MY CHANGING LEAFS

So tomorrow is my last day at Le Peep. It's been a fun run, and I'm really going to miss it. The people that I work with have become a sort of second family to me and I love my early mornings with them. The deep and meaningful conversations mixed with the inside jokes and yes, even some of the drama, has all been a positive experience. It isn't without it's downfalls, because nothing in this life is perfect,  but this job was pretty awesome. 

It feels like transition periods are always bittersweet. On one hand, I'm leaving to train for a management position at a local juice bar. So this is valuable experience I will be able to put on my resume and I love, love, love the girls there. And on the other hand, I'm leaving behind a place that I have really enjoyed. 

This feels kind of like when I moved away from Moscow to go be a student teacher. It's so weird that college went by so fast when it started out being the slowest of the slow. Now when I go back with Nathan to visit his family and we drive through campus, it's almost a foreign place. We drive by the buildings I used to inhabit on a regular basis and all my memories come flooding back to me at once. 

I did not want to leave Moscow. I was not ready to be done with school and with my independence or with any of my studio classes. Maybe it's the teacher in me who is just never quite done learning all of the things. I'm filled with this hunger to keep furthering my knowledge and I guess there are worse things in life. 

But then, after I moved back home and started student teaching and my life kept changing, it didn't really make me miss school less, but it helped to see that I was applying my knowledge correctly and that my students were learning. And since I've been back in Coeur d'Alene it seems that my life has not really quit changing, because hello! Here's is another life altering transition for you!

I'm a firm believer in the Everything-Happens-For-A-Reason and the If-It's-Meant-To-Happen-It-Will and I know that this is where I'm supposed to be. There is a purpose for my transition from Le Peep to The Wellness Bar and this is the beginning of the Adventure Of Why. 

It's funny that this is happening now, as the seasons are changing. Welcome Autumn and instead of the changing leafs signaling the start of a new school year, it's instead signaling the start of a new job. 

Today I did laundry and went grocery shopping. I cleaned the kitchen and tidied my bedroom. I bought a cinnamon pecan swirl scented candle and tonight I will make dinner and probably watch Netflix. And tomorrow I will wake up for my last hostessing shift and spend the night out with my friends for a happy Halloween. So far, it's been a good year folks. 

BEST PUMPKIN COOKIES OF YOUR LIFE

Sunday was a beautiful fall day and since the weather actually changed to being for autumn like, I have recently been loving putting pumpkin into ALL OF THE THINGS because what else is the reason for fall?

We had a long indian summer here in Idaho. I mean, it was 80 degrees still in the beginning of October which is basically unheard of. At that point, even though I love summer and I never want it to end, I felt like mother nature was just toying with my emotions. Like a malicious owner dangling a treat in front of a dog's nose. I knew the bad weather was coming, I just didn't know when. And trying to enjoy 80 degree October days was just like...come on and be cold already. I need to wear some sweaters.

And now that it's cold and it gets dark around six and I have been wearing the sweaters and the boots and drinking the pumpkin flavored things, I'm totally ready for my trip in December to the warm Caribbean. Can it just hurry up already?

But yes, back to the pumpkin flavored things. Right. I am working in a juice bar, in addition to the restaurant hostessing life I am leading and we have a pumpkin flavored smoothie right now that blows my mind. And it has also been making me crave some pumpkin chocolate chip flavored cookies.

My sister makes these pumpkin cookies that are delicious and amazing and I almost texted her to send me the recipe that she has at the house but then I remembered Miss Hey Natalie Jean's pumpkin cookie recipe and how she went on and on about just how amazing those ones were and well, shoot. I just had to try them.

And then I bought all the things I needed for these cookies that I didn't already have and here we are! My house smells amazing, and those cookies! Those cookies are just the absolute best pumpkin cookies I've ever eaten in my life, is what I keep saying.

I guess maybe fall isn't so bad after all.

JUST WHAT I NEEDED

Today I think was one of the first days where it has actually felt like autumn. It was windy and rainy and just downright gloomy outside, which actually pleased the dusty little corners of my soul because I just needed a gloomy day is why.

