What it means to be a friend

What if I disappeared for a while?
What if I hid from the social media sphere
and didn't post
and didn't go to events
and didn't have pictures to share.
Would you even care?


What if I didn't answer your call,
your text,
your direct message,
Would you even care?


What if we stopped hanging out?
What if we stopped going out and about?
What if you never hear from me?
Do you even care?


What if I never said Happy Birthday
Happy Thanksgiving
Merry Christmas?
Do you even care?


Do you know my favorite color?
Do you know my worse fear?
Do you know how I feel
when the wind is all I hear?


Do you know my husband's basic story?
Do you know about my pups?
Do you know how I feel
about misplaced lingering cups?


Do you know what holidays I love
and which I like the least?
Do you know how I really feel
about a Thanksgiving family feast?


Do you know what songs I love
to sing in my car aloud?
Do you know what I did
that has made me most proud?


Do you know what I do
when there's nothing to do?
Do you know
that I want to know you too?


Do you know what I keep track of
and what I let fall to the side
Do you know about my writings
my gratitudes, my thoughts inside?


Do you know what I know,
that you're sometimes fake when you speak?
Do you know that I care for you
very much, as high as a mountain peak?


Do you know that when we make plans
and then you don't follow through,
that not only am I said
but my heart breaks for you?


Do you know that when you don't share
those awesome exciting moments in your life
I celebrate for you anyway
whether its the excitement of a baby, or becoming a husband or wife?


Do you know that when you post a picture
but don't send a text
I'll "like" it, but sincerely
unlike some of the rest?


Do you know that when I bring a grievance,
that when I confront you on something you're doing
It's not because I hate you or want to tear you down,
I want to build you up, friendship isn't a state of being.


Do you know, that poetry is a heart's cry?
Do you know I wrote this for you
whether you're a new friend, an old friend,
someone fake or someone true?


Do you know that in a crowd,
I often feel alone?
Do you know that recently,
I no longer have a heart of stone?


Do you know that at work, I often bust my butt,
and often do a lot?
I try to talk and befriend my coworkers
but to do the same to me? They'd rather not.


Do you know that sometimes
I want to talk behind your back?
"Have you heard what (your name here) has done?
Wasn't that awesome and good!" It's not about what you lack.


Don't you know I value you
and the time you give to me?
Don't you know it's love I have,
that I want the world to see?


I wish I could be a talking mirror
so you could see your worth.
I'd crack a few jokes
we'd enjoy healthy mirth.


I'll admit a truth
I've been a cruddy friend.
But I vow to get better
until the very end.


I will fail
but I will keep trying.
Trust me I'll still be there for you
it ain't my bridge you're frying.


So if you wanna try again with me
Let's see where we go.
I'll do my best to be honest and fair
and tell you everything that's true.


And even if you don't,
If you decide to walk away from me.
Know that you're still gold,
Someday that's what I hope you'll see.

Scheduled and Stranded

From twice a week for sure, to maybe once a week, I’m changing how I’m blogging.

 

When I first resumed this blog, I was ecstatic to be inspired to pop out 2 times/week information and how God is working in my life. Then, for a week or two, I was silent, and now this past Wednesday I was able to put together another blog after I was inspired the Thursday prior. I don’t want to put pressure on myself to crank out 2 posts a week and work to queue them up so I don’t fall behind. We all know how well that worked a few years ago when I tried working 2 part time jobs and posting every day (inspiration, food, fashion etc)…it didn’t.

 

I desire quality over quantity. I don’t want to put half hearted efforts out. I want whole hearted worthwhile posts. I want to be inspired by others to inspire everyone else. I want whatever following is out there to be satisfied by my postings and not get one post every 6 months, or 18 at once and nothing for periods after.

 

I hope to have something up at least once a week, but it might be once every two weeks. Maybe there’ll be a bonus of 2 in one week. I don’t know.

 

Which is flat out scary to me. I am Type A, Organized, OCD. To not have a schedule? To not have consistency? I am laying my trust in Jesus that he will provide inspiration when it needs to be published. So until then, I’m just WOTLing around. (Wait On The Lord)

 

Amen and Amen.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

I know Halloween just got over and done with, and by the title, I'm wagering you're cringing in your seat, awaiting the onslaught of Christmas cheer.


Well fear not my friends, for the only Christmas cheer in this post, is simply just a wishlist.

"An online blog post wish list? Really Samantha? Tacky."

Ah, you say tacky, I say convenient, and here's my reasoning why. Year after year, person after person, "What do you want for Christmas?" Rather than repeating myself time after time, or forgetting what I tell who, I figured for everyone's convenience, a list would help everyone out. Besides, years from now, how cool will it be to look back on this and reflect, either on how it was a good choice, or I probably could have asked for something "better" (but c'mon, some of this stuff is pretty rad). 

