We are very happy to share another awesome entry from guest blogger, Darcy Lucas of Mission Fitness in Glastonbury, CT.  We hope you enjoy (and take to heart) her advice for putting some positive focus on your health during this crazy season!  If you are fortunate to live within a reasonable distance to try a bootcamp at Mission Fitness, I highly recommend!   In fact, most of us at the studio go – so call us up and we’ll go with you!!!  It is a tough season….. and you are only one workout away from a good mood!  (I think I read that on Darcy’s Facebook page once).

From Darcy….

“All that we are is the result of what we have thought. The mind is everything. What we think we become.” ~Buddha

It is very easy to let yourself go over the holidays.  However, if you have a wedding coming up you have NO TIME to go backwards with your goals!  However, we all know the challenges of the Holiday Season.  Your schedule starts to fill up, you may have family or money stresses, there are temptations everywhere you turn, and the holiday spirit fills the air.  So many of us already have it in our heads, “I always put on a few pounds this time of year”.  What if we started to think differently?  What if we challenged ourselves to get through the holidays healthier and stronger than ever?  And we know with that we would also be stronger MENTALLY!  If you can get through this time of the year, you can most likely get through anytime.  Change your way of thinking and your mindset.  PICTURE yourself coming out of this season looking and feeling better than ever!  When you want to skip that workout or OVER indulge in the Holiday “cheer”, picture yourself walking down the aisle.  What do you want to feel like?  Look like?

So why not make it your challenge this season?  That does not mean you are not going to be able to ENJOY the season, or even indulge in the season.  Everything in moderation, and stay consistent with your workouts.  Here are some tips to stay healthy this season:

*FIND A FRIEND OR FAMILY MEMBER TO GET ON BOARD WITH YOU.  HOLD EACHOTHER ACCOUNTABLE & SHARE TIPS, SUCCESSES AND CHALLENGES  WITH ONE ANOTHER. HOW ABOUT A CONTEST WITH A NICE PRIZE AT THE END?  DO IT WITH YOUR WHOLE FAMILY, OR MAKE EVERYONE AWARE OF YOUR GOALS. THAT WAY YOU WILL BE SURROUNDED BY PEOPLE ON THE SAME PAGE & WATCHING YOU!

*COMMIT TO A SCHEDULED FITNESS CLASS, PERSONAL TRAINING OR SPORTS TEAM.  JUST SIGNING UP FOR A GYM MEMBERSHIP DOES GURANTEE YOU WILL GO. 

*DRINK LOTS OF WATER.  OFTEN TIMES THE FEELING OF BEING “HUNGRY” IS MISTAKEN FOR BEING THIRSTY.  STAY HYDRATED FOR THE MANY HEALTH BENEFITS, ALONG WITH STAYING FULL.

*DO NOT DENY YOURSELF OF THE FOOD YOU LOVE.  EAT IT IN MODERATION & TAKE TIME TO ENJOY IT.  INSTEAD OF A BIG PIECE OF CAKE, HAVE A FEW BITES!

*PICK AND CHOOSE WHICH PARTIES TO ATTEND.  YOU MAY GET A LOT OF INVITES THROUGH WORK AND FRIENDS.  YOU DO NOT NEED TO ATTEND EVERY ONE.  CHOOSE WHICH ONES MEAN THE MOST TO YOU.

At mission FITNESS we have a family of clients who hold each other accountable to workouts.  If you miss your usual class, you will be sure to get a few inquiries, “where were you Sunday?”.  We also have a Weight Loss Contest coming soon.  This is a great way to be held accountable, and to gain support from the many others who surround you.

Jackie and Jason are getting married on Saturday!!!!!!  We snuck a quick engagement session in before their wedding.  This is a beautiful couple in a beautiful place….. now that is a good day at work! 

“If you are on time, you are late!” say Steve and Janna!  And, it is no wonder they feel this way. ….. It is this ultra punctuality that is responsible for Janna and Steve meeting.  It is a really entertaining story.   Imagine two people set up on dates by friends….. These two were set up on dates to meet DIFFERENT people!   They were meeting their dates at the same place.  Only, they were early and their dates were late!  Guess the early bird REALLY wins out in this story!  

