Life.

Life is a funny, funny thing.

I started the summer out thinking that I would have endless amounts of time on my hands, devoted to cultivating a blog where I could record some of my life's adventures thus far and making silly videos on YouTube that would showcase new adventures I would experience and to complement blog posts. You don't have to look at my blog for too long to realize that my plans did not turn out the way I thought they would. Sometimes life just happens, progressing faster than you expect leaving you wondering where in the world summer went. Between being fortunate enough to find summer work and my older sister planing a wedding for early August, life took on a life of its own. My plate got too full which meant I had to take a step back, reassess, and prioritize the goals I wanted to accomplish over the next months. While I wanted to put this blog and YouTube at the very top of this list, I knew deep down I couldn't. I had other important things that had to be put first, and as much as it broke my heart to neglect something I felt so passionate about, I decided the right thing to do was to focus on work and the wedding. After all, I knew the internet wasn't going to disappear over the summer.

Now with August nearly over, school has reared it's mostly ugly, but sometimes fun and beautiful, head, my job is over for the time being, my sister is married, and I'm ready to get this blog back in order, with occasional appearances on YouTube.

As I said in the very first (I think) post, I hope to make my little corner of the internet a wonderful, inviting, safe space, a neighborhood, if you will, where we can visit, share stories and ideas, and have a nice time.

Has life ever gotten in the way of something you were passionate about? Tell me about it in the comments :)

Have a safe weekend neighbors!!

A Good Tired

Hey hi hello!

You know that feeling when the end of the week arrives and you're absolutely worn out, but you think back on everything you did during the last 6 days and you are so happy and proud that the fact you're worn out doesn't even matter anymore and you just feel good? That was me on Friday evening. I got home from work feeling tired, but very accomplished at the same time.

It reminded me how lucky I am to have so many exciting things happening in my life that cause me to feel "good tired". Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love time to myself, lazy days lounging in bed while reading, watching tv, or getting a few extra hours of sleep, but those days definitely need to be balanced out with busy, hard, productive days. And believe me, last week was full of those days. In addition to starting a job, I helped out my church's youth group with their mission trip (which I'll talk about in another post), so my days were spent at work and my mornings and nights on the mission trip. I had roughly an hour to myself every afternoon when I got home from work that I used to shower and pack work clothes for the next day, which was difficult for me because I'm such an introvert that I need more "me" time than most people. Despite that, I had a fantastic week and wouldn't have changed it for anything.

I'm excited to share the experience of the mission trip in an upcoming post!
Keep an eye out for it :)

Let's make today great, my fellow internet neighbors!

A Letter to Daddy

[I know I'm two days late with this post, but since I spent Sunday with my dad and not on the computer and Monday at work, I think you all will understand!]

[Dad and I at the zoo, Summer 2012]

Dear Dad,

Happy Father's Day! Thank you for being the best guy I know and such an inspiration in my life. The list of things and lessons you have taught me during my short 21 years of life longer than you probably know. Because of you I know how to make French toast, can watch endless hours of the History, Discovery, and Science channels, have fond memories of days spent at the park fishing, and can water and weed a tomato garden like a pro. The best advice you've ever given me is that the answer is always no unless you ask and I know that my faith wouldn't be half as strong if I didn't have yours to look up to. 

I appreciate the time you take to answer all of my silly questions about the world around us and the generous laughs you give to my jokes that probably aren't that funny. I love the time we spend together in the evenings watching Jeopardy and I love even more the time we spend watching "my" TV shows and movies. 

Thank you for constantly making me feel special and loved.

I hope to spend many more Father's Days with you!

Love,

Bug

[Dad with me and my older sister, Father's Day 1995]

PS. I promise you'll get your gift as soon as I find time to go buy it. Yay procrastination!

Instagram Insanity

Hey hi hello!

I have a confession to make: I love Instagram. I don't just love it; I adore it, am obsessed with it, 

and I find myself constantly going through my timeline looking at everyone's pictures. 

If you don't believe me, I think the 637 (and counting...) pictures I've posted speak for themselves. 

Because I have so many Instagrammed (who else loves making pronouns into verbs??) pictures, I thought I would start a series sharing recent uploads as well as my past favorites!

 1. My best friend Angela and I at the zoo when she came to visit me. [old favorite, Summer 2012]

2. Taking a trip to Wisconsin for a family gathering. [old favorite, Summer 2012]

3. Woke up to see my sweet cat Pippi curled up at my feet. [old favorite, Summer 2012]

4. Some gorgeous clouds I spotted on my walk home from work. [old favorite, Summer 2012]

5. My well-worn TOMS. I've recently had to retire them :( [old favorite, Summer 2012]

6. My cat Vera tried to convince me to take her with me on an 11 day trip. [recent upload, May 2013]

7. My best friend Ryan and I being silly watching movies on said 11 day trip. [recent upload, May 2013]

8. My best friend Olivia let me stay with her for 11 days. We had a lot of fun! [recent upload, June 2013]

9. Woke up with some crazy bedhead the other day. [recent upload, June 2013]

10. Dinner at Five Guys. I eat there way more than I'd like to admit. [recent upload, June 2013]

How blessed am I to have so many best friends, fun memories, and beautiful places to share? I hope you enjoyed these 10 Instagram pictures. If you'd like to see more, you can here! Feel free to follow me as well, just be warned I post a lot of food and cats :)

Do you like or use Instagram? What are your favorite pictures to post?

