This month, I received an honor with Professional Photographers of America that, once upon a time, I never dreamed of accomplishing.  I received my Master of Photography degree.   This degree is awarded for superior photographic skills—demonstrated through photographic competition, advanced education and service to the industry.  I honestly pursued this goal just to see if I could do it, it became my Everest.  I also received a Bronze photographer of the year award for meriting with all 4 of my competition entries and one of these being admitted into the Loan Collection.  Now that I have accomplished this goal, it is time for me to purse some new personal and professional goals.  I have a couple of ideas, but I will keep you posted.

I apologize for not keeping up on my blog.

This has been a year of many changes in my life, one of these being the loss of my father.  And frankly, I haven’t really been myself since his passing.  I am working very hard to try to get back to feeling like myself again.  Of course, maybe we never really feel the same again, but rather try to move on the best we can with our new normal.

I remember the day I took this image.  This was a portrait of both my mom and dad together.  It was in January of 2011, six years ago now.  Dad very much wanted me to take a picture of him and my mom.  Both of my parents were healthy and it was a great time to capture them.  Little did I know at that time, that this picture would also serve as my Dad’s obituary picture a mere  5 1/2 years later.

None of us knows how much time we have left.  Dad wasn’t ready to go when he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer at the age of 73 in September 2015.  He had a lot of plans for traveling adventures and enjoy his and Mom’s golden years.  Cancer treatment did not fit into his future.  He was scared, yet he took on this challenge.  He was so happy when an MRI indicated that the cancer was gone following his surgery and chemo treatments.  Pancreatic cancer is sneaky, though, and it grew in spite of treatments.  He passed peacefully with my mom and siblings by his side this past July.

I am still grieving.

I haven’t disappeared with my photography business, but merely needed to take a step back these last several months.

Thank you, friends, for giving me the opportunity to heal these last months.