Cape Hatteras, NC - Do you see the clouds and rain, or treasures, beauty, and potential?

Insomnia.  Again.  I see posts from friends almost daily on facebook about being up all hours of the night.  I am envious of my husband, who can fall asleep in under 10 seconds and not wake up until the alarm goes off.  I spend a lot of time on my computer in the middle of the night, wishing my brain would turn off so that I could enjoy the same kind of rest and rejuvenation.

When I woke up a few hours ago (it's 5:00 now) I started to fall into that same grumbling trap.  I checked my facebookpages, played around on pinterest, thought about all the things I need to do and haven't gotten done, listened to the wind, and finally started to think about what I wanted to write about today.  Yesterday didn't end as well as it started, so I decided I needed to work to change the way I was starting to look at things today.

........ HOW? ......

I have taken thousands of photos in the past several years.  Most of them are "not good enough" to print and offer for sale in the gallery.  After deciding to delve in to blogging, however, I have gotten a lot of enjoyment out of sorting through the files and looking for images to match up with quotes that inspire me.  SO, this morning, I went back to the archives.

Take the beach photo above, for example.  It was a rainy, cloudy, overcast day...not optimal for walking on the beach.  I don't remember the day at all (I have a yet-to-be-explained issue with short and long term memory, you'll probably read more about that later;) but it was probably a lot like today sounds like it will be.  That is, overcast, windy, damp, dreary...the kind of day that makes you wish you didn't have to get out of bed in the morning.  For some reason, I must have decided to brave the elements and go to the beach.

 

December's Glory (c) Jennifer Johnson

Living on Hatteras Island, most visitors would think we spend all our time at the beach.  The truth is, we spend most of our time working, driving on and off the island, and going about our daily lives.  We are either too busy or preoccupied to remember that we live within minutes of such peace and beauty.  We "save" our beach time for whenever we can sneak away and get there, usually with friends, on pretty days in the summer.  When I first decided to embrace photography as a "career," I would make time to go to the beach for spectacular sunrises and sunsets...

Lately, I've been going to the beach to take pictures of "products," like my Seaside Memory Lockets or Jim Downey's Glass Turtle Pendants...I've been looking for oyster shells and driftwood to use to make displays for the shop.  But I haven't gone just to look for a happy place to be.  THAT's what I will look for today...THAT's what I plan to see.

I hope that, if you are sharing my journey through this blog...you look for the same thing today.  Maybe you can't get to the beach, but maybe you can SEE something in a new way, just because that's what you are LOOKING FOR.  Enjoy your day.

Epiphany - A new year; a new PLAN

e-piph-a-ny:  "A comprehension or perception of reality by means of a sudden intuitive realization"

Have Faith and Have Wings - photography by Blue Pelican Gallery owner Jennifer Johnson

I had an epiphany yesterday.  

On a rare day when my husband took our twin teenage girls shopping, and I spent the day with my son and a friend, touring the campus of UNC, and we all met back up at the Carolina Brewery to go to the Dean Dome to watch my beloved HEELS defeat NC State in an improbable win, (take a breath here) 

...I made a great business decision.  

As we reopen Blue Pelican Gallery in Hatteras Village this week, I am going to change my management style.  Instead of struggling to do the things that don't come naturally, I'm going to find people to help me who specialize in those areas of a business and LET GO of the feeling that I have to do it all.  If I hold on to that control that I have grasped so tightly since we opened our doors about seven years ago, I will continue to stifle my creativity.   

Love Family, Enjoy Work, Live Life    

My role model, the strongest woman I have ever known, my mom, Barbara Foster passed away on New Year's Eve from complications of her seven year fight against metastatic breast cancer.  The week before she died, she asked me to take better care of myself: lose weight, become healthier, stop volunteering so much, and focus on the things that make me happy. 

1950's - Barbara Foster, aka "Grammy"

 SO, Be on the lookout for fun, exciting, creative, NEW things at Blue Pelican.

 NEW artists.  NEW work from me.  A NEW look.  

New boards on Pinterest.   

New specials for our facebook fans.  

And finally, I'm going to find instructors for those knitting and crochet classes I have been promising since we made the commitment to add YARN to the shop at the end of 2012.

Step 1 - A Blog. I love to write. I always have. Thanks to the power of social media and the pages I have created to share information, I've realized that I really am pretty good at it.  THANKS to my friends, family, and "the kindness of strangers," I have received enough positive feedback and encouragement over the past few years that I am putting my fears aside and taking flight.

Step 2 - ...Stay Tuned!  I'm still figuring out step one