I'm having another one of those days where I can't seem to sit still. I feel like constantly shaking: probably due to the adrenaline of my to-do list running through my veins, some really exciting stuff coming up in my business (EEE!) AND the very caffeinated green tea I had on an empty stomach in a client meeting this morning. And I had 86% dark chocolate for lunch. With an apple. I'm such a balanced woman. ;)

I want to talk to y'all (I don't know why I love typing y'all. I'm not Southern at all. I never say it. But typing y'all is just fun) a little bit today about social networking. I really don't like the excuse some photographers give for not blogging, for not twittering, for not facebooking: "I'm too busy." If you're too busy, I'd venture to say you're spending your time working on things in your business that you don't need to be doing: like editing or designing albums. Don't! (Oooh, I'm calling you all out now!) Take a break from the to-do list and spend some time working on your business, instead of in your business.

I think the world of blogging is brilliant. The world of social networking in general is brilliant. I've connected to a huge network of photographers through forums like OpenSourcePhoto, sites like Twitter and Facebook and my blog. These connections and networking sites have led to second-shooting opportunities, referrals to wedding clients in faraway places (like the wedding I'm shooting in Malibu next year) and great life-long friends I've made along the way.

Just a little reminder today to step back and look at the big picture in your business. Could you hire somebody to package those client DVDs and drop them off at the post office while you take a vendor you admire out for lunch and learn about their business? Could you let go of your control-freak nature and outsource your album design so you'd be free to spend one day a week refining you brand? Consider this a challenge. ;) GO!

[Edited to Add] Oh yes, before I go and receive a ton of questions about who I use for album design, that would be my brother Brandon Peterson. You can contact him at peterson.brandon@gmail.com - he will hook you up!

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My green tea and I. Taken by my friend Christi Ann who visited me last weekend! I did a quick session of her that I'll share in the next few days. ;) P.S. Christi and I met through the internet: there's a crazy little web of networking out there.

I love design. I love art. I love art galleries. I love graphic design. I love typography. I love a well-built house. I love a quirky centerpiece. I love square plates. Some objects, some finishes, some brochures, some magazines, some homes make me want to have them right now. One of my absolute favourite things to do is to walk through new model homes in new subdivisions or apartment buildings. LOVE. I'm super pumped to have my own place someday. Until then, I'll just dream.

On our family road trip in September (posts you can find here and here) we stayed in the Four Points by Sheraton Levis Convention Centre in Quebec. I've seen some pretty Sheratons and some not so pretty Sheratons, so I wasn't sure what it would be like. Umm, let's just say my favourite hotel of the whole trip!? So modern, chic, sexy. Yup. The hotel was sexy.

For breakfast one morning we walked into the Le Cosmos Cafe located in the hotel. My mouth pretty much dropped to the floor. Okay, let me get girlie for a few sentences here: this is my dream wedding venue. DREAM. Look at that wood paneling. That stone feature wall. Those purple chandeliers. The bubblelight fixtures that change COLOUR every few minutes along with the hanging tree curtain thing at the back. The big print of Marilyn Monroe? The purple chairs and the purple booths? AH. I just thought this place was so stinkin' beautiful that you readers needed to see.

I felt inspired. And the French language that was flowing around me here certainly was inspiring too.

Hello blog readers and hello the start of a new week! In light of Saturday's post, I took the whole weekend off--except for answering client emails. Just can't let go of that yet. And it was wonderful! I saw some beautiful spots, took some beautiful photos, laughed at this beautiful life. Segway... here's another beautiful thing: this couple. Jalen & Kyle. We met in a funny little way. Jalen and Kyle became engaged last year. Jalen's former youth leader is my aunt's sister. We got in touch and Jalen and her friend and I met over coffee and talked and laughed about their May wedding. I just loved her. In the end, it didn't work out for me to photograph their wedding, but we stayed in touch since then!

We have been facebook friends since that first meeting about a year ago now and we definitely have the same kind of humour. I constantly found myself laughing at her statuses, or being inspired by her beautiful writing on her blog. There came a point when we said, "Why do we NOT hang out?" So we went for coffee a few months ago: me, still a wedding photographer, her, no longer an engaged woman, but a married one. ;)

I posted on my twitter and facebook page that I was looking for young, fun, hot couples to model for a photographer learning session I was teaching. I received a comment from Jalen right away, "Um. Hot is kinda intimidating?" Hah! I immediately wrote on her wall and said that her and Kyle would be PERFECT. And that they must model. They agreed! Kyle and Jalen were such a joy to photograph: kept me laughing the whole time. I love seeing young couples lovin' each other and lovin' Jesus. Makes me happy.

P.S. Does Jalen look familiar? She's Whitney's sister! (Oh and random fact, just because I find this so interesting. Jalen and Whitney still have the same last name because they married two boys both with the last name Dyck. Unrelated.)