November 29, 2017

a note to my past (and present) self



I unearthed this scarf from the basement last night. I made it in winter 2015 after Justin found out I had cheated on him. It’s my first project that I knitted in the round, and it’s twisted and littered with mistakes. Wearing it all day today made me feel a certain kind of way. 

Remembering the tender moments where all of your softness and emotions come spilling out is an exercise in boundary setting. 

I have learned that it's okay to come close to the things that hurt you. 

Get lost in your memories. Sit with the things and the memories that hurt you. But you must remember to come back to your present. Come back to your life here and now. Come back to the people that are here, loving you right now, instead of living with the ghosts of your past in your head. 

Come close to the things that hurt you, but come back when your heart starts to hurt too much.

Don’t be afraid to let it out. Write down your feelings. (And then burn them if you have to.) Cry when you're all alone in the shower. Cook yourself a delicious meal, and take out all the emotions you're feeling on the veggies you're chopping. Call your best friend and have a three-hour catch-up call between kids and life and all the messy things in between. Reach out to your people. They will be there to catch you and lift you up when you are doing the messy work of getting into the mud.

Listen, I know you're tired. I know you're dirty and there's mud caked in your hair and all you want to do is give up and quit and go back to things being "easy."

But you have to keep going. 

The mud is going to swallow you whole for a while. It will consume you and become all you can think about for days and weeks at a time. You can sit there with your phone in your hand, scrolling through Instagram and Twitter and Facebook and back again shaking your head at me, but the stuff that wakes you up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat because you keep dreaming about it is no coincidence. The half flashes of memory that come to you in quiet moments are begging for your attention, inviting you to dive deeper.

You must confront your demons.

The only way to start thriving instead of surviving is to go through your demons instead of shoving your fingers in your ears and screaming, "LA LA LA, I CAN'T HEAR YOU." Your bare bones survival methods are not made to be how you live your entire life. There will come a day where the darkness becomes too much for you to bear. You can't take the solitude and the cold comfort of only your own arms for warmth anymore. You can't take the strange noises and the things that go bump in the night anymore. You will long for the light and passion of connection and community. You will find yourself stumbling around, asking yourself, "How on earth did I get here?"

Eventually, you will take your fingers out of your ears. Your voice will be hoarse from shouting and your arms will hurt from trying to keep everything and everyone else out of your proverbial eardrums. The exhaustion from running away from your problems will overtake all of your senses, little by little, until you have no choice but to fall to your knees in the mud and start the hard work of getting into it.

When you're ready, go all in.

November 27, 2017

magic monday







The sunset tonight was 360 degrees of pure joy. A Magic Monday, indeed. 

November 26, 2017

end of the holiday weekend






sunday’s are for... sleeping in. two cups of coffee. waking up to Tammy & Randy yelling at a squirrel for stealing one of the solar lights off the deck and running up a tree with it. snuggling with the cats. knitting until my hands feel like they’re going to fall off. noticing how all the buildings pop downtown now that all the leaves are gone. a gorgeous sunset from the drive thru window. 

happy sunday. 

November 25, 2017

good things



  • silhouettes of almost empty trees
  • cotton candy sunsets
  • coffee. coffee coffee coffee. COFFEE.
  • it's the time of the year for my annual Gilmore Girls rewatch
  • putting up Christmas decorations at work
  • it was almost 70 degrees yesterday!
  • Tegan & Sara sing alongs
  • knitting Christmas presents
  • the sun is out
  • my heart is filled with Grace and Light

November 23, 2017

happy thanksgiving



Happy Thanksgiving everyone. 

To be honest, this time of year always leaves me feeling soft and raw and open in all the worst ways. The holidays just aren’t the same without the people we have lost over the last few years. But those soft, vulnerable moments are where grace sneaks in places gratitude into our hearts. 

This year, I am thankful for a lot on Thanksgiving. First and foremost, I am thankful for my people. My family, my friends, Justin and his family—the ones who deal with me on an every day basis and still think I’m interesting and laugh at my bad jokes.

I am thankful for my hobbies. Photography, writing, knitting, scrapbooking... And lately I’ve been obsessed with Sudoku puzzles. I would be nowhere without my creative outlets, both the ones I try to monetize and make a living off of and the ones I do solely for myself and my loved ones. (Because nothing says “I love you” like “Hey I made this for you!”) Creativity is my passion in life and I will never grow bored of pursuing my passions. 

I am thankful for love. And grace. And hope. And joy. And purpose. And faith. And forgiveness. Without all of these things, my life would be a lot smaller for sure. 

Thanksgiving. Here’s to the little things in all of our lives. They turn everything we have into enough. 

November 19, 2017

sunday snippets





Sunday. I used my new mug from I Can Be Society this morning. Saw Christmas trees popping up at Pick N Save. Watched a gorgeous sunset out the drive thru window from work. The winter chill has settled in and probably won’t let up again until March (if we’re lucky). It hardly feels like Thanksgiving is THURSDAY. Somehow it is almost the end of November and all I can wonder is where has the year gone?

