New Leaves

Can I just say that I am SO excited about 2010?! I have so many plans and goals for this year. There will be some big changes in my family and personal life, and in my business. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Same old story,” you say. But it’s true! I’ve set some very serious goals for myself and pretty much set the game plan for accomplishing them. By the way, I don’t like to call them New Years Resolutions. That is just so cliché. I’m going to call them goals. I forget about my resolutions by February, but I won’t forget about my goals all year long! One of these goals is to blog more, so here I am! I used to only blog about my shoots, and even then I’d write something small and then post a million pictures. From now on, I’m going to be putting a lot more of myself out there in Blogland so that my readers can get to know me a little better. I might even get rid of my family/personal blog, but we’ll see how brave I get with blogging some of the personal stuff that I might put on our family blog on my photography blog.

I am in the midst of some changes to my business as we speak. I’m building a new website to have along with my blog. I’m also planning a whole new blog. This year has some really big, fun projects planned. I’ll be working with some really great models, a really great makeup artist, and an amazing hair stylist. Just you wait – we are so excited to show you what we’ve been planning!

So, here are some of my Goals for 2010. Some are personal goals, some are photography/business goals, and some I’m not even bothering to mention i.e. exercise more, eat better, get out of debt, bla bla bla...

- Be done “working” by December: I am determined to get my business running to the point where I don’t need to work my two “real” jobs anymore. This will enable me to be a stay-at-home-mama by the time I have a baby.

- Go on a “real” vacation with Brett: We’ve been married for almost three years now, and we really need a big, fat, get outta the country vacation. And we aren’t talkin’ about a little cruise, folks. This will be a big, huge, exotic vacation. I’d really like to go to a Sandals resort in the Caribbean, but something in Bora Bora would also suffice, I guess, hehe… I don’t want to go somewhere where we’ll have things that we’ll have to see while we’re there. There will be no itinerary besides, “Day 1-10: Sit on the beach, eat lots of food, do nothing.” This is something that we want/need to do before we have kids, so, this has to be the year!

- Brett’s wonderful mom, Judy, taught me how to knit last year and I have fallen in love with it! I would like to finish at least knitting project each month in 2010. I’ll be sure to include lots of pictures of these projects!

- Take classical voice lessons. All the Christmas music that I heard at church last month really inspired me to develop a talent in music, and I’d like to learn how to sing. Good thing I can’t take pictures of sound.

- Shoot at least 12 weddings this year! 2009 was just a practice year for me, and I have some big plans for 2010 as far as my weddings are concerned. Watch for those!

- I’m going to blog at least twice a week, if not more. Right now, I have three followers on my Blogger dashboard, and I’d really like to change this. It needs to be more like 300 followers. I’ve already made myself a list of lots of things I can blog about, so be prepared for some ramblings!

- Learn more about photography and Photoshop. I haven’t taken any photography classes since high school, so I’m going to delve into some classes at Monterey Peninsula College and see what they know. I’d also like to go to some workshops and meet with other photographers in the industry. Sometimes I feel all alone out here in Monterey and I need some photog buddies!

- I’d love to try a 365 Project, but I just don’t see myself following through with that. Instead, I’m going to try a 52 Project. This will force me to take more pictures of our life. It’s really sad, I’m a photographer, yet I hardly take any pictures of our life. Granted, there hasn’t been much to take pictures of; until now, life consisted of us working day in and day out. But, this will change. Brett will lose all camera-shy tendencies, mwahahahaha!

So, there ya have it! This is my game plan for 2010. I hope you are all with me along the way, out there in Blogland. I’ll need the support and reassurance!

Since a blog post is lame without a picture, here’s a cutie for you. She answers to "Sassy Girl."