And of course, as a Type A person: I love lists, so it just makes sense.

So, if you're all ready, here we go.

Samantha's 2016 Christmas Wish List (in no particular order)

• Michael's Gift Cards (Because who doesn't love getting crafty?! Planning supplies, Washi tape, canvases to paint on...ahhhhh)
• Etsy Gift Cards (Stickers for my planner, and other awesome stuff!)
• InkJoy Gel Pens (all black)
• Pair of rain boots (Who knew October could be so rainy!)
• Another Pair of Tieks (no patterns, already own the grey pair, seriously comfortable shoes! LOVE THEM) 
• Ulta gift cards (because Professional Hair Care that actually does something good to your hair other than build up crap is more expensive than the drugstore)
• A nice gym bag because my high school bag is....well its high school)

This list is not complete and final, it's a draft I'll be working on throughout the next month and a half. So in the meantime, I hope you're inspired to create your own Christmas wish list. :)

PfWo Project: House to Home - Painting

As nice as the light yellow walls, and the blue walls, and the purple walls are, it's just not our style. Our goal for the house? An elegant and classy home, with neutrals and shimmer (think Carly Cristman's loft).

So phase one of house to home: Repainting! Our goal is greys and blues.


All the common spaces have gone from yellows to grey.











This was all done the day before Halloween, before we officially moved in. Since then, we've done a lot to the house. I really sucked at posting House to Home updates. I'm working on some more posts, so be sure to keep an eye out for you!


What's your favorite part of remodeling? Comment below!


(Update 11/4/16) All of the pictures have disappeared and I'm not sure why. I will look in to remedying this situation asap!)

PfWo Project: House to Home - The Introduction

I think I'll call this series about the house PfWo Project: House to Home. We'll see how well the title sticks, or if Max likes it too. [Maybe he'll be a guest blogger. Though his blogs are more poetic here's how I feel posts. Less the DIY, Tried it and here's how it turned out, Fashion posts.]

Title derives from our last names. First two initials of our last names, mine being "Pf" and his being "Wo". And then since it's our first house, it'll be how we take it from just a house, to our amazing home. (Eventually the names in the title may change, if I'm lucky!)

So first off, welcome to the PfWo house when we moved in eons ago (Being October 2015). These were the pictures I took on our final walk through before we moved in:

Here's the kitchen and laundry room. Hideous color! Blech.

 

We have plans to remodel this bad boy and make it more efficient. Now after living there 3 months, we have a good idea of what we want to change. (By the way, that handsome devil is Max, the awesome boyfriend I have in my life :))

 

Our living room. Still a weird yellow color. We have since painted the whole house.

 

The unique full bath in the hallway

The tiniest room in the house, it's 8x9. Max and I think we're going to make it workout/prayer room. And we're going to repaint it. But we haven't decided yet which color we're going to.

This is the master. It isn't a horrible color. But we've repainted since we've moved. Look for future posts to see the aftermath.

 

 

This is the unique half bath in the master.

 

Walk in closet in the master. I have since taken over the left side, and Max has the backside.

 

This is the guest room. We've left the color as is so far. And it's also my cat Smidge's room lol.

 

This room will be the office. We're not going to keep the purple color. I've ordered a desk (last week) and I'm assuming Max and I will paint it before the desk gets placed.

 

The house wasn't awful. But does need a little TLC and conversion from the way the previous owners had it, to the way we want it. There are also some big renovation projects to be done: aka big money depleters. But Max and I will work on saving up for those. :)

So until next time...

Let's Get Personal: An Update in the life of Samantha

So I’m quite irregular when it comes to blogging. I’ve tried writing as many posts as I can when I feel inspired, and then set them to post on a schedule, when I was posting daily a couple years ago, I think I might have done a couple things wrong: 1^st off, not picking a theme for my blog and 2^nd just trying to do too much. If I would have spread things out, I might have been able to make it work. 3^rd is that there isn’t a specific space to work. I live in a one bedroom, 610 sq ft house and don’t have a desk anymore, because there simply wasn’t space. My laptop usually lives on the coffee table amongst clutter I can never seem to conquer.

I do have a hard time with habits. After a couple months, whatever I’ve been doing has seemed to just stop. I miss one time and then I feel like I’m incapable of resuming.

But! There’s hope! A new wind is about to blow in, a new season, which may leave room for consistency in blogging!

Drumroll please!

I bought a house! Well, not me by myself, but that wonderful boyfriend of mine and I did. And we mostly got it for our dog, Ruger, so he'll be able to have a nice backyard to run around and patrol. He's also been going to agility training, so I'll be able to invest in those "obstacles" and train him at home.