Working inside the restaurant, running back and forth, seating tables, telling servers, cleaning all the things because it's slow. I worked up the temperature of my body and my sweater was just a pinch too hot. But then I walked outside in the rain and weird cloudy dim lighting and just, I didn't ever want to go back inside again.

It was a soft rain that drizzled down from the sky in the sort of way that is just the perfect kind of rain. And the wind was blowing my bangs in my face just like so. And I wished that Nathan wasn't at work so that somebody could share that simple little moment with me so I didn't have to be alone. But he wasn't and I was and still, it was a pretty good moment.

Actually it was kind of exactly what I needed in a weird way.

I unlocked my car and sat in the driver's seat listening to the rain drops beat against the roof of my Lancer. The leaves on the trees rustled in the breeze and the clouds were this dark grey color against a grey sky and I probably could have sat there forever watching the world move around me. It was peaceful and satisfying in a way that almost makes you want to cry.

I know I'm being dramatic here, but go with it.

And then I drove to the grocery store with this insane need to buy all the things to make pumpkin chocolate chip cookies but then I decided to just go home and watch Gilmore Girls instead because I didn't have "the" recipe and also, I didn't know what we had at home and I really wasn't keen on buying all the things and then having doubles of stuff I didn't really need. I mean, good grief.

So. Gilmore girls it was.

Once Nathan got back from work we went to the gym and then made breakfast for dinner, which is the best kind of dinner, and then we sat around asking ourselves just what we should be doing now. And if you're new around here, this is a constant debate.

We are always looking at each other and asking "well, what should we do now?" and then we roll our eyes because we can't ever decide on a thing to do as one of us (me) is listing off ideas and the other of us (nathan) is being frustratingly noncommittal. But this is real life and what are you gonna do?

So we dug down into our souls real deep and decided that we should go to the mall to buy some new jeans. And we ended up buying a nice pair of new jeans (on sale!) and then three sample bottles of lotion from bath and bodyworks because impulse purchases are the best? I don't know, it just felt right at the time.

And if today is any indicator of how fall is going to go, then maybe it won't be so bad after all.

AND FINALLY: PICTURES

So my brother went and got married way back in July (way back. HA) and they have been keeping their wedding pictures hostage over in the greater Seattle area, and I finally just got ahold of 256 of their giant photo collection. They tried to tailor the CD to the pictures I would want to see and they did a fantastic job.

I bring this up because they were here for the weekend - the first visit since they left for their honeymoon at 10 o'clock at night on July 11, 2014. That's the sucky thing about living 5 hours away from each other. I sat down with Rylie and looked at the pictures on computer, talking about the people in them and reliving their wedding. It was just such a magical night, I mean, honestly.

Those crazy kids are two of my very favorite people and I wish we got to spend more time together. It's been a great ride watching my little baby brother grow up and become a man. He had the chubbiest cheeks and this little rotund belly and the cutest little voice. And now he's tall and thin and handsome. I mean, how did that even happen? Shoot.

And so now I give to you, the picture portion of the post because that's what you're all really here for anyway, right? Right.

 possibly my favorite picture from the morning

 this picture makes me think American Gothic. 

 the family! (it's still weird to say sister-in-law haha)

 don't be alarmed, this is a recreation of one of my parents' wedding photos. 

 i love the looks on both of their faces in these two photos. katie captured their love for one another perfectly. 

 and then it was time to party - with nerf guns and bride kidnapping. way more fun than a money dance, oh yes.

 i super love this guy. 

and just like that they roared off into their new life together in a convertible bumblebee camaro. 

THE JOURNEY

Growing up I always thought there was a right way and a wrong way to do life. And I was always terrified that I was going to be that person who did all the things wrong and ended up in an ally somewhere living in a cardboard box. If you ask me what my biggest fear in life is, I will tell you one word: failure.

