O & E L’s November Woman of the Month

Meet Katrina Christ — O & E L’s November Woman of the Month

Evernwalked into a friend’s house and seen gor­geous black, white andncoloured pho­tographs of their fam­ily pos­ing nat­u­rally and look­ingngor­geous together? Chances are, those pho­tographs were taken by Kat­rina.nPho­tog­ra­pher extroad­i­naire, busi­ness owner, wife and mother — shendef­i­nitely has plenty to share with us about how she is Organ­isednand Elegant!

Our last email to our sub­scribers found that this is the seg­mentnthat you look for­ward to the most every month in our newslet­ter. Andnwe’re so pleased to con­tinue to bring this won­der­ful series to you.nSo with­out fur­ther “ado” let us delve into what makes this O & E  Woman tick.….

What inspires you to get up each morning?

Another day! Each day is so dif­fer­ent and I love this. I might benshoot­ing all day or on phone for meet­ings or fly­ing to eithernSyd­ney or Mel­bourne to visit my fran­chisees. Or i can be tak­ingnkids to danc­ing, play­ing hockey, or try­ing to cook for the one nightna week when my par­ents come over. I know this sounds pathetic,nbut my hus­band is a fab­u­lous cook. If I am busy and with peo­plenthen I am happy.

How did you end up in the pho­tog­ra­phy world? Was it always some­thing that you were pas­sion­ate about, or did you come by it via another career first?

I was work­ing as a nanny sav­ing to travel, in the hope thatnwhile I did I would fig­ure out what I wanted to do. The beau­ti­fulnfam­ily I looked after in Bris­bane gave me a cam­era as a going awayngift. I shot so much dur­ing those 2 years, and no real sur­prise Inloved to pho­to­graph peo­ple. Upon my return I enrolled in Uninand 4 years later I grad­u­ated hav­ing worked full­time withnuni­ver­sity most nights and I also got mar­ried in my last year!

Didnyou know that you wanted to focus on every­day fam­i­lies andnpeo­ple, rather than edi­to­r­ial, fash­ion, scenic pho­tog­ra­phy?nOr did this love evolve?

Inloooved fash­ion to start with! The first few years I was in busi­ness Inwas shoot­ing any­thing and every­thing really. How­ever, in 2001 Inchose to spe­cialise on the advice of a mar­ket­ing  con­sul­tantnand it has been one of the best deci­sions I have ever made. I donstill love to pho­to­graph fash­ion and will very soon benlaunch­ing a new range so will keep you posted!!!!!!

Howndid you go about grow­ing your busi­ness from an indi­vid­ualnpho­tog­ra­pher to a stu­dio in Bris­bane, to now a multi stu­dio,nnational business?

I kind of always wanted to be a bitnfamous! As my busi­ness grew I wanted to keep chal­leng­ing myself,nand it was a mat­ter of why not? It was always in the back of mynmind to “go big” and I have always sur­rounded myself with great peo­plenand often get advice. I tend to research new ideas exten­sivelynand really mull over, how­ever once my deci­sion is made it is fullnsteam ahead. I have always been incred­i­bly aware of where my strengthsnlie. I am a big pic­ture per­son, (not so good with small detail) andnso con­stantly have new ideas  run­ning through my head , which mightnexplain my sleep patterns.

As with most womennforg­ing ahead there are usu­ally mul­ti­ple “balls” or parts ofnlife that are jug­gled, could you share some of these things that you’renjug­gling with us– life, love, home, busi­ness, friends, family?

Thisnis def­i­nitely everyone’s chal­lenge now isn’t it? A big part ofnhow I make things work is due to a very sup­port­ive hus­band. Andynhas been the main carer of our 3 daugh­ters for these last 8 years andnsome­times I need to start as early as 6am. As time has gone on andnnow our old­est is 13, I realise she/they need me now more than ever. Inhave always taken Wednes­days off and now this year I also don’t worknon Tues­days. This enables me to have that pre­cious time before andnafter school to “chat” and make sure every­thing in their world is good.n This time off is also really impor­tant as the fact is that just asnimpor­tantly I need them. I am also, for the first time, mak­ing time tonsim­ply have cof­fee with girl­friends. I have tended to be a bit of anworka­holic, but I have rec­og­nized that I needed to slow down andnjust enjoy.

