Back to My Roots

Boots: Rios of the Mercedes from Texas Boot Company c/o | Dress: Chelsea and Violet | Vest: Levi (retro, similar)

 On this day, I was totally in my element. Did you know that I grew up a country girl? My family and I moved to Texas when I was in Junior High (before that we lived all over the south). My dad bought us a house on 3 acres of land with a pasture and a barn, and shortly after a beautiful palomino horse lived in that barn. I named him Yoohoo 🙂

Yoohoo definitely wasn’t just a pasture horse. After some training, we both learned how to run barrels well enough to compete, so my dad and I were on the road almost every weekend headed to rodeos. We placed every now and then, I won almost $100 once, but we really just did it for fun. It only lasted for 2-3 years because I took up golf too and didn’t have time for both, but it’s a time in my life I’ll always cherish. My dad and I really bonded on those trips, and I kept and took care of my horse until I left for college and my parents sold him. I was pretty sad about it, but I knew it was the right thing to do since he was still young and loved being ridden. Maybe one day I’ll have horses again!

Anyway, that’s the story behind why I felt so in my element for this shoot. There’s something so serene about being out in the quiet of a country field. Carlos shot a wedding here a while back which is how he found it. There’s absolutely no way we would have just come across this place on our own. It was about 15 miles down a country road in Walburg, Texas, and not on the way to anything. It’s actually pretty close to where I had my first real date in high school, though. Haha! (The venue is called Giardino Bertucci, by the way).

The reason we went with the country theme for this shoot is because of my awesome cowboy boots, obviously. The owner of Texas Boot Company, Marc, invited me out to visit the store a while back and it was so fun! It’s located out in Bastrop, so just a hop, skip, and a jump away from Austin, and has such a gigantic selection of boots. Seriously, anything you could ever want, he has. He also has a fully stocked bar and gives customers complimentary drinks to sip on while they shop. I, of course, took him up on it and had a margarita 🙂 I found these gorgeous Rios of the Mercedes boots and just had to make them mine! I can’t wait to wear them more in the summer and to football games in the fall. A Texas girl can never have too many pairs of boots!

Thanks for reading, and sorry (kinda) for the photo overload! Carlos really nailed it again with the lighting and location and there were just so many I wanted to share.

Photos By: Carlos Barron Photography