It's you, babe

Aaah, another day passes. Today was a little challenging due to being a little under the weather with a cold and rushing around to get things done but I accomplished everything, I'm sitting here in my bed at 10pm eating my go-to meal of meat, rice, and kimchi, listening to music and for the moment...I'm happy. Like really really happy. I'm soaking in it!

My five baby caterpillars arrived on schedule and are growing rapidly. So cute to watch! These aren't mine below but they're about this size today. How can they grow so much EVERY DAY?!

In other news, while dropping my kids off at Spring Break camp I ran into this...

I was so fascinated that the world left me for a good two minutes and when I came back from work to pick them up it was there waiting for me. LOL

That's all for tonight! I'll leave you with two things. The first is an embarrassment but it is what it is. I stumbled into a pop song today, Camila Cabello's Never Be the Same, and I'm hooked. It will be played to death for a few days and then left alone but for now...Preach it girl...PREACH!!!

The second, a poem that hit home this evening...

Gardens are also good places
to sulk. You pass beds of
spiky voodoo lilies 
and trip over the roots 
of a sweet gum tree, 
in search of medieval 
plants whose leaves, 
when they drop off 
turn into birds
if they fall on land,
and colored carp if they 
plop into water.

Suddenly the archetypal 
human desire for peace 
with every other species 
wells up in you. The lion 
and the lamb cuddling up.
The snake and the snail, kissing.
Even the prick of the thistle, 
queen of the weeds, revives 
your secret belief
in perpetual spring,
your faith that for every hurt 
there is a leaf to cure it.

~In Perpetual Spring by Amy Gerstler

Coming down the pipeline

Three months...that's how long it has taken for me to start feeling stagnant after finishing school. My brain is bursting with ideas for new things to experience and new goals to tackle. In an effort to keep myself under control I'm working from some lists.

First, I wanted to read for pleasure again. Unfortunately, grad school absolutely killed this for me. With the suffocating and consistent time constraints for pleasurable activities, I got to the point where I would only read graphic novels (and only the shortest ones) because I knew I could get my story fix quickly and move on. Regular novels were too much of a time commitment. When school ended I found myself still struggling to make those time commitments and no book looked appealing anymore. My solution was to dive into an old list I was working through before school and I'm now, once again, working my way around the world through books. I'm currently in the middle of Forgotton Fire by Adam Bagdasarian which is a YA, historical fiction novel focusing on one boy's experience during the Armenian genocide of 1915. Every chapter seems more horrifying than the last but I'm learning something new from history and engaged so win/win!

Second, I created a bucket list during the last few weeks of school of things for me to do and experience when I finished. It was motivating for me to think about having a life again. I've been pretty sloth-like since graduation but those fires seem to be raging again so I'm finally tackling one of the items on that list. I purchased the butterfly kit below from Amazon and my five baby caterpillars should arrive tomorrow. Somehow I missed out on this as a kid but I will finally be able to see a caterpillar turn into a butterfly! I'm a little excited. ;) In the future I hope to do it the more natural way with a milkweed plant perhaps. More on this later probably.

Finally, I have so many projects/wants/needs bouncing around in my head. I'll jot down a few...

• A complete master bathroom remodel. I've never done this before, have no one who can give me much advice, I'm overwhelmed by the options and decorating is not my strong suit, but I'm  excited!
• I've been looking for a large painting for weeks and cannot find what I'm looking for. I'm toying with the idea of doing it myself. I didn't take art classes in college for nothing!!
• In that same vein, I'm working on putting some of my own photos up in the house as well as adding some other homey things like curtains and other decorations. I'm sick of living in a house that looks like no one lives here.
• I'm ready to repaint my living and dining room which happens to be the entire middle of the house. Currently they're orange. Yes, orange. I love the orange still but I'm ready for something more neutral and with a house sale in the not-so-distant future it will have to be done eventually anyway. Pretty big project but its itching at me.
• Everyone in the house needs a new bed and mattress. $$$
• I've been waiting for the right time to buy a new, bigger TV for the living room as well as my very own PS4. Coming soon!!!
• I've picked Spanish back up and have been working hard on Duolingo to refresh myself on everything I learned there. From there, I plan to pick back up where I left off in my workbooks and begin weekly Skype chats again with my language exchange partner(s).
• My backyard garden beds are taunting me every day. "Plant us", they say. I will! I promise!

Enough of that for now. Its late and a long day is coming tomorrow. 

So, Internets, what have you been planning?

Gone but not forgotten

It’s been 6 years, 1 month, and 15 days since posting to this blog. I’ve been gone a long time but you’ve not been forgotten. A lot has happened in my absence! I’ll jot down a few…

• I maintained a 5-year working relationship with one therapist that ended successfully and voluntarily.
• I bought my first home.
• I earned an undergrad and graduate degree.
• I adopted a greyhound.
• My babies from this blog are now 10 and 7.
• I’m gainfully employed.
• I’ve discovered new hobbies, kept old cherished ones, let some go, put some on hold, and have come full circle with others that had been dormant for many years.
• I’ve experienced many new things, learned much about myself, and made new friends. Yes, friends!!
• I entered my fourth decade of life.
• I survived deployment with a toddler and a baby…and thrived!!
• I moved to another city for six months, then moved back.
• I conquered my eating disorder and learned to control my anger.

Going forward, I’ll be adding various entries from my time away that I’ve journaled elsewhere in hopes of preserving them and include new posts from the present. We’ll go from there! I'll leave you with a quote I ran into this morning and an excerpt from one of the most important books of my life.

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”

― Søren Kierkegaard

"Congratulations!

Today is your day.

You're off to Great Places!

You're off and away!

You have brains in your head.

You have feet in your shoes.

You can steer yourself 

any direction you choose.

You're on your own. And you know what you know.

And YOU are the guy who'll decide where to go."

— Oh, the Places You'll Go! by Dr. Seuss

Holy shit I won bitches!!!!!!!!! I have soooooooooooooo many things to say about my NaNoWriMo experience but, honestly? I've been writing for the past two hours and I'm kind of over it for tonight.

Floating around in my pool of euphoria,

Some chic you don't know

NaNoWriMo

I'll see you on the other side!

Just a couple more things I've figured out about myself...

A couple things I have learned about my decorating style. 
First, I like wood for wood.   I ran across a project book today on painting wood furniture.  While some of the projects looked "okay", I cringed at the thought of covering up something so beautiful with paint.  I mean, why?!  I love the way wood looks, smells and feels.  How could paint ever hold a candle to the natural grain pattern of wood?! Needless to say I didn't think I could actually go through with any of the projects in the book and therefore my thoughts on the subject were solidified.  I hope to get into old-fashioned woodworking in the not-so-distant future and build the simple furniture I need.  Stay tuned for that!

Second, I like black and white photos...black and white.  Maybe my intro photography class has turned me into a snob but I want black and white photos on my walls, with the correct size WHITE mats housed in BLACK frames.  My mother recently has put some of my black and white photos on my walls using blue frames and computer paper mats and while I am ecstatic to have my art on the wall and I do like the blue frames, the combination of it all is just not setting right with me.  Every day I walk by and remind myself that it must be done up to spec SOON. 

Here's to stained wood furniture and walls covered in correctly displayed black and white photography!

Just finished the movie Mooz-Lum and this song is at the end and I thought it was so beautiful that I had to blog it so that I could save it for later.  Enjoy.