They had a very intimate ceremony and reception with their closest friends and family.  They were married at Gillette Castle in East Haddam, CT – former home of William Gillette, the original Sherlock Holmes.  It was a GORGEOUS day.  Under the circling of eagles over the CT River, they exchanged their vows.  Then, off to La Vida Gustosa for a fun and light-hearted dinner party-style reception.  The only “formality” being a cutting of their wedding cake.

It was such a pleasure to be a part of this celebration.  Congratulations Janna and Steve.  Thank you for having me be a part of your wedding day.

Aubrey and Graham are getting married next April and I can’t wait!  This was the first time I got to see them in action together…. and what a great time we had down on the farm!

We played with some off camera flash lighting for the images inside of the old tobacco barn – between a fun couple, the sun coming in through the slats and a little bit of flash “love,” these engagement images ended up being some of my favorites!

Heather and Joe met through their work in the medical community.  They began as friends, and, as most “friends-turned-into-more” couples, their deeply-rooted friendship is evident in the way that they interact with each other.  It was a joy to be a part of their wedding day.   They both teared during their vows – along with many in the room.  And, they both laughed whole-heartedly at the toasts and expressions of their friends and colleagues with whom they danced the rainy night away (to the tunes of one of my favorite Connecticut bands, The Savage Brothers).

It was a beautiful and special day – BUT it really wasn’t the wedding day that these two sun and boating-lovers had envisioned…..  Heather and Joe’s day started out a little drizzly…. and as we left the bride’s home to head to the shoreline, it got more and more drizzly and much more windy!  The ceremony had to be moved inside to the Grand Ballroom at the Water’s Edge instead of out near the beach.  And, we had to do our family photos under cover.  We did decide to take the risk of heading to the beach via the golf carts (be sure to check out the pic of Joe with all the girls in the cart – it is one of my favorites!) for the bridal party pics.  No sooner had we gotten to the water’s edge (no pun intended), than the skies opened up on us!  The girls ran for cover, the boys ran for the port-o-lets(?!?!?!?!).  And, Helen and I made a mad dash to try to keep our gear safe and dry!  (There was one official casualty in that department – thank goodness for backup gear and Nikon Pro Services!!!).

So knowing how much these two love the water and the sunshine, be watching for a fun post-wedding bridal shoot…. we have some great ideas in the works – and this time, we hope to get better cooperation from Mother Nature!

Thanks again to Heather and Joe for inviting us to share this day with you.

I will be adding the rest of the vendor links later….. I can’t get to that file right now and I didn’t want to wait until Monday to post these images!

And here begins our mad dash to the beach for photos…… can we beat the rain?!?!?!

The answer is no…….  :(

They both had such great images dancing with their parents….

And a huge thanks to my Associate Photographer, Helen, for helping me cover the dance floor action!

And though the rain never let up, we covered our lighting gear in plastic bags and headed up to take this shot at the end of the night…..

These photos tell the story of two people that have gone through life’s toughest passages and found their way to each other.  ”Concetta and Giovanni” found more than love in each other.  They found a completeness that neither expected they might find again or at all.  It was such a joy and honor to be a part of their union.  On this day I felt like a part of their family – as I think I always will.

The beautiful music was performed by students from the UHART school of music.  The flowers were by Amy Taylor Designs.  And Kathy Taylor performed a beautiful ceremony.  As well, the 1820 House in Simsbury, CT was the perfect venue for such and intimate affair.

The “Off Season”…
It would likely be described by a New England photographer as something like this…. “The period of time between wrapping up the wedding season and holiday card season and the beginning of the next “season” of shooting which is typically consistent with a new, and arguably better season of weather!!! It is a time designated for projects…. LOTS and LOTS of projects!”

So what the H.E. (double the hockey sticks) happened to this off season?!?!? Oh yes, of course….. we were snowed in!!!!! This year it was snow, last year it was something else. In a nutshell, there is always something about the off season that prevents us from making it through that darn “off season” project list.  So we decided to focus on not just the studio’s projects – we came up with some very serious personal projects:

Seeing how much coffee we can drink from our “neighbors to the North,” So G Coffee Roasters…. answer, it is a lot!!!!!

Debating the merits of Sweet Potato fries vs. Regular fries from  our “neighbors to the South,” South Tavern.  It remains a split decision…. Carrie and Molly vote Sweet.  Helen and Colleen vote boring (Carrie wrote this)!

