As a photographer, I find myself taking photos all the time (and I take a lot of them!!!) But the problem is that we don’t often get photos of our whole family all together (ie with me included) That is why I had to have a few taken by professional photographers in Disney World and pay for photos – Ryan was not impressed as he couldn’t understand why I would want to pay for more photos when we took over 3000 photographs of our own on holiday.

Anyway, I convinced him to buy a few (and we only bought pics with me in) as all the other pics I had also taken with my camera. So I thought I would post a few of them here (Riani always asks why there are never any pics of me on the blog… that’s because I always take all the pics!!! unless Riani is around)

So that is why it is so nice to go to a studio, or get a professional to come to your home, and have some professional family photographs taken. They will capture the bond between you and bring back all those special memories – beautiful family photographs are something you treasure forever and ever…..

Your wedding day is perhaps one of the most important day’s in your life and this marks the beginning of a new era and the creation of a new family.

Keep it simple!  This is the one day when neither you the bride nor the groom (love of your life) wants to be running around and stressing when something is going wrong.

Is it really neccessary to have small kids as part of your entourage, even though they always look adorable they have absolutely no idea what it’s about and it’s nerve wrecking for them to walk down that aisle with everyone staring at them.  Whilst being uncomfortable in their fancy dress they also can’t sit still for that long so they disrupt the service.   

As far as the first dance is concerned:
Plan ahead: Every other aspect of the wedding is being planned, why not your first dance? Ideally you should begin practicing 6 months before.
Less is more: You don’t need to dance the whole song (remember, dance professionals don’t). Your DJ can cut the song or you can even just have it fade out. Bottom line: you’ll look and feel better dancing for two minutes and doing five terrific moves, than dancing for four minutes and trying ten poorly executed moves.
Think about what you’re wearing: If you are wearing a tight fitting dress you’ll look great…. You’ll also be taking very tiny steps… so take this into consideration and if you have an off-the-shoulder dress you will not be able to lift your arms over your head………consider this before you put in all those spins.

Make-up:
It’s your wedding day! You want everything to look perfect. Your makeup is a very important part of your overall look, however, it should enhance you, and not make you feel like you’re wearing a mask.
If your thinking of hiring a profesional make-up artist look at her to see how she wears her own makeup. Schedule a consultation with her so you’ll see how you’ll look ahead of time.
Don’t wear heavy shimmery makeup, unless it’s applied by a professional makeup artist. It doesn’t photograph well under less than perfect lighting conditions. If you do, apply only on the eyes.
Whether you apply the makeup yourself or not, if done with care, you’ll look and feel wonderful. The mementos of the day, your photos, will reflect the beautiful, radiant bride you’ve always dreamed of being.

How to look good in the photos:
Never skimp on your photographer. No one will remember if your bouquets had daisies or rare, exotic Lilies. 40 years from now, your great grand children will be looking at your wedding photos and trying to envision who you were. They’re not just souvenirs, they’re heirlooms.
Keep your veil and hairstyle simple and elegant. If you want a dramatic veil for your walk down the aisle, look for a style that allows you to detach it easily, leaving you with something more elegant and comfortable at the reception.
If you’ll be having outdoor photographs, light is most flattering in the morning and at dusk. Avoid any outdoor shots from 11am to 2pm; everyone will just be squinting.

Dont exclude the groom, planning the wedding together and working as a team, gives the bride and groom a wonderful opportunity to dream together, plan together and share their thoughts and expectations.. Working together will draw the bride and groom closer together as they discover more about each other, and is a good beginning to the rest of their lives together.

Long after the last friend have left your wedding reception,  you and your partner will have your wedding photography to look at when you want to relive the wonderful memories.
When deciding on your wedding photography, having an idea of what you want is the most important.. Then you’ve got to find someone with enough experience and a personality you can connect with.
It’s true that you get what you pay for and if you’re willing to pay the minimum amount, you might just end up with minimum wedding photography service.
Take into consideration that wedding photography and videography services will make a big dent in your wedding budget. Also know that it’s an absolute must to book this type of talent as soon as possible, at least 6 months before the wedding date, especially if you’re planning your wedding during the summer months. You’ve got to get a head start and although that offer from your Uncle Sam to photograph your wedding (for free!) as his gift to you sounds really tempting, resist the offer. This is not the time for someone to do a practise run.