Let's make this Sunday great, neighbors!

Busy Life

Hey hi hello internet neighbors!

It has been quite a long time since my last post, but I am in the possession of a great excuse: life. In the last three weeks, a lot has gone on: my older sister graduated from college, we helped her move back home, I went on an 11 day trip to my old college town to stay with a friend, and I'm learning some music to sing at my church's you mission trip. Phew. That was a mouth full! Next week is proving to be even busier since I'm starting a job during the day while singing previously mentioned mission trip music in the mornings and evenings in addition to staying the night to keep an eye on the sleeping mission trip youth while the sleepy mission trip adults get some sleep. Woah, is there a world record for the most times "mission trip" has been used in a sentence? I think I could give it a run for it's money. 

Anyway, I'm hoping to write a few posts describing some of the above mentioned adventures as well as a few more introduction posts in the next few days. That way I can try to be a bit more timely and regular with the days that I put new posts up on this blog. Yay organization! Perhaps if I have some little posts backlogged for busy days it will be more helpful with my goal :)

That's it for this quick update! I hope you're having a lovely day. It's Friday after all. Congratulations!

You made it to the end of the week. 

Be proud of yourself. 

An Introduction

Hey hi hello internet neighbors! 

How are you on this fine Wednesday? In my neck of the woods, it's almost 80 degrees, so it looks like summer is officially here! With the introduction of summer, I thought it would be appropriate to introduce myself a little bit more :)

Anyway! My name is Emma and I am a 21 year old living in the wonderful, midwestern state of Indiana with my parents, soon-to-be-married older sister, and two cats. I've lived here my whole life and for the most part, I really love Indiana. It's true what they say: there is more than corn here! Hopefully as the summer goes on, I can help prove that theory by sharing the non-corn activities I get up to! [Side note: I live in the city, so there's not a whole lot of corn around me. Which just adds more proof that there is more than corn here.]

If you were a crayon, what color would you be? I think I would like to be a pretty, soft, spring green. Green is one of my favorite colors, so I would love for my crayon alter-ego to reflect that. 

What are your favorite smells? I have a long list of favorite smells, some of them pretty normal and some that usually get me odd looks when I share them. The normal ones include my momma's perfumes (Estée Lauder Youth Dew and Dolce & Gabbana Light Blue), my perfume (Chanel No. 19), the candle Over the River by Yankee Candle, pumpkin pie baking, freshly mowed grass, and lilacs and lilies of the valley (both flowers that I have bouquets of all around the house because they are blooming in our garden!) The odd favorite smells include brand new Crayola crayons (what kid doesn't love opening a fresh box a crayons?!) and shoe polish. They are strange I know, but what can I say?

Mountain hideaway or beach resort? Can I have a mountain hideaway that is a short walk to the beach?

What are your favorite sounds? I love music, but I won't go into that during this post. My favorite non-music sounds have to include laughter, birds chirping, high heels clacking on hard floors, and the sound (and feeling) of anticipation when you're at a concert and the lights go down because it's about to start. 

Lastly, what is the last movie you watched? I can't really remember! I know that I've watched Finding Nemo in the past few weeks, so I'll say that. I'm truly a kid at heart.

 Over the next few posts, I'm going to share more of my life with you, so the introduction process is not quite finished. If you stuck with me rambling on this long, I appreciate it very much and would love for you to share some of your answers to these questions in the comments!

Until next time, thank you for visiting! I hope you had fun in my corner of the interwebs.. 

Have a beautiful day!

hey hi hello!

Welcome!

So. Here I am. Blogging. Let me tell you first now: I've tried blogging before and have failed every time. I yearn to be a "blogger" with every bone in my body, but I'm too lazy for my own good and put off blogging "until tomorrow". Of course, tomorrow turns into never. Maybe this time I'll be able to stick to it! 

If you're reading this post, know how grateful I am you chose to wander over to my little corner of the interwebs. Here, I hope to create a safe, happy, honest, loving, and wonderful place for you to continue visiting. Over the next few days, I'll be writing posts to introduce myself to you and make things a little bit more personal. The first thing you should know is that, while I love technology and the internet, I'm a bit "uneducated" on the behind-the-scenes part of it; meaning you might notice little (or quite big) changes to my little blog as I figure out the layout and what I like. 

Thank you for visiting and I hope that you come back :) If you've stuck with me this far, I'd love for you to leave a comment telling me where you've came from! Let's start getting to know each other!

Happy Monday, new neighbors. I'm happy to join you in this crazy internet world. Let's make today great :)