November 16, 2017

drawn to the neon lights


We're on vacation in Appleton right now. Today we went window shopping at the mall in search of a candy store that was in the mall when Justin was little. That was a bust. So we went exploring downtown and Justin made fun of the Christmas decorations that were starting to litter the city streets. We found a candy store/ice cream/gift shop/bakery called Crazy Sweets and spent 45 minutes browsing through all the old candy selections. I got almost all of my Christmas shopping done for Justin's family, and we spent like $35 on candy. We drove home as the sun was setting and it was the perfect day.

Tonight, we went to Funset Boulevard. It was our entire reason for this vacation. One of the best things about being an adult is getting to choose when you feel like a kid again. We got a discount on our hotel through Funset, and we got 20 free tokens and money off of a pizza with our hotel room key so I'd call it a win-win! Seriously, stepping into Funset was sort of like sensory overload, but in the best way.

First, the smell of grease slaps you in face when you walk in the door. It makes you crave pizza and french fries that you know are going to give you a chin full of acne for the next week, but if the goal is to let your inner child run wild tonight, who am I to deny her? We got pizza, cheese curds, cheese fries, and Justin got a burger that he has to rip apart into teeny, tiny little pieces in order to be able to eat it without teeth. We're going to be eating leftovers for days. After we ran our leftovers back to the hotel, we were ready for some games. (And the photo booth!)

I kicked Justin's butt at Skee Ball, thank you very much. But he kicked my butt at basically everything else. ;)

20 free tokens + $40 worth of tokens from the machine = 2 and a half hours of entertainment AND 995 prize tickets. I was kinda pissed that we were 5 short of 1000, but we were out of tokens and ready to go home. Instead of using our tickets to get something we didn't need and don't have the room for at home, Justin gave me the task of finding someone to give away our tickets to. I gave them to a sweet family, and the little girl's face lit up when I handed her the slip. Good deeds make my heart shine brighter. It lets out more light into the world.

The rest of the night we're hanging out at the hotel, watching TV and grazing on all the leftovers we've accumulated over the last three days. One more full day tomorrow and then Saturday we head back to real life.

I love vacation.

November 11, 2017

currently, november edition



enjoying the first snow of the season

drinking all. the. coffee. 

bundling up every time I have to go outside

watching all the true crime documentaries I can

knitting Christmas presents... it’s crunch time!

staying in bed for as long as possible every morning

looking forward for vacation on Tuesday!

making Christmas wishlists & gift lists

thinking about how much can change in a year

wishing you all a happy Saturday... :)

November 09, 2017

thursdays are my mondays



Or at least this week it is. 

Magic is on my mind today. Feels like 15* but the sun is out today, so I guess I can’t complain about the cold too much. There’s also something to be said for taking a shower for the first time in three days. Makes you feel human again in a way that never fails to rejuvenate and calm the soul. 

I’m trying to focus on the little things. Practice gratitude and let go of the things that I can’t control in this season. It’s always a work in progress. That’s the beauty of it. 

November 05, 2017

seven years ago










Seven years ago, I finished my first 365 challenge. I took a self portrait every day for an entire year, starting right around the time I started my college apps and ending a few weeks away from my first set of art school finals. If it’s true that every cell in your body regenerates every seven years, I am no longer the girl I once embodied in these photos that still mean so much to my fragile heart. 

Something I’m struggling to come to terms with is how very different my life has turned out to be at 25 than what I thought it would look like at 18. College didn’t pan out for me, and in a lot of ways I’m still very bitter about that. All of the jobs that I want now besides working for myself, I need some sort of degree to really be considered for the position. I’m managing a fast food restaurant at 25, and I’m still trying to chase my teenage dreams of making art and making a living at the same time. 

What I realize now though, is that art doesn’t have to be wrapped so tightly into only one medium. Since leaving SCAD, I have discovered I love to knit. And scrapbook. And occasionally play with paint. I don’t have to stick to solely photography or solely writing when I have creative energy that I need to let out. Part of being an artist, I think, is experimenting. Learning different mediums both helps us with gaining new knowledge and a new skill set and also helps us to further our creative process. And, to be honest, the process is one of the reasons why I make in the first place. 

Art usually serves as a distraction from my mental illness. I first learned of the discipline it took to write creatively when I went to writing camp at seventeen. After that experience, the following November I embarked on this crazy 365 challenge of mine. I wanted to prove to myself that I could make good pictures. I wanted to better understand my camera, and also get a better understanding of myself. Without turning my camera on my face for an entire year, I don't know that I would even be here in this text box, sharing my thoughts with all of you, Blogland.

Forever grateful to my 17 year old self for embarking on this crazy journey. I literally don't know where I would be if I hadn't. 

November 01, 2017

happy november



Some words I wrote on Instagram this morning:

“Being rejected stinks. There’s no sugar coating the feeling of your heart dropping because that little life you envisioned in the gray areas of waiting and transition has suddenly evaporated in the blink of an eye. Now you have a choice to make though... Will you sit back and live a half life inside that bubble in your head, wallowing in the prospect of what could have been? Or will you go have a good cry in the shower and then dance it out and use the yellow towel because it makes you happy? You can surrender to your soft, tender moments where your world feels like it’s caving in. Just remember to pick yourself back up again.”