The Best Way to Predict The Future is to Create It

Procrastination, thy name is Piccsy.

Fourteen out of twenty-seven hours of homework completed.

Animal Person

I am not.
But I have a strange obsession with pictures of these:

LOVE, Danielle

Dear snow,
I understand peoples qualms with you and how they tire of the cold and the dreariness. But I still love you, dangit!

Dear new boyfriend,
You are a recent addition to my life. But you make me quite happy and have a lot of good answers to my questions. We make a good team.

Dear art school,
We were made for each other.

Dear Jessica's clothes,
You are so nice to borrow when I'm sick of wearing mine. Thank you for fitting me sometimes:)

Dear apartments by the river,
You are colder than everywhere else in this place! Please stop freezing my car door locks so that I cannot leave in the night.

Dear Elizabethtown soundtrack,
What a sweet birthday surprise you were! I don't think there will ever be a road trip without you from here on out.

Dear little sister and man,
You guys are a revelation. I've never met anyone better at being in love than you. What a delight to witness.

Dear Anthropologie,
Let's have an affair. A love affair. I love you. I am in love with you. Love. Is had. From me. Oh gosh, the love and the joy. In my heart. Pitter patter..

Dear bedroom,
Whatever happened to our agreement for you to stay clean and organized? I am going to be quite busy from here on out, so perhaps you should do some self-preservation and get your act together.

Dear strange, strange dream I had about the little brother and illegal drugs and laughing,
WHAT in the WORLD...

Dear giant nineteen layered rainbow cake,
You. Are awesome. *high five*

Dear Sister Berry,
You are truly an inspiration. I love you dearly and cannot adequately express how much I respect and admire you. What an example you are, and such a great friend.

Dear singles branch,
I pretty much feel like it was the best decision ever to switch my records over this time around. I have had THE BEST Sundays these past few weeks in many, many, many Sundays. Feeling very blessed to be a part of you. Feel home.

Dear Streupers,
You guys are hysterical. LOVE hanging out with you. Perk.

Dear Christmas socks,
You are my favorite socks of all the socks. Keep up the good work.

LOVE, Danielle

Independent

I am AFRAID that since I am already such a fiercely independent person and so used to only having to take care of myself that if I grow up too much more on my own it will be increasingly difficult to adjust to being married and always having another person to think about with every activity and decision. Someone else to report to and be accountable to than just myself. I know people who are like that. They are so comfortable with only taking care of themselves that they just don't really do relationships. Conversely, I also know people who made themselves ready and committed themselves early on in relationships and who simply grew together knowing that they just always factored that other person in. I am not ready to get married. I am not getting married. But sometimes I think about these things... Unrealistic, perhaps. Ridiculous, perhaps. But hey, that's me.

Secret

I don't talk about boys on this blog. There's a very good reason for that. I am twenty-one years old. I'm dating. I'm meeting new people. I'm changing my mind. I'm falling in and out of love. And that is allowed. I live a very unapologetic life. It's wonderful and freeing. However, I also know that because I feel so deeply, I tend to get carried away. I don't want this blog to be a place where intimate, but ultimately short-lived feelings and thoughts come to die. There are things I believe in and other feeling that I want to be able to remember for years and years to come, and then there are feelings and things that I will gladly forget about if/when I break up, move on, and start feeling and thinking about someone else. That said, I have mentioned a particular someone in recent posts. I will do this again. And I feel the need to clarify (I am a qualifier. The queen of disclaimers. I accept this.) that this does not necessarily mean I won't ultimately have a change of heart. I am not secure in the knowledge that this person will remain in my life. But he is here now. And I accept full responsibility for the effects of my public and recorded (however vague and brief) accounts of him.
:)

