This past week Jason got back from his California trip, we photographed a physical magazine shoot for Wedding Day Magazine for 7 hours an hour away at a barn venue, photographed one of our (2 years ago) wedding couples’ 6 month old infant at our studio (who came in from the middle of the country) for last second surprise Christmas portraits (so we can’t post Teasers on the blog of them), had wedding consultation meetings hours in all directions of us from Michigan to Indiana, printed & delivered physical photos & cards that came with our summer wedding couples’ photography packages, and more! It’s been a whirlwind of a week and as we crawl to the finish line of this past week, we’d like to share some of the things we’ve personally been up to over the past couple weeks and what’s coming up.
This week we’re taking a moment off our our regularly scheduled wedding & portrait blog posts from clients and sharing with you a bit of our personal lives! Jenny’s 33rd Birthday is coming up tomorrow AND as of last week have both returned from solo trips out to California to family and best friends before we head to California again next week (whew)!
First we’ll start with Jenny: She traveled some 11 hours (plane & automobile) to the desert near Los Angeles to celebrate Jason’s twin brother having their first kid-! Jenny got to hang out with Jason’s twin, his wife, her parents, Jason’s mom, Jason’s grandma, and about 40 other women there to celebrate! It was great catching up with everyone and having 5 hours of low key downtime gift giving, chatting, and being in a warm atmosphere. (An unfortunate side happening was a guest completely sideswiping Jenny’s rental car in the driveway with scratches along the side of the car and her not finding out until driving away as the last guest to leave).
After that portion of the trip, there were 4 more nights in California- 3 of which were camping. Jenny headed straight up to Santa Barbara, California where we’d originally met in our next educational degrees back in the day. For literally half of her 3 years out there for her MFA in Fine Art Photography she lived in the Los Padres National Forest (a 10 minute drive from the bottom of this beach town), so she immediately grabbed a “California Burrito” (Mexican burrito filled with french fries) and was able to catch sunset at Lizard’s Mouth above the city overlooking the ocean and entire town! Night one was a bit cold, so though she did bring her tent (that her aunt had originally gotten her for a solo trip 6 years ago to Peru), she did intelligently buy a cheap sleeping bag the next day (since her fancy one in no way fit into the tiny backpack she was allowed to bring onto the Spirit flight).
Day 2 in California started at sunrise (gotta love camping) after which Jenny woke up camping, checked out her old home (gate) there in the mountains, then checked out the infamous new multi-level Target (something residents had fought because they tend to fight big box stores in the beach town- though it a wonderful view of palm trees from the 2nd floor). After that she walked through the courthouse (gorgeous) to go to the library across the street. The chapel shown after her selfie in the courthouse where Jason once photographed a wedding back in 2013. After the downtown things Jenny then went back up for a tri tip sandwich lunch in the Mountains from Cold Springs Tavern with all of the live music playing and then headed to Solvang for some goodies and dessert before heading back to the campground to meet Maggie who was joining in on night 2 of camping!
Day 3 started with college friends Maggie & Jenny heading out on a hike to Jenny & Jason’s favorite Santa Barbara hike (including a “watering hole”). These two had some deep heart-to-hearts to catch up on the past year & a half and really everything since they initially met in Ohio at Miami University down near Cincinnati. They had lunch at another great spot on the wharf (On the Alley) for some delicious tacos, walked around downtown and saw Jenny & Jason’s old university, then grabbed some coffee downtown. They then went to the best beach (Mesa Lane/ Hendry’s Beach) and ended the evening on the beach at a restaurant for dinner before Maggie had to head back home to Long Beach to run her store Burke Mercantile!
On day 4 Jenny had some uni (sea urchin) for brunch on the wharf in Santa Barbara, then drove down to Maggie’s storefront in Long Beach. Jenny didn’t get to see Maggie’s first store front shared space that she first opened a year & a half ago, but was thrilled to get to see Maggie’s first solo store that she opened just a couple months prior! Her store Burke Mercantile had just had an event over the weekend, so the store was glowing and gorgeous! Maggie wants to be able to outfit many different sized folks in the unisex, ethically and locally made garments, so she had Jenny try on different outfits for 5 hours of the two hanging out in the store! Jenny loved so many things she may have exceeded the highest amount any one customer has spent at one shopping trip, but has decided that it was a great early birthday gift to herself to get all of these gorgeous clothes that she’s been wanting for the past year & a half from Maggie’s store! At the end of the successful evening these two headed to grab delicious thai food nearby in Long Beach, then Maggie had Jenny stay over as a guest for the first time in probably 5 or 6 years (since the next morning Jenny had to drive to LAX to return her rental car and fly home to Jason on their anniversary)!
