He watches over our family like no other. Behind-the-scenes he does more than anyone could imagine whether it’s homeschooling the kids in History and Science, helping me prep for a presentation, being the technical hero when we do the Nate Berkus Show, playing with the kids in a way that opens their imagination to the impossible being possible (like Barbie Photo Shoots!)
and then letting me know he believes in me–no matter what.
Brian believes in the impossible and finds evidence of life everywhere–with his heart, with his camera, with all that he is.
Because of Brian, I’ve soared to heights I never dreamed possible, and I know our kids will do the same. There is so much that I owe to this amazing man.
I simply love this man.
Will you help me wish Brian a Happy Birthday today?!
If he’s made a difference in your life, no matter how small or big, will you post up your story today? Thanks so much!
(I love you honey! Little did you know what blog post I was working on while I was sitting right next to you! )
Today I get to introduce you to one more special lady, our third SOAR! Recipient! Meet Ali Anderson!
If you missed Ali’s SOAR! video submission, check it out. I love the part about her grandparents.
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Ali, we are so excited to have you be one of the three SOAR! Recipients! The three of you bring a wonderful balance that will only grow and grow. Thank you for sharing your heart in your video and in your initial thoughts below.
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Initial Thoughts by Ali Anderson
I alphabetized my spices last week. My kitchen junk drawer should be on display at The Container Store. The toy depot in my living room now has all the order of a U.S. Army barracks. And that is just the tip o’ the iceberg, people.
Ordinarily, I engage in losing battles with domestic entropy, but when someone knocks on your door, holding a neatly wrapped gift the color of cotton candy, and delivers you the life-changing news you’ve been secretly hoping for, there are unanticipated aftershocks involved. Like big-time nesting (and potentially the need for cardiac resuscitation equipment). It took me a week of obsessive home organizational projects to realize I was nesting in preparation for this year of SOARing. (And here I thought I was just on a hot streak of domestic prowess.)
Many of you know the feeling all too well: You can’t possibly go to bed until you’ve cleaned out the kids’ closets and boxed up their outgrown clothes in hermetically sealed containers according to gender, season and size. It doesn’t matter that you vacuumed the dust bunnies under the sofa last week. Surely they are capable of asexual reproduction. And when you’re under the influence of nesting, you practically have a vocational calling to sort the clothes in your closet according to the hexadecimal color values grid.
As women, nesting is what we are crafted to do when we’re anticipating change. And SOAR!, friends, is a big one.
That is exactly why the gravity of accepting the honor weighs so wondrously heavy on my heart. I have watched every one of your videos. I have humbly read every one of your comments, feeling blessed to be on the receiving end of so much genuine sentiment. I am impressed and moved by your creative talents and the personal stories that have propelled each of you to this community. Your talents, stories, dreams and challenges are not lost on me.
My promise to you this year is to live this experience transparently. You will see me fail gloriously. You will witness some frustration (I’ll try to keep the kicking and screaming to a minimum for my sweet husband’s sake). I hope you will also share my successes, excitement, and inevitable growth. You can count on me to put it ALL out there for you, but here’s the thing:
You gotta come along. Especially if you submitted an application this year or wished now you had, *please please please* come with Charisse, Rachel and me on this journey: don’t stop here. I see myself as a conduit for the growth and achievement of anyone who is willing to endeavor with me. Be all in.
So if you’re ready to get this party started, I’ll see you over on the SOAR! blog next week. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to go dust all my ceiling fans before the first photo exercise is due.
-Ali
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Now that you’ve met all three SOAR! Recipients, don’t you think that as a group they have a wonderful balance about them? All three women are dynamic, diverse, gifted, passionate, and yet scared, overwhelmed but still going for it in their own way. One of the things I’m most excited to see is how their relationships with each other unfolds. It’s going to be a wonderful year of adventure!
Will you help me welcome Ali?!
Now let’s get this year rolling! First up on Monday, Business Coaching exercise for all!
Are you ready to get to know your second SOAR! Recipient?! Meet Charisse Rhodes!
If you missed Charisse’s video submission, check it out below!
Some of you may remember seeing Charisse from last year’s SOAR! submissions. It takes a lot of guts to try again (and we are so glad Charisse did). This is her year!
