Monday, April 1, 2013

Straight Haired Girl is Back

Hey Y'all.
How you been?
Good?
Good.

Yes, I took a 5 month absence from the blogging world.  It was a weird season of life and I couldn't really find a voice for this blog . . . or let's just say a pleasant voice for this blog. I just reviewed my 10 drafts in blogger and most were cringe worthy. Ringing with the sound of whining, ungratefulness, and misery. I was working around 12 hour days to appease the unappeasable. My best friend since 17 moved to Japan, and the cherry on top was being a victim of a company layoff.   There are several other "mini" things that happened in between, but trying to write a blog from that place is hard and I didn't want to do it. 

So I bring you good news! The storms have settled and I feel more encouraged about life and the ups and downs than I have ever before.  This isn't the first time several life changing things have happened to me in a short amount of time.  I didn't handle it well at 22 so this go-round at 25 I knew myself better and knew what to expect. I knew I couldn't do it alone. My friends, family, and boyfriend just stepped it up and were downright awesome. I could be that annoying person on social media who shouts those people out individually every day with how much I love them, how amazing they are, and they are better than your family, bestfriends, boyfriend, but let's be honest and say those people are the most annoying people ever. I mean ever.

Eight weeks of no work is kind of amazing. There is a lack of income but because of that you find joy in the smallest of things. I read, slept, laughed, and danced more than I have since probably college. It was awesome. Don't get me wrong it was stressful but awesome. I'm celebrating this Easter season with a new sense of appreciation and joy.  I have been blessed with a new job where I honestly believe I will be very happy. I'll be posting soon on things going on currently, my advice for if you ever get laid off, and how to make the best egg sandwich (I've had lots of time to practice). Until then let me catch you up on the past five months via pictures!

You know those people who are just down right awesome? Yeah, I play kickball with those people every Tuesday night.  We may not be the team with the most wins, but we are always the team that is having the most fun. 

Sarah & I went to Vegas! It was pretty amazing to have that weekend with her & Alyssa.

In Vegas I got to see my other BFF and Vegas resident Alyssa and meet her beautiful baby girl Baylor. I love these girls.

Speaking of love & girls . . . shortly after Vegas Alyssa made the trip to Charleston. Needless to say getting TRIO time twice in one month is pretty fantastic.


And as you saw from pictures above I cut around 5 inches off my hair. I'm still Straight Haired Girl just not Long Hair Don't Care Girl. I like the shorter hair, but I miss throwing my hair in a up in a messy bun. Messy buns were my favorite. 
(Selfie pic rule: Before & after selfie pics are acceptable only two times a calendar year)


Dana & I celebrated one year of officially dating with a trip to Asheville. If you haven't had the pleasure of going to Asheville I recommend you plan a trip ASAP. Especially if you're a craft beer enthusiast.


Tupelo Honey Cafe was my favorite place. That is homemade jam & honey on a homemade biscuit people. YUM!

This is Dana doing a high kick (which he is extremely proud of) on one of the top 10 nights of my life. This was the week I was laid off. We went to a comedy show, played some pool, and ended up on an empty dance floor with some new & old friends on a random Thursday night. It was exactly what I needed. I get to wake up to this man every day. It's the most fun. 

I celebrated turning 25 this year in February. It was a really fun week- because girls get birthday weeks if not birthday months. So yes, I had so much fun that I didn't take a single picture other than this one of cupcakes. Three of which Dana, myself & our waitress already consumed . . .

I took a letterpress class at Redux Studios downtown. It was my birthday/Valentines day present from Dana. I learned how to mix & roll ink on to the machine & setup cool things like this. I also learned how to run the print. If I didn't find a job by the summer my plan was to do an internship with these people. I wanted to make things again and that is still my goal.


We did a lot of downtown visits in my 8 weeks of being without a schedule. When it was 75 degrees in January we caught some Charlestonians tightrope walking by the battery. I need this weather back in my life.

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Straight Haired Girls Has Boy Advice...Sort of

All My Single Ladies,

I have been asked by a few dear sweet friends to post my feelings, thoughts, experiences on boys/men on my blog. To be honest, I have tried ladies. I really have. I have around 7 drafts saved on my blog about the subject.  I can't do it. I ramble way too much. I sound slight contradictory, slutty, bitter, and angry.  All things of which I don't think I am. I get on a rambling roll when I talk about how innocent I was once. How I just didn't know any better about guys and didn't know that in fact they are just guys. They don't do or think the way we do.  In April a girl from Though Catalog wrote an essay on the subject of women and men and I really loved it. It sums up my feelings pretty accurately. I put my favorite lines in bold. If you don't have time to read the entire thing (it may be lengthy) then just skip to the last paragraph. 