Planning evertyhing in advance is the greatest tip of all. On the day of your wedding, you want to enjoy yourself knowing that someone reliable is out there, capturing memories that’ll last a lifetime!

Well, CFT Labels is almost 10 years old! I can remember the day we started CFT and my good friend and auditor, Haroun Mayet said that 10 years will fly by. It seemed like a lifetime away. But here we are 10 years down the line, celebrating the success of an amazing business and an amazing team of people.

It is hard for me to put into words exactly how I fell about CFT Labels. It certainly has not been an easy 10 years and we have had many ups and downs but then I began to realise that that is how business works – in fact, that is how life works! When I learnt to understand that and then also learnt to plan for that, it became a game of strategy and not so much a game of emotions. As a result, I became hugely grateful for the business that not only supports our family but 30 other families as well (not to mention all the extended families as well as the ripple effect on our suppliers and their employees’ families – it goes on and on)

I am extremely proud of the fact that we are about to celebrate our tenth birthday. It is a huge milestone for us and one that we see as the end of the foundation phase. We have now built the foundation for the business and are ready to take it to the next level of growth and profitability. I am also humbled when I think of the work and the hours that many of our staff have put into CFT Labels and there is no question that we would not be here today as a successful label printing company without each and every one of those people.

I would like to say a big thank you to every single person at CFT, as well as our suppliers and clients, all of whom make up the success of CFT. I would also like to say a big thank you to my mom and dad who started in the label business when I was only 3 years old. It took a lot of courage to leave their financially rewarding and stable jobs to start their own business and years of hard work and lots of challenges to build it up. They taught me about business from very little and allowed me to grow into the businesswoman that I am today. They both supported me and challenged me and I am really grateful for all of that.

CFT Labels is just a baby in business terms but now that we are done with all the teething problems and have learnt to walk firmly, it is time

Well, we have been appointed as the official Woman@Work photographers!

The directors of Woman@work, Tanya Dimas and Toni Mackrell,  loved the photographs that we took at their last event so much that they have asked us to be the official Woman@Work photographers. This means that we will photograph every networking event, which is currently held on the first Wednesday of every month.

This is a wonderful oppurtunity to meet other women in the south and promote your business. We certainly enjoyed the last event and found it to be very beneficial to our business. We love photographing corporate functions and events as we have the freedom to walk around and catch those special unexpected moments as well as the different interactions between people…. It certainly is true that every picture tells a story.

Our photographs from the last networking event will also be published in this month’s issue of Get It! magazine in the south, so look out for those! The next Woman@Work evening will be held on the 4th February 2009 at the Adega restaurant in the Comaro View Shopping Center, Bassonia.

It is certainly worth going – you get to meet some wonderful women, create a few new business oppurtunities (which is always good and more than pays for your entrance fee), eat some good food and of course have your photographs taken by 2 amazing professional photographers, Louise Diesel and Riani Labuschagne!!! What more could you want……

Well, if you are an ‘Idols’ fan like I am, you will be looking forward to the next ‘Idols’ South Africa starting later this week. I am even more excited now after having been to the American Idol experience in Hollywood Studios, Orlando Florida. We were lucky enough to take a few photographs (though no flash photography is allowed – I just adjusted the ISO and used a slower shutter speed to catch a few decent pics).

It certainly was a fun experience and my children loved it. They were very disappointed that Ryan had not auditioned earlier in the day though as he was asked by one of the cast members to do so. Personally, I am quite glad that he didn’t (not that I don’t love it when he sings romantic love songs to me in the bath…. ha ha that’ll be the day) but seriously, there was some tough competition and I am not sure the boys would have voted for their dad. (lol)

Anyway, we really enjoyed it and will relive that experience when we watch the new season of Idols this week. We will have a new appreciation for the contestants too – it certainly is not easy to get up there and sing in front of those judges! But then again, when you are inspired to do something, you will do what it takes….

May the best singer win!!!

My sister’s baby is now 10 months old and I can honestly say he owns twice as many clothes as I do! For most people, buying gifts for babies is not a duty or a chore, it is a compulsion. Every time my girlfriend and I walk past a shop window and see something cute that we think my nephew would like, we have to buy it!