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Initial Thoughts by Charisse Rhodes
In being asked how I have felt these last few days, I am hard pressed to explain in a way that makes sense and does not make me sound like a rambling head case. Seriously, I just keep replaying the entire thing in my mind over and over. While I now know that I don’t have to be pinched, I am already awake; I do realize that as one of the 2010 SOAR Recipients, I have received a blessing that was truly unexpected.
As I sit here to write this initial post, I am consumed again with tears and overwhelming appreciation. I am totally excited and elated that somehow the stars aligned, or as I believe…God said to me, “Yes my dear, now it is your turn” and he gave me the opportunity to receive this amazing blessing of the SOAR Scholarship. I quickly saw that I was also given an even bigger gift. It was the gift of this amazing community of women who I get to live my journey out loud with. You are all the most compassionate beautiful group of women I have never met!
Last year at this time, I sat watching Linda, Jen and Lindsay receive their gifts. I remember the disappointment juxtaposed with a sense of relief and excitement for those three ladies. I knew in my spirit that it was not my time for this scholarship. There was other work in me that I needed to do to prepare myself and to learn on my own. I needed to make some baby steps by myself, yet not alone. I realized I received what I needed at that time. It was not gear, but a community of women and new associates…many of whom I have never met in person yet whom I can call upon for support! These friends are different though. They are not caught up in the drama of my everyday life. They share with me and allow me to share with them a passion and creative expression that I love so dearly. Over the year we have gently and at times, strongly encouraged one another to move forward, shared in our joys and disappointments. Trust me ladies, there are no winners and losers with this SOAR community.
What I found is that Me Ra & Brian are the most amazing people. They birthed this community of women and men who support us, to come together. It’s done in a way that we can learn, grow, achieve, and lean on each other in a way I have never seen in any other community. For me, that is huge. I so miss the sense of community that I remember growing up with in my home town. To think they created a place where we can find it on cyberspace is an amazing achievement!
My video showed a little sense of who I am. I am a nurturer who put almost everything and everyone’s needs before her own. I haven’t allowed myself to dream about my personal desires for years. Sometimes I was nearly at the point where I felt I was not supposed to.
The first video I did was a struggle. Yet I showed myself I could do it and that it was okay to come out of the shadows of my life. I almost did not apply again, thinking I had no chance of being selected. Encouraged by some friends, along with several SOAR sisters from last year, I gave it a try. You can only imagine that I am so glad I did! I made jokes about cleaning my house to prepare, but boy oh boy if I only knew. I had no idea! My husband is usually terrible about keeping things from me. This time he and my one of my best friends really pulled one over on me! I thought I was going to a bridal show, only to hear my door bell ring and see Genie and Linda standing on my porch! OMG…the shock! Well, if you watched the video of my open mouth and wide eyes…well… you saw the shock. It was REAL. I couldn’t catch my breath!
However, within days my elation quickly went through a series of emotions. The other reality hit, that I had just expanded my little bubble of safety, and now I would need to fulfill, live out loud and dare to share dreams and fears that before now had been kept in a very private place. I can not duck and run for cover when life gets in the way as I have done before. The reality that I can share the other facets of myself beyond my motherhood was going to manifest. Wow!
While it is true that I may have access to a few extra tools and resources, there is still much work to be done.
I can not end this amazingly long post without thanking Me Ra, Brian, Genie, Sony, jill-e, Shootdotedit, Barefoot Memories, SmugMug, Wisdom Connection, Pixel2Canvas and all the other sponsors that make this opportunity possible! To Linda, Jen, and Lindsay thank you for paving the way filled with authenticity and your willingness to support us over this next year. Thank you for believing in me! Thank you for your heart for helping women all over reach for their stars! I implore you my SOAR Sistas….let’s ROCK this thang!
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Will you join me in welcoming this beautiful lady!! Congrats Charisse! We are so excited to see this year unfold for you!
xoxo,
m
p.s. To follow the individual journey of all three ladies, tune into the SOAR! blog on Tuesdays for Rachel, Wednesdays for Charisse and Thursdays for Ali! It’s going to be an awesome year!
Rachel is one of the three new SOAR! Recipients that you saw on last week’s exciting SOAR! Video! If you missed Rachel’s SOAR! video submission, here it is below.
