Create: my style

One creative thing I've worked on this year (besides dozens of half-finished crafty projects at home) is my style tumblr blog.  After participating in a few fashion challenges over the last year, I had gotten used to taking pictures of my outfits everyday, so in April I created an outlet for those pictures:

http://lattestyle.tumblr.com

I wasn't really sure it was going to work considering I blog 3-5 times a week already here. But I didn't want to turn this blog into a style blog, so it's been a great place to grow and explore my interest in fashion.

This side project has also allowed me to write in a way that is slightly more sarcastic and stream-of-consciousness than usual (and maybe a little more like my real-life persona?). So it's been a fun outlet for creative writing, as well as creative dressing. My readership has crawled up little by little over there, and now about 90 people follow my every-few-days, daily style tumbls.

Here are a few of my favorite outfits from the past 8 months since I started it. (if you click on the photos, they'll link to the posts).

p.s. If you follow me here or there, thank you! It wouldn't be nearly as much fun without you around.

             

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I'm participating in #WEverb11

The 10th prompt is: Create. Share a creative project you undertook this year (art, writing, DIY, cooking, home decoration, crafts, photography … whatever comes to mind). How do you use your creativity to express yourself?

WEVerb11: Thrive

Somewhere around this time last year, E and I started talking seriously about some practical changes in our lives for our health and wellbeing. We had both changed out lifestyles quite a bit after we got married -  gaining weight, and not exercising at all - and we generally felt physically poor. I was, without realizing it, cooking lots of carb heavy, cheese laden, meat dishes that were packing on the calories. We spent more time at home and greatly decreased our physical activity.

So, right after the holidays (how cliche!) we started on a plan. I would cook healthier, purchase more produce and make more fresh food. I blogged out about the plan as motivation.

Things were going really well for the first month. We felt somewhat better (Admittedly, the working out was much harder for me to start, and I didn't do much). But we has both lost some weight and were fitting into old 'skinny' clothes, which was encouraging. I wrote an update about how things were going with some renewed/modified goals. We were doing well.

And then things kind of stalled; life got busier and our progress slowed down. It was harder for me to be motivated when I stopped losing a pound a week. I didn't step up to the next level, I gave up.

We went to Italy. We had a busy fall where I traveled, E was in night classes, and I did very little healthy cooking. And we both stopped working out. While we haven't gained the weight back, we will soon if we don't change something, again. I'm still 7 pesky pounds from my goal weight and far, far, far from where I'd like to be endurance-wise and generally feeling healthy. I have felt pretty terrible for the last few months-weak and tired. My immune system must be much weaker too as it took me two and half weeks to get past a cold which took E four days to recover from.

E and I haven't talked specifically about a plan for this year, but we do know we have a plan to get back to, soon! Generally I hope to do better at meal planning to buy fresh food that doesn't go bad. I need to come up with a workout plan that fits for me (i.e. not in the morning, and not running outside because its dark when I get home from work), even if it's not as intense as it could be. I tend to set really high goals and then give up because I cant meet them, rather than setting small realistic goals and building up. Hopefully we'll get a chance to work on this over the holidays and get started again.

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Along with other friends, I'm participating in #WEverb11, organized by Kim. I'm excited to reflect on this last year and look forward to what's ahead. We'd love to have you join us!

The 12th prompt is: Thrive. What was your healthiest habit of 2011? What would you like to change or do differently in 2012?

Back to WEVerb, a little behind.

The biggest choice I made this year isn't something I'm ready to blog about.

I'm not going to feel like I have to quickly qualify - "No I'm not having a baby", because I know that you guys don't automatically jump to the conclusion that having a baby is the only big decision I could possibly make in my young, newly-ish wed life. [And I thank you for that!]

A characteristic of a lot of my decisions from this year is letting go of anxiety. This year has been a year of deep breaths and deep plunges. It's been a year of dipping toes in, and deciding to wait. But it's been a year where we have decided to let go of the anxiety that comes with making big life decisions and just giving it to God.

Being a Christian who believes in a Sovereign God, it can be tempting to avoid decisions and just wait to let things happen on their own. While I do believe God has a hand in even the little things in my life, we also know that He allows us to use the minds He created and the will He formed, to act.

So we've been acting. Talking, praying, asking, and acting. And I look forward to another year of big decisions and adventures doing the same.

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Along with other friends, I'm participating in #WEverb11, organized by Kim. I'm excited to reflect on this last year and look forward to what's ahead. We'd love to have you join us!

