I think of my good friend, James A. Watson daily, send him love in my nightly prayers and have much gratitude on the influence he had on me. He was a special person and all his goodness lives on in all who knew him. Today is the anniversary of James’ passing. I personally believe (and know in my heart) that his soul is still with us.
You are dearly missed but not forgotten, James. I will always carry you in my heart.
Fantastic track workout with these strong beautiful women tonight! Such great energy! We are on week 2 training for the Eugene Marathon. Some half marathon. I’m so encouraged about how well I’m feeling post stress fracture recovery, which sadly took me out of racing the Boston marathon in 2024. Hoping to requalify for 2026. These incredible friends and a handful of others who couldn’t be here tonight are the ones that help keep the joy in running for me.
Special thanks and shout out to @speedsportscoach for the great tips on using the LW energy enhancers + the other patches - the difference for me is quite noticeable! So excited about this! I appreciate you! 🙌🙏
Celebrating my oldest son today!
Happy birthday, Nicholas! 🥳❤️
As we said to you this morning…
“You are such a wonderful person in all that you do and are: as a son; from what we witness seeing you as a husband; friend; brother; an adventurer; runner; skier; successful engineer; traveler; devoted cat owner; foodie; and so much more! We love you SO much. ❤️🥰🎉🥳”
We are also proud of you for volunteering with relief efforts for the victims of the LA area fire. Thank you so much for that!
Hope you had the most wonderful dinner out tonight!
Sending love and prayers to every person, pet, all the wildlife, the natural landscape - everything associated with the fires in California. I’m also currently exploring ways to provide more support.
I am choosing not to share fire photos since everyone is seeing enough from other sources. These are photos from Inspiration Point in the San Gabriel Mountains, greatly affected by the current fire. Such a magical place with scenic views and inspirational quotes engraved on beautiful park benches. I hiked there with my son and his then girlfriend, now wife, some years ago. [Thanks to those of you messaging me inquiring about my family in LA - they are currently safe, besides smoke and heart break and they are directly helping with relief for victims.]
May we all find hope, healing, and learn and grow in better ways from this horrific experience and may it just end now. ♥️🙏
Nourishing my body and soul meet up with and running with these lovely humans! I love that we also start and end with a hug too! 🥰🙏🏃🏻♀️✨
Engaging in physical activities with friends can significantly boost oxytocin levels.
Oxytocin, most known as the love hormone, is so much more! Beyond social bonding and trust, it plays a role in reducing stress and anxiety, it can boost one’s mood, immunity, AND also heart health, and it even aids in reducing pain and inflammation.
A 10 second hug can also provide benefit and for more a more optimal effect, a 20 second hug is even better! https://www.medicinenet.com/how_do_hugs_make_you_feel/article.htm.
Do you notice a difference when you engage in physical activity with others? What about hugs? 🤗
@cloudforest 100% pure dark hot chocolate with toasted marshmallow 🥰 for me, Mesoamerican 70% cacao, honey-sweet and spicy for my son, Jacob! 😋
Highlights of Connor (my nephew) and Katie’s beautiful wedding in Tallahassee, Florida - December 7th, 2024.
Recovery run along the Portland Waterfront with my oldest son, @nmkef! Tony, Rosie, & Theo came along for a walk at the same time! We got lucky with the weather!
Merry Christmas! Happy birthday, Jesus! May there be joy to the world, peace on earth, and goodwill to men! Wishing you and yours much love and happiness.🎄❤️🙏
@wyeastwolfpack Annual Santa Hat Run for @snowcappdx Community Charities, a philanthropic organization which was created to provide food, clothing, advocacy and other services to those in need.
Always a great time! My youngest son, Zack, came into town just in time to join us!
Happy Birthday to my handsome, sweet, thoughtful husband! I am immensely blessed to have him to celebrate! 🎂🎉🥳
Happy Thanksgiving! Are you prepping and cooking a special meal too? One of my favorite meditative activities, which infuses nourishment into my soul, as well as love into the food I am preparing, is chopping, slicing, & dicing with a GOOD knife. This @steelportknifeco Carbon Steel Chef’s knife is way beyond good and exponentially adds to the experience. It’s incredibly sharp and so very satisfying to use. In fact, the best knife I’ve ever used! I feel SO very blessed by all the beautiful connections I have in my life. An additional blessing is that I won this knife via a joint give-a-away with one of my husband’s and my favorite Youtube chef’s @rick_bayless. My husband regularly makes many of his recipes and we even traveled to one of his restaurants in Chicago - twice now (@fronteragrill - incredible). One more beautiful blessing to mention is that Steelport Knife Company is in Portland, Oregon! My husband and I are excited to go visit them and tune up our knife skills! Thanks so much! So much to be grateful for! Many blessings!
Happy Thanksgiving week! May you find much to be grateful for in this wonderful world. This is my beautiful mother, sometime in the 60’s (she was in her 20’s), also pregnant with one of my younger siblings. I love this photo!