It’s got 4 bedrooms and is over 1000 sq ft. There will be plenty of space to set up shop. I’ll be able to take consistent outfit of the day photos, because I’ll be able to leave my camera set up. I’ll be able to have a desk, so my laptop will always be ready to be used. I can make that whole space an office, so that when Max and I are in there, we mean business. No fun goofing off time, it means working time. We’ll be blogging, or I’ll be working on photos (I photograph as a hobby). I’m really excited for it. I’ll never have to try to make space, or have cords draped all over the place.

Along with having this new house will mean remodels and revamps and painting and pinterest project-ing the place. It’s not a brand new freshly built house. It’s about 30 years old. But it’s not a crappy starter house that will need a TON of TLC. So look forward to fun house posts to come.

And finally, thank you to any loyal readers I have out there. I know I’ve been inconsistent, but I promise to be better about blogging and voicing my opinions and projects. If you’ve stuck around, and read this through the years, please please please comment below. Readers are why I blog. If I actually don’t have any, and the random one a day page views are random stumbles, then how will I know? If you think I’m doing something wrong or something could be done better, please speak up! Constructive criticism is crucial.

With that, until next time

-S

Movie Review: The Age of Adaline

This past weekend I had the chance to finally watch “The Age of Adaline” with Blake Lively. I had asked my boyfriend Max to watch it with me, and he didn’t seem too interested in it at first, but once I popped the movie in, he confessed he had wanted to see it. So I’m glad I had a willing viewing partner.

 

First off, holy crap. What a movie. For my emotional and life relating response, keep reading. For the review on the movie, scroll down to the *****

I don’t think I’ve felt that deeply, emotion wise, as a response to a movie ever. The movie was really well done to have produced a response like that. First emotion to hit me hard was sadness. One of the characters dies in the beginning part of the movie (before the halfway point). The characteristics of the character’s death hit home because I had something oh so similar happen in my life.

And the second, which was probably the most powerful emotion, was love. This one hit me the hardest, so much so I almost had an anxiety attack with how deep the truth hit me. Like Adaline, I too ran from love, obviously not for the same reason: I’m aging just fine and did not have my DNA affected. Due to fear, or the man not treating me well, I always found a way to get out of the relationship. Even though I wanted to share my life with someone, be married, make a home and all of that, I’d always find something wrong that I “couldn’t get over” and get myself out ASAP, with no second thoughts.  Sometimes second thoughts would creep in later, but I’d shut them down and overrule them. For those of you reading this who’ve known me a while, you’ve known this about me, that I’ve been in a fair number of relationships.

I was never content, until Max. I never felt secure, until Max. I never felt comfort, until Max. I never felt love for anyone like this, until Max. I never realized how much I could love, until Max. I never wanted to share a life, buy a house, or get a dog with anyone, until Max.

I never felt nervous to lose someone, until Max. I never wanted to be selfless, until Max. I’ve never cared so deeply, until Max.

This movie hit me hard in the heart. I looked over at Max at some point during the movie and just felt a rush over my body of deep appreciation for all that Max is. The rush was overwhelming and adrenaline fueling. I’m pretty sure due to the similar circumstances of love with Adaline and mine: something just clicked in my head and released these feelings, and helped me see deeper how much love I have for Max.

I don’t know that everyone will feel this way about their loved one after watching this movie. But if you haven’t seen it yet, go ahead and give it a go. If you’re single, give the movie a go and see what you can get out of it, I’m sure it’ll be something.

 

***********

As far as the actual movie goes, it was a beautiful movie. The acting was great. Cinematography was great and the storyline was awesome.

It wasn’t what the trailer made it out to be. The trailer I thought, made it seem like there was a man who also didn’t age and chased Adaline through the centuries. While instead, Adaline falls for a man hard in the current year. (I think they made it 2014 and then the movie came out earlier this year). That was a bit of an “Oh, ok” moment. I was actually kind of hoping to see how it would have turned out having two ageless people find each other through the centuries.

One thing I was a bit confused on is in the beginning, once Adaline became ageless, the FBI approached her on the street and she ran from them. I kind of wish they would have expanded on that. I don’t think the FBI would give up on an interesting case like that. After that part in the movie, we don’t see any more of them throughout the entire movie. C’mon people…tie up loose ends, or don’t have any ends that could unravel and be loose.

That’s all I have to say on the movie, and how it affected me, and I’m done bragging about how awesome Max is and how I feel about him and what not. Tune in for the next post, probably a book review. I’ll end it here.

Until next time

-S

Crazy Little Thing Called Love

Well, it's that time again.  A New Year is upon us. This may be a little "late" to post, but 5 days in is better than never.