Have any of the balls ever dropped from your jug­gling act?

For sure, about 2 years ago, I sort of had a mini melt­down.nEvery­thing got a bit much, my Syd­ney fran­chisees had just walkednout and after a hard year I had had enough and really was not myself. Inhave to say full credit goes to my man­ager Lani who had thencourage to speak with me and in fact she sug­gested a break . Atnthe end of that week I was so excited to take 3months off. I reallynhadn’t realised that I was stressed as I just do not ever seenmyself that way. I am so much bet­ter now at being ok with notnwork­ing like a demon and had to relearn to relax.

Did drop­ping any of these parts every give you a turn­ing point in your life, or an “aha” moment?

As men­tioned above, I needed to find some bal­ance, but it hasncome about in so many ways. I am always inter­ested in and amazednat how in a rela­tion­ship you are so good for one another. Andy isnthe first to encour­age and sup­port me. Things I haven’t donenfor­ever I’ve now got­ten back into. I now play hockey one night a week,nplay ten­nis one morn­ing and I am back read­ing every nightnplay­ing Uno with the kids. As a mother that works there is thisncon­stant guilt that when you are not work­ing you must be withnthem. I am slowly becom­ing ok with the fact that if I need my hairndone for exam­ple that is it ok if they can only fit me in, inntheir time . I know this sounds ridicu­lous but true.

What helps you pick upnthe pieces when some­thing hasn’t worked? Any mantras, self helpntips, ice cream flavour pref­er­ences etc.

I amnso fine if some­thing doesn’t work,  I learn so much from thenexpe­ri­ence and truly can look at it pos­i­tively. Talk­ing is anbig key for me , I tend to talk and talk and this helps. I amncon­stantly say­ing to my staff that being good com­mu­ni­ca­torsnis the key and I believe this is a big rea­son why we are such a tightnlit­tle team and why my girls and I get along so well.

If it was all gone tomor­row and you had to start again, you would

….be a photographer

What/ Who inspires you?

Peo­ple , I love being sur­rounded by happy happy .

What is your def­i­n­i­tion of being organised?

The cal­en­dar in my iphone and my abil­ity to remem­ber lots of things( and yet for­get lots of things-weird)

How do you cre­ate and/ What helps you cre­ate your organ­ised and ele­gant lifestyle?

Oh my gosh I am absolutely hope­less at inte­rior design, so I anhave had some won­der­ful advise and help from a few peo­ple.nRecently  Melissa Healy from Futari Design  with the stu­dioninte­rior . I do like  a clean house  and so along with mynlovely clean­ers, my girls are at an age where they want to earnnpocket money so they have set chores. Being visual I love to look atnhome mags etc

What keeps you grounded?

My kids , and fam­ily and inter­est­ingly my hockey girl­friendsn, because when you play no-one cares who you are and what you donand I can just be me.

Where do you see your­self in ten years time– and doing what?

Still doing what I love, but I would imag­ine another 3 or so fran­chises within Aus­tralia, and through­out America.

Describe your per­sonal style?

I am such a dag at heart, hav­ing been a lit­tle bush kidnwear­ing no shoes, to now. I do love to acces­sorize. I am a fan ofnlong skirts , I have an eclec­tic mix of scarves and big bignflow­ers. I wear jew­ellery most days, my biggest  love is my range ofnrings. Love a beau­ti­ful ring.

And your life style?

Hmmm most peo­ple who know me would say I am cruisy. I like to be busy and love catch­ing up with friends.

And finally, if we could buy you a ticket to any­where in the world right now, your des­ti­na­tion would   be……. (and why)

Well Inwould have said the Uk where my brother lives , but we are going fornxmas , yay, so instead I am think­ing New York– the ten­nis at flush­ingnmead­ows, walk­ing and shoot­ing around the city, Martha’s Vine­yardnjust sounds great doesn’t it?