Today's [belated] prompt was: Choose. What was the biggest choice you made in 2011? What caused you to choose what you chose?  

This Year's Travels

Where did I travel this year?

Chicago (x3), Grand Rapids, New York City, Atlanta, Tucson, Santa Barbara, Boston, Spokane, & Italy!

It was a busy year for travel - I realized I started to mark time by when I was leaving or returning for my next trip. I earned status with both the airline and the hotel rewards programs I participate in.

I loved experiencing some new cities in the US, but my favorite part was Italy (big surprise, right?). Not just because of it's far away location and beautiful sites, but because being in Italy brought out what I love about travel. Seeing new places, experiencing new things, seeing a new culture - and thus seeing my own in a new light, realizing what I take for granted about home. We learned so much from our experience there and E and I have both been missing it lately - especially the people.

We are planning to go on a cruise early next year, but don't really have any other travels plans, so we'll see what happens. I imagine the travel bug will bite us again soon.

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along with other friends, I'm participating in #WEverb11, organized by Kim. I'm excited to reflect on this last year and look forward to what's ahead. We'd love to have you join us!

Today's prompt was: Where did you travel this year? What was your favorite part? If you didn’t get to travel, where do you want to go next year?

A Haiku for 2011

dreams for the future
we traveled so far to learn
there's no place like home


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along with other friends, I'm participating in #WEverb11, organized by Kim. I'm excited to reflect on this last year and look forward to what's ahead. We'd love to have you join us!

Today's prompt was: Sum up your year via Haiku

Lesson Learned: Where Home is

This year I learned firsthand, that home is wherever we're together. E and I spent a lot of time (relatively*) apart this year. I was gone for about 5 weeks total for work trips, and then we spent another 5 weeks consecutively apart in July. We missed each other in more than just the tangible, obvious ways; I mainly just missed E's presence in our home. The meals shared, messed up sheets, teeth brushed in unison, annoying morning shower concerts.

And then I learned that we could make it in an entirely different culture and environment. Our time in Italy was by far the most life-changing event of the year, and probably of our marriage so far.  I learned that leaning on each other forced us to appreciate things about each other that we rarely acknowledge. As we're beginning to face the reality of moving somewhere unknown...sometime in the future, I'm realizing it doesn't matter where we go as long as I'm with you.


*"a lot" is relative to the normal amount of time we spend apart and relative to some couples I know who've never been apart for more than 24 hours, and for the military spouses who regularly spend the better part of a year separated.


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along with other friends, I'm participating in #WEverb11, organized by Kim. I'm excited to reflect on this last year and look forward to what's ahead. We'd love to have you join us!

Today's prompt was: What lesson did you learn in 2011 from “The School of Life” rather than a classroom?

In a Word

This past year has been a bit crazy. In the year 2011 I took nine trips and we had five visits from out-of-town family and friends. In the beginning of the year, I decided to take a class at E's school which led to me being gone two nights a week, in addition to our weekly youth group commitment. I felt like we were never home. Then in April we got approached with the idea to spend the summer in Italy. We had a frantic few weeks of pulling things together to be gone, and we left. After our vacation to New York and time in Italy, (including 5 weeks apart), we had out-of-town houseguests for most of the rest of August. Then school started back up, including me taking another class, E taking German in addition to his full-time class load, and me traveling for almost the entire month of October. In addition to all that we've had family and church related things going on.  Looking back on the year (it hardly seems like I should already be doing that!) we feel incredibly blessed to have gotten through it as smoothly as we have. But it did feel a bit crazy.

The word I would like to use to be able to describe this upcoming year is difficult for me, because right now it feels very unknown. E and I have finally been faced with the reality that once he is done with school in the spring we have no idea where we're going or what we're doing. He could be called to a church right away, or [likely], it will take a while, and we'll have to have a plan for the meantime. It's hard for me to imagine us leaving this area and our lives here, but at the same time I'm eager to see what's next for us. So, at this time next year, I'm hoping to be able to describe 2012 as: at peace. It could very well be that our future will be as unknown one year from now as it is today, but I'm praying for a peace to get through the uncertainty of what our lives will hold over the next year.

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Along with other friends, I'm participating in #WEverb11, organized by Kim. I'm excited to reflect on this last year and look forward to what's ahead. We'd love to have you join us!

The first prompt is: Choose one word. Encapsulate the year 2011 in one word. Explain why. Imagine it’s one year from today, what would you like the word to be that captures 2012 for you