Summer Vacation Vlog #1

Here is the first installment of our Summer Vacation Vlogs!  We took a two week roadtrip and ended up in Michigan.  For the first part of the vlog we went to Nashville, TN to visit some friends.  It was pretty fun.  But I was a horrible vlogger and forgot to include shots of me explaining where we were or what we were doing as we were doing them.  So instead I had to insert a very flattering and not awkward at all narration... (can you sense the sarcasm?)  We got to do some sightseeing, but most importantly we got to spend quality time with my bff and some other awesome friends!

I wasn't able to vlog everything we did because some places didn't allow cameras and also we were having too much fun and I just plain forgot!

I hope you guys enjoy.  Look for vlog #2 coming soon!

Don't clean your house

Have company coming over?  Don't clean your house.  Seriously.  This is one thing I'm truly convinced of.  Tidy, yes.  Pick up your clutter (or at least arrange it in an organized way), throw away your trash.  But don't deep clean.  Because what really happens?  You spend hours dusting and sweeping and mopping, making your house look perfect... it's exhausting.  Then your friends arrive and you're too tired to enjoy your time with them.  Or you're too busy "tidying" while they're there.  It's not worth it.  You lose out on an enjoyable evening with friends.  Trust me, your friends won't care.  Your friends won't notice if your house has been mopped or not.  They'll notice if there are poop stains in the toilet (clean the toilet before they come, because ew germs, but that's it, just the toilet), but they won't notice if the blinds haven't been dusted.  Assuming they've been dusted at some point in the past...

And if your friends do care, maybe they're not the type of friends you need to be having over.  Real friends don't care if you cleaned your house.  They just want to have a fun evening with you.  Now, if your house is a total pig-sty, well then I don't know what to tell you.  Maybe hire a housecleaner to come before your company arrives.

Don't clean your house!

So you had a lovely evening with your friends, they enjoyed your spaghetti and ice cream... now what?  Don't do the dishes. Sit, enjoy your time with your friends.  Play a game, talk for hours, laugh and have fun.  DO NOT ruin the evening by disappearing into the kitchen for an hour to "clean up for just a second..."  The dishes can wait.  Savor the moments with your friends.

Don't do your dishes!

The point is this: HAVE FUN WITH YOUR FRIENDS.  Don't worry about if your house is perfect.  Don't stress and exhaust yourself before they even arrive.  The people who matter won't care, and the people who care don't matter.  

Ok so that's my life advice for the day.  What do you think?  Do you agree or disagree?

A picture an hour

This past weekend we went to Michigan for a friend's wedding.  I thought about doing a vlog, but I wasn't planning on bringing my computer and I knew I would run out of phone memory.  So instead I decided to take one photo every hour.

Here's our first day in Grand Rapids, by the hour:

8am - At the airport waiting for our plane.

9am - The view out our plane window.

10am - Still on the plane and not sure how we feel about it

11am - We made it to Grand Rapids and picked up a tasty snack (London Fog and Coffee Cake for me)

12pm - Peter's best friend's mom picked us up and took us to run some errands, such as picking up some items for the wedding, as well as picking up Peter's tux.

1pm - We took a drive-by tour of downtown Grand Rapids

2pm - We made it back to the house and relaxed with Netflix (Pictured is an episode of Sherlock).

3pm - Peter and his best friend.

4pm - A spot of tea to keep us warm.  We were not used to 30 degree weather!  It's still in the high 70s in Alabama!

5pm - Fully naked trees.  Also something that's not a familiar site down south.

6pm - I took a much needed nap and failed to get a picture.

7pm - We were going out for dinner and I could not get a cute picture.  They're all blurry because Peter and his friend were making me laugh too much.  This was the best I could get.

8pm - Dinner! (Thai friend rice)

9pm - Back at the house, back with Netflix!

And that's pretty much where it ends.  We went to bed early that night.

I hope you enjoyed this post!  I will soon be posting a bit more about the trip.  It was a great time to catch up with friends and take a little break from school!

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Free Therapy - Art Journal

So I decided I wanted to use my art journal as more like a journal (by actually writing daily thoughts in it) and scrapbook-hybrid... so I got it out, got out some paint to prep some pages, and then just got carried away.  And I painted about 6 pages yesterday and 5 today (not sharing all of them on here because some of them are reeeeeally ugly lol).  And I like what I painted so I don't want to "ruin" them by adding more layers or journaling.  So for now it's going to stay as an "idea book" and maybe I'll start a new, real, art journal when I finish this notebook.  Only a few more pages to go.

Here's what I have come up with lately.  Sorry for the bad quality photos - all I have is my iPhone and bad lighting.

This page is incomplete but I thought I'd include it anyway.  This is inspired by a city in Italy called Portovenere:

Watercolor and Sharpie pen

Of course, flowers:

Watercolors and felt-tipped markers

Sharpie pen and Watercolor

Crayon, watercolors, and Sharpie pen

This was inspired by a very similar drawing by one of my favorite artists, Alisa Burke.

Watercolor, Sharpie pen

Multimedia flowers:

Watercolor, Acrylic, Washi tape, sharpie

I wanted to illustrate my favorite quote but I'm really really bad at lettering.  So I just started writing to fill up the page.  I tried it two ways: the first way was to just keep going with the letters, even if the words are split up between lines.  The second was to use all caps and try to fit all the words in.  Which do you like better?

