at little t's

I've been really inspired by Abby's blog pretty much since I discovered it. One of the things I love the most is when she shows off different places around Portland that she loves going to. These little sneak peeks always feel like little vignettes and I finish reading wanting to check these places out in real life. I've tried to take more and more photos documenting the places that Jared and I go around Minneapolis. Now that I've had this blog for over two years, one thing I really like doing is going back and reading the archives to see what I was up to a year or two ago. Especially since I started this blog only a few months after I moved to Minneapolis, I feel like it's such a great documentation of my time here so far.

One thing I love about photos is the reminder of something special that they provide. It's not necessarily the subject of the photo that might be the something special, but whatever the photo is usually sparks a memory of something that may have happened just before or after the photo was taken. The first time I realized this was after a summer trip I took to Nepal when I was 16. While there, the group I was with worked on an erosion prevention project, building a fence at the top of a steep hill that surrounded a lake. We had to carry buckets of pebbles up the side of the hill and we did this (the traditional way) by attaching a strap to the bucket and putting the strap across your forehead while the bucket was behind your back, so you're using your neck strength. I have one photo of me and a friend with our buckets, almost to the top of this very steep hill, and I'll always remember that immediately after the photo was taken, my friend tripped and dropped his bucket and then we laughed as we watched all the pebbles tumble down the side of the hill.

But back to Minneapolis...One place that we used to go to a lot is Little T's (it's actually called Little Tijuana, but it was introduced to me as Little T's and I've never been able to call it anything else). Little T's might be the most inauthentic Mexican restaurant I've ever been to. It's greasy, has insanely tacky decorations, provides paper tablecloths and crayons to diners of all ages, and the bill is always accompanied by a handful of tootsie rolls. I first got to know it as an after bar spot, but it gets pretty crazy around 2am (when the bars close here), so we kind of stopped going (plus we're not usually up at 2am anymore, and if we are, we usually choose to just go home and go to bed than go get food).

Nowadays, we usually end up there when we're out doing errands on a weekend and realize that it's 3pm and we still haven't eaten lunch and we're both crabby and need something greasy! I took these photos back in January (hence the leftover holiday decorations) when we were still looking for a dog (life pre-Freddie, it's so hard to remember now!). We had just gone to two different rescue events and left empty handed. I was feeling especially disappointed and we had a little re-grouping lunch out before heading back home. I really like how these photos turned out (especially the one of Jared, maybe my favorite portrait of him yet) and now I'll always have a little snippet memory of that day.

{PS: Speaking of Abby, I'm really excited to be sponsoring her blog this month, head on over and check it out. And be sure to check out the other amazing sponsors too}