Life Art Photographs is Turning Five!!//January 7, 2013

Where in the world does the time go? It’s hard to believe that it’s my fifth year as a full-time photographer. I couldn’t be more excited about that, I love my job! I’m also going to be celebrating my fifth wedding anniversary this year too! The past four years have been such a blessing, but this year is going to be something special, I’m going to make sure of that! In fact, my husband and I decided that this is going to be the year of the Beekmanns! I am going to be doing a bit more blogging this year in order to make this a more personal place for my clients (past, present, and future), curious photographers, and for myself. To kick it off, I decided to share some of my 2013 goals. I’m mingling professional and personal goals together in this post because they are equally important to me. None of these goals are task oriented, they are all there to enhance an aspect of either my life, my creativity, my business, or a combination of one of the three. Living a well rounded, positive, and fulfilling life is a key ingredient to my business and the quality of the products and service that I provide. Continuing to maintain a love and enthusiasm for photography, relationships, and people is the foundation of what my business is all about.

1. Take more the time to savor all of my experiences. I have a tendency to move so quickly that I miss opportunities to enjoy life as much as I should. This year I endeavor to slow down a bit and smell the proverbial roses. I’m looking to find a balance between satisfying my need to make sure I’m not keeping anyone waiting and taking time to make sure that I’m ready to move forward before taking the next steps in whatever it is in that I’m focused on.
2. Look for beauty in unexpected places. I plan to spend more time looking around at life itself to find beauty, both physical and otherwise, in all aspects of life. Beauty in all forms is inspirational to me. What I hope to learn from this exercise is perspective. I already know what I’m drawn to naturally, so taking time to look around will give me an opportunity to appreciate things I may not have otherwise noticed.
3. Accountability to my health! This is a huge goal for me in 2013. I’m not an unhealthy person today, but I do have a LOT of room for improvement! This year I will prioritize my health over all of the tasks that have diverted my attention in the past. Translation, exercise first then check my email, then facebook, etc…
4. Incorporate creativity in my personal life. Having a career in a creative field is wonderful, but I will be the first person to admit that I have a tendency to turn that piece of my mind off in my personal life so that I can try to maintain a work/life balance. This year I want to pull it back in. I vow to take more photos in my personal life and take on additional creative projects just for the sake of pure enjoyment. Learning to knit is one of the things that are high on my list.
5. Last, but not least, prioritizing family is a huge goal for me this year. My nephew Cooper is now almost four years old and we’re expecting a nephew this year on Brock’s side of the family as well. Life moves so quickly and I want to soak up as much time as I possibly can with these little guys while they’re still little. We’re also going to continue prioritizing trying to start of family of our own. Losing our first pregnancy in 2012 shined a huge light on how much it means to me to make sure that our two-legged family grows. We’re officially at capacity with members of the four legged variety now.

Finally, I’d like to share a couple of frames from Emily and Kyle’s wedding from this past weekend. I’ll be sharing a full preview later this week, but just can’t wait to put up a couple of favorites to go along with this post. 2013 is off to an amazing start and I can’t wait to share more as the year unfolds!