All right you guys… I am in my sketchy basement writing a blog post using voice command on my phone in the notes app while trying to get a workout in while the babies take their afternoon nap. (Here’s a photo of my current status, just so you can get a good visual of how sketchy our 100 year old basement really is! haha)
My brother has been harassing encouraging me to get back to posting more than just shoots and weddings on my blog again and I promised him I would do my best. The truth is I have felt very torn this year about giving up my usual and regular blog posts. There is one thing I always preach at our workshops and that is to be consistent on your blog. I was a 5x a week blogger since 2010, up until my pregnancy in 2015, at which point I backed up to three days a week. Once the babies arrived it was a whole different story though!
We were in survival mode for the first few months of life (and on maternity leave, to be fair), and once our wedding season picked up we were really just figuring it out day by day and doing our best (on about 4 hrs of sleep a day). Ha! That meant at the time during my working hours (which were scattered throughout all hours of the day) I was focusing 100% of my energy on giving our current clients my all. I didn’t have the time I used to for dreaming about new ventures in our business or for sitting down to just empty my brain into a blog post. All year I kept telling myself I would get back to it and as I’m sure you’ve noticed… that has not happened.
Part of me felt like that was OK because most people seem to be going more to social media (Instagram in particular) for connecting with businesses lately and so I kept telling myself it was OK to just let it go and do what I could when I could. In reality, some of that is true – but there is still so much value in sharing yourself on your blog as well. Also, and probably more importantly to me – I really do miss writing in this platform and connecting with people in a more concrete way.
A funny thing about myself is that I am constantly writing my experiences in my head. James is one of the few people who has noticed this – but throughout the day I will type out a blog post in my brain as if I were really typing on a computer… like ghost typing with my fingers basically… haha … which is super weird I’ve realized, especially when James and I are holding hands – he’s like “Are you writing in your head again?!” Anyway, this is all to say that obviously I have missed sharing our stories in this platform and this coming wedding season I am truly going to do my best to get back to doing it on a more regular basis.
The truth is, as I’m sure you know… life after children looks very different than life before children – no matter how much you convince yourself “nothing is going to change.” haha. I know this in the deepest part of my being, and yet I find myself watching other people in the photography industry on social media and feeling bad about the fact that I can’t put as much effort into doing big things in our business like I used to be able to. I see people traveling to all these beautiful destinations, hosting workshop after workshop, speaking at conferences, attending networking events, and all sorts of other things. And as silly as it is, I let the comparison game get to me now and then. Which is actually really ridiculous… as I’m sure you know… since our reality looks absolutely nothing like anybody else’s that I know. Therefore, why would I ever compare our reality to anybody else’s… especially people in the photography industry who don’t have any kiddos?!
We had those years in our business for all of those big dreams and working pretty much nonstop. We did that so we could get to a place where when we had kids we could focus more of our attention on them and pull some of that attention and time away from the business for a little while. I have to remind myself that that was the whole point of all our hustle to begin with… to build a life that we had dreamed of with our family. And I am well aware that as our children grow – our balance between our family and our business will adjust in a variety of ways throughout the years.
I have to believe that we are doing what is best for our little family right now, and making decisions so that we can thrive in ways that matter to us, which for us will ALWAYS ALWAYS be time spent together above all else. And for now that means putting some of our big business dreams on hold so that we can focus on our big life and family dreams, including spending these formative years with our boys.
Every day is a learning process for us. We are CONSTANTLY trying to find a balance between ourselves… our marriage… our boys… our business… our health… our hobbies… and more. I hope to be able to share more of that struggle with you all this year – as well as the beautiful days and joyful moments of course!! And if that means I’m writing a blog post using voice command in our sketchy basement while squeezing in a 30 minute workout while the boys nap… then so be it. I hope you’ll keep tuning in and keep supporting us as you have in all of the years prior to this. We are where we are right now thanks to the support and referrals from all of you and I never forget that for one moment!
Now, I have a favor to ask from you! I would love to hear what you guys would like to hear from us. I’ve toyed with the idea of doing more Facebook Live videos with James and myself… And I also want to broach various topics on the blog with you all.
Some of the blog posts I have bouncing around in my brain are:
- Tips for shooting weddings while pregnant (& how to handle client relations/expectations when you have a baby on the way)
- Thriving (not just surviving) the first year of marriage after babies… (Thoughts on our struggles and what we learned this past year)
- Must have items for babies’ first year (twins in particular!)
If you have things you would love for me to write about please leave them in the comments below! It can be business related, photography related, marriage related or babies/twins/parenting related… whatever! 🙂 Otherwise I will just continue to write from my heart as I have in all the years past, and hopefully you all will come back here and read what I have to share. 🙂
And now I have to get my butt into gear and finish this work out because there are a babies wide awake in their cribs upstairs! LOL
Talk soon, I promise! 😉
Oh, and because all posts should have these two cuties featured… here they are! 😉
