The 4th of July is my favorite holiday (right next to Halloween), and so I always have plans, no matter how big or how small! This year my boyfriend and I went up to upstate NY for a little R&R with a few friends. His favorite band, Phish, was also playing nearby and so it didn’t take me a lot of convincing to persuade him to travel a bit north.

We took in the Saratoga weather (which was heaven compared to the 100degree Atlanta weather that we left) and wandered around the streets while we consumed ice-cream and played arcade games. It was fabulous, and I’ll say that playing arcade games as an adult is WAY better than as a teenager because now I actually have some money to throw away at Mario Kart.

Coming off of a full week away I’d be lying if I didn’t say that my body is currently 78% Cheeze-It’s and Tito’s vodka. It was a fun week, but I’m feeling an urge to get back to normal.

In order to motivate me to not fully morph into a snack-food I am looking back at some selfies I took a couple of weeks ago! And you know what, it got me thinking... we use a lot of others as inspiration for ourselves, and there is nothing wrong with that, but there is something quite special about being your OWN motivation.

I look back at my boudoir photos from the few sessions I’ve had, and I LOVE myself. Hell, this isn’t even from a boudoir session and I still LOVE it.

In a world of “oh god, can you retake that” we should all have images of ourselves that we love. Boudoir can do that, a great portrait can do that, amazing selfie-light can do that... but the point is that everyone deserves to be able to look at themselves with love for their OWN self ❤️