I love to begin the new SOAR! year with giving our blog readers a chance to get to know each of the three recipients. As you follow the SOAR! Blog this year, you’ll watch these ladies tackle Business Coaching Exercises the first Monday of every month, Photography Exercises the second Monday of every month and much more! All of this starts a week from today on the SOAR! Blog, and I’m excited to see what happens in your lives as you tackle the assignments too!
But before we start, I’ve asked Rachel, Charisse and Ali to take a moment and write about their “beginning thoughts”. This beginning marker will be wonderful to recall as we all begin to grow and transform. When we hit moments of discouragement, we can look back to these early posts and see how far we’ve come. If you are following along with the SOAR! year, I invite you to break out a new journal and start with your own beginning thoughts.
As I sit here, I have tears in my eyes. Not only am I about to embark on a journey I never imagined, but I have the support of my amazing husband, wonderful family and friends, and a huge group of women(and men) that I have never met. There are no words to describe what a feeling that is. If I could put how I feel about being selected as a 2010 SOAR! recipient into one word it would be HONORED. I believe each one of the 129 applicants are deserving women, as I have seen from your videos. I thank you for the support you have already shown and hope that you will learn to SOAR! in your own unique way.
As you saw from the video, I was completely shocked when Wendy and Christine came to my house. I saw the pink and brown boxes and thought, “They must have the wrong house. There is no baby shower here.” Then Wendy introduced herself on behalf of Me Ra and the SOAR! scholarship and I screamed so loud that I scared my poor 4 month old baby! I think you can hear him a bit in the video! I have been in shock ever since. It still seems so surreal to me that I am going to get to pursue something that I have loved and feel is so very important.
Now, I’m not going to lie, of course I am PUMPED! But, boy, am I scared! You are reading about a gal who is starting from ground zero! How do I run my own business? How do I set the camera for low lighting? Why are all my pictures either yellow or super bright? What setting do I use for fireworks? How about for action shots? Gosh, I should start looking for props! My mind is going a mile a minute. I have a lot to learn! But you know what? I am so excited about it. Excited to learn and excited to share with y’all the things I learn. I am excited to learn from you!
I bet you are wondering who I am. Who is this girl, well woman I guess, that you will be watching over the next year? I write girl at first, because even though I will be 30 this year, sometimes I feel though I am still so young. I feel there is so much I have accomplished, yet there is so very much for me to learn. Not only learn about photography, owning a business, but more learning about myself. Learning how to follow my dreams, how to open my eyes, how to accomplish anything I set my mind to.
I am first and foremost, a wife and a mother. Some girls dream of being a doctor, lawyer, ballerina, actress when they grow up; all I ever wanted to be was a mom. I grew up in Houston, Texas and the first time I left was when I went to Texas A&M, a mere 90 minutes away. When I accepted Pete’s marriage proposal, I knew I would have to grow up quite a bit…I would live farther from my family than I ever imagined. I am so blessed to be married to such a wonderful man, who is a Marine. Throughout the short 6.5 years of our marriage I have grown in ways I never expected and accomplished things I never imagined. I have survived 3 deployments to Iraq in 5 years. I have moved houses 5 times in our 6.5 years. I gave birth to a baby while my husband was deployed. I have learned to stand up for what I believe. I have learned how to believe in myself.
So who am I? I’m a mom. I’m a wife. I’m a runner(training for my first marathon!). I’m a group fitness instructor. I’m a friend. I’m a daughter. I’m a woman who is truly blessed-in more ways than I can put into words.
I’m sure the upcoming year will be one of laughter, joy, tears, and excitement. I hope that you will be able to share in those emotions with me. I hope that together we will learn about ourselves, learn about each other, and learn how to SOAR! So put a smile on your face, patience in your pocket, and spread your wings…it’s time to SOAR! together.
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Thank you so much Rachel for sharing yourself with all of us. Three deployments?! You are amazing! Clearly, you are a strong woman! We are so excited to get to know you more and watch your photography dream take flight!
In our CONFIDENCE Workshops, we teach women to shoot with the lowest ISO–when possible. The “when possible” is the key to that sentence. The lower the ISO, the more buttery, creamy, saturated your color is. But is the high ISO bad? Not necessarily. A high ISO can definitely have its place. Yes, the higher ISO will give you more of a “grainy” texture rather than smooth color. But grain isn’t necessarily bad “all” the time.
