2022 - sounds good to say, so I'm banking on this being a good year! We're approaching mid February so six weeks in I can say so far so good!  

One promise I made to myself was escape the winter. That we did. It wasn't quite the three weeks I was hoping for but 11 nights away was actually a lot for our typical 3-5 night getaways. 

Thankfully I had someone to stay with Toby, I had made plans with family and friends and the SUN SHONE on us for most of the vacation. The weather wasn't tropical, and yet it was so great to walk without snow and nice, experience gray cloud coverage, scrape car windshields and just to be able to experience the peacefulness and beauty of the ocean and palm trees. Superb. 

Now back at it at home with work to do and goals to focus on and habits to refine. I started re-reading the book "7 Habits of Highly Effective People" this week and it did give me a good reminder of being impacted by your environment. Productive people thrive no mater the weather and reactive people let bad weather spoil their day. Sounds a bit like me so something to evaluate on a deeper level. While the weather does impact me (to a great deal) I do realize that this is my life right now and will be for a few more years (hopefully not more than 8!) so winters away are a must and I have to remind myself to put away my negative stance on winter. Embrace the seasons. Know that this too shall pass. Do what you need to do even when it's -14 and there is no sun for days. Take the good with the bad, and that includes you Miss Mother Nature. But thank you in advance for longer days, sun and spring in a few short weeks  

 
Heeeey Summer. Where are you going? I'm not ready for you to disappear again. It's been good to have you here....the warmth, the sun, the green, the birds, the water, the sky. You bring excitement, gatherings, happiness and promise. HEAT = good for my soul.  Don't leave me! When in the frenzy of my thoughts I don't mean to leave out fall.... yes...fall is here which is wonderful but the looming thought of winter is right around the corner.

I have a few family members that love winter. WHAT? Eww. Perhaps because they were born in the cold winter months? I don't understand it, but I suppose I'm happy people thrive during all seasons. That's what makes us all unique. 

My parents go to FL, my father in law seems to want to move back to AZ. Lots o people plan vacations to seek out the sun. Anything to avoid snow. Anything.  If I take my hatred for winter away, what would I have? Time to bust out my favorite blankets, cozy up by the fire, watch movies, read more books, get organization projects done, sink into that holiday spirit of Christmas and New Years, bake more, cook more, sleep in because the sun is too, stick close to home, do art projects, exercise inside, and ahhhhhhhhhh countdown the days til spring. Until I'm happy once again.

The sign I have up in my house "I'm sorry for the things I said when it was winter" is (unfortunately) true. WOW can I be a bear when I'm cold to the bone. It's just facts -  my body does not adjust well to cold weather- no matter how many frickin years I've lived here. For people who "run hot" it's hard to explain. I need sun and warmth. Period! 

This winter (2021-2022) will be my best winter yet. Why? Because I said so. I will be coming off of a great fall in real state. Jeremy and I will both be healthy (no COVID like last winter), we have enough money in the bank so no stress there,  and I'll be dreaming & gearing up for some big plans I have for 2022.

Feb 2022 I have decided to take a minimum of three week off. AWAY from Wisconsin. I'll make this work through careful planning for dog care, budget, and time off of work. 

Summer 2022 We will be traveling as a family to Italy/Sicily. omgosh I can't wait!

These two things will seriously get me through the winter weeks. Dreaming about escaping and making my #1 trip destination (family is everything!) will be so wonderful.

I am so fortunate to live this life, through each and every season I'm given on this earth. 

​I've been thinking a lot about life & death lately and really more specifically what we do with the one precious life on earth we've been given. Death is extremely hard - obviously not for the person who's in no more pain, resting, the soul living eternally, but for those left behind with the struggle of living without physically seeing/hearing/touching that person again. 

This past weekend I attended a memorial of a friends husband who died last year during the COVID-19 pandemic. It look a while to plan something safe and meaningful and I thought it was important to support a grieving friend. I knew "Dave" very briefly and very little. I learned more about him during the memorial service then I did the previous 10 years I only surface-level knew him. He left a legacy - so many people were impacted by his kindness, athletic, artistic and musical talents it was impressive to hear the stories from family and friends. I wanted to take a lesson away from it. "Live like Dave" I thought. That would mean doing art, taking up musical instrument lessons and being active in a sport. It seems like a lot of work to live like Dave.... but dang it, why not? This lead me to other memories. The four year anniversary of my sister-in-laws passing (still very hard as she had so much life left to live - including with her three young boys. I'll never understand that lesson) and the memories of my mother in law Dianne whom I miss every single day. 

I thought I should attempt to document how someone else's life & death could impact my own. Here are a few topics that have meaning to me:

1) Do the thing you always wanted to do! (Travel, play a musical instrument, design a home!) Live like Dave, Dianne, Jeanette & live life with passion & purpose.

2) Family is everything. 100%

3) Friends that aren't loyal don't deserve a place in your life.

4) Be kind. There is always room for improvement in this world.

5) Love! Love people, animals, nature, babies, seniors, teenagers, dark days, blue skies, traffic jams, birthdays cold weather AND yourself. The last one is probably the most important.

