A big, huge Mrs. Doubtfire-style HELLOOOO to you all this morning! This past weekend was my breather window during the last big push pf wedding season, and I still somehow managed to cram three portrait sessions into it anyways. But hey, sleep is for the off-season, right? Know what else I was supposed to do this weekend? Run a marathon. But my dad and I just got so dang bored with training this year that we decided to defer til next year, keeping up with our “every other year” tradition of running the Marine Corps Marathon. I don’t feel the slightest bit guilty about it, either. I’ll just run two halfs or something in the spring to make up for it.

As always, lessons learned/things that transpired over the last week:

• If you have a family recipe for roasted pumpkin seeds you’ve been using for years that calls for butter, and then you find a different variety of recipe online that calls for olive oil, ALWAYS GO WITH BUTTER. Olive oil is to butter as turkey bacon is to real bacon. They just can’t compare. 
• Yesterday as I made my way out to my car to head to church, I saw a guy in a full gladiator costume (plumed helmet, spatha sword and all) walking down the street. This is only not strange because Halloween is this week. Any other time of year and I’d have called the cops.
• I bought a spaghetti squash last week- that stuff is GOOD! I thought it was bound to be gross, because I don’t know that I’ve ever replaced pasta with a gourd before, but it was delicious. Definitely recommend trying it.
• Speaking of pasta, I’ve finally managed to out-garlic myself. I LOVE the stuff- if a recipe calls for two cloves, I’ll typically add three (or four). And if a recipe doesn’t call for any but I think it needs it, I’ll add it anyways. But yesterday I hit my limit. Matt & I were making this recipe for dinner, an old standby, and I guess the FOUR large cloves I added were finally too much. My mouth tasted like an Italian food truck for at least an hour before I finally figured out that a spoonful of peanut butter was the trick to ridding myself of the taste.
• I used the hashtag “notadomesticgoddess” yesterday and then, out of curiosity, looked up the other photos tagged with the same phrase. I felt a LOT better about my domestic skills afterwards.

On Saturday, we met up with one of my college roommates and her husband for a portrait session- Shawn & Ashley are expecting their first baby in December and I was so excited to document this incredible time in their lives! More later this week :). (PS- I don’t typically take on maternity sessions, just when it’s close family and friends!)

The happiest of Mondays to you all!