a resource

lighstalkers is a great resource for independent photographers and journalist. there are discussion forum and networking tools for anyone traveling around the globe.

it is free to join and there is a ton of incredible information circulating.

happy traveling!

new you 2008

i am a member of we2e (woman entrepreneur to entrepreneur), an unique networking group focused on supporting entrepreneurial boulder women.

on sunday may 4th, we2e is putting on the NEW YOU 2008, an experiential expo, at the st.julian in boulder, colorado. you can go to NEW YOU site to register today. this event is going to be amazing and you won't want to miss it! please forward this flyer to other women in your life!.


The $20 admission fee (as well as all proceeds) benefit the Boulder YWCA and gets you:

• Entrance to the tradeshow that includes free services, tips and giveaways from Boulder women-owned businesses
• Mini-seminars such as "Declutter your Life and Your Thighs", "Turn Your Digital Trash into Treasure" and "On-the-Spot Style Edits"
• Wine and appetizer networking hour
• Evening Gala featuring keynote speech "Practicing Safe Stress" by Gina Shreck, as well as the results of whole-life makeovers we2e members provided for 8 lucky women

three weeks old

in march, kim asked me to document her pregnancy. all smiles throughout the entire session, kim loved pregnancy and could not wait to meet her little girl. her maternity photos can be seen here.

three weeks later, sydney arrived with her eyes open and ready to absorb the world. and three weeks later, kim asked me back to photograph the start of their new family. a baby changes so much in the first year so it is special to have photos to remember and reflect on when you have a moment. as parents we know those moments are far and few between but they are perfect when you get them.

to see a slide show from our day, click HERE.

{is that a nake lady in cheney's sunglasses?}

today's hot photo topic is dick cheney's sunglasses.

a photo of vice president dick cheney is sparking a lot of questions among internet readers as to what's being reflected in his sunglasses.

is it really a naked woman? what do you think?

The picture, posted on the White House Web site, shows Cheney fly fishing in Idaho.

{photography in magazines conference}

if you have ever wondered about how to break into the magazine world, there is a conference in boulder this weekend to help you figure out how. the 2008 photography in magazine conference is bringing in photographers and photo editors to speak specifically on shooting for magazines.

as a photo editor at backpacker magazine, i have been invited to speak about the how the decisions get made to choose which photographers are chosen to shoot a feature and why. brad kaminski, the photo editor at velo news and inside triathlon, will also be speaking with me about how his magazines make their photographic decisions.

there are a lot of great speakers, corey rich from aurora stock agency, beth wald, outside magazine, and national geographic to name a few.

this is a great opportunity to meet with photo editors to establish a relationship. everyone wants to work with people who they like and enjoy so you could start your new relationship in boulder.

over the weekend, i am planning on attending most of the lectures and i will post tips i learn from conference for you.

here is one tip to start your weekend off.

* do your research. get a subscription to any magazine you are interested in shooting and study it for before calling the photo editor. be familiar with the front and back of the book as well as the features.

{for all those parents out there}

a dear friend emailed this to me and it made me cry.

By Anna Quindlen, Pulitzer prize-winning columnist and Author

All my babies are gone now. I say this not in sorrow, but in disbelief.

I take great satisfaction in what I have today: three almost-adults, two taller than I am, one closing in fast. Three people who read the same books I do and have learned not to be afraid of disagreeing with me in their opinion of them, who sometimes tell vulgar jokes that make me laugh until I choke and cry, who need razor blades and shower gel and privacy, who want to keep their doors closed more than I like.

Who, miraculously, go to the bathroom, zip up their jackets and move food from plate to mouth all by themselves.

Like the trick soap I bought for the bathroom with a rubber ducky at its center, the baby is buried deep within each, barely discernible except through the unreliable haze of the past.

Everything in all the books I once pored over is finished for me now.

Penelope Leach, T. Berry Brazelton, Dr. Spock. The ones on sibling rivalry and sleeping through the night and early-childhood education - all grown obsolete. Along with Goodnight Moon and Where the Wild Things Are, they are battered, spotted, well used. But I suspect that if you flipped the pages dust would rise like memories. What those books taught me, finally, and what the women on the playground taught me, and the well-meaning relations - what they taught me, was that they couldn't really teach me very much at all.

Raising children is presented at first as a true-false test, then becomes multiple choice, until finally, far along, you realize that it is an endless essay.

No one knows anything. One child responds well to positive reinforcement, another can be managed only with a stern voice and a timeout. One child is toilet trained at 3, his sibling at 2.

When my first child was born, parents were told to put baby to bed on his belly so that he would not choke on his own spit-up. By the time my last arrived, babies were put down on their backs because of research on sudden infant death syndrome. To a new parent, this ever-shifting certainty is terrifying, and then soothing.

Eventually you must learn to trust yourself. Eventually the research will follow. I remember 15 years ago poring over one of Dr. Brazelton's wonderful books on child development, in which he describes three different sorts of infants: average, quiet, and active. I was looking for a sub-quiet codicil for an 18-month old who did not walk. Was there something wrong with his fat little legs? Was there something wrong with his tiny little mind? Was he developmentally delayed, physically challenged? Was I insane? Last year he

went to China . Next year he goes to college. He can talk just fine. He can walk, too.

Every part of raising children is humbling. Believe me, mistakes were made. They have all been enshrined in the 'Remember-When-Mom-Did' Hall of Fame. The outbursts, the temper tantrums, the bad language - mine, not theirs. The times the baby fell off the bed.

The times I arrived late for preschool pickup. The nightmare sleepover. The horrible summer camp. The day when the youngest came barreling out of the classroom with a 98 on her geography test, and I responded, "What did you get wrong?" (She insisted I include that here.) The time I ordered food at the McDonald's drive-through speaker and then drove away without picking it up from the window. (They all insisted I include that.) I did not allow them to watch the Simpsons for the first two seasons. What was I thinking?

But the biggest mistake I made is the one that most of us make while doing this. I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs. There is one picture of the three of them, sitting in the grass on a quilt in the shadow of the swing set on a summer day, ages 6, 4 and 1. And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked

when they slept that night. I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less.

Even today I'm not sure what worked and what didn't, what was me and what was simply life. When they were very small, I suppose I thought someday they would become who they were because of what I'd done. Now I suspect they simply grew into their true selves because they demanded in a thousand ways that I back off and let them be. The books said to be relaxed and I was often tense, matter-of-fact and I was sometimes over the top. And look how

it all turned out. I wound up with the three people I like best in the

world, who have done more than anyone to excavate my essential humanity. That's what the books never told me. I was bound and determined to learn from the experts.

It just took me a while to figure out who the experts were.

colors of costa rica

last week we took our first international family vacation to costa rica. along with two other families, we rented a house in ojochal just south of dominical. six adults and four kids toured around the beaches and jungles in and around ojochal. as the sun was setting margaritas were drank. there was plenty of fresh fish and the tastiest avocados ever were eaten daily.

we already have our next trip planned. can't wait to return.

here are a few photos from the week as well as a slide show click HERE.





this is a little slide show from my point and shoot.

{memories}

i just returned from my first family vacation to costa rica with my husband and sixteen month old daughter. during our 10 day visit, we created many memories and shared many experiences with dear friends that i will cherish. in a few days i will post photos from our trip so stay tuned.

i believe it is the relationships we create in our lives that make our lives rich and meaningful. before i left for costa rica, i had the opportunity to photograph a wonderful relationship that has been going strong for 14 years between theodore and margaret. sadly, theodore's health is declining so we visited some his favorites spots to walk, run, and explore. these photos will preserve their relationship forever.

to see the slide show from our afternoon, click HERE.