Happy Holidays!
I would love to wish all of my clients, readers, family and friends a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. If you celebrate something different, let me know. I love hearing about other celebrations and traditions. I also want to thank every family that has hired me to catch their wonderful memories that will help them remember 2022, whether it was the arrival of your new baby, celebrating a 1st, or getting together for a beautiful family session at the park. I am beyond humbled and blessed at the amount of families I have provided my services to this year. I plan on furthering my education, as always, in 2023 to keep on upping my game and offerings. I had planned to take a Doula course this past fall, but there was just too much going on, so I will now be signing up for the weekend of 1/27/23. It is a full weekend of hands on learning and on the last night I will be officially certified and ready to take on clients. I will be able to attend births at any hospital with my certification and of course home births, which I am very excited for. My husband is going to travel with me for the course, and we'll get a hotel room. He figures he'll do some exploring the area and hanging out while I'm in class and when I get out each night at 7pm we'll have a nice dinner and hit the jacuzzi. (Requirement of the hotel haha) I also have my eye on a photography training class for early this year as well. I figure January and February will be best for these classes and courses. Getting them out of the way and being ready for the year ahead, plus when I'm not photographing in the dead of winter, I'm just home staying warm with my dogs. I do not love winter and I hate being cold, but oddly enough I love snowstorms, big ones. I think it's the planning and preparations leading up to it that I enjoy. Hey, we all have our things right, haha. I was totally hoping this weekend's storm was going to be snow.
As I'm typing up my last blog post of the year, I am sitting on the couch, reclined with my laptop. My husband is in the other recliner and my German Shepherd is curled up on the side of me. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation is playing and the lights from the electric fireplace and the Christmas Tree are just so beautiful. This is such a perfect night to start off Christmas weekend that's for sure. My daughter's friend just left, she came over for dinner and to exchange gifts. They did gel nails and had a fun time together. With tomorrow being a heavy rain and crazy wind day, we'll be baking homemade sugar cookies and decorating them, I'm thinking at trying my hand on a reindeer one to leave out Saturday night for Santa. I'm so grateful I do not have to go out tomorrow and deal with the weather. It's definitely going to be a Christmas movie day. I will be doing some editing in the morning as I did squeeze in a session today for one of my clients who wanted to surprise her mother with a photo session for her with her 4 grandkids, one being just 2 weeks old. It was very lovely, and a little chaotic because two of them were 2.5 years old haha, it was great though and what else would we expect. I have fun with all of my clients. Toddlers will be toddlers and I understand where they're coming from and that they do not share our enthusiasm for photos haha. But I will always do my best in capturing life the way it is, right now, at 2 years old, these will all be precious memories in the future.
I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend and you all get to spend time with those you love most. Enjoy it all, even if something doesn't go as planned. If you have little ones, remember, that what we do isn't a cherished tradition to them, YET and they don't always understand why something should be special. It'll all come together as they put more Christmas's under their little belts and they'll enjoy it all just as much as you do soon enough. Let them be happy doing what they're doing. Is the box more fun right now, play in it. Do your Christmas cookies look like they just came in from the rain, let them. Do the kids need to eat RIGHT NOW and can't wait until the dinner, let them eat. Just enjoy it all and relax. I know so many of my 2022 clients are spending this holiday with a new member of the family, that in itself is so special. They won't remember this Christmas, but you will never forget it.
Happy Holidays and see you and those precious babies in the new year
