Here is the latest installment of The Weekender! Cheers to costumes and candy and the weekend!

Halloween: Vitaliy is shooting a wedding on Saturday with another photographer so it’ll just be Rose and me. I gave up on the family costume idea and am taking it easy with a hand me down costume for Rose. I can’t wait to share! Follow us on Instagram to see her tomorrow!

We’re moving: It’s so bittersweet! We absolutely love our little tiny in-law unit and the family we rent from, but God provided an opportunity to rent a home in our area that was too good to pass up. We did nothing to make this happen and are so thankful to God for everything, our current home the past 4 years and the new one we will enjoy come December.

Date Night: Unfortunately, date night has been pretty spotty for us lately. We’ve been short on time, money and energy. But we did manage to make it happen this week. Not wanting to take the time to find a babysitter, we enjoyed a date night in. We planned on watching a scary movie in honor of Halloween, but ended up enjoying a foreign film, The Secret In Their Eyes.

Talking Heads Concert: Vitaliy has been asking me for weeks to watch a Talking Heads Concert from the 80s with him. Nothing about the idea appealed to me. On Monday night, I came home after a Mom’s Night Out event with my local MOPS group and found Vitaliy watching the concert. I was so relieved until I realized he had just started watching it. He nicely asked me to put my phone away and watch it with him. As I mentioned, we haven’t taken a lot of time to invest in each other lately so I felt the need to comply. As I watched and listened to the music and to Vitaliy’s commentary of the performance, I was intrigued. Both by the artistry of the band and the mind of the man I married. My take away from this experience: I’ve been married to this man for 9.5 years and there is still so much to discover about him. Also, those activities your spouse invites you to enjoy with them that you loathe just might be an invitation to step into their world and get to know them even better. I’m so happy I joined him!

Family Photo Sessions: Every fall we do a very limited number of fall family photo sessions. We have a few spots still available before we hit the road on November 17 so email us if you’re interested and we’ll send you more details. In my book, Christmas cards are always better with a photo!

Photo: Rose’s first trip to our favorite pumpkin patch, Bob’s. That was not the outfit I originally planned on her wearing to the pumpkin patch, but she pooped out of her original outfit at church, which also included soiling the nursery helper’s shirt.

There was a time when I was pregnant with Rose that I couldn’t open the refrigerator without wanting to vomit.

That time lasted my entire first trimester. This was also the time Vitaliy started to cook more. I am now thankful for that time because Vitaliy is one talented cook. I believe it’s the artist in him. And since I love to eat, I have been encouraging him to hone his new craft. One meal at a time. At some point, Vitaliy realized one of the keys to his success in the kitchen was cooking things slowly. Then we started to learn this same technique works in life too. We now refer to it as our “slow cooked life.”

Over the past few years, our life began to change. We started to downsize. And I don’t just mean stuff. We began to declutter the busyness of our lives. We learned the art of saying no (which is still hard for me) and began feeling more and more comfortable not always being on the go. We didn’t plan it this way, but I think this helped us adapt to becoming parents and having our social calendar become more limited.

But living a slow cooked life isn’t easy. In business, you’re convinced you have to do more or you’re not going to bring in new clients. With friends, you feel like you have to say yes or people may stop inviting you. At church, you often feel like you’re not doing enough if you have only one commitment. And the list can go on. But the theme is the same, you’re not moving or growing fast enough. You’re not doing enough.

One of the things that has become a family ritual for us is a slow cooked breakfast each morning. This now usually takes place during Rose’s morning nap. I often find myself questioning it. We need to start our work day earlier. We’re not putting in enough hours. Our day is off to a slow start. I open my Instagram and see what everyone else has accomplished by the time I’m just sitting down to eat (and I’m still in my pajamas).

And some of those statements might be true. But this is sacred time. Or it has become sacred time over the years. Vitaliy and I have had some of our most honest and vulnerable talks over hot oatmeal and coffee in the morning. Sometimes it’s filled with Jimmy Fallon and hearty laughter. Other times we listen to a sermon and feed our souls. We cry. And we pray. And we assess. In the busy, when do you assess?

Let me repeat, a slow cooked life isn’t easy. Likely because of the slow aspect. Nobody wants to wait – I don’t. But I’ve tasted Vitaliy’s slow-cooked meals and there’s nothing better. You can’t rush a good thing. And life is good.