Collard Greens

Today my heart aches for my sister. Kira lives in Phoenix, and while I was there in Arizona working last semester I made the fifty plus mile drive up to their house on many occasions. I feel like that semester we grew closer as people than we have our whole lives. It's almost unreal how deeply I love and respect and admire her. Kira is the oldest sister. She has always been the "example" at least to me, and I oftentimes felt like that meant she was showing me what not to do with my life, simply because she did it differently. There were times when I honestly did not understand her. There were times we didn't really ever talk. But now? Oh, we talk. And it physically pains me (okay, maybe that's just the lady cramps today) to not be able to now just drive up to Phoenix to spend the day talking [I almost wrote chatting, but we don't really chat, we have actual meaningful deep conversations. It's beautiful.] and creating and cooking! Oh to cook with Kira! Anyone who knows Kira, really knows her, can see how much she enjoys cooking. She combines the oddest things into the most delicious meals you've ever eaten. I never knew how much I could enjoy cooking until I did it with Kira. It's like a narcotic. That sounds extreme, but seriously. Even if I am having the worst of worst days all I have to do is whip up some off-the-wall crazy delicious vegetable riddled meal that she comes up with on the spot and it's like my load is instantly lifted. That's something I really admire about Kira too. The woman knows how to use vegetables. I swear, it's like some freaky gift she traded her soul to the devil for. Who even knows how to cook vegetables in a million different ways and use them in every meal in such a way that they often rival the meat or pasta or whatever else would normally be categorized as the main dish? Kira inspires me. She makes me want to be the kind of person, and eventually the kind of wife, who will do this. Will actually cook for her family, good filling healthy meals. And not only that but she has such a fervor for life! There is nothing she decides to do that isn't accomplished in the most efficient and organized way. And with excitement too! I have no doubt that she could take over the whole world if she really wanted to. I'm just in awe of her abilities. I could go on and on. But today I'm just missing missing missing her dreadfully!! We probably email each other a hundred times a week, different pictures and ideas that we've found and little interesting things that happen to us. Many, but small emails. But it's hard to email a real in depth conversation like the ones you can have face to face. I met someone when I came home. We've been dating for several weeks now. And it's new. And it's exciting. And I'm very happy so far. But for some weird reason it almost doesn't feel real because I haven't been able to tell every single little inclination and feeling to Kira and have her validate me and tell me what she thinks about all of it. I almost don't want to fully open myself up to this person because Kira hasn't met him yet. That's not really the whole truth of it but it's like I need her approval before I can say, yes, this is my boyfriend. Dumb! How dumb is that? I do really like him. And no one else's opinion is going to change that. I don't ask for permission. I am an independent person and I act for myself, fully. But there's just something that completes any given situation for me when I have Kira's input. She's like... My philosopher. My mentor. My advisor. I fantasize us living near enough to each other when we start our families to be able to get together a couple of times a week and cook for everyone. Throw little themed parties and just to have our children grow up together. I'm almost afraid to do it without her. It looks like I won't really have this opportunity, at least not for an extended period of time, and that makes me really sad. But I guess what I can remember about all this is just how incredibly lucky and blessed I am to have a sister who inspires and teaches me so much about myself and about the world around me. Kira, I love you. I love you so, so much. Today, I miss you. And I always miss you. But I love you. Thank you for being my sister. <3

Twenty-One

Delish toasty herby salmon
Roasted brussels sprouts (All you non-believers are missing out on brussels sprouts I tell you)
Sweet potato fries
Dutch apple pie (Okay, apple crisp)

Delighted to be cooking this yummy birthday dinner!! Today I am a happy girl:)

Deep Breath

School starts tomorrow. I went to orientation on Thursday and had a nice little run down and tour of everything and got to meet some of my teachers. I have to say, I am getting exponentially more excited about this as the days pass. It is clearer and clearer that this is the very thing I need to be doing right now in my life, and that makes me feel so great. I know that this is what I want to do. I know I'm going to love it. And I know what I want to do with it for the rest of my life too. (Obviously in flexible general terms, but still.) I'm just really feeling it. This is right. Isn't it so awesome to feel that way about something? I never felt this way about hair school. I was excited about hair school, but in a way I was still going in blind. I thought I wanted to do it so I psyched myself up to taking that chance because I knew if I didn't start taking chances to find the things I loved I would never get there. But this time I don't feel like it's a risk at all. It's a lot of money. Holy crap is it a lot of money. And if there's one thing in this world that I struggle with wrapping my head around, it's money. Just ask my mother. I'm damaged when it comes to my ability to think positively about money. But for this, especially in this case where I will be spending loads and loads of it and pinching pennies all throughout just to get by, I'm surprisingly at peace. I'm confident that it will be totally worth the investment. I don't know if that's ever happened for me before. Just so happy with this decision. :) On the flip side, I totally know that it's not going to be easy. I'm going to be working my butt off basically non stop. But honestly, I'd rather be busy out of my mind than sitting around feeling like I'm not making anything of myself. I've always needed to do something notable. If not for anyone else, just for my own peace of mind. So bring it on art school. Ready or not, here I come.
In other news, I started dating this guy... And he's pretty great. And it's kind of nice... :) Feeling good Danielle! Keep breathing!