Put Down The Häagen-Dazs And Nobody Gets Hurt: Why Women Are Losing The Battle Of The Sexes
By DONNA SHUTE PROVENCHER


“Here’s to the liars and the cheaters and the cold mistreaters, to the mama’s boys who can’t take a stand,” warbled Danielle Peck in her 2006 Billboard chart-topper. “To the superficial players, the I-love-you-too-soon-sayers, if you hear me girls, raise your hand — let’s have a toast, here’s to finding a good man!” From Beyonce’s catchy “All the Single Ladies” (If you like it, then you should have put a ring on it!) to Katy Perry’s iconic earworm “Hot ‘n’ Cold” (Stuck on a roller coaster! Can’t get off this ride!), our pent-up sociosexual outrage as mistreated and much-put-upon women against the misogynistic powers-that-be is a force to be reckoned with. I defy you to scroll through your iPod playlist without stumbling upon a few such frothing-at-the-mouth gems as Taylor Swift’s “Picture to Burn” or Kellie Pickler’s “Best Days of Your Life.” (Country music in particular, it seems, has the market cornered on this brand of feminine angst; one has only to wonder if Jesus took the wheel before or after Carrie Underwood dug her key into the side of that poor schlep’s pretty little souped-up four-wheel-drive.) Musical theater would not be complete without one such man-hating showstopper in every musical. Romantic comedies would not be complete without one such charming but heartless sociopathic rat-bastard of a character. I believe that men get screwed over by women, sure, but if popular culture speaks for anything, women are getting screwed (figuratively and literally) by men in exponentially increasing numbers — and WE ARE PISSED. Chivalry is dead and men, if we are to believe our cultural conditioning, are little more than sadistic walking penises out to destroy everything in their path. They are lying, cheating heartbreakers who think with their dicks, objectify women, play mind games, send mixed signals, don’t know what they want, and refuse to commit. Just eavesdrop on any conversation on the Metro between two or more female participants and you will hear ample evidence to support this conclusion.

While there is an element of truth to such generalizations, hasty stereotypes are the hallmark of little minds; a healthy sense of balance is called for. We know the truth (to paraphrase Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird), and the truth is this: that some men lie, that some men are immoral, that some men cannot be trusted — but this is a truth that applies to the human race, not just to stupid boys and their stupid boy penises. (Okay, a loose paraphrase.)  Some, perhaps even most, men are unfeeling assholes, just as some, perhaps even most, women are manipulative bitches. We all occasionally get dumped, we all occasionally get hurt, and we all occasionally have our fragile hearts unceremoniously stomped upon, dragged through the mud, and run through the nearest paper shredder.  It’s called life.  And the best part about it is that it goes on.

Moreover, the thing about growing up is that it often necessitates unpleasant confrontations with our own stupid selves. “We are pessimistic,” writes English phenomenological existentialist (yes, that is a real thing) Colin Wilson, “because life seems like a very bad, very screwed-up film. If you ask ‘What the hell is wrong with the projector?’ and go up to the control room, you find it’s empty. You are the projectionist, and you should have been up there all the time.” In other words, finger-pointing is one of our most elemental childish reactions — blaming all our personal woes on our parents or our exes or our environment or our ecosystem, and women are the worst culprits I know, mostly preferring to weep into a vat of Häagen-Dazs instead of putting on their big-girl pants and confronting the source of their pain.  And while I like abdicating personal responsibility almost as much as I like shopping for shoes, it’s about damn time we all stopped wearing a wishbone where our backbone ought to be and quit blaming society at large, the media, the porn industry, the American public education system, the Christian right, or the lunar calendar for the fact that men treat women like crap. Men treat women like crap for one very simple reason:

Women let them.

