26 Things + A Letter to My Future Self

26 things to do before turning 27 // Ready...go.

1. Run a 5K
2. Visit San Fransisco (and maybe get back to San Diego)
3. Collaborate on a styled shoot
4. Go to three cultural events/concerts/plays
5. Be in a musical
6. Decorate the living room
7. Decorate the bedroom
8. Go to London (or at least book tickets)
9. Get business coaching
10. Clean up, organize, and prettify the office
11. Read 10 books
12. Pick a cause and volunteer
13. Pay off one college loan
14. Get the sofa cleaned
15. Find a dentist
16. Go kayaking
17. Find new music to enjoy and artists to love
18. Buy a camera with video possibilities and play around with it
19. Take a dance class (not zumba, something real like ballet or tap or ballroom)
20. Make a crepe cake
21. Plan one romantic getaway with my husband
22. Do a hike on the AT
23. Get new head shots - and generally get in front of the camera more often
24. Buy a tilt-shift lens
25. Have a girl's weekend
26. Plan a 27th birthday party

Making that list was HARD. Thanks to Dani for the wonderful idea.

Dear future self,

I hope you look back on this birthday as one where you were truly happy. Not wishing to be at a different place in life. Loving who you were with and what you were doing...every single day of it. A time when you were content and felt like you had reached a place of peace and joy with the life you had up until this point. That everything finally came together. I hope you basked in it. I hope you enjoyed the sunshine. And I wish you many more birthdays and years like this. Keep shooting for your dreams, but don't forget to stop and love the life you've lived. Now go out and do something that you wouldn't normally do, like buy absurdly large balloons, just for the fun of it - it's totally worth it, I promise.

Sincerely,

Present self

Illinois: Planes + Parties

There were too many pictures of the farm to post yesterday, so I split my photos of our recent trip into two parts...and this one is all about the celebration.

After touching down in Chicago, we headed over to my aunt's house and picked up some pizza at my mom's favorite local pizzeria for a dinner finished off with my grandpa's favorite dessert, cherry pie. My grandma had the recipe for the Drake Hotel's cherry pie that has been passed down to my mom and is something of a family heirloom at this point.

Every meal concludes with coffee. Somehow I was born without this gene. Thankfully, my mom remembered to pack some tea so I didn't feel too left out.

No matter where we go, I have a soft spot for puppies.

The next day was the actual day of my grandpa's birthday, and because it was also a Saturday, his party was that afternoon. My grandpa's brother was able to be there to celebrate with him...as well as his friend Art, who has been almost a lifelong friend. Grandpa has a group of friends who have known him and the family for most of the time they've lived in Beecher, which is a small enough town that you almost know everyone, but to have true friends forever...that's something most of us only wish to have, and absolutely worth celebrating.

Guess who was sent to the store and picked out special sparkly birthday candles?

Favorite.

 

 

Happy Birthday Grandpa!

Cupcakes

Happy Birthday to me! I had a few people over this past weekend to celebrate, and we had lots of scrumptious cupcakes. 

Aslan invited himself to the party.

And thought he would help himself to some dessert.

See what I mean about this being a daily conversation at our house?

I know thanksgiving the only holiday that is set aside for giving thanks, but all holidays (including my birthday) remind me of the things and, most importantly, the people who I'm grateful to celebrate with. My life would not be as full or joyful or wonderful if it weren't for all of the love and support from the amazing people who are my family and friends. So today I celebrate all of you...because you have made it the best 24 years a girl could ask for :o).

Confidence is a Performing Art

Last week I had a life revelation.

I seem to always have at least one within a month of my birthday. Every year. Sometimes they're painful; last year, it was like that, and I swore the reason I teared up about my birthday during the two weeks leading up to it was because I was allergic to it. Like onions. But the truth was that I didn't feel like an adult, yet my age and everything else in my life were telling me to act more like one.

And finally, last week, I discovered what it takes to be a grown-up and to act like one.

The secret is confidence.

The funny thing is, I used to be a performer. And performing is all about confidence. It shows in your posture, it's audible in the strength of your voice.

I decided that if I could muster up the confidence to sing in front of hundreds of people, I could dig down to find it again for my everyday, grown-up hurdles. See, the scary part, at least for me anyway, about being an adult is the notion that you are in control. And at my last birthday, I didn't feel in control. I wanted to be, but didn't know how.

One of my favorite books is The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. She says that sometimes you have to act the way you want to feel. As in, if you want to feel happy, you have to act happy. And I figured that if I want to feel confident, I have to act confident. Fake-it-till-you-make-it type of philosophy.

So I'm giving it a shot. And it's totally working. Boosting my confidence has also improved my happiness. And I think it's done more too. It's changing the way I take pictures. Instead of worrying that what I'm going to take is going to turn out bad, I pick up my camera and tell myself that I can take an amazing picture. I fall asleep at night believing in my ability to take interesting pictures and thinking about how I can make my pictures look like I want them to, instead of worrying that they'll turn out badly.

So here's to all the amazing pictures and things that I know that I can do. And just for fun, here's a picture from my last birthday...