Today was one of those days, one of those pages in the story of your life where time freezes and for one second you almost think the book is over and you are no longer here then you breathe and see you are okay although you just saw a car flip a couple of times through the air through your rear view mirror and thank God for your life, for your family, for your safety. I had to stop the car and a gentlemen approached the upside down bug laying sadly on the concrete floor on broad cloudy early afternoon light, the lady was concious and okay and as we waited for the police and for help, my heart beat so fast. I was in the left lane you see and what if I was in the right lane, what if I was closer to her, what if she had hit my car. Ironically I was on left lane 2 minutes before thinking why was I on left lane, I was near that crazy two way street lane and thought that kind of lane would never work in Brazil and not even 2 minutes goes by and I hear a loud noise and look through rear view mirros confused and in disbelief at the site which seemed more like a movie than real life.

Our lifestory is a short one and the more I think about death, the more I want to live, the more I want to laugh, the more I want to love, the more I want to serve God, the more I want to reach for the stars, the more I want to be happy, the more I want to cuddle my boys and kiss my husband as he walks in in his construction clothes and I kiss him anyway and so more I want to take pictures, good ones, bad ones, iphone ones, whatever cause I want to hold on to these pages of my life as best as I can. Attending WPPI last week and doing photo shoots in Las Vegas was fun, exciting and uplifting and another lesson I got from it was I am missing the big picture. As God’s children, He wants what is best for us as we do for our own but we are so limited by our disbelief, at least I am, I am limited by my narrow sided vision and forget He takes care of our blindside and has such a more bigger picture for us.

Here is an example, when I attened the Fast Track Workshop in NY last October and I met Dane Sanders and saw how genuine he was and heard he was going to Brazil, a little voice in my head said, offer to translate for him while he is there, who knows you may get a free trip to Brazil. My limited vision was in thinking of my immediate needs situation, had not been to Brazil in 5 years, would love to go and what not better excuse than to hang with Dane? Coming back from WPPI and seeing what God had planned for me makes me want to kick myself in my behind and makes me realize that I need some bigger dreams for I am missing the big picture. As I stated yesterday with some of my mom photo friends on line,

“how little my mind is compared to what God really has envisioned for my life since we dont see the big picture we get stucjk on minor details that fog up our vision and see only what is so close to us meanwhile God is working on a panoramic view “

You see I was bummed I did not get asked to go to Brazil to  this one time event, sad, and just kept dreaming of it but to my surprise something magical happened, and I was invited to lead a Fast Track Brazil group on line, so I was in turn not attending 1 event but I was asked to be a leader for my fellow Brazilians, how cool is that? do you see the differance? do you see the much bigger picture at hand? International Leader, ambassador for the culture I so love? scary but I will sure try, I am so thankful to Dane’s friendship and the whole Fast Track Community and all the great photogs I met at WPPI. I am looking forward to dreaming bigger, higher, wider and encourage you to in what ever you are doing, if it is launching a photography or any other business, if it is planning your wedding, if it is restarting something, if it is finally taking that trip, setting that goal, dream bigger and cherish todays page in life.

Here are a few shots of me and Katrina Wheeler in our debut on Fast Track TV ( watch it here if you missed it)  where we gave some moms some tips of how to use social media  to help organize our chaotic life which we have motherhood, business, wife tales etc.  ( I will do separate blog post with tips since I really did not get to say everything I wanted) Thanks to my new awesome buddy Michelle for taking these.

I make some funny faces and I talk with my hands while I close my eyes sometimes, hay whatever works!

and we had a live audience too!

Thanks to all our friends and family who support us, who stopped by on twitter @fasttrackphoto and who came just to encourage us, thank you so so so much

and here are some Las Vegas pixs from my hotel room ( MGM Signature Hotel photos)

As a NJ based Wedding and Lifestyle Photographer, I have to say I am so excited.Within 24 hours  I will be on a plane headed to Las Vegas, NV for one of the biggest if not the biggest Photography Convention in the world, WPPI ( Wedding & Portrait Professionals International) which will take place at the MGM grand in Las Vegas Strip. you probably have seen all the crazy tweets and might even be a bit annoyed but let me tell you good times, great pictures and lots of changes to come.  I feel very blessed that I am able to go and have friends and family supporting me and major helping with the kids. As a mom, it is not easy going away, it seems the kids act up right before, house is a little crazy and the to do list is never ending but again just feel blessed I am able to go at all. Some amazing things are about to happen in the next 5 days professionally and personally and I must thank God for all of that, for being able to share my ideas, my work, my feelings on this blog with you and to continue to create art with my camera As I write here in the dark and the kids are asleep, I feel tired, excited, proud, happy, blessed,worried about the kids and hubster already and I feel peaceful too.