To me that meant losing my job, my ability to provide for myself and ending up homeless and smelly and wearing someone else's donated clothing. This image of my future life, had I picked all the wrong things, started when I was in elementary school.

We live our whole young lives preparing ourselves for adulthood. I believed it was my duty to go through school, graduate, continue on to college, graduate, get a job, get married and live happily ever after. I honestly had never planned on what to do after I was married other than be fabulously rich and travel the world, which, obviously, is still going to happen. ;)

But on a serious note, I have been learning and relearning that the world does not work in rights and wrongs like my brain initially thought. And when I lost my teaching position last year it rocked me down to my core. I had to learn to shake the feelings of failure and convince myself that this was not the end of the line and that I was not going to end up in a dirty refrigerator box somewhere.

If I'm being honest though, that was a change for me that I had never planned to go through. I mourned my lost position and cried myself to sleep, scared and wondering what I was going to do with myself once my contract was up and I was no longer getting paid a teacher's salary. As low as a teacher's salary might be in this state, it was still more money than I'd ever made in my life.

Plus, I have bills to pay and an apartment to care for and it was all piling on the pressure so fast. Sometimes if I sat and thought about what was happening to me, my chest would get all tight and I wouldn't be able to breathe. So I did what I knew I had to do.

I went back to the restaurant where I worked last year and finished out this summer doing the same thing I did back then - managing nights. And then when the summer ended I just stayed on staff because at least it was income and the atmosphere and the people are great. It is truly a good place to work.

And then I got all this art stuff and chalkboard things to help out on the side.

I was all sorts of certain that I was going to fail. That this was a step backwards for me and that this was somehow "wrong." But if I've learned anything, it's that life never does what you want it to. Just because I'm not teaching this year doesn't mean that unemployment and back ally living are in my future. I'm smart and resourceful and something is always provided to allow me to take care of myself and to pay for the things I need to pay for.

It's in the realm of authenticity too, these life lessons that keep showing up. I feel like I am maybe more myself than I have been when I was trying to convince myself that I was a teacher. I am much better at being an artist and creating the things people look at than I felt I was at conveying to other people how to produce a great work of art. Partly because I am maybe still figuring that out myself.

To go from school straight into a career I felt like I was skipping a step. I have always been a step skipper, if we're being honest. If I can smash two steps together, I probably will. So part of me was proud of myself for going right into the career path and part of me was kind of exhausted and I've been telling myself since my sophomore year of college that I just wanted to take a year to not be in school. To not have homework. To not have to worry about being in the school system.

But then life happens, and job opportunities come up and it would be stupid not to take a full time salaried position that is standing right in front of you, so I kind of went against myself and took the job anyway. And what I've realized in the past couple of months is that maybe losing that job was actually good for me.

It has forced me to bend in ways that I didn't think I could. This path has started to show me what I'm really made of and it's begged me to at least start to question what I really want to do with my life. I've known from the beginning that I wanted to be an artist - but I also knew that I never wanted to end up like van Gogh, or become that typical starving artist. So I never truly believed that art could take me where I actually wanted to go - which is all around the world, if you remember. And yet, here I am, working in a restaurant (stereotypical job liberal arts majors end up doing!) but still creating and sometimes getting paid for it.

The more art jobs I do the more I am realizing that that is where my heart is. It's where my passion lies. I feel the most at home when I am creating something with my hands. It allows me to think in ways that I don't get to when I'm doing something else. Now, if I could only get paid for blogging as well. HA!

I haven't been 24 for very long, but it already feels like it's going to be a year about shedding my layers. It's going to be a year about doing the things I want to do because I want to do them and not because I feel obligated to do what everyone else is telling me, or at least what I perceive everyone else is telling me to do.

I have always wondered how old you have to be before you're really an adult. Sometimes I still feel a little like a child, striving for approval from other people and unable to make my own decisions. But you know what? The only approval I need is my own, really, and I am more than capable of making my own decisions. It is a process, to learn to live unapologetically and out loud, but it will be beyond worth it.

This is the journey to becoming myself and every day brings me one step closer.