08/11/2026
With this being my last year of photoshoots, I’m really relishing slowing down and savoring these sweet moments with families! I’m reading an unexpectedly wonderful novel that I just want to carry with me everywhere I go so I can sneak in snippits of its profoundly magical nuance. The book is called Counterweights by Shannan Martin // Neighbor + Author. It was on display at the library and caught my attention because of its beautiful cover art, and the subtitle on the cover. (When they say don’t judge a book by its cover, I totally do. And I think that’s ok because a captivating book deserves to be paired with equally captivating art. But I digress…) “Counterweights help ease my guilt about enjoying life when there’s so much going wrong.” “Counterweights remind us of the duty to find joy.” Life feels like kind of a lot right now. It has for a long time. And this book is the both/and…feeling the hard, while, in the same breath, seeing the beauty. Being on the top of Vail Mountain, with this lovely family felt like my counterweight of pausing to soak in the joy: looking far across the vast expanse of the mountains and valleys while also seeing the up-close wonder and innocence of a child exploring a flower, a butterfly; the heat of the sun on my shoulders while the icy cold water of the mountain creek shocked my bare feet; feeling like there’s always so much work to be done, and yet the work that I do requires me to connect with people, notice their special bonds, and show them how beautiful it is to be them, living their one, incredible life. The duality. The counterweights. The opposites, living in harmony at the same time. One illuminates the other. As Shannan Martin // Neighbor + Author brilliantly puts it, “standing with one foot in the grave and the other in the garden”. That’s what this life is. Don’t miss it.