When we are learning photography, it’s easy to search for all the rules. We want to become better photographers, as fast as possible. We tell ourselves ‘If I just figure out what NOT to do, then I can relax more and not look so silly.’ We think that by learning the rules, we will gain confidence that much faster. But often the opposite happens.
We are online into the wee hours of the night, and we dig and dig for all the things we are NOT supposed to do. We write those rules down, and without realizing it, we hyper focus on how to NOT break the rules rather than feeling free to create. Instead of gaining confidence, we are terrified of making a mistake. And since beginning photos are often all about making mistakes, we talk ourselves out of taking pictures.
Deep breath.
Exhale. Close your eyes while exhaling even deeper and picture yourself making room within you to make mistakes, to bend the rules, to color outside the lines, and to fall in love with discovering why you love taking pictures. This space is where magic can breathe.
Here is a high ISO photo that I recently shot.
If you look close, you’ll notice the graininess in the image. I shot this at 1600 ISO on the Sony a55. Does the graininess bother me? Quite the contrary. I actually like how it adds even more character to the photo.
The girls had just come home from playing at the beach. They jumped in the warm, outdoor shower. The sun was setting fast which means not a lot of daylight left. My ISO was 1600, Shutter Speed was down to 1/60th (or 60) of a second, and Aperture was f 3.2. If I wanted more light, I would have needed to pop my external flash. But an external flash would have changed the look and feel I was going for–much more than a higher ISO.
This high ISO image works for me. I LOVE this moment. My niece’s middle name is Twilight, and I love that twilight was fast approaching as the girls giggled in the shower–twilight was my inspiration for not brightening this image more than I needed to in post process. Playing, creating, experimenting, discovering–all pieces that keep photography alive and new for me.
As we embark on 2011, we are going to create a space within ourselves that allows magic to breathe deeper and discoveries to happen. There are definite guidelines for taking great photos or running a successful photography business, but they are guidelines. Joy is what brought us to photography, but so often the stress of getting better eats away at our joy.
A big congratulations to Charisse Rhodes, Ali Anderson and Rachel Abelson!! You will get to know these women a lot more in the months to follow! We are so excited to officially start their journey! Will you help me welcome these courageous ladies!
This amazing video was edited by Photographer’s Reel! They are the latest company to join our SOAR! Partners, and they have produced promo videos for pros like Jasmine Star and David Jay! All three SOAR! Recipients will have their OWN promo video made with Photographer’s Reel at the end of the year! Isn’t that amazing!
Special thanks to a handful of women who represented our incredible community in today’s video; Christine Barker, Wendy Zippwald, Linda Baylis and Genie Ohashi. Thank you for taking the time to bring the good news to these ladies in person!
*If you were a SOAR! Applicant this year, or last year, I’d like to invite you to a special SOAR! Teleconference Call on February 18th at 10am PST/1pm EST. I will be joined with Wendy, our SOAR! Coordinator, and the SOAR! Business Coaches from Wisdom Connection. We have planned a special 1 hour call to kick off the new SOAR with inspiration and coaching questions for you to reflect upon. Keep a look out for a special email invitation with all the call-in details so you can join us. Again, this SOAR! Teleconference call is a special call for ALL our SOAR! Applicants. We can’t wait to talk with you!
Have to say it one more time! Congratulations Charisse, Ali and Rachel. Soak it in ladies and fasten your seat belts!
I’m so glad that Lynda’s video inspired so many of you. Isn’t she amazing?! She is a wonderful representation of one of many beautiful, awesome stories from last year’s SOAR! applicants. I have a feeling those stories are going to multiply with this year’s applicants.
We are in that “in between” moment for SOAR!’s new year. Our team is putting on the final touches to a video so you can meet the new recipients. We are all so excited for this next step to happen, and the new year to officially start!
In the meantime, I’d like to announce the Running on Empty for the upcoming Seattle CONFIDENCE Workshop. This contest means so much to me because my heart knows what it’s like to feel as if you are running on empty while trying to do your best with what you’ve got as a mom.
