What a Beaut!

Gosh, she's a beauty...

How lucky I am to have a gorgeous muse for my photographic journey! I'm so enjoying learning my camera settings, lighting, and composition with Aurora. Her energy is intense, which also helps me to practice getting the shot! lol

More kids coming soon!

xo

jbnewcomb<3

LOVIN' it!

This is IT! The moment I feel truly confident about calling myself a photographer....

It feels so good to finally declare my passion to the world! It takes a lot of courage for me to put myself out there, but I'm all out there, baby!

Have you taken a risk today?

xo

jbnewcomb<3

Life-changer

Cough, cough, sneeze, sneeze, it's gotta stop sometime, PLEASE!

Ok, I'm pretty playful at this moment, but for seven whole weeks, I'd been an utter biatch. And all because of a life-sucking cold or flu. The diagnosis doesn't matter. It freaking sucked out of me all the life and motivation to do anything productive.

I got so mad at myself. The business-savvy part of me had formed an extremely detailed goal spreadsheet, complete with mini-goals for each of my major goals with dates and details. The moment I proclaimed to the world that I wanted to learn photography, I poured much of my energy into it, gung-ho, like I always do when the flame of passion ignites. But then WHAM, my passion fizzled out, and all because of the sniffles.

But it wasn't just the sniffles. I'll spare you of the play-by-play of every ache and pain. What I really want to talk about is the life-changing realization I had, facilitated by Gay Hendricks, a self-help-type of guru.

In his book, The Big Leap, he explains that when we get really excited about something, when we feel elated, we tend to quickly squash that feeling with any number of downers. He calls this "upper-limiting". It's an awkward term, but he explains that we a have a limit on the amount of good feelings we can tolerate. Pretty bizarre sounding at first, right? But the more he explains it, the more it makes sense.

This brings me to the realization I had.

I have this pattern of feeling good and then feeling bummed. It's not manic-depressive disorder. My swings aren't dramatic, but they're noticeable. By the way, Gay Hendricks is a psychologist, and I just love his way of looking at these swings. His insight is refreshing and empowering!

Basically, if you want to stop the pattern of feeling great and then sabotaging yourself subconsciously, you have to first recognize the thing you've done to bring yourself down. For me, this was getting sick. Really sick. As soon as I recognized this, the sickness began to subside. And I couldn't be more thankful.

I feel like I am in control of my future. Really, for the first time, I am clearly aware of my self-sabotage. I don't feel like a slave to what-ifs anymore. I'm determined to stay focused and happy, and I'm going to blog about my experiences.

It feels good to be honest because I know everyone has this issue. Some more than others, and I'm definitely one of the "some". It's cliche, but I'm my own worst enemy. But I can also be my biggest ally. Here's another cliche, but it's so true....

This journey we call life is truly what we make it. :-)

i <3 

xo
jbnewcomb<3

Summer of Love

He was finishing his second contracted book, staying in a city he wasn't from and knew no one.

She was home from college for the summer.

Both were lonely and curious to see what would happen if they looked for love on Yahoo! Personals.

He wrote her. She liked what she saw. Artistic. Gorgeous, friendly eyes. A cool air to him. So, she gave him her phone number, and no one else.

She liked to sleep in, so when he called at noon, he woke her. They talked for a long time. Laughed. Hit it off. They were anxious to meet right away.

They went to the beach to walk and talk. Both didn't wear sunglasses, but somehow that made it more magical. Being bathed in light, their instant attraction grew as intense as the sun that blinded them.

She went to his vacation home where he had been writing and painting. A gorgeous painting he'd started looked eerily like her. She loved it and he promised she could have it. And he painted many more paintings of her that summer, their Summer of Love.

He captured her eyes best in this one.

Painting by Jason Augustus Newcomb

{How could I resist a man that worshipped me with his paintbrush?!}

xo

jbnewcomb<3

Porkin' Out!

I'm a major carnivore. I'm not proud of it, but it's a fact. I just loooove me some meat!

I tried going vegetarian after my friend enlightened me to the horrors of slaughterhouses. Just the word slaughterhouse invokes guilt in me.

After a couple days of eating soy-based foods, I got really sick. I had no energy and I felt like I was dying. It was the weirdest feeling, so I said flip-it, I'm a carnivore.

I'll blame my cravings, my NEED for meat, on my type-O blood. Ever read that book Eat Right for Your Type? Well, type-O is supposedly the oldest in the evolution of humans. Basically, cave men were type-O.

The newest type is AB, and they function well on a vegetarian diet. My friend who sent me the terrifying animal-killing videos is an AB. See where I'm going with this? ;-)

When I was growing up, I ate beef almost every day. Mmmm rib eyes are my absolute favorite! (I kinda loathe myself for loving it so much.)

Now that I'm head chef in my household ;-) I am cooking lots of interesting dishes, and lately, I've been really into pork tenderloin.

Pork is great with mustard. I never thought I'd like it on anything, but mustard in cooking is so different than on a hot dog or burger.

I'm also not a huge fan of rosemary, so I am hyper-conscious of not using too much, and my hubby thinks I'm a master spicer now...is that a word? It is now!

Here's one of my latest pork faves...my mostly vegetarian friend tried it (she's a funny bunny like that)...and she absolutely LOVED it...

This recipe is from All Recipes but I always change it because I'm cool like that. hahaha

Apple Rosemary Pork Tenderloin

Ingredients



Pork Tenderloin (Any size, really)

1-2 tbsp mustard (depending on size)

1/2 cup unsweetened apple sauce

6-8 minced garlic cloves (depending on size)

about 1/2 tbsp dried rosemary

salt and pepper

Directions

Preheat oven to 325F.

Place pork tenderloin in pan, sprinkle salt and pepper on it, and cook in over for an hour to lock in juices.

Mix mustard, apple sauce, garlic, and rosemary together in a bowl.

Thoroughly spread sauce mixture over pork.

Put back into oven until meat thermometer reads proper temp.

(I cook a 3-4lb tenderloin for about 40 minutes to an hour with the sauce on it.)

If you like pork, this is sure to become a favorite! SOOOooooo yummy! Makes my mouth water just typing the recipe out. :-)

Enjoy....

And because I have yet to take photos of my dishes before the fam (or I) devour them instantly, here's another one of the latest Newcomb carnivore (or maybe not, who knows?) ;-) Thanks for taking this, Grandma Leila!

These dimples make me melt!

xo

jbnewcomb<3