I am incredibly grateful for all the people in my life, especially my family, friends, running buddies (my soul sisters/personally appointed mental health coaches), clients and professional colleagues as well as my many acquaintances, my puppies, Rosie & Theo, my new role volunteering with @accent_care hospice, my health and the magnificent Pacific Northwest I live in. Much love to all of you. ❤️🙏
Short but super sweet visit for my Dad’s 85th birthday! 🥳 We had a wonderful dinner out on his actual birthday. We later enjoyed a family celebration at my sister’s lovely home. My middle son, who lives in Maryland, joined us, as well as my niece and her beautiful family! I got to hold her precious brand new baby boy and got hugs and kisses from her cutie pie daughter! Also pictured are just a handful of my parents many pets, all rescues except the collie puppy, my mom’s dream dog and my the result of my meditative rock balancing down my the river they live on. I’m very grateful for my family. They inspire me.
Celebrating our beautiful, smart, inspiring and totally fun friend, @portlandcarol after her choice of a hill repeat workout in the cold and dark! She always shows up regardless of weather and any shenanigans 😉 that may have kept her up late the night before. Happiest of birthdays dear friend! May they only get more amazing each year. You are such a blessing and we all appreciate you! 🥳❤️
My maternal Pop Pop.
Nearly 5 decades of sisterhood together with these beautiful women. Lifting each other up through struggles, celebrating successes, and expressing unconditional love. And of course shenanigans, mischief, and hilarious fun. I am so grateful.
Fall ‘dos for these two joyful pups! 🥰
📷: by our awesome groomer, Kendra!
#signaturelabradoodlesnapshots
Yay! Beautycounter is back up and running today (November 1st - December 1st) before their big relaunch early 2025. If you are like me, my sensitive skin was missing Beautycounter SO much. I tried a few other “safer personal care products/brands” and I am just not getting the same results as I have been getting with Beautycounter and actually am currently nursing a delayed reaction. I’m still a Beautycounter consultant and would love to help you choose what works for you during this “In-Between” sale. I’m happy to answer any questions you have. If you would like to shop with me, my link is in my bio or you can type it out as: beautycounter.com/hollymorello. As a consultant I receive a commission. I appreciate you shopping with me! Be sure to check out the special deals too!
Back Story: As a Functional Nutritional Therapy practitioner and as someone that cares a lot about the health and wellness of those I love and my community, I’ve been committed to helping clients and loved ones address their wellness holistically, which includes addressing chemicals of concern in everything they put in & on their body and what they bring into their home.
I’ve been impressed by Beautycounter’s mission: advocacy & education to get harmful chemicals and even those of concern, out of personal & home care products for everyone. I’ve also impressed that they were a B Corp and so much more.
Regardless, everyone wants high performing products, and high performing they are, which is also big reason why I use, support, and align with Beautycounter.
During my work with Beautycounter (Counter Brands dba Beautycounter), they were bought by a larger corporation from the much beloved founder, Gregg Renfrew. That corporation shut down in the spring of this year. Sad news. HOWEVER, there is good news! Gregg Renfrew, the founder of Beautycounter, was able to acquire some of the assets including the right to sell Beautycounter products in the future. Gregg and her team are working very hard at their re-launch with much enthusiasm.
Very much like my Aunt Rene who just turned 100 (see August 28th post), my beautiful Aunt Marie, 95 years young, and pictured here, has been very active throughout her life. She spent years traveling around the country with her husband, my Uncle Howard, doing a special form of square dancing. She golfed, and for many years had an RV and traveled all over the US. She reminisced these experiences with me and others when I stayed with her the last night I was visiting a little more than a week ago). I was so impressed and inspired by how fit she is at 95. I asked my Aunt Marie for some words of wisdom to the younger generations and she replied “mind your own business!” 😂
Some great wisdom there and what I need reminding of every day. I’ve learned that lesson by not following it THE HARD WAY, especially when I started nutritional therapy and wanted to shout out all I learned and experienced from the rooftops - sometimes in a very dogmatic way. I’m embarrassed by that now but none of us are perfect. As long as when we know better, we at least try to do better! If you catch me in the act, all you have to say is, “remember the words of wisdom your Aunt Marie shared with you?”
Another family member, a cousin in his 90’s, shared his words of wisdom too: correct and apologize for your mistakes as soon as possible. I think these are great words to live by too! I fractured an important relationship and lost too many precious years with a loved one who I tried to push unasked for Nutritional Therapy recommendations on. At the time I thought it was with good intentions. It took me years to simply apologize without any excuses. The apology was welcomed and the other person took some responsibility for the situation too. Mind your own business is fitting here too. Not easy when you love someone and want to help! Of course there are always exceptions to the rule but that’s not what I’m talking about.
I feel very blessed to have such a wonderful family.