My Everyday Runway

moments.  maybe you know the ones i'm talking about. moments that make your heart race and your face light up.  the unexpected handwritten letter in your mailbox. the warm hug from an old friend. the crunching of leaves underneath your favorite fall boots. the wide smile from  that  boy.  the perfect song on the drive home from a hard day, your problems retreating further and further away in the rearview mirror.  how sweet are these.  how sweet are these.  but yet, maybe there's another kind of moment you thought of earlier.  the heartfelt text followed by a "wrong number". the friend who used to hug you passing by but now seems preoccupied by whatever is so fascinating on the ceiling of your high school hallway. when it seems to be one hundred degrees out the one day you decide to pull out the cute fall coat, yet freezing on the day you want to wear the dress. when that  boy puts his head down and ignores you. when you ge...

"In a beautiful world that has come to hooray the hustle, I find my sweet-loving soul rebelliously dancing to the contrary- for this season, busy has no place- busy cannot lasso my time. It is down by the river, sunbathing on silky rocks." - Tess Guinery  I love these words. The first time I read them, I immediately knew they would be a defining part of my senior year.  Traditionally, senior year is a lot. Senior pictures, college applications, part-time jobs, volunteering, clubs, sports, resume-building activities, etc. Basically, a lot of busy.  Personally, the things listed above really stress me out. Some of them just don't feel necessary yet, but I also feel like they are things I have to do.  I have struggled with these thoughts for a while now because I don't feel ready for the senior year everyone expects me to have. I still feel like a little girl who wants to live at home and go on bike rides and immerse myself in a good book. I still wa...

sixteen.  the year of fearless.  the year of unapologetic joy.  here's what sixteen is to me. sixteen is my favorite birthday party i've ever thrown. it's white tretorns (like my mom wore in high school)  every. single. day. it's taking a moonlit canoe ride with my grandma and falling asleep at many drive-in movie theaters. sixteen to me is the most memorable road trip i have ever taken. seeing the u.p of michigan-leaving my phone and worries behind. it's kayaking the beautiful lake superior with a sweet boy and eating the most delicious pasty of my life. sixteen to me is packing boxes in the kitchen of my childhood home- saying goodbye after all those years of memories i will never forget. it's crying sitting on our old back patio with my doggies right before we left the driveway for the last time. it's the most painstaking drive of my life. an emotional breakdown in culvers. it's saying goodbye to all i've ever known-- headed towards...

Year after year, the final weeks of the school year break my heart. I become extremely emotional and nostalgic, and start to spend a lot of time in my head reflecting on the past year. As this school year comes to a close, I want to share some things I would've loved to have told myself before I went into my junior year. 1) find people who show love in the same way you do. a key to successful friendships lies in having similar core values and ways of expressing your compassion 2) you like someone? don't text them. hang out. 3) saying 'no' is harder than saying yes, but it will leave a much bigger impact 4) if your heart is telling you to do something, please just do it. you'll regret it if you don't 5) 'ghosting' is a sign of immaturity and fickleness, and that is all there is to it. don't spend time worrying about their quick changes of heart 6) dancing in the street is really, really fun 7) enough taylor swift music can solve jus...

If you know me, you know that birthdays are my FAVORITE! Which means today is a super special and happy day because it is my friend Annika's SWEET 16!!! Annika is one of the most genuinely kind people I know. She shines Jesus and His light every single day and it is SUCH a joy to be her friend. I wanted to write this super short post to not only celebrate one of my favorite people ever (who is also one of the only people I know who faithfully reads this blog haha) but also to talk about the joy of celebration itself. There are celebrations everyday. Some are huge, like getting married in a beautiful white dress to the prince charming you'd always hoped you'd find, or graduating college after 4 years of essays and tests. Some are small, like having someone in front of you at Starbucks buy your drink, or finishing an assignment that had been on your to-do list for weeks. Although I'd say I'm an extremely emotional person in general- this week has been a CRAZY ...

Hey friends! I seriously cannot believe it's April. My junior year is coming to a close and I'm not ready! Looking back on the past month, I am blown away with what a transformative and fantastic few weeks it was. It's far too easy to get caught up in our fast-paced lives and keep moving forward with never taking time to reflect, so I am stopping to take a moment to remember this amazing month gone by. I hope this encourages you to take a minute to look back at your March.  How was it?  For me, it started pretty fast-paced with a college visit I was SO excited for! I won't go into detail, but I'll just say there was an AMAZING breakfast served and that's my kind of college.  The next day I headed to DECA state! I started doing DECA this year mainly to get some experience practicing a job interview, and I had no hopes or intentions of competing. It's pretty crazy how God has other plans for you sometimes. Not only did I actually compete at state (...

Happy Galentine's Day!!! This amazing nonofficial holiday originated from Leslie Knope, the hilarious, kind, and loving star of Parks and Recreation. She essentially invented a a better Valentines day, a day to celebrate the female friendships in our lives. As she puts it, "Every February 13th, my lady friends and I leave our husbands and boyfriends at home, and we just come and kick it, breakfast-style. Ladies celebrating ladies. It's like Lilith Fair, minus the angst. Plus frittatas."  I've hosted Galentine's day a few times before, and to say I love it is an understatement. It's becoming a tradition that I know I will carry on long into my future. I love hosting my friends and celebrating how much their friendship means to me! So, if you want to host your own Galentine's day this year (which you totally should!), or you just want to read about how I celebrate, keep on reading! Step 1: Invitations I love sending cards and in...

It's the start of a new semester and I'm feeling good! This past finals week was the best finals week I've ever had, my half birthday last week was so much fun, and we're in the midst of a literal 6 day weekend. God is so good. I've been thinking and thinking about what I want to dive into in my next blog post for quite some time now, but I've come to the conclusion that who cares!? I mean, I do, but the whole point of this blog is to share my thoughts and hopefully help my readers out in some way. So, I'm aiming to write more frequently, more candidly, and more spontaneously on here in 2019. For my 16th birthday, a ton of my favorite gals and I dressed up in our best Mamma Mia outfits, ate dinner at my favorite place, saw the new Mamma Mia movie, sang ABBA karaoke, and ate lots and lots of Chocolate Chocolate Cafe Latte Cake. (eeee I miss it already!!) And, even though I knew that it would be such a fun night, I could've never suspected what I would...

What does having a "bad" day mean to you? It probably changes all the time. There are days that make you cry because of something tragic happening, other days make you cry for no apparent reason. Some days make you angry at others, and other days make you angry at yourself. Some make you frustrated with the entire world, and others make you frustrated with your situation alone. Other days make you regret, and others make you wish you did more.  These days may not feel like they have a lot in common, but there's one feeling I find that holds true for them all.  Defeat. Feeling defeated at the end of a day that brought so much you weren't ready for. Feeling defeated after others tore you down and you eventually started tearing yourself down without even realizing it. Feeling defeated because another day has come and gone, and it wasn't one you loved.  On days when others hurt us, intentionally or not, we tend to start asking ourselves, "what did I do...