While most people are making resolutions about healthier habits, things to try, bucket lists, (most of which they'll probably end up breaking, or forgetting about as the year goes by)I have just one. Just one resolution for the year.

And with this one, I want help. I need help to remember. So I'm inviting you to keep me accountable to this resolution. Because really, if you have just one thing you're focusing on, the rest comes so easily.

Now, if you've known me for a fair amount of time (not long, because it doesn't take that to know this about me) you'll know that I'm a little bit boy crazy. I like me the male species. If I'm not actually talking about some guy I'm interested in, 99.9% chance is that I'm thinking about him, and when the next time I'm going to see him, or do this activity, or go here or there with him. Bottom line of this craziness is I've let men run my life. (Hi, I'm Samantha. Let's get personal). I've had different goals for a while with men, first I just wanted to have boyfriends, but not commit to long periods of time, then I just wanted to date a whole bunch of people to see what's out there (Ok, well "date" in a not complete kosher sense of the word). But as I hit the ripe old age of 25...I realized 1-I'm tired of the boys in the world and need to hold off for the men. 2-dating is hard. 3-I want to settle down and have 1 guy for a long period of time, aka marriage, aka till I die. I know this one will take time and all that good jazziemadoodah everyone keeps talking about.

But this year, I'm dropping all of that. It's not about me and my future husband. It's not about me trying to weed through all the fish in the sea. It's not about me and this guy or that guy. It's not about me initiating anything with a guy.

It's about Me.

It's about Love.

While I've never completed loathed myself as a person, I've never completed loved myself as a person either.

So rather than focusing on everyone else and me last, I'm putting me first. But not in a narcissistic egotistical way. I'm going to do things for me. I'm going to really take the time to figure out who I am this year, what I really want to do in life, and what makes me, Me. If I can completely love me, working out will be a breeze. If I completely love me, staying organized and keeping a clean house will be like the Disney movies (well maybe minus the animal help because I'm sure my cat isn't interested in that).

My goal this year is Love. By loving me, loving others (friends, family and even the grumpy customers I help at work) will be second nature and I won't even have to think about it.

I don't have all the kinks planned out. I don't have the 'how to's planned out. But I have my goal. The details and methods will come :) I don't expect it to be easy, but it'll be something to look back on at the end of the year, and see progress, for sure.

Until next time,

Samantha

Book Review: The Help - Kathryn Stockett

I visited my family back in June. My mom had gone to Goodwill and picked up a few books. One of them happened to be The Help by Kathryn Stockett.

 

I'm usually a proponent of reading the book before I see a movie, but this was not one of those times. I was comparing the movie to the book and pointing out to myself "Hollywood got this wrong, and this wrong". It's amazing to me how much they'll change and makes me wonder what their rationale is for doing so. But this isn't about the ideas of the movie creators.

The story is told through the perspective of two maids and a journalist: Aibileen, Minny and Miss Skeeter. I usually have a harder time reading a book written this way, as it takes time for my brain to recall who was saying what the last time they talked. Luckily, this book was written all in the same time (present versus switching between present and past), so even though the narrator was changing, the storyline kept progressing. Each character's perspective was riveting and I couldn't wait to see what happened next. I knew the general finish line for the story, but the details were entertaining and page turners.

The book was quite enjoyable and one I will definitely recommend. It was far better than the movie (as most books are) because there is much more detail and information an author can fit in the pages than a director (or writer/producer; I'm not sure who ends up putting the movie in order) can in a movie. Some details were changed from book to movie, but one of my favorite lines from Skeeter was in both places, "Were you dropped on your head as an infant?!"

Aibileen was a maid who played by the rules and had many words of wisdom. She was described to be the oldest of the three narrators at the age of 50+ (if I do recall correctly). If she were around today, I'd want her as a mentor I could take my problems to. Minny was the spunky, quirky, tell it like it is maid. She didn't really care what others thought of her, but cared about her own family and wanted to protect and have the best for them. If I were in the south during this time, I'd want a maid like Minny. In this day and age, I'd want her as a partner in crime friend. And finally, Miss Skeeter was the youngest narrator who wanted to see change in the world, and help give a voice to the unheard. I could see her and I writing together to make those changes. She actually reminds me a lot of my friend Kristina: real pure of heart and wants to see more good in the world.

This book was a happy read, despite the theme of racism in the south. I read this book between two Gillian Flynn novels which were far darker in content. It was definitely a good choice to break up the dark with the light.

Overall this book kicked it's movie counterpart's behind and blew it out of the water. If it came down to seeing the movie again or re-reading the book, I'd pick the book, hands down. If you haven't had a chance to read it, make it the next book you read.

Until next post,

-Samantha