There were more submissions than ever for the ROE contest. Every entry was incredible to read–such amazing perseverance from so many women. The panel of judges were, again, amazing. The job is never easy, and we are so thankful for the heartfelt time. When they emailed me the winner, I cried. Her story is heartbreaking, and if any mom deserves a break, a weekend of being filled up and given to, it’s this mom. For Seattle, the Running on Empty winner is Claudia. Her story was and is incredibly moving. I can’t read it without crying as I hear the heartache in her words. I have copied Claudia’s story below so you can welcome her in today’s comments. This is a woman that defines the word Courage. Claudia, Brian and I welcome you to the Seattle CONFIDENCE Workshop. We hear that you are flying in from CHICAGO! Wow! And that’s not all, a big thanks to Sue Christianson, one of our SOAR! Applicants from last year. Sue has graciously offered to open her home to Claudia for the weekend. Have I said how much I LOVE this community?!! To read Claudia’s moving story, see the p.s. You can also see a more intimate view of her story here.
So much to talk about in the coming weeks, like a recap on our first CONFIDENCE Workshop of the year! Brian and I had a moving, powerful weekend with the OC/LA CONFIDENCE Workshop this last weekend. If this first workshop for 2011 is an indication of what the rest of this year will be…we are off to an amazing start.
In our “in between” time, we had the opportunity to catch up with family in Ventura, CA. The cousins played on the beach every day while mom and dad went to teach the workshop.
As we fly home we are already missing them but so thankful for the magical window of time we shared. (love you Carm, Gregg, Zoe and Jude)
With the sincerest humility and gratitude, I respectfully nominate myself to attend the Seattle Confidence workshop. 2010 was the most difficult, painful year of my life. In 2011, I hope to pick up the pieces and find happiness again. If I were chosen to attend the conference, it would give me the opportunity to reconnect with one of my greatest passions, photography. I fell in love with photography when my children were born. I was blessed with two beautiful daughters, Lindsey (born in 2004) and Ashley (born in 2006). I loved having my children photographed often. I felt like each photograph captured a fleeting moment. Through photographs I felt I could capture moments, smiles, and memories that might otherwise be forgotten. In connecting with other photographers, I quickly became interested in studying photography. Sadly the events that were to follow over the coming years would prevent me from pursuing that interest. Shortly after her second birthday, my daughter Ashley was diagnosed with a rare and aggressive form of pediatric cancer. Our lives changed dramatically in an instant. We were given the option to not pursue treatment because her prognosis was so poor. She had a less than 5% chance of surviving this rare and aggressive cancer. Weeks before we had been celebrating her birthday in Disney World, and here we were being told that her time with us would likely be brief. I remember wanting to scoop her up in my arms and run out of the hospital and get on the next plane back to Disney to make as many lasting memories as possible. She was immediately scheduled for surgery. The tumor was wrapped around her spinal cord and was invading her lung cavity in such a way that the threat of paralysis was imminent. Within days of this surgery she began a rigorous treatment protocol that involved multiple surgeries, 18 months of chemotherapy, 3 months of radiation, countless visits to the ER, every major holiday spent in the hospital and countless hospitalizations. Throughout her treatment we probably spent 100 nights at Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago all the while spending time apart from my husband and 5 year old daughter Lindsey. I always did my best to be strong and put on a brave face but the moment someone asked me how Lindsey was doing I would burst into tears and my heart would break. I was always felt so torn and wished I could clone myself and be with both daughters at the same time. If I was in the hospital with Ashley, I felt like I was missing huge moments in Lindsey’s life. For nearly 18 months I felt like I was living through hell on earth, like my family was being torn apart, but yet Ashley kept me strong. Ashley gave me courage. She went through all her treatments with a smile on her face. When she was going through radiation she’d wake up at 4am giggling and smiling before our hour long drive to the hospital each day. If she needed an IV she’d sweetly extended her arm for the nurse. If she required medication by mouth, she’d swallow it down and simply ask for some juice. She smiled as the nurses connected her “tubbies” (access to her port) to the pump that would administer her chemo. She smiled as she woke up from each surgery. Her doctors came to me and said “Ashley is a miracle. She’s handling the most aggressive treatments and we believe she will beat this.” We had let our hearts believe that everything would be okay, but our worst fears were realized just days before Thanksgiving (2009) when her oncologists said her tumors had returned and we were out of treatment options. This is every cancer mom’s worst nightmare. Treatment itself is hell, but you go through it all in hopes of ridding your child of this horrible disease. On February 5, 2010, my sweet girl lost her battle to cancer. She died in our home in my arms. My heart will forever be broken. We go through each day with a huge gaping hole in our hearts. My older daughter Lindsey who is now 6 misses her little sister terribly. She knows more about cancer than any child should ever have to know. I want to continue to be the best mother I can be to Lindsey and I want to capture and document every special moment of her life. We recently had a mini-getaway over the holidays and Lindsey borrowed my camera the entire trip. I loved seeing her excitement and passion for photography. It warmed my heart greatly when she said she wants to be a photographer when she grows up. I love that we share that passion and that bond. It seemed like my camera was collecting dust for those 2 years when our lives were lived out of a suitcase going back and forth to the hospital. In 2011, I’m hoping to reconnect with myself again and I truly believe that attending your Confidence Workshop would help me do so. Thank you for taking the time to read my entry.