My way-too-time-consuming project/obsession with finding cool Converse Chuck Taylors… and Colleen and Bob having to reign me back in….. After all, how many pairs of Converse does one woman need?  Answer….. just wait…. I will show you!!!!!!

Preparing for our interview with Better CT – which is airing tomorrow at 3pm on CT WFSB Channel 3….   We are very excited and honored that they contacted us to do a feature on the studio.  (Be warned, they interviewed me in the morning, pre-coffee (see note above) so I can’t even remember what we talked about!!!!!).

Training for the upcoming Warrior Dash in June (please see our training video below… Warning – it is VERY hard core training and not for the faint of heart!).  Also, please keep in mind that we are professionals and that these stunts should not be attempted at home!

So, we are getting to our studio to do list slowly but surely…. but the above projects are far more fun!!!!

And we are excited to be kicking off our 2011 shooting season in just a couple of weeks with Laura and Lowell’s awesome Boston wedding!  We can’t wait!!!!

We have been nutty here in the studio in our “Off Season.”  We are still wrapping up our final weddings from 2010, making changes to our internal processes and workflow, trying to find the studio in the snow, meeting great new couples at the bridal shows…. whew!  Not to mention, we are all training for The Warrior Dash in June www.warriordash.com (more details on that to come!)  All I can say is OUCH!

It has been a great start to 2011.  We were honored as a Top Pick in The Knot Best of Weddings for 2011 – our third time in four years!  And, we were also chosen for Wedding Wire’s Bride’s Choice Awards 2011.  Both of these awards are so meaningful to me – as they are essentially given to us by our couples.  THANK YOU!

We also have some fun things coming up on the blog (because my new year’s resolution is not to be a crappy blogger!!!)  And, now that I have stated my resolution out loud, Colleen, our amazing Studio Manager, is going to hold me accountable!  Actually, I have always struggled with prioritizing blogging…. if I have 10 shoots in my editing backlog, I feel badly taking the time to put together a good blog post.  And, what happens, is that nothing gets blogged!  However, thanks to Colleen and our dear photographer friend, Richard Esposito, we believe we have created a systematic way to blog without slowing down our workflow.

So, I had to put together a little slideshow of recent work for a local business meeting…. It is a little bit of all that we did this year…. and I know that it happens fast!  So, grab a cup of coffee and don’t blink…. here is a crazy trip through some of 2010…  We have some wedding-specific slideshows and things to come.  Please come back and visit!

Alyson and David have not seen their wedding photos yet because they just got back from their honeymoon to do a Trash the Dress session.  With their permission, I wanted to give a sneak peak at one of my favorite sessions of recent.  Not only are Alyson and David so much fun, but I got to spend the morning working on a boat….  not a bad day at the office if you ask me!  And, for a Colorado-born and raised gal, any time I get to see the water, it is still a novelty…. even though I have been in Connecticut for fourteen years now!

Back to Alyson and David….  Alyson’s dad (wearing his cotton, tuxedo T-shirt, I might add!)  helped take us out of the marina in Niantic.  A big thanks to Dad, too for helping to steady my lighting on the water.  It was so fun to have you be a part of this shoot!  We did a little “fishing”…. more photos to come – but thankfully we didn’t pass any schools of tuna or dad warned me that I might miss my afternoon appointments…..

Alyson and David, I hope you love them…. I know that I do.  :)  Thanks for taking me out on the water with you.  It was a fun and relaxing treat for me – especially this time of the year!

Doesn’t Alyson look amazing?!?!

And David, too…. of course!

Danielle and Paul wanted to do a Breakfast at Tiffany’s-inspired engagement session in Hartford.  We had such a fun time.  We started at The Society Room and moved onto Pratt Street and surrounding areas.  A HUGE thanks to Jody, the owner of Stackpole Moore and Tryon in Hartford for really dressing up Danielle for the final “window shot” – dress and pearls on loan from this amazing store!

And JUST as I was shooting this next shot from ground level, someone walked up to my coffee on the ground, asked me if it was mine and proceeded to walk off and drink it….  He did turn back to say it tasted good!  Seriously, I will never forget this great coffee heist!

And here begins our Breakfast at Tiffany’s-inspired images…..