CIRCUS FOOD | summer picnics

Summer food is simple, fresh, and easy to transport.  We picnic - a lot.  Sometimes on the kitchen floor, sometimes in the mountains, and anywhere in between.  This meal is the treasure we picked up this morning at the farmer's market.

ABOVE:

baguette

fig

fresh goat cheese

honey

lemon thyme

Here are a few of our other favorite sandwich combos...

apricot | goat cheese | arugula | honey

thick sliced tomato | herbed yogurt | balsamic vinegar

apple | goat cheese | basil

So go - pack a lunch.  Enjoy the long day.  And spend time with those you love.

xo,

amanda

durham | beloved

One of the many blessings about this job is that we get to be students...  of so many loving people.  We get to invite these beautiful souls to join us in the big wide open, and inspire them to speak words of love, to embrace, to laugh, and on this day - to sing.  The language of love can take so many forms, and can be expressed with so many facets.  I learn so much about how tender and unique relationships can be, and am overwhelmed by the strength that binds them together.  My heart grows and I am forever touched by each and every person we meet, and my view of the world forever influenced by the ways you love each other in front of our lenses.  We are blessed.  Truly.  And we are vested in your future.  This is our gift to you - the gift of reflecting on the beauty and the love you shared that day.

Use your love language on a daily basis.  Speak tenderly.  Embrace fully.  And sing it to the mountains.  

xoxo,

amanda

7 on Seven | May 2012

The thing about fear is that it is a thief.  It snatches away possibilities.  It distracts from beauty.  And sidetracks happiness.  In my quest to be fierce I have a goal ...  to push fear aside, to grab hold of the love and beauty closest to me, and to let go of the worry.  Of the everything else.  And of the things I am not.  

My sweet girl, she's a smart one.  "7 is a good number,"  she says, as she twirls around in her little white dress and pink knee socks.  "I think this is going to be a good year.  I'm happy with 7."  

So I listened.  

Yes - 7 is a good number.  A great place to start.

So on the 7th day of every month, I'll be reflecting.  Gathering.  7 good moments from the month before. 7 images that remind us of laughter.  Happiness.  Goodness.

There is magic in a photograph.  Thrilling magic.  It pauses a moment and forever gives you the gift of possibility.  The thing that fear did not take - not that day.

So this is where I am.  And where I've been this last month.  And the moments where beauty and Grace were so heavily present that I couldn't help but gather it up for later.  They may not mean anything to you - but to me, they are anchors.  My moments.  My hope.  My badge of success.  And my bridge into June.

What are yours?

xo,

amanda