As some of you know by now, my name is Tess. I’m 29 and new to the Boerne community. I love to run and write and cook and read, although time to do those things is limited as I have two adorable kids—Gunnar (5) and Harper (1.5)—who keep me “entertained” and very busy right up until they shut their tiny eyes at night.

My husband’s name is Tanner. He’s a Marine Veteran (Iraqi Freedom), and he enjoys fly fishing and bass fishing (and bay fishing and ice fishing and ALL THE FISHING). We actually MET fishing, and we enjoy going to Possum Kingdom Lake as a family on warm weekends to, you guessed it, FISH! (Theme, anyone??)

While I personally enjoy fishing, I tire pretty quickly of being bad at it, which works out well for Tanner who tires REALLY QUICKLY of tying all my bait on and getting my hooks unstuck.

However, our son Gunnar, lives and breathes fishing just like his daddy. For Tanner that means a constant (less needy) companion and fishing protégé, and for me that means hikes and family picnics outside and always near the water. We all genuinely enjoy the outdoors, so you can only imagine how excited we are to have moved to this region of Texas where rivers, lakes, state parks, and giant granite hiking-domes are abundant.

Harper, my daughter, keeps me the busiest. Her interests include waking up at odd hours of the night to snuggle, playing in my kitchen cabinets, blowing kisses at strangers in HEB, unfolding all of Mommy’s folded laundry, breaking it down hardcore to Baby Shark, and (in typical toddler fashion) looking so adorable all the time it’s hard to ever be mad at her.

Having Harper was actually my inspiration for Low and Slow To Go. In preparation of her arrival, I used to “freezer-prep” crockpot meals, so that once she was here, I could rely on prior meal-assembly and still appease my family’s need for home-cooked dinners.

Because I was nursing a new baby, I decided early on to adapt my freezer meals to be “clean” as possible. As you probably know by now, this meant nixing most canned ingredients, spice and gravy powders, and making my own from scratch. The final product was delicious, my family enjoyed my creations, and I became dependent on the ease that “dumping” ingredients in the crockpot brought me.

A couple of months post-partum, Tanner accepted a job in San Antonio, and within 6 weeks’ time we had left Lubbock and officially moved to Boerne. The abrupt move disrupted my infant-daughter’s already erratic sleep schedule, so cooking and cleaning up anything in my sleep deprived state became unfathomable. Consequently, Crockpot freezer-meals became a full-time necessity.

It was around this time that I began to expand on the idea of selling my Crockpot “Starter-kits”. If I relied on them so frequently, wouldn’t other busy individuals also benefit from an expedited (but also home-cooked) meal? Why did being busy, or in my case, sleep deprived, mean sacrificing nutrition? It didn’t for me–I had created a “dinner hack”—and I wanted to share.

And truly, starting a business helped expand my world at the time, which, as most mothers of new babies know, can feel very small and isolated. I would think about Starter Kits when I woke up in the morning, when I went to bed, and when I was awakened by my colicky daughter four to eight times a night. Planning and recipe testing and developing my idea helped fill the void and lack of autonomy I felt as a full time mom.

I like to think of the progression of Low and Slow, from ‘Idea’ to ‘Business’, like my son’s Lego sets. Hundreds of legos come out of the package as a mess of tiny blocks and a thick book of instructions, and page by page and block by block, finally a spaceship or T-Rex or submarine materializes, and you realize how every tiny piece fitting together plays an integral part in building the final product.

My company manifested in the same way, one spare moment (sometimes one spare brain wave) at a time, and yet here I am, with a solid, tangible, business that I am extremely passionate about. (And by the way, I rely on my product now more than ever before—I use starter-kits at least three times a week!)

And now my babies are older and I am able to devote my whole self to the cause.

 

I am excited about the future of the company and its never ending evolution.

 

I am excited about the prospective families I can help provide a wholesome dinner to with Low & Slow Starter Kits.

 

And more than anything, I am excited to meet you. I hope you feel like you know me just a little bit better.

 

Kindly,

 

Tess