For those of you at WPPI you will also see me wearing a pictagerazzi shirt. I was one of the photographers selected by Pictage to capture some pictures of the event so photographers there can order free prints from the talks and trade show. It is an honor to be connected to Pictage and looking forward to meeting many cool photogs and leaders. And also I super excited about participating in the Fast Track TV which will be aired on www.askdane.com so if you are not attending WPPI tune in and see full schedule here*** I am nervous but luckily I will not be alone, I will be with fellow mom photographer Katrina Wheeler and we will have a talk on being a mom, launching a photography business and how social media has helped. Please join us Tuesday at 2 p.m EST/ 11. am PST and send your questions ahead of time on twitter @fastrackphoto

And if you want to connect while at WPPI, dm me on twitter and here are a few places I will be at for sure. THESE TIMES ARE PST TIMES.

Sunday-

9 am- brunch - Rainforest Cafe, feel free to join me

12:30- Pictagerazzi meeting

1:30- Bui Brothers Workshop

8-9 - Pictage Welcome Reception

Airhorns and Lasers after that- woo hoo

Monday- busy day

8 a.m

then some classes and trade floor

2:00-4:00 pm workshop with Stephen Knuth

4:00-5:30 pm Fast Track Shoot out

WPPI pool party – 8:00 p.m. – 10:00 p.m.
The 30th anniversary WPPI pool party at the MGM pool? no swimming for me, hair is not water proof and need it to last while I am there, lol

Tuesday-

11:00- New Media Lounge- tune in on www.askdane.com to watch me, hopefully I will not chatter away,

3:30 pm- Dane Sanders Platform talk

6:00 p.m- Fast Track After party

Then B-school Party perhaps

Wed-

8 am breakfast  with Show it Unite

perhaps 1 class and back home

I have not packed just yet. I am a planner, I love to plan plan plan but have a bad habit of leaving some things for last minute, just like my shopping and packing list and then when I go shopping, of course I can not find anything that fits and the mall is about to close. Happy Friday, so are you an early color cordinate your socks packer or are you a last minute see what fits in suit case and pray you dont forget your tooth brush but you always do anyhow packer? I would like to say I am in between and pushing for the first then the second one, after all I do not want a tooth brush collection. I also work well under pressure for these kind of things, well sort of, at least that is what I tell myself, I would love to hear your packing and traveling tips. Of course we need some pixs up in this blog so here are some sneaks of my new business card which I got paid for my trip, designed by the lovely www.charlenevaz.com

As you can see I most  likely will be not updating my blog but please follow me on twitter and facebook for the updates on my great trip. Wishing everyone safe travels and I can not wait to connect. Also booths I will be sure to check out are: Tofurious, Shoot Sac, New Media Lounge, Pictage, Finao Albums, Shoot Q,Shoot Dot Edit, Kevin Kubota, Drop It Modern, and some others

Last week I had the pleasure to listen in to Jesh De Rox talk to Dane on www.askdane.com, you should check it out, the live recording at Imaging USA . One thing he asked was, what brings you Joy? And he then said do more and more and more of that and it made so much sense. Then I made a list of things that made me joyous and thought hum I need to do more of this and I will be in better mood and perhaps more productive but more importantly I will be HAPPY because isn’t that what it is about, sometimes we think it is about success and making money, great things too but what if you get there to the top and you are not happy? Isn’t better to be happy along the way instead of thinking you will one day be happy. I am reading the book the “The 4-hour work week” and just gotten to the part where the author talks about Elimination and said some of the same ideas, I will quote it here:
80/20 rule which I think is a great exercise-

1) Which 20% of sources are causing 80% of my problems and unhappiness
2) Which 20% of sources are resulting in 80% of my desired outcomes and happiness?

Then he went to say that he found out that only 5 customers were bringing him over 90% of the income and he was spending all this time calling all these are people that were just taking energy from him ( could so related to that especially in beginning of my photography business) and making him unhappy so he says

I then identified the common characteristics of my top-five customers and secured three or similarly profiled buyers in the following week. REMEMBER MORE CUSTOMERS IS NOT AUTOMATICALLY MORE INCOME. More customers is not the goal and often translates into 90% more housekeeping and a paltry 1-3% increase in income.

