Happy New Year

What a year!!! I remember my excitement for 2020 and how I KNEW it would be a big year. Well…. IT WAS!!! I’m not going to spend this post recapping everything that happened in our lives, but I do want to touch on a few things... Our generation has gotten the chance to experience living through a life changing experience with everyone else in the world. Not something that just your family, county, or state experienced, but everyone EVERYWHERE is experiencing the same thing at different levels. It brings the constant reminder to be kind, to give grace, and to understand that life does not revolve around us. Everyone is experiencing difficult, saddening, heart wrenching, beautiful, glorious, and magnificent times. Since we are all walking a similar road we have learned to have extra sympathy for others. Remember though, that things happen in everyone’s life that are not caused by a pandemic. These personal hardships have been happening for centuries, but many times we forget that. When I am angry, frustrated, or saddened by the actions of another, I have to remember to have grace for them. To remind myself that I don’t know what is happening in their life, but to know that God has extended the same grace to me in my weak moments and I can do the same for them. Personally, my family experience a loss because of this pandemic. My incredible Grandfather passed so suddenly just weeks before my sister’s wedding. No one saw it coming, but the sadness was none the different. As I write this post, I’m sitting with my Grandma, sister, and Mom watching a movie. Sitting in the home I haven’t been to for years, a home without my Grandpa, a home that is still so full of love, yet missing a beautiful part. It causes me to embrace the moments I have with my loved ones, the memories I had with my Grandpa. I will never again hear my Grandpa’s laugh, see his wink, watch him nap with newspaper over his face, feel his strong hugs, lose a card game to him, hear one of his amazing stories, or listen to his hilarious jokes. There are so many things I wish I had said or done with him, but I choose to be grateful for the time I had, to remember those special memories. Losing a loved one is never easy, but everyone walks this road. When a war, famine, earthquake, tsunami, car accident, cancer, tumor, broken limb, heartache, loneliness, family death, friend’s passing, flood, or pandemic changes our life, we can either rise to finding our NEW normal or wish for the old comfortable way. We can complain or be grateful for what we had and still have. Every road is different every year, but we can choose to start paving it or let life pass us by till it becomes easy. Half the point of a road trip is the journey. You might have to sit in hours of traffic, but you can always make the best out of it. 2021 might not be what we were hoping for back in 2019. 2021 won’t be the reset to 2020, but it is a new year to grow. To love learning, changing, hoping, embracing family and friends, to make your God the center of your universe. Change is hard, especially when we didn’t ask for it, so embrace your new normal. Be excited to meet the challenges ahead and don’t live in worry and fear that paralyzes you. I hope 2021 will be the absolute best that God has for you. That you can leave this year so grateful for it. I am! 2020 saw my sister married, I gained a brother, started new deep friendships, visited my Grandma, my piano studio grew even larger, I saw many friends, photographed weddings and portrait/engagement sessions, read books, learned a lot about myself, became vice president of my local music chapter, and found my Lord and Savior even more pure, loving, true, kind, and mighty. He's Never Failed Me Yet Be encouraged as you walk your new road. Cling to knowing that God see’s the view from the helicopter and knows the destination.

Happy New Year!

Jusqu'à la prochaine fois,

Maria

5th Annual Collage of the Year

Note: Due to the lack of space and out of respect to clients, I was not able to display all my favorite images, but please know that I loved every moment I got to spend with each of you! You all make it possible for me to keep doing what I love. <3