These are lyrics from my favorite song, "Corcovado," by Antonio Carlos Jobim.

"I want a life always like this

with you close to me

until the old flame (of passion) is put out."

I'm not an artist by any means, but it is a fun way for me to relax in the evenings.  Peter and I sit together at the dinner table and paint while watching Netflix.  I love getting lost in the paint and forgetting whatever else is going on in life.  Very therapeutic.  I'm still trying to find "my style..."

What do you do to relax?

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Blogtober Day 4 - My favorite Instagram

Day 1, 2, 3

Day 4: My favorite Instagram

It was pretty difficult to narrow it down, but I'm sticking with this one.  This is when two of our favorite people (this lovely lady) came to visit us in Rio de Janeiro.  We had such a fun time with them and I think this picture turned out awesome!

P.S. you can follow my instagram here.

Cute Crocheted Things

Isn't it fun when you have friends that are good at making things? LOL  I used to love knitting and crocheting but never had the patience to complete any projects.  A few weeks ago my friend, Marie, gave me some cute double-sided oven mitts for and early-birthday/going away present.  She made them to match my kitchen towels, complete with the white stripes:

I was impressed, so I asked her if she could crochet anything else.  She replied that she can crochet pretty much anything.  In fact, she is trying to start a little side business and would love to start taking custom orders.  (I am going to order some coffee/tea cup cozies for Christmas gifts.)

  Here are some examples of things she has made:

Beanie

Boot Cuffs

Pet Scarves

Baby Booties

Owl Ornament

Beard Beanie

Dog Paw Stockings (She can also make some for cats, with a fish instead of a bone)

Scarf

Wine Cozy - would be such a cute hostess gift

If you want to order from Marie, go ahead and send her an email at: mjbrown912 (at) gmail (dot) com.  She is willing to take custom orders and will ship anywhere in the U.S.

XOXO,

Julie

Summer Favorites

Some things I'm loving this summer:

(If you follow on Instagram, some of these will be repeats)

My 5-year-old-nephew, Ryan and his favorite uncle.  This was on a "date" at Starbucks.  His name for Peter, which is the only name he calls him, is "Best Friend."  As in, "Hey Best Friend, want to play outside?" or "Best Friend, look what game I got at the store!" etc.

A few days ago I got to spend the day with my oldest friend who lives about an hour away from where we are staying.  She and I have been friends since before we were born!  We were both saying how nice it is to have friends that, no matter how much time has passed since we last saw each other, we just seem to just pick up where we left off.

I found the perfect summer lipgloss... Mary Kay's Nourishine Lip Gloss in Coral Rose.  On me it looks more pink than coral.  It's a neutral shade that goes with anything.  Here I am with no makeup on except that lipgloss.  I love it.  Actually I just realized it might be a discontinued color.  :(  You can find some similar shades here.

I downloaded A Beautiful Mess's new app, Party Party.  Here was my first attempt at creating a gif.  It's pretty fun.

When I was still in Brazil, with about one week left, I ordered myself this ring, as a kind of "welcome home" present to myself.  LOL  I used some PayPal money I had leftover from a pervious freelance job I'd had.  It's yellow gold with my birthstone, a raw Peridot.  I love it and wear it every day.  I got it from this Etsy shop.

What are some things you're loving this summer?

XO,

Julie

Feeling Refreshed

We took an almost-two-week vacation and it was lovely.  It was so great to spend time with family and friends.  I was reminded that there are people out there who "get" me and like me just the way I am.  It was refreshing to see friends who are kindred spirits (including this lovely lady).  And now I'm sad to move so far away again!

Here are a few snapshots of our time at the farm.  I have another post planned dedicated to our time in the cabin at Shaver Lake, but for now here are some pictures from my brother's farm.

Self-explanatory.

The cutest little helper.

Donkey butt.

My weird fortune...

My beautiful nieces.  Miss them already.

My niece made us an organic trifle using raw-milk and all organic everything.  It was so delicious.

Just a gopher snake my brother found while doing some landscaping.

Hope you've had an awesome summer so far.  I have slowly been catching up on my blog feed, but I haven't been able to leave many comments yet.  I definitely have missed the blogging community and can't wait to get back into it soon!

XOXO,

Julie

How do you deal with stress?

Stress has been a hot topic around our apartment these past few weeks.  We've had plenty of it thrown our way.  From hating disliking our job, to asthma attacks, to thinking worrying about the future, to trying to get my visa stuff done, we've been stressing out way too much!  We've been talking about what we should do to eliminate or relieve our stress.

In a perfect world, my stress reliever would be this:

From DustJacket

Or this:

From PlumPrettySugar

Ah, but where am I going to get such pretty, fancy things?  

In reality, my favorite way to relieve stress is so hang out with friends, talking about our lives, confiding, complaining, giving advice, laughing, and eating good food!

Somewhere like this would be ideal:

From DustJacket

Or this Persian Tea Party:

Or La Lune Sucre with my SJSU besties:

From my Instagram

So what I've come to realize is that, sometimes, being "alone with my tea" isn't so fun.

(Maybe I should rename my blog, "Alone with my tea but wishing I had company."  Or, "Brazil is cool and all but I'm really starting to get homesick and miss my friends.")

So... what do you do to relieve your stress?  Comment below!