Hey there! TGIF 🙂 This week started out fairly busy, but calmed down throughout the week. As of the end of work today, though, I will be gearing up for a very busy weekend consisting of teaching, moving and doing lots of shopping.

You may remember me mentioning my coworker/friend, Tim, in my Stowe, VT recap. Well, he was up here for business again at the beginning of the week and decided to come up Sunday evening instead of taking one of those deathly early flights on Monday morning (don’t those flights always seem like a good idea when you book them? And then you are rudely reminded of how awful they are when your alarm goes of at 4am, right?), so we got together and grabbed dinner and drinks at the Yard House in Fenway. I thought it would be go to Fenway since Jay-Z and Justin Timberlake were playing there. It was packed, but since the Yard House is huge we didn’t have a problem getting a table. I was a bad blogger and didn’t take any photos, but Tim did take this video that I’ll share.

IMG 4712 from Monique Gagnon on Vimeo.

It was pretty cool that you could hear the concert so well!

I was able to get up Monday for an early 3.5 mile run before work. After work, since Tim was still in town, we grabbed drinks at the Alibi Bar which is in the Liberty Hotel. The drinks were delicious!

Since most coworkers were on vacation this week or out of town for client site visits, we didn’t have a big group dinner like we usually do. Some of us went to Gaslight in the South End. I was hesitant of going there because the one and only other time I had been was one of the worst dining experiences I’ve ever had! From the service to the wine to the food, I was utterly unimpressed. It bothered me so much because I’m usually pretty easy to please and the Gaslight has really great recommendations. With that said, this past visit completely erased the former bad memories associated with the Gaslight. The wine was delicious and my dinner (Swordfish Roti–with couscous, heirloom tomatoes & cucumber gazpacho) was amazing!! Some of the best swordfish I have ever had. So happy they redeemed themselves!

On Tuesday, my sister met me at my new apartment after work. She was so sweet and brought champagne and treats! I’ve been avoiding moving or even thinking about moving (I’ve had my keys since August 1st and hadn’t even stepped foot in the apartment since then. Clearly I’m having issues with moving!), but having her there and seeing her be so excited for me helped to get me out of my pending move funk and actually make me excited! So much so that I started making my “need to buy” list. Yuck!

The rest of the week was as they all are: work and teaching, but I did want to take some time now to show you the amazing headshot photos that I got back from my friend, Dan Brown (aka, Kapitol Photography). Dan and I went to college together and via Facebook, I realized that he is an incredible photographer. Not long after I started my blog, I realized that I wanted to get some professional photos taken so I reached out to Dan. He was more than happy to help! It took us forever and a day (ok, not really, but it took a while) to get a date that worked on both of our calendars, but after seeing the photos, it was well worth the wait. We headed to Acorn Street in Beacon Hill and then made our way to the Esplanade. Here are some of my favorites! I’m looking to pick one to use as my B2B headshot- please vote for your favorite in the comments! 🙂

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The two photos above were taken on Acorn Street, which is the most popular street to photograph in the city of Boston! It was absolutely beautiful and we were lucky enough to have it to ourselves the entire time we were there. We walked up and down the street and Dan got photos from all different angles, but these two were my favorite (very similar- I realize that 🙂 ).

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These two were taken as we left Acorn Street and made our way up and down various other streets in Beacon Hill. The brick buildings are my absolute favorite! How great would it be to live in Beacon Hill?! We also tried a bunch of serious face photos, but I looked terrible in them! I am just not one of those girls that can pull off the straight/serious face photos.

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We took these right as we were about to cross over the bridge and photograph on the Esplanade. I feel like these have the real “city” image so I like them for the background, but they aren’t my favorite in terms of strictly headshots. By the time we made it over to the Esplanade, the sun had unfortunately set a little more than Dan would have liked. I was really impressed with how he was able to know where to put me, how to have me angle my head and my body (did you know if you put both your hands right on your waist, vs. on your hips, it makes you appear thinner in photos? These are things us ladies should all know 😉 ) and how to maneuver his way around different places in the city to get the “right” shot.

We are going to do another shoot, but instead of focusing on the “professional, Boston living, work hard/play hard” side of me, we are going to focus on the fitness side of me. I’m super excited for that shot because it means I get to buy new Lulu, right?! Big thanks to Dan for taking time out of his busy schedule (he’s getting married in 2 weeks!!) to take these photos and allow me to share them with all of you! If anyone is interesting in having Dan shoot photos, he can be contacted through all forms of social media:
Facebook: Kapitol Photography
Instagram: kapitolphoto
Twitter: @KapitolPhoto

That about does it for me today! I am not sure how much I’ll be blogging throughout the next couple of days or so since I’ll be moving, but I hope to get some regular posts up next week!

Questions for you: What is your favorite Fenway bar? Where is the last restaurant you went where you had a horrible experience? Have you ever had professional photo’s taken?