Gratitude + Waiting

This season of life has been particularly hard on me and our family.  Long stretches of time separated from one another, solo parenting, living out of a suitcase for months, and feeling uprooted and desperate for home has been taxing.  I often find myself descending into negativity.  Feeling angry, frustrated, helpless, it's a pit with slippery walls and can feel so inviting to indulge in.  Sometimes when I think that I still have over a month left before we can even move into a home of our own I just feel so depressed.  A month isn't that long, but it can feel like an eternity in my mind, looking at the long days stretching out in front of me, each one its own little infinity.  When I realized we wouldn't be home until October and would miss summer in Tacoma, I got bummed out, but today I want to focus on the positive and get excited about all the great things that I can look forward to, instead of feeling sad that they aren't here yet.  

• Pumpkins on the front porch- we got married in November, right after Halloween, so our wedding had tons of pumpkins.  That first November we had a front yard full of pumpkins left over from the wedding.  It was so festive and I love how pumpkins on the porch remind me of our wedding.
• Going to the pumpkin patch- Dan and I have gone to the patch before, but this time it feels like the beginning of a little tradition with Jack and his first autumn!
• Fall leaves!- Alaska has lovely fall colors, but fall is short and there isn't a huge variety of fall colors the way there is in the Northwest.  Fall lasts so long in the Northwest.  Getting to take photos in the leaves is so much fun and I'm thinking Jack might be walking by then and will be able to play in piles of leaves!
• Home renovations!- In the summer I don't really want to renovate anything because I just want to enjoy summer and it's so damn hot (and we don't have a/c like all idiot PNW people.  Why don't we have a/c? I don't know. We are sadists).  After we redid the kitchen of our Anchorage apartment, I'm feeling really inspired and empowered to DIY the reno on our Tacoma kitchen.  I like our kitchen all right, but it can be so much better, and so much more "us" than it currently is.  Another mini reno I want to punch out?  ripping the nasty, old, dated, brown carpet in our upstairs and replacing it with white wood floors. Oh! And making our old bedroom into Jack's room!
• Going for neighborhood walks with Jack and Dusty- Our home in Anchorage wasn't great for going on walks, and here in Oregon it's pretty bad too.  Our house in Tacoma is the perfect walk distance from some of my favorite coffee shops, and I used to just take Dusty for walks with me, but now I can bring Jack in his stroller!
• Vintage shopping + Thrifting- I've been inspired lately with my personal style. I love the locally owned vintage shops in Tacoma and I plan on slowly building a wardrobe that makes me feel excited by grabbing special pieces from my favorite shops.  One of Dan and my favorite things to do together is go thrifting, and since we pared down our furniture a lot when we moved away, there are a lot of pieces we'll need to replace when we move back.  Instead of just hitting up IKEA, I want to find cool and funky pieces at thrift stores to refresh.
• Getting back in the gym- While lifting a tiny human has probably given me some of my strength back from my year absence at the gym, I'm looking forward to getting my sweat on and having a bit of time to myself.  My gym in Tacoma is my favorite place I've ever found for working out, and I've been looking forward to going back ever since I could think about working out post-baby without cringing.
• Planning Jack's 1st Birthday- Okay his birthday isn't until December, but you only get to plan a 1st birthday for your first kid once!  I do love planning parties, so I'm looking forward to putting together a really fun little party.
• Lady Dates!- my bffs are in Tacoma and I'm so looking forward to getting to hang out with my women.  Mama needs some boozy girls nights and some dancing in her life.
• Learning new things- Two things that I've been wanting to take classes in are pottery throwing and metal working for jewelry making.  Learning a new creative skill just for fun is such soul food.
• Cheap + amazing craigslisting- okay, no joke, people price things SO CRAZY HIGH on craigslist in Alaska.  I don't get it.  And it's nearly impossible to find anything cool.  Craigslisting here in the PNW is a dream.

waiting for october

Last week Dan and I got to go out sans-Jack for the first time in forever!  We headed into Portland to grab some drinks and food at Church, but when we got there some event was going on and a bunch of kids were in there singing karaoke, so (since we were actively avoiding children that night, haha) we decided to walk over to Hale Pele which came highly recommended by my sister in law.  Oh man, it was bomb.  I'm not a huge tiki-drink aficionado, but every drink I had was so incredible, as was the food.  And I can't say enough about the atmosphere. I'm a fan of when a business or brand commits 100% to their thing, and Hale Pele was an intimate tiki wonderland.  

I'm bracing for another weird month without Dan.  He goes back to work up in Tacoma this week, which means we won't be spending much time together until we can move back in October.  Being in this odd time living in other people's houses has been stressful and if I'm honest, I could go for one of those fast forward buttons so I could skip this next month and just move back to Tacoma already.  In the meantime, it's my busy season for work, so I'm buried in wedding images to edit, which helps keep me occupied.

Eight Months

Eight months old, this little one is.  It's so weird to think of him as a little newborn lump.  I remember being excited when he kinda sorta touched a page of the book I was reading him.  Now he has such a grip I can barely wrench that book out of his little paws.  Everyone who meets him says he's the happiest baby they've ever seen and his smile is the greatest and best thing ever.  I have a feeling he's going to be a funny, opinionated kid who makes friends with everyone he meets.  He's almost never snuggly because he is constantly moving, but lately he's been more clingy than usual when he's tired, so I've been letting him nap and sleep on and next to me.  Today he was curled up next to me on the couch and it was so precious I could hardly stand it.  

I'm trying to figure out the balance of mom-hood and independent-adult-hood.  For some reason, it doesn't seem like men have quite this crisis.  Perhaps it's because our culture tells them from childhood that they are the breadwinners and will work all day to support the family, and then they'll come home and spend time with the family then, and on the weekends.  I don't really feel like 100% stay at home mom life is what I'm designed for, but I also don't want to miss out on Jack's childhood and the moments I can never get back while I'm pursuing a dream outside of motherhood.  I don't know what that balance looks like but I'm pretty sure it's messy as hell.  

5 ways to style jeans

Truth be told, I'm not actually sure I own any of these jeans anymore!  Since they're all high waisted I may have put them in storage last summer, or maybe I got rid of them?  I don't know!  What I do know is that black jeans are an absolute staple.  I'd say they're in my top 3 most needed clothing items at least.  All of the ones in this post are dark blue jeans, but if you look in my closet right now, all the jeans I have are black as can be.  In a way, I feel like it's my version of a uniform in that I know that all my jeans are black and everything goes with black.  It makes it easier to put outfits together, and I like black.  That being said, I do know that I still have those wide legged jeans in storage and I'm looking forward to pulling them out and seeing if I still like styling them up!

Shop The Look

California Gold Rush

It's National Thrift Shop day, so I thought I'd post this outfit with a new piece I just snagged from Salvation Army this week!  It's been a while since I got a new influx of clothes in my wardrobe and my tendency to gravitate towards late 70's, early 80's mom-style is kind of cracking me up.  Every time I see my mom she's like, "that looks just like something I wore in the 80's."  I snagged a few other awesome pieces at the thrift store this past week so I'm excited to style them up and pop em up on the blog!  I got a brand new Lou & Grey maxi dress from the thrift store that I'm super in love with.  I'd never heard of Lou & Grey and after looking them up, I'm kind of obsessed!