Jenny returned to Chicago with Jason picking her up on their anniversary! We had plans to celebrate our anniversary the next day, so we tried to get some rest after that. For our anniversary we went to our favorite further away park, ate authentic Mexican tacos that we’d picked up, then went for a hike. We picked up some rental movies, went putt-putting at a spot we hadn’t been together yet, and then went home to watch a movie together. Jason had to fly out to California from Chicago the next morning, so we had to get to bed so that we could drive the 2.5 hours to Chicago for that. (Subsequently Jenny worked all of Friday through Monday on photography business “Have to Do” list things).
Jason then went on a trip to Southern California to attend the bachelor party of his best friend from home Bryan. The group which consisted of Bryan, Jason, Matt, Travis, and Bryan’s brother Brandon booked a stay at a bungalow at the Lafayette Swim Club in San Diego. The bungalow was a two floor suite with two bedrooms, one bathroom, a living room, and a full kitchen which was barely used by any of us. Once all of us had arrived from our respective homes we spent the first night by attending a hardcore concert at San Diego’s famous SOMA. The club itself was underwhelming following the many years of hype we had all heard about the place. The show itself was packed as full as it could be and the legacy of Terror and Stick to Your Guns pulled in some hardcore fans. Bryan and Matt decided to make the most of the night making sure to dance around like idiots and crowd surf their way on and off of the stage and into the crowd. After the show had come to an end we headed to the nearby Modern Times brewery before moving on to The Taco Stand for the first of many delicious meals.
The next morning we awoke early to get some coffee before heading to Barbusa to get an early lunch. Prior to out trip, Matt had compiled a list of several high profile restaurants that we needed to enjoy on our trip. This meal was the first of a few opulent meals that our bank accounts would later cry about.
Later on Saturday afternoon we had tickets for “The Festival of Dankness” beer festival at the nearby Waterfront Park and used the couple of hours of time in between to check out the farmer’s market and walk around a little.
The beer festival on day 2 drew in breweries from all across the country from San Diego all the way to New Jersey. We made sure to make the most of our few hours there by enjoying as many of the specialty beers as we could try. The group consensus for some of the best beers goes to Phase Three out of Chicago.
Once the beer festival had come to an end we were in need of more food and had reservations at a nearby sushi restaurant named Azuki. We got some of the most flavorful and delicious rolls and shashimi that any of us had eaten in a long while. After the meal we all headed back to the hotel to shower off before heading over to Matt’s apartment to hang out with his cats and listen to him attempt to DJ. On our walk back to our hotel we decided to get one last late night meal, but not having a car all of the local fast food restaurants would not serve us. So we turned around and walked a little over a mile in the wrong direction until we got to Lucha Libre, a luchadore themed mexican restaurant that specializes in various fry filled versions of California Burritos. The additional silver lining to our mile trek away from the hotel was that I found $80 on the ground.
The next morning found us at another coffee shop in the North Park area of San Diego. After coffee we headed to the local bottle shop BottleCraft before heading back to the hotel to get changed for an afternoon at the beach. Realizing that all of the beaches would be overly crowded we bit the bullet and Bryan drove us out to La Jolla. We spent a few hours hanging out and going for a swim in the ocean before parting ways with Brandon. Once Brandon had made his was to the airport Matt made sure that we went to his all time favorite sandwich spot Board & Brew. We got there a little later in the day so they were low on a few items, but their “special sauce” made up for anything that may have been absent from the sandwiches.
For our final night we made dinner reservations at one of the premier dinner locations in Little Italy, Juniper & Ivy. Prior to the start of our reservation we stopped by the Mikkeller tasting room for a couple of beers. Once at Juniper & Ivy we got many amazing small plates including the pictured oysters with dippin’ dots style creamed jalapeno puree. We concluded our night at the dive bar Live Wire, where Matt proved to us that he is the most accomplished hunter of us all.
This week for Jenny’s birthday after we worked a very intense full week even including Labor Day, we headed to camp for a couple weekdays since it seemed peaceful and Jenny has always wanted peace & quiet on her birthday. We brought our pets and had a nice peaceful time in our camper that we purchased at the start of 2018! We took it to 4 states last year (New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Indiana), yet haven’t had time to use it yet this year, so we figured a last minute trip was in order since we will be working ever single day from this Friday through next Thursday on wedding photography editing, another September wedding to capture, and more!
After capturing a wedding in Valparaiso next week we again head out to California again to attend Jason’s bestie’s wedding and welcome Jason’s twin’s daughter to this world (hopefully)! The day after we return from California we capture another 10 hour wedding in South Bend, work through final edits of September weddings, capture Fall Family Portrait Sessions, then head out to Italy a couple weeks after California, so needless to say, we’re fully expecting to be puddles of exhaustion when capturing and editing weddings in October with this being the craziest Wedding Season of our lives with the most weddings booked and most personal social things booked throughout those! Check back next week for some September Wedding Anniversaries the day before we capture Malyssa & Dakota’s Thursday wedding in Valparaiso!!