Don’t get me wrong; I am not some antifeminist crackjob. Simone de Beauvoir is my homegirl and while I may order amaretto sours at the bar, I’ll punch you in the face if you think I can’t pound a Guinness with the best of them. I think it’s idiocy bordering on criminal in this enlightened century that we still blame rape victims for dressing provocatively and consider women who have had multiple sexual partners whores while exalting men as gods. And I am certainly not saying that men don’t need to step up, take ownership of their own behavior, and stop acting like selfish dickheads. But we as women seem to have a faulty understanding of what true feminism is. As Georgian feminist Mary Wollstonecraft once put it, it’s not about having power over men; it’s about having power over OURSELVES. No, you are not to blame for the men in your life treating you poorly, but when you consistently accept that poor treatment as the status quo without a word of protest, you categorically forfeit your right to victim status. “Forces beyond your control can take away everything you possess except one thing,” writes Viktor Frankl in Man’s Search for Meaning: “your freedom to choose how you will respond to the situation.” And so I challenge you to ask yourselves: how many times have you decimated several forests’ worth of Kleenex because a man used you for sex, strung you along, couldn’t make up his mind about you, dumped you for no good reason, caught you in the cross-fire of his own quest for self-actualization, or committed any number of similar offenses which should in fairness get a guy’s man-card revoked for life? How many hours on the psychotherapist’s couch have you spent blaming your drug addiction/eating disorder/clinical depression/general psychopathology on some man or other who done you wrong? How many bad relationships have you nursed far longer than their life expectancy because the one thing more unthinkable than living with him was living without him? How many broken hearts have you suffered as a completely avoidable consequence of jumping feet-first into a situation you knew from 500 yards away was a trainwreck waiting to happen?
Well, I heap well-deserved albeit politically incorrect personal castigation on you for your own stupidity. Shame on you — and on myself — and on all of us.  You’re a person, not a puppy dog; don’t leave your bullsh-t detector set to “silent.” Doesn’t return your calls? STOP CALLING HIM. Won’t commit to you? STOP SLEEPING WITH HIM. Treats you badly? BREAK UP WITH HIM. Doesn’t love you anymore? STOP WASTING YOUR TIME. Man up, delete him from Facebook, cut your losses, and move on. People as a general rule live up to exactly what you expect of them and no more, so the only way to be respected by men is to start commanding that respect. You are not the helpless love-child of Daisy Buchanan and Marilyn Monroe, so quit acting like it. Can you imagine Golda Meir or Margaret Thatcher sobbing in bed for a week obsessively checking her phone messages and drowning her sorrows in chocolate-chip cookie-dough over some stupid thing some stupid boy did? Of course not. Why? Because they had more important things to do.

So don’t put up with people who are reckless with your heart. Don’t hand over an all-access pass to your mind, your time, your emotions, and your body to anyone who abuses the privilege; it’s like crying about your house getting burgled when you keep leaving the doors unlocked. We like to think we can have it all — and we are kidding ourselves, even as we defend our delusions to the death. We scoff at men who hold the door for us, then wonder why they don’t do it anymore. We hold up heroines like Katniss in The Hunger Games to our daughters as the feminist ideal — strong, self-sufficient, in need of nothing or nobody, literally dragging her love interest around as a useless dead weight – yet can’t figure out why men won’t fight for us. Most importantly, we spent the better part of the 20th century clamoring for our right to sexual expression and free-love and now bitch about how men don’t commit when we give them everything they want free of charge. We like to fancy ourselves innocent little lambs led to the slaughter, but we are more like Mary Shelley’s Dr. Frankenstein, placidly watching a monster of our own creation escape the lab and wreak havoc on humanity. We have accepted and enabled male mistreatment for years, and we are rightly hoisted with our own petard.

Ultimately, I challenge you, along with myself, to cash in your chips and stop playing the blame game. “She wins who calls herself beautiful and challenges the world to change to truly see her,” writes Naomi Wolf. There is nothing sexier than an honest woman; let others know you will no longer stand for their cruelty or carelessness and divest them of their power. Chase after your own dreams with a billy club and start being the best possible you you can be; the rest will fall into place. Stop coveting the cryptorchids and hold out for a hero. Real men honor their commitments, keep their promises, and love you for exactly who you are — squidgy bits and all. Wait for a man who “compels your strength, makes enormous demands on you, does not doubt your courage or your toughness, who does not believe you naïve or innocent, who has the courage to treat you like a woman” (Anais Nin). Wait for a man whose world is a better place just because you’re in it. You are worth nothing less.

Stop settling for sour cream and salsa when you deserve the whole enchilada

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Straight Haired Girl Plays Catch Up

Y'all,  I am so sorry. Has it really been a month since I've last posted? Seriously. I feel like I have been so busy but yet not really. I'm sure that is confusing to you but we'll get through this awkward transition sentence together.

