (not your typical New Year’s Eve attire!) and loaded up with some New Year’s Eve gear: sparklers, glow sticks, and some hot cocoa to toast with. Unbeknownst to me, Reuben had other plans in mind!

The mountain was all lit up for the ski season, and it was the most incredible hike, even before what was about to happen. We cracked our glow sticks and the snow literally sparkled like millions of diamonds. We hiked to a lookout to watch the stars and wait for the countdown. We are both photographers, so we set up our tripod to take some photos looking over the mountains and the surrounding islands – the view was completely surreal at night. Reuben nonchalantly suggested we take photos of sparkler skywriting, where you use a sparkler to “write” or draw letters backwards in the air, and take a long exposure photo to reveal the word. When the shot finishes, with the word seared into the darkness with shimmering sparkler light, the result is magic. We took turns writing things in the sky, which takes a lot of practice, as you have to write backwards! We wrote our names, B + R, 2016, drew hearts, and sketched as many fun designs in the sky as we could think of.