Having said that, there have been times in the past when buying gifts for babies did cause me some dismay. Trying to find a Christening gift for a friend’s baby was one difficult occasion that springs to mind and another was trying to find a suitable gift for a newborn baby belonging to a relative that I hadn’t seen in years. The problem was that at the time of gifting I wasn’t close enough with the parents to know what was a suitable purchase and what was not. For example, I see my sister every week and so I know the decor of the nursery and therefore I know which products would fit in with this theme and which would clash. Similarly, I know which toys my nephew already owns and the colours and materials of the products that my sister likes him to have. He is also fairly big for his age and so my sister likes his clothes to be the next size up otherwise they would only last another couple of weeks at best!

My point is that unless you know those little family details, buying suitable clothes is extremely difficult to get right. Toys, games and books are easier to get right but a lot of people choose this option and so you could easily buy the same thing as someone else without realising it. Furthermore, in my opinion, there is a difference between presents and gifts- a red and yellow plastic race car that plays music and flashes lights as it’s pushed would be great for Christmas but I certainly wouldn’t think it was appropriate for a Christening. In the gift market, especially for Christenings, there is a staggering array of keepsake gifts that are occasion-specific: A silver photo frame with a Christening message engraved on the base for example, or a crystal figurine of a teddy bear. These types of gifts are fine but the good-quality ones do tend to be over-priced. Furthermore, they are a fairly obvious buy and I always want the recipient to know that I have put great time into the thought process. The images displayed on websites of such products can also be misleading and when the gift arrives, more often than not, you discover that the quality is not as good as it looked on screen. Because many of us shop for these occasions at the last minute, by the time they have arrived it is often too late to get a replacement.

I’m sure you have all bought something in the past that the gift-recipient smiled at and thanked you for, but that you knew deep down wasn’t quite right. It’s a horrible feeling and after a few unsuccessful gifting experiences of my own, I began to dread the whole thing. I decided there must be a better way and this eventually lead me to leave my well-paid career in the music business to develop my own product line and to open my own store. Unlike other retailers that offer gifts for babies, I do not diversify. I have a small, very carefully-selected product range that I selected to solve the problems listed above. My flag-ship product is the key to the business brand and is what I am most proud of. Due to the fact that we are a new business, our products are relatively unknown. Therefore, if you have stumbled across this article, you may just find the little gem that you are looking for. Recently, we have been featured in the Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph and BBC radio so 2009 may be the year we establish ourselves as a house-hold name. Until then, many of our customers like to think of us as the best kept secret in this niche. Our customers have kept coming back time after time and have nearly all taken the time to send extremely warm letters of gratitude to convey how well the products were received. I find this so rewarding because even when I have been very happy with personal purchases in the past, I have never felt compelled to write a letter of gratitude to the manufacturer!

So you must be wondering what exactly these new products are?

As a professional musician, singer and award-winning songwriter, I had to cover many miles in the car travelling to different venues. I first came up with the concept for the products when I was driving home from a concert one evening. I was trying to decide what to buy for a friend’s baby when I thought of the perfect product. After trawling the internet for it I discovered that nobody was manufacturing the product of high-enough quality for this demanding market segment- so, I decided I would! The product-development took over a year but in essence, what I decided to do was to write a selection of original Lullaby CDs with carefully tailored lyrics for each baby-gifting occasion. So for example, the Welcome to the World lullaby that was designed for commemorating the birth of a newborn baby, featured a lyrical sentiment of welcoming a new life into the world. I carefully designed the chorus of each song so that it could be personalised with any baby’s first name. The idea being, if the newborn baby was called Bethany then in the chorus the soothing vocalist would sing the lyrics, “Sleep little Bethany, may all your dreams come true. Sleep little Bethany, know that we’re always here for you.”

Once I had written the songs, I located the best design agency I could find and together we produced the perfect packaging concept to compliment the gifts and allow them to be treasured for all the years to come as unique and precious keepsakes.

I am thrilled when I hear stories of how well the gifts have been received. Stories such as parents who have played their baby’s personalised lullaby at a Christening ceremony and reduced every guest to tears! Or a new mother that has written in to share how she adores rocking her baby to sleep with her own song playing in the background.

If you would like to find out more about these Baby Gifts please visit us at www.lullaby-babies.co.uk

For the how to be a good parent – visit this blog.

Well we are home and are finally starting to recover from the jet lag! It is really wonderful to be home and we realised just how much we appreciate everything here!!! So the last few days before we left the USA were really busy and I didn’t get to post the rest of the blogs, so better late than never….