It is a honor to introduce you to an inspiring woman, Lynda Kennedy.
She applied for SOAR! last year, and she didn’t win. Nine months later, she sent me this video. There are no words for this video. May it lift your spirits and inspire you to keep moving forward!
Thank you Lynda for sharing your beautiful story. You are beautiful inside and out. We are so blessed to have you as a part of this community. This video means so much.
Color for the year? We’ve got our word for the year. Next week we are going to work on our beginning 2011 Self Portraits. But this week…what’s your color for 2011?
We loved watching all your videos and learning more about you in your applications. The judges did not have an easy task in front of them. But alas, we have picked our three new SOAR! Scholarship Recipients. They have been contacted, and they have confirmed their acceptance.
I know a lot of you have been waiting patiently and wondering if I’m the one ringing your doorbell. As soon as we knew we had three confirmed recipients, I wanted to let you know. We will introduce you to them next week, but unlike last year, I want to give you the space to regroup.
Not winning is never easy. You can feel rejected, angry, “not good enough” and most of all lost. The “lost” feeling is the worst. If I could show you all the rejection emails I’ve received over the last fifteen years for magazine articles, book ideas and TV shows I’ve pitched. You would probably look at me and say, “Girl, you either can’t take a hint, or you are just crazy.” I’m probably a little crazy but also determined . I hope you will find that determination too. If I could emphasize anything, you not being this year’s recipient is NOT evidence of whether or not you are meant to SOAR with your photography dream.
Can I say that again?
You not being this year’s recipient is NOT evidence of whether or not you are meant to SOAR with your photography dream. This is the truth. But the disappointment is real. Take time to love yourself this weekend. But come Monday, let’s regroup together so that disappointment doesn’t get the last word.
In fact, on Monday I’m going to introduce you to a lady that didn’t win last year. She’s made a video for all of you. And every time I watch it, I cry because of how raw, real and inspiring it is.
We have exciting news friends! I’m still pinching myself!
Last week, I talked with The Nate Berkus Show about the awesome auction that Thirst Relief is doing. I told them how amazing it is to have the photography community come together like this every year, what I was including in my package, and… Would it be possible to have The Nate Berkus Show support Thirst Relief too? (FYI, these requests are never easy because of the endless legalities involved, but it never hurts to ask.)
For some wonderful reason, this opportunity fell together!
I’m excited to announce that The Nate Berkus Show would like to show it’s support of Thirst Relief’s Auction by giving us TWO VIP TICKETS for the show!
What does this mean? If you are the highest bidder for my auction, you will not only get a Private Mentor Session, reserved spot in our CONFIDENCE Workshops, one of the first copies of my new book and our Complete, award winning, DVD set, but you will also get VIP access to a taping of the Nate Berkus Show in New York! So fun!! The experience you have will be unforgettable. It’s so fascinating to see all that is going on Behind-the-Scenes (especially the funny bloopers that get left on the editing floor)! So whether you are in NY or want to make a special weekend trip out of this, your adventure is calling!
*The auction ENDS TONIGHT between 6 and 8pm PST!!*
CLICK HERE to place your bid. Just $5 gives someone clean water for LIFE!
Most of all, a BIG THANK YOU and virtual HUG to Nate Berkus for supporting the awesome cause of Thirst Relief and increasing their exposure even more! We love you Nate!
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