I am pleased to be participating in the Total Women’s Show next weekend at Bingeman Park in Marshall Hall. The dates are February 9 and 10th from 10a – 5p. I went just as a spectator last year and there were alot of really fabulous booths, with a real range of products and services being featured.
Here is a link to the show information, including a list of vendors
http://www.totalwomanshow.com/
Hopefully I will see you there!
Well, who can help thinking about summer when it is so stinking COLD out there…it is only survival (tricking the brain into thinking “warm”). My seed catalogues have started pouring in for my new garden. My only problem is that now I have to restrain myself…afterall I do have dogs and kids and they DO want some yard to run around in…but there are just so darn many cool things that I would love to grow and I could take the whole yard (I mean, “I” think that raspberry rows would look pretty nice around the pool…??!? Not so sure what everyone else will feel about that though).
I am also thinking ahead about family vacation time (camping, cottaging, or local sight-seeing?). And once that is in place, I can plan my summer photography fun. I will be offering beach sessions once again (details to follow once those dates and locations are worked out). Just to tempt you, here is one I did of my own guys last summer at the Pinery (the group one now hangs in my bathroom as a 16×20 in a red frame! Love it! The others sit on my work table, helping to encourage those thoughts of hot sand under my freezing cold feet).
I am currently in the process of setting up my online store! It will be so great for everyone – you will be able to put your order together directly from your proofing gallery (and if you are an online shopper, you will be amazed – not that I know anything at ALL about online shopping…really honey, I don’t even know how to sign onto those places…really…)
I also want to share some links to some very cool childrens clothing. I know, I know…usually simple coordinated colours are recommended (you can see I did that for my own kids beach shots). BUT I also want to encourage you to think outside of that “rule”, especially for sessions for individual kids. This first link is very very cool…I simply adore the clothing in this line (check out the catalogue previews in the right side border). The little sun dresses are just so sweet.
http://matildajane.typepad.com/
I would LOVE to photograph some little girls in these tres chic outfits! And for the modern baby, check out the kimonos at this link…
I photographed a little guy last year in one of these kinomos. It was just so cute! You can get some of these locally too. There is a great baby store in Cambridge called Offspring Baby http://www.offspringbaby.com/ . Check out all the great stuff in that place – the diapers bags…oh my – I was wishing I had a baby so I could buy myself one of those cool bags (okay, I was only wishing that for a moment, but then sanity returned LOL!).
WARNING: this post has nothing to do with photography and is a personal post – read at your own risk!
For the past couple years, I usually decide on a “theme” for my year. Not really resolutions or anything, but an area that I plan to focus on for the upcoming year. This year my theme of choice is Health (and the fact that I just turned 40 in December has “NOTHING” to do with that choice…at all…really and truly…well…I guess I can’t deny there “may” be some truth to that rumour, but for now, the reports are totally unconfirmed so I will go with “no comment” about that one).
There are going to be three areas that I want to focus on, along with a few spin off areas for each one (and if you are wondering why I am telling you all about this, well it goes to the idea that if you tell everyone what you are trying to accomplish, it will help hold you alittle more accountable).
1. personal health – well stating the obvious place to start is some weight loss. Not for those size 10 jeans hanging WAAAAAY at the back of my closet, but for my health and well-being (and maybe the jeans just alittle bit). I actually started on this in December – I woke up one day and realized that I was about to turn 40 in a few weeks with 40 pounds too many! Yikes – so even with all the upcoming Christmas parties, I decided the time was right to begin. I allowed my self to indulge ONLY at those said parties, and I was good the rest of the time. And things are going really well so far on that front. Now I just have to address the dreaded exercise aspect of this whole thing…not going as well on THAT front. But remember, I have a whole year to get this right. One thing at a time…
In this category also falls mental health. I already do some great things for myself – for years I avoided clothing shopping because of my weight, but last year, I decided to heck with it, I want to look nice NOW. So I bought lots of new stuff and it does feel great. I endulge in a great haircut, colour, makeup, etc. I get a monthly massage and try to get a pedicure once in a while. But I think the smartest and best thing that I just did for myself was to create a CHORE CHART and actually gave some jobs to those other inhabitants in the house – AND I even have a day off from house chores (once a week, but it is something at least). Today is day two…yeah I know, not that far into things, but I am so excited at the possibilities (even though my 13 year keeps huffing at me when I remind her what her tasks for the day are – but I can handle it!)
2. family health – I want my kids to NOT go through this whole letting yourself go thing (cause seriously, I was a skinny young thing in my teens and 20’s), and my DH certainly needs a health makeover so he will be around as long as possible (cause who will pickup the dog poop if he is not here!). So the whole eating healthy thing applies to all of them as well (and can you imagine how “thrilled” they all are with me – but hey, that bean soup we had last week was actually pretty tasty). My secret weapon in this part of the battle is a great website allrecipes.com. There a ton of GREAT recipes there (we have several favourites already – if you want a great salad, try the Winter Fruit Salad – OMG, it is divine!). And of course, I am not obsessed and we will still have our treat night every Saturday (my treats will just be alittle less treat-like, for a while at least).
3. planet health – So as I started thinking about ways to eat healthy, I decided to get my veggie garden going again. And when I thought of that, I decided I needed to dig the compost out from under the overgrown shrubs. And that thought lead to a whole concept of going green in general. So we have taken some steps in that direction – we have replaced about 80% of the light bulbs in the house with CFL bulbs, we now have two lovely big bins to sort our recycling (we always did recycle, but our bin was small so we could only do some stuff – now we can do it all), we have a new compost pail with a charcoal filter for the kitchen, and we are eating at home more (I was the queen of takeout all last fall – hence the bigger belly and smaller bank account). We will also be looking for ways to be more earth friendly with our pool this summer, as well as getting the aforementioned veggie garden going (I grew up in the country so we always grew alot of food for ourselves, so I can vouch for the fact that there is NOTHING better than eating fruits and vegetables that you picked just minutes ago. Plus, no pesticides!)
I also thought about some ways to go green in my business. In December, some of you might have gotten prints packaged in plastic or foam padding. That was because I ran out of all my normal stuff, and had to resort to the packaging the lab uses. BUT…I got to thinking about how great it felt to actually reuse that stuff, instead of just saving it in huge piles til I can think of something to do with it (yes, I have huge piles of the stuff). So I will be looking at reducing, reusing and recycling in my business practises as well this year.
If going green is on your list too, here is a nice and simple site that gives some concrete ways to start Green Village – 30 days to green. Of course, not everything is doable for everyone (cause I am not going back to using my Brita for water – my water cooler stays!!). But if everyone did just a couple things we as a whole will have a big impact on the environment (I read that if every home in the US changed ONE regularly used light to a CFL bulb you would have a HUGE impact on energy savings).
So if all goes well this year, by the beginning of 2009 I should be a healthy, happy, hugging-a-few-more-trees, hot mama! I can’t wait!
