Totally Logical Tips for an Easy Move.

1.  Don't move.  The most logical way to have an easy move is don't.

2.  Hire a company.  Hire someone else to pack and move your stuff, to clean your old place, and to unpack at your new place.  Then just pop some champagne and watch them work.

Side note:  You're probably going to want to get them to cook you dinner your first night in your new place.  Watching other people work is exhausting.

3.  Abandon your old place and everything in it.  Buy all new things for your new place.  And have someone else unpack your new things, obviously.

4.  Change your identity.  If you are no longer Sarah Smith, you no longer have to be responsible for Sarah Smith's old apartment.  Right?  Right.

5.  Don't move. 

An easy move just doesn't exist.  I have literally been moving since Friday and am pretty sure I've never been this tired...but man, you just can't beat this new view.

w h i l e   y o u ' r e  h e r e :

Happy to be Alive: Books, Headbands, and Peaches.

1.  Tomorrow is moving day!  While this means that today will be crazy, I'm so looking forward to waking up in our new home on Sunday.

2.  I mailed out 58 of my books to reviewers this week!  The blog tour for my book is starting in two weeks...this means that 58 book bloggers I have never met will read and post about my book.  This is both insanely terrifying and thrilling, and I'm so excited to see what they think!

3. I made these headbands for my shop and asked Chris to take pictures of me so I could list them.  He was actually really good at it and I got to laugh a lot while listening to someone say I was pretty.  Hello, win-win.

4.  I'm working really hard on being okay with the fact that not everyone is going to like me.  This has a lot to do with the fact that I just sent 58 copies of my book to strangers.  To them, it will be 304 pages of words.  To me, it is 304 pages of three years filled with dreams and emotions and time and tears.  I'm working on being okay with the realization that there are going to be people who just don't like my book.  I was looking on pinterest (because duh, where else else do you turn when you're trying to learn a big life lesson?) and saw a quote I've heard so many times:

I'm pretty sure it's going to be a lifelong journey, but I'm going to try to remember this every are of my life.  Way easier said than done.

5.  Let us end on a wonderful note...it's a three-day weekend.  I wish you immense amounts of pool time with way too much sunshine and guacamole.

Why are you happy to be alive this week?

w h i l e   y o u ' r e   h e r e :

Because I want to remember every single second.

Blogging is cool for a whole lot of reasons, but one of my favorite reasons is that it's pretty much an online journal that catalogs weeks and months and years.  If you have a blog, you'll be able to look back at it years later and see how your interests changed, how your dreams changed, how you changed.

Chances are, if something is big or important to you, you blog about it.  And I just really like the idea of one day being able to type in an address and see the past years of my life--pictures, emotions, gifs, and all.

This week, I have been overwhelmed by the fact that people are actually reading my book.  That's crazy to me! I mean, obviously that was the goal, but it's one thing to hope and pray and cross your fingers that something is going to happen, and a completely different thing to see something actually happen.

So here are a few texts and tweets from this week that made me stop what I was doing and just soak in the fact that this is real life.  

w h i l e   y o u ' r e   h e r e :

A Very Helpful Little Fox.

Once upon a time, I captured a wild fox and told everyone he was a puppy.

Little did I know how helpful he would be with chores around the house!

Like folding laundry laying on top of warm laundry....

...and helping with the dishes trying to blend in with the dishwasher so maybe I'll accidentally give him some dirty plates instead.

He's great at giving me a hand with scrubbing the tub very bad about understanding personal space...

...and is especially good at scrubbing hard to reach places I'm not sure what his plan with this toothbrush was, but he looks very untrusting. 

But, of course, his favorite activity is blogging. 

Also, remember those rooftop pictures I posted a few weeks ago?  We got that apartment!  Annnnnd we're moving there on Saturday.  Please, ask me how much of my house is packed.  I'll give you a hint:  the answer is zero percent.

I'm off to spend the week in packing frenzy, and trying to convince this puppy to pull his weight around here.

Does your dog get involved while you're getting stuff done? 

w h i l e   y o u ' r e   h e r e :

The Mad Ones.

“The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars.”  -Jack Kerouac

I adore Jack Kerouac, and this is probably one of my favorite paragraphs he wrote.  It makes me think of the kind of people I want in my life, of course, but it also makes me think of the kind of person I want to be.  A mad one, desirous of everything, adventuring, dreaming, burning, burning, burning.

This morning, I was on the way to work when Chris called to tell me his tire blew out and he was stranded.

Today, being a dreamer, a mad one, looked like calling into work, turning around, and sitting on the side of the road with the love of my life until we figured out the car situation.  Which, trust me, was an adventure in and of itself.

So what about days like that?  Because that's life, right?  Balancing the mundane with the wishful and hoping to end up with something somewhat whimsical that you are proud to call your life.  Because life isn't always only risks and chasing things.  And that's okay.

I have a lot of dreams I want to pursue.  I have a lot of adventures I want to go on.  I have a lot of goals I hope to accomplish.  Most of all, I want to live life passionately and love it with all that I possibly can.