He also said instead of having this huge to do list, take a piece of paper that you can fit in your pocket and write 1 or 2 urgent things or things that if you did just those things, you would be satisfied and then go on your day to do other things like fun cool stuff so this sparked my interest. I work up Saturday having 2 important things to do for my Sunday Christening shooting event and then decided I would take the boys to the Liberty Science Center. We had driven by it on our way to the city many times and Lucas was especially interested. When I saw the T.Rex Sue Exhibit was launching that day, it was a green light. I got dressed up and pickup up my sister Ana and we headed to a fun filled afternoon of discoveries, dinosaurs, learning and even creepy creatures. I so loved the Center and we even watched a 3D Dinosaur documentary. It was such a relaxing time even with little Joshua acting up a bit and the day made me smile and made me happy. It was also a pretty much computer free day. As I was driving back home, my husband said he was cooking dinner for some friends to come over, perfect or what? I do plan to eliminate more things that cause me stress and suck up my energy, eliminate and automate so you could live the good life. Here is a glimpse of mine. Be sure to watch the SLIDESHOW*** to see more pixs.

Fuse News ( p.s if I like you enough, I will let you call me fuse, some very close friends of mine from high-school call me that and I like it.

• We are touching up the blog, testing out some things so some changes now and more in near future and I hope my website will be launched next month.
• I also was invited to lead a Fast Track Brasil group which I am so excited and nervous about since it will be an international group of photographers in Brazil or Brazilian Photographers to get insight on our local Fast Track Groups here. It is a test out phase before Dane goes to Brazil in April. If you are Brazilian, I ask that you join us, more info coming soon.
• I was contacted to be interviewed by a local paper today and I can not wait to see final print
• Q & A by the Fuse- I will be interviewing some fun guests in wedding industry, this includes, photographers, vendors, planners, so if you want to be interviewed just contact me under contact me form up on the blog.
• Want to sign up for my newsletter to receive my current Valentines’ Day offer? then use contact form and sign up

When I got involved in hosting the NY Fast Track Road Show with Dane Sanders, I knew it would be big but I did not know it would be life changing, I left this workshop feeling refreshed, renewed, energized and full, most workshops I have attended had that feel good feeling during the workshop then you went home feeling empty nested but not with this one. The workshop was held at the awesome Ira Lippke Studios in NY and that was exciting as is, thank you Ira for allowing us to come into your space like that, we felt so honored and after this workshop  I felt ready, excited, and different, different is so many ways that a blog post will not bear to hear, but one thing I did not expect was Dane’s gift.He has a gift of reading people, like I never seen before, he looks at you and hears your second and third conversations going inside your head and not that first conversation you are muttering with you lips and words seem to come out. I am still impacted by the amount of care from other Fast Trackers and how committed they are in being a support system for newbies like me. I feel so loved and supported and I am so excited for every one’s journey and success as well, we were a very diversified group from all over the States with different backgrounds and religions but we have this passion thing going on with Photography and we are committed in making a successful business of it and helping each other so we can all raise the bar. And with this kind of foundation, how can I not? I encourage you if you are new and can attend one of these workshops, it will be worth it! and if you are feeling down, discouraged and feel like giving up! buy the book at least but try and go because opportunities in life they pass you by and they may come once. I also loved our hands on shoot with this hot Brazilian couple that I found 24 hours before the shoot began, first couple backed out last minute but it sure worked out. We each had a chance to shoot and be in command for 5 minutes interacting with couple and the other photographers would second shoot for 4 minutes and we shot alone the last minute then we received feedback from the group. I chickened out in beginning and went last which was not the best idea but it was okay to fail, we were there to practice. I absolutely loved the tips Dane gave about natural lighting, ambient lighting and natural reflectors. We were in the meat packing industry in NY and what a great spot!  I can not thank Dane enough for his kindness, his sincerity and compassion for us and the only way I can truly thank him is by continuing and inspiring others to be Fast Trackers as well, live the dream! Here are some ok shots of the session, I was a nervous wreck! Way behind folks but getting some help this week so bare with me with the blog posts.

We went up the High Line and it was so much fun! more pixs to come!