6) If you dwell on the negative, the more negative things will appear to be. Positive vibes only.

7) Release the past, plan for the future but be sure to live in the moment.

8) Why worry about what other people think of you? When you are doing your thing, who cares what other people think about that? Not their life, not their concern. (tough one for me being that people pleaser)

9) Let small worries stay small. Don't grow them into something big. Water what truly needs your attention.

10) Leave a legacy behind you'd be proud of. Determine what that would be and go do it!


​

The sun is shining, flowers are in bloom, grass is emerald green and summer is officially underway. I LOVE SUMMER. This is the time of year when calendars fill up quickly and life moves at a super quick pace. A few days until July......WHAAAAAAT?

This is also the time of year when I often reunite with extended family as people definitely like to celebrate when there is zero change of it being negative 38 degrees. So we gather. and eat. and celebrate and are quickly reminded what's important in this life. FAMILY.  So today's post will give you a little run down of why no matter what is going on in your life, family is everything.

I grew up with a close knit family. I was close to all my aunts and uncles. Cousins were the best. Holidays were planned months in advance and traditions were strong. Our parties would often involve performances (yep-singing, dancing, comedic skits, costumes,... all of it) I would say I am one of the most fortunate people I know as my childhood into adulthood has really been special. As I get older, I really cherish the time I have watching littles learn the magic of this life and also enjoy appreciating the invaluable wisdom shared by the elders ;) 

In summer we celebrate June Birthdays. My dad has two siblings all born many years apart but within the same week. Crazy how that worked out. This June was no different. Uncle Andy turned 89, Aunt Theresa turned 82 and my dad turned 73 we celebrated with the other June birthdays and soaked up the sun and warm conversation. It means so much to me that we love each other and getting together is as important as anything else in this life so we definitely prioritize it. 

Hopefully you also have that special family you could tell stories about and cherish the time we have together. I challenge you to prepare a song, have a themed party or dress up like your favorite talk show host and tell jokes at your next family gathering - promise it will be a big hit. 

In my daily work to learn, grow, explore, improve, etc. I've definitely determined that in all of life's greatest quests the job starts on the inside. Not how much money is in your bank account, how many friends you have, the boss you worked for, where you live, or what the weather is like (because if you know me, you KNOW most of my negative comments relate to our crappy Wisconsin weather)  - anything you want to do in this life starts with YOU. 100%.

There are external circumstances that you'll never be able to control so you might as well start with what you can.  I've purchased a Passion Planner calendar for the past three years and its helped me to identify what I want to accomplish. From small soul-filling days like planning family dinners to large bucket list type items like starting a design business and learning another language.

The easy road = making excuses, blaming others, putting it off, listening to what others think you are capable of, staying where you are. It's doing the HARD work (but necessary for your soul) that will be the ultimate sacrifice but also completely worth it. The inside job takes dedication, measurement, alignment to your truths, passion and focus. It takes everything you have and constant reminders of how and why you're doing it.  

As a real estate agent I need to be on my A-GAME much more than I ever thought was needed to excel at this job. I realized after countless conversations, trainings and self discovery that the distractions come easy but I have to the power to focus on what I offer to my clients. And that far outweighs what Agent B, C, D, E does.

Tell me: What do you need to shift your focus on? How do you make it an inside job where you apply logic to your challenge vs. bringing emotion, guilt, jealously to the table. 

Well if you know me, when I set to finish something I DO IT. It takes me a bazillion times longer than I planned but somehow I muster up the long term dedication to getting it done. I would've never expected that my first blog post would've been written 7 years ago and I just completely abandoned this website that was going to be the start of something great.

Well... guess what fans, it still can be. So here we are 7+ years later recording an entry for this blog page. In 2014 the world looked a whole lot different on the internet. This still feels like a straight up blog post 101 from like 2011 when it seemed like this world began. This isn't a topic I've educated myself on, and quite honestly have never felt like I had any sort of talent to write (ask my very talented, smart and artistic daughter - she would prob shutter if she read this), but maybe after 7 years the world has proved the internet is alive and well and can teach us all something, even if it's not perfect.

So another day, another trip to a home improvement store to work on a bathroom project. These are going to be my hardest clients yet - my parents. Plus, they won't even see the finished product until they arrive home from Florida. Hopefully our visions are in alignment and they are happy with what they see otherwise it may be a sour day on sweet sugar lane.  

Today's mission: Pick out tile. I have a pretty good idea of the (natural + gray + nothing flashy or super pricey) look we are going for so today's goal is make that final decision so we can get going. Our May 20-something deadline is going to come fast so material day is today!

So in exactly 15 months from today, I am turning 40. WOW. When I reach the big 4-0 milestone I imagine my life getting sweeter and more exciting, not the opposite. So I decided today to start prepping for it. Not in an armageddon type of way but from the perspective that life IS short and perhaps there are big things I can do over the next 15 months in my "30's" that I wouldn't have done otherwise. So, any suggestions, comments, etc. are welcome as my build my big list of "15 months to 40" activities. Each month I'll post about my adventures! Check out my Life List page for some of the resources I'll be using during this time. Life is short but sweet for certain.