This summer has flown by to say the least. Every weekend has been filled to the brim with plans and I'm worn slap out. I'm extremely thankful for my life and all the things going on it but lately I've just been dragging, kicking and screaming. Why? Because the summer time makes me think of Summer 2010. Summer 2010 and the rest of that year was the year I grew the most as a person and practically the best year of my life to date. I didn't have a care in the world besides if it was going to rain and prevent me from laying out at the pool that day. It also makes me miss college. Miserably miss it. Okay- done pouting. This isn't a pity party. Again, I'm thankful!

I feel 2012 is a year of transition. I feel so much is changing and maybe it always has been and I've just never noticed. I feel big and amazing changes are still to come and I cannot wait to share them with you all! Okay time for an update! Here's what's been happening....

This is Sarah & myself. BFFs since 17 and she is moving to Japan in December.
Separation anxiety will ensue shortly thereafter.

I attended a skype baby shower for Baylor and Alyssa! Gotta love technology.

I attempted to paint Rainbow Row.
Excuse the fat shudders. I couldn't stop laughing the entire night. 


Let me introduce you to Penny. We adopted her! I'll post on her later!

I've been here every weekend. The parents got a pool and it is pretty amazing!

Penny loves her bed. Sorry had to throw another one in there :)

 I'm re-reading Harry Potter because my eyes need a break from the Kindle. I purchased this book in 6th grade when we had to fill out reading logs for class, remember those?


Last but certainty not least I'm going to VEGAS!!
Sarah & I are going to see the other leg of our tripod Alyssa and hopefully her newborn baby girl Baylor. It'll be the last time all three of us are in the same state for quite awhile. 


Friday, July 20, 2012

Straight Haired Girl Rambles

First, my Straight Haired Girl is a Beach Girl post had 14 page views. My, Straight Haired Girl is a Christian post had 209. So.... thank you? I'm not really sure how to absorb that. It's thrown me off and I've been struggling on even what to write as a follow up to it. Everything I type sounds kind of silly now. Not really planning on this being a blog about my faith. I feel it's a private matter in the fact that you know i'm a Christian and how I sort of became one and that's all I feel you need to know. I'm not going to shove The Bible down your throat or tell you that you're going to hell. I'm not that kind of girl. You can still call me up to have a drink and I can still tell you a funny story. That Lauren is still alive and well, don't you worry. 

Most of you know that my memory is ridiculous. Ridiculously amazing that is. I can recall dates, times, smells, weather, wardrobe, and food that was ordered without a bit of struggle. My memory and my hair are two favorite things about me. It's okay to have favorite things about yourself. I'm not saying I have the best memory and hair in the world, but i'm saying that those attributes about myself are my favorite. With that being said I've recently started writing it all down. I have a feeling one day I'll lose these gifts. I'll get older and my hair will either turn grey or fall out and my brain won't be as sharp as it once was. So I've taken up doodling, journaling, and all kinds of silly little things to do with my hands in my spare time. I no longer have cable or internet really at my house and it's allowed me to do so many other things then go into zombie mode. Yes, we just went from talking about my favorite things about myself to not having internet. Anyways, I write down my memories now. It's not a diary more like a recap of that day's events...the important ones anyways. 

Due to lack of digital entertainment in my household I now come home and play with Kennedy way more. She can now say Lauren in the way an 18 month old can say Lauren which kind of sounds Chinese. She says, "Ya-yen" she knows when to say, Please, Thank You, and You're Welcome...obviously still in baby talk but still very impressive. I'm so very proud of the little girl she is growing into and feel honored every day to be able to witness her milestones. I only hope to know Baby E & Baby B like I know my K. 

From happy stuff to the sad stuff, it's hitting me more and more that my best friend since 17 is probably going to move at the end of the year. A ton of bricks land on my chest almost daily at the thought and I cannot handle the emotions that come with it. She was married in April and I cried through the entire thing. Before ceremony, during ceremony, and reception. Dana kept looking at me and shaking his head. I was a mess and I'm sure that is only going to be a fraction of how much I'll be crying the day she leaves. You know that person you text when something happens? That first person? She is that person. She is not irrational and I take comfort that after my rant of texts I can join her for a glass of wine a short time after. We feel weird when we go more than 5 days without seeing each other. I honestly do not know how this is going to go down. It won't be pretty though. 