On the 12th Jan, we went back to Animal Kingdom so the boys could go back on the Dino-soar ride again. Jamie got his new camera and they both spent all morning taking photos of all the animals and rides and just loved it! Then it got a bot cold so we decided to go home and rest for a while.

After lunch, Demi had a sleep and we decided to take the boys to movies. We went to the AMC movies just outside Pleasure Island. We were early so Ryan got to have a beer at Pleasure Island (really brings back old memories – dad can you remember the Adventure Club?)

Then we went to see Disney’s new animated movie “Bolt 3D” and it was brilliant! We really enjoyed it! The boys loved the whole experience: the huge popcorn and cokes, the huge boxes of candy, ice cream in the movie and they especially loved all the video games in the movies that we just had to try after the movie…. I thouroughly enjoyed the movie – it is a lovely story filled with comedy, adventure, danger and of course a happy ending!

That evening, Ryan & I went shopping on our own again and Ryan revisited his favourite Nike outlet store.

On the 13th of January 2009, went to Magic Kingdom in the morning. The boys got pins and spent the whole day trading pins – they loved it!  We also went on Goofey’s rollercoaster twice and back on Buzz Lightyear again… The boys weren’t really interested in anything else as they were sooooo excited about trading pins, so we had the chance to just walk around slowly (stopping to trade every now and then) and just enjoy the Magic Kingdom and all the details that make it so special!

Demi decided that she wouldn’t sleep there, so we decided to take her home – just after that it started raining so it was perfect timing… The boys came home and watched their new Star wars movie – they really are hooked on star was now and it’s really cute!

Ryan & I needed to get a few groceries so we decided to go to Walmart instead of Publix to see what it was like… it was so cool! They had so many nice things there at good prices!!! We bought the boys a Sony PSP for only $169 US (it costs double that in SA) and some second hand games for $5… we also got the boys the new Star Wars PSP game!!! They were so excited!!!!

That evening Ryan & I went for dinner at TGI Fridays – it was nice to get out and chat though the food wasn’t great.

14th Jan 2009 – our second-last day!!! We went to Hollywood studios – watched Indiana Jones and Disney playhouse again – the children just loved it! We also went to American Idol Experience and watched a finale show. Ryan ahd been asked to audition by a cast memebr and we nagged him all day but he wouldn’t but we decided to watch the show anyway. Jamie really enjoyed it and we were singing and clapping and it brought tears to my eyes to share such a special moment with my big boy…. they also loved being able to vote for who they thought was the best (though Mikey refused to admit that he voted for the loser and insisted that he had picked the winner all along…. he is too cute) It was really awesome!

We also went back to the Magic of Disney Animation and we drew MICKEY again – Jamie wasn’t too happy
with his drawing (he is a perfectionist like me) so he wanted to go back but we were out of time
so we bought him the drawing guide book and he just loves it! And of course the boys traded pins…..

In the evening we went back to Magic Kingdom to watch Wishes – the fireworks display again – the boys were so excited and just loved it! It brought tears to my eyes again…. it is just such an incredible show that you can’t help but feel inspired and grateful and touched in some way by Disney’s magic…..

Jamie said he loves Disney World and America and he has dreamt of coming here his whole life so he is very excited!!! He said it was his dream come true….. It felt so good to hear him say that…

We have all decided that we need to make new vision boards now . Ryan asked the boys what our next big holiday should be and Jamie decided that when he passes college he wants to travel the whole world (did you know that Basil’s mom travelled the whole world and she has money from every country in he world!!!)

15th Jan 09 – our last day: we packed, went to Downtown Disney so the boys could build lego (they loved building and playing outside that Lego store even though it was freezing that day) and Burger King for lunch, then back to Hollywood Studios one last time!

16th Jan 09 – we woke up early, made our way to the aiport and started the great trek home. It was a loooong flight but the children were really good and it was great to get home and see Duncs and Debs and Ben at the airport!

We really had a wonderful holiday – it was hectic and we are quite tired now but it was worth every minute of it. The growth that we have seen in our children is immense and their understanding of the world and the possibilties they have open to them has expanded and that is hugely rewarding! The children might not remember all the places we visited and all the rides we went on, but the memories of the good times we shared as a family on this holiday, will certainly last forever!!!