And I would venture to say that those things can be just as present on a Thursday morning with a flat tire as they can be on the day when a dream is realized or a goal accomplished.

Because if you're a dreamer who loves life, every day is good.  There is no such thing as boring.  Even the boring parts of life beckon you to adventure, and if you accept, they cease to be boring.

What do you think?  Can everyday life be just as good as the burning, mad, wonderful parts of life?


w h i l e   y o u ' r e   h e r e :

A List of People Who Need to Stop Killing My Vibe.

I feel like the world can be broken into two groups:  people who are happier when they are making other people happy, and people who are happier when they are NOT making other people happy.  Not only when they are not making them happy, but when they are taking happiness away from them. 

Let's look at some examples. 

When I'm obviously into a song, and you say, "This song is so old, why do they even play it anymore?"

When I tell you something I really like, and you respond with, "I really want to like it, but so many other people like it...I just feel that it's a little too mainstream."

If I'm watching a show or reading a series that's already finished, and you decide it would be appropriate to tell me the ending wasn't all that great.

When I'm eating a cheeseburger and it's the best cheeseburger I've ever consumed and you choose that exact moment to tell me that meat or cheese or bread is what makes people fat or unhealthy or sick.

If you tell me you think flower crowns are stupid.

If you tweet anything along the lines of: "So utterly over seeing ______ pop up all over my feed" and the blank is something like pictures of flowers or rainbows or puppies. 

When you tell me whatever I'm feeding/teaching/doing with my dog is wrong and I should do it a different way. 

Basically, if you have a habit of saying things that ruin other people's day, and you enjoy it.

Have a happy happy Monday and don't kill anyone's vibe today.  Because that's just rude.

Check out this month's featured sponsor:

Happy to be Alive, Because: No More Studying & A Flower Discount

1.  Christopher's exam is  o v e r !  We have been hanging out so much that I think my heart might explode from sheer happiness.  PSA:  If you're going to get married, marry someone who you makes you that happy just by spending time with them.

2.  When he came home from his exam, this is what the walls looked like:

"Such done.  Wow.  So finish.  Relax."

3.  And then I got this picture: 

4. We went apartment hunting yesterday!  All.  Day.  Long.  I guess the reason this is on the list is because it means we'll (hopefully!) have a new place downtown soon.  That, and I'm glad that I married  someone that after eight hours of tours and questions and information together, I still want to be married to him.  That's a big deal.  If you don't believe me, go see nine apartments in a row.  Nope.

That's the rooftop at one of the apartments. One can dream, right?! 

5.  My pretty friend Jordyn did a photo shoot with some headbands from my shop, and she looks absolutely stunning.  If you still haven't looked at her pictures, you need to do that immediately.  You will want to drop whatever you're doing and go find yourself a tulle skirt and some flowers for your hair because she makes it look so fantastic.  I can help you with the flowers in your hair part, and you can even take 22% off in her honor with the code TAYLORSWIFT.

What made you happy to be alive this week?

w h i l e   y o u ' r e  h e r e :

I Firmly Believe That...

Breakfast food tastes best after dark.

A good haircut changes everything.

Bright colors are the best colors.

If you give a girl a good cup of coffee and some sequins, she can change the world.

Most problems seem significantly smaller after a long bubble bath.

There's something in every day worth celebrating.

If there is an opportunity to wear flowers in your hair, you should.

Puppies make life approximately 12 million times better.

You should go out of your way to be kind at least once a day.

No one should be judged on how they act before coffee.

What little things do you firmly believe? 

Be sure to check out my girl Jordyn looking insanely gorgeous in some Pretty Lovely Little goodies.   In honor of her, take 22% off any order with the code TAYLORSWIFT.

w h i l e   y o u ' r e   h e r e :

Happy to Be Alive, Because: Cinco de Mayo & Dogs Reading.

1.  Christopher takes his board exams tomorrow.  Which means the six weeks of crazy intense studying is over and I can actually hang out with my husband again. Movie nights!  Date nights!  I'M SO EXCITED.

2. Megan put this picture on instagram yesterday.  That's her horse dog reading my book.  He liked it, duh.

3.  It's MAY!  Which means it is officially summertime in my heart.  And no matter how far removed I am from having a summer break, there's just something about summer that's more laid back and relaxed than the rest of the year.

PS:  Happy Cinco de Mayo!

4.  My book is finally available on Kindle!  Some of you have email me about that, I'm sorry it took so long to get everything worked out!

5.  Yesterday was a craft day and I added some bun wraps to my shop.   Also known as, this is what my hair will look like for the rest of the summer.

It's Monday!  Why are you happy to be alive this week?

w h i l e   y o u ' r e   h e r e :

With Flowers in Your Hair.

Since the beginning of March, the days I've gone without wearing some sort of flowers in my hair have been few and far between.  I foresee this continuing for the rest of the summer, and that makes me really happy.  Summer breaks may be a thing of the past, but I can certainly wear flower crowns to work, because nothing makes me feel like celebrating summer quite like wearing flowers in my hair.

c l i c k  h e r e for flowers for your hair and get 20% off with code: MAYFLOWERS.

What do you do to celebrate summer?