Okay. I'm done rambling.

Just to note my 2 least favorite things about myself:
I wear my emotions on my face, especially the bad ones.
I'm extremely impatient in the majority of things I do. I'm worried I'll never be crafty for this reason. 





Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Straight Haired Girl is a Christian


Today is July 10th, 2012 and a year ago today I was baptized.

I don’t want to mess this up. Seriously, cannot stress that enough. I do not want to mess this post up.

The fact of the mater is a good percentage of people think they know me. They think I’m still the same Lauren I was 3 years ago, 2 years ago, 1 year. Hate to tell ya but I’m not. I am not the same person I was one month ago. I, like most girls, am complicated and change frequently. To worry what you all think of me is exhausting. Honestly, exhausting. This post has weighed on me because I knew I needed to do it but at the same time I didn’t know if I really wanted to for this sole reason . . .

One extremely large and brutal weakness of mine is that I value others’ opinions on what they think of me. Now, I know everyone wants to be liked but this is different.  This has always been a weakness or how I’ve viewed it recently, a sickness of mine. I’ve always wanted to impress, to be loved, and to be shown off. I have wanted to be valued highly by others and even viewed as a necessity. An attitude of . . .

"You need me in your life because . . . I did this for you or I can do this for you. I am an irreplaceable friend, girlfriend, co-worker, daughter, niece, and roommate. You will be lost without me."

Selfish, prideful, and just plain old ugly does not even cover it. Trying to be everything to everyone is exhausting and also extremely prideful in thinking I am THAT meaningful. Also, it’s exhausting trying to please everyone. What if people think I’m a hypocrite because I follow Jesus now? Do they think its copout? Do they think, “Oh, she is a Christian now of course she got a blog.” “Ugh, she is going to be all religious now.” Seriously, these thoughts and words have come through my head and it’s exhausting. EXHAUSTING. I’m never going to be the Lauren you want me to be and I’ve learned that’s okay. I’m going to be the Lauren that I want to be, and the Lauren I want to be is an out of the closet, bible reading, church going, knee praying Christian. So let’s talk about why and how I am where I am (The answer is Jesus but read anyway).

I have a friend. . . a dear, sweet, beautiful friend that I love. We did not always get along though. We played nice in high school for the most part, but it wasn’t until recently that I realized my hostility towards her was because I just didn’t get her. Haters gonna hate and I was full time hatin’. She frustrated me so easily with her bluntness, ridiculously cute outfits, and her ability to get the attention of the entire room without even putting any sort of effort into it. I couldn’t put my finger on it but something beyond the external also frustrated me. I’ve known her for years but from a distance so what was this thing? She was telling my friends and I a story one night when it hit me. What I was going through in life she had already been through. She survived. Survived is not the word I want to use but I mean it’s the only one coming to my head right now. (Again, paranoid about messing this up.) People still loved her for her. They didn’t question her. They accepted the new version of her. I didn’t think that her story would be an option for me. I was looking at the life she was currently living and thought, “I’ll never feel that way. I’ll never be able to give over my life like that. I like the way my life is now. I’m happy.” Pshhh. I thought I was happy & fulfilled? I’m such a silly girl sometimes. See, the thing is she was a Christian. She was giving life into others or maybe she always was and I was just noticing for the first time. I never wanted to go out of my way to be friends with this girl but now, two years later, we’re on the level of me meeting her during my hour lunch break from work. My one-hour lunch turned into two. Easily. I could have stayed there and talked to her all afternoon if that was an option. I have realized, and it was reiterated to me during our lunch that I could be like her.

I was going to church and felt moved every now and then but not in a “come to Jesus” way for at least 6 or 8 months. I again had that feeling of,  “I could never be like her.” “I’ll never be the Christian she is because I’m still holding onto sin that I cannot give up.” “I will always be ‘Damaged Lauren.’ I will always be wrapped up in myself, selfish, and that past of mine… whew . . . No one will ever be able to forgive that.”

What did we have a sermon on shortly there after? Oh, that would be about letting go of your past! God does that to me a lot. I have a feeling about something, I show up, sit down, and boom!

“Oh, Heyyyy Lauren! How are you? I mean I know how you are but umm… (fake cough)… So since I’m God and I love you and all we’re going to work out that conviction you’re dealing with. Do you have tissues? Of course you don’t. Okay, well you’re going to ugly cry, but it’ll be okay that manly guy in front of you is going to cry too.”

I am not perfect and never will claim to be. I am seriously fallen and flawed in so many ways. I am controlling, impatient, stubborn, and have a bad case of road rage. I have a past that I thought I would never be forgiven for but He did. Undeservingly so. I don’t deserve His grace or His love. I didn’t think I could ever be a Christian. I knew I would fail at that “lifestyle”, but over the year I’ve grown closer to Him by learning more about Him.  I am doing my best to be in His word daily and to follow Him so that I may continue to grow.  I will fall again. I’m 110% sure about that, but God with a mighty hand will pick me up and dust me off and remind me of the cross and what it means. I am forgiven. I am loved. I don’t have to do anything besides confess and repent, because I have claimed Jesus as my Savior.  Jesus already paid the price for whatever sin I commit. He forgave my friend, He forgave me, and I’ve learned to never say never. He’ll show you He can change anyone.



Friday, July 6, 2012

Straight Haired Girl is also a Beach Girl

Some friends said I should post a picture of my straight hair, but as of late my straight haired pics have not held up to my standards. Today at the beach I was taking some pics of the scenery around me and then turned the camera on myself. Being my worst critic I think it turned out just fine. 



Sulivan's Island Station 16 & me.

Thursday, July 5, 2012

Straight Haired Girl is on Vacation!



Man, oh man am I happy to be on vacation. My definition of vacation by the way is four days off from work to stay in Charleston and do absolutely nothing. Today is the 4th of July and so far I’ve eaten breakfast, showered, brushed my teeth and for a good solid hour I pinned some stuff on pinterest. This makes me incredibly happy and I should also mention thankful to live in a country where that is perfectly acceptable. I’ll be celebrating my country’s independence in a few short hours with fireworks and friends, but for now I’ll let my hair air dry and write a blog post.

I only did one blog post last week due to the fact it was the last week of the quarter. I was in a zone. Unfortunately, blog posts didn’t fit into that zone.  I should mention to you that I work in a corporate environment and I’ll probably feel this way at the end of every quarter. I do love my job though.  

On this vacation I’m going to relax but also do some reorganization of my life. I’m a planner but only when I can sit down and put my full attention towards the task at hand. I don’t like to be distracted, rushed, or I guess imperfect? Eek. I should work on that. If I can’t do it well then I’m probably not going to do it at all. There are things I just want to fit in my life and this time off from work will definitely allow me to do just that. Make a plan.

I’ll let you know that I do want to create a blog plan. Think of times and days when I’ll most likely have some down time and be able to knock out a few posts.  Squeezing blogging into my routine isn’t a huge concern for me. I’ll make time for it because I enjoy it. I need to make time for the things I don’t enjoy as well. Which leads me to the topic of exercise. I really need to be more active. Sitting at a desk for over 8 hours a day is horrible for your health and body.  I have a co-worker that I walk with sometimes after work but I feel I need to be more dedicated with this routine and probably amp it up a bit as well. Goals associated with working out will not be weight or size oriented. I get discouraged very easily and normally don’t do well with those.  At my healthiest I focused more on my time and progression. Example: Do jumping jacks with a stopwatch for as long as possible. Do it again for that amount every day for a week, but next week add 30 seconds on to your time. The following week add a minute. Get the picture? I pushed myself and didn’t focus on the scale but rather my endurance. Pinterest has tons of workouts you can do in your room without joining a gym. Plus there are great apps for workouts too. Do whatever works for you.

The biggest and most important thing I want to fit into my schedule is reading scripture daily. I’m ecstatic with the resources I’ve discovered recently. My two favorites are #Scripturedoodle and Shereadstruth.com.  I follow along with a reading plan and devotionals with an online community of women I’ve never met. They are so encouraging and I am so thankful for them. I haven’t been able to do it every day of the week yet but I’m getting there. I’ve failed at reading plans my church has offered. I often get bored with them or lost. The reading plan I’m using now breaks down the scripture and has journal prompts for you to respond. It’s been something I enjoy doing and also want to do it more often. I’ve been working on a post about my faith for over a week now and I just can’t get the wording, my story, or I guess my message across the right way.  It’ll come soon though and needs to. It’s a huge part of my life that I refuse to hide on this blog. I just want to do it well. Hope you all had a good 4th! I’ll post again soon.