It felt just like falling in love, again.

Happy Monday!

I hope you all had a lovely weekend. I did.

Do you ever just realize growth, or change. Like you wake up one day and you can literally feel a shift in the world?

This weekend this happened to me.

I went up to Houghton to see my boy. The weekend was just bliss. I felt that my smile was permanently plastered across my face.

There was some point when I looked up at him, and I saw him, I saw growth.

We are just about to hit the one year mark in our relationship. And I'm not going to lie, its been a really rough year. Beautiful, but rough. Such a learning experience has been going on. Not just about each other, but who we are as well. And I've come to some conclusions.

It has taken me literally a year to stop pushing. To let my guard down and trust. I looked at him this weekend and knew it was okay.

It was okay to let him in. It was okay to not know all the answers. It was okay to love him. It was okay that hard things would still happen.

It was okay that sometimes he would let me down.

I think I realized all this because I know I'll be okay. My happiness is built on so much more. And for the first time in life I think I can confidently say.. I am loved.

Loved by a King. Loved by a family. A community. A sisterhood. A boy.

I felt warm and I felt safe. Just to know life will suck, but I will be okay.

I'm moving forward, I'm gaining some ground. Sometimes it just hits me in the face.

We went on lovely walks to end the weekend so I could collect some Fall treasures.

Here we go, today is new! Be inspired by the changing of the leaves. Maybe it is your time to fall from the branch and trust you will fall on solid ground.

xo, bird.

sleepy bird.

Yay, Wednesday!

Halfway through this week, thank goodness.

I have been doing 12 hour days again, 6:30am nannying, school, 3-6:30pm nannying.

I'm so drained I feel like I haven't even caught up from sleep from this weekend. So last night I wanted to just come home and do something mindless to relax.

So I made this hat:)

I've been wanting a little scandinavian inspired hat. I think I've fallen in love with the culture from hearing about it all the time from boyfriend and company. I love my Finnish family:)

I'm working on another one right now with different weight yard so I can compare effects of the outcome. I'll let you know:)

How are you feeling this week? Anyone have adventures planned for the weekend?

more soon, xo,

jess

Oh dear soul.

I know I had my shout our yesterday to all my friends who helped with hearts and crafts but I really needed to make an extra special thank you to my dear friend, Joy.

I literally do not know what I would have done without her over the last few weeks. (most likely, I would have lost my mind) She was totally standing next to me through everything and even pretty much dragged me along at some points.

When I tried to drop out of the show because of stress and too full a plate. She gave me hard love.

When I needed company to sit and distract me, we had dinner and tea.

When I was freaking the night before, she hot glued about a million things for me (and has a battle wound to prove it!)

When had sat in the same spot all day long, she took me out in the grass under the full moon and did yoga with me.

When my nerves kicked in the morning of, she showed up with breakfast for all, and coffee, and hugs.

Joy, I just stinking love you.

I had no idea how to repay her so of course, I crafted.First I made her a doll, one that looks just like her:) I was realllllllly happy with the way it turned out, I almost couldn't give her up.

Then while I was at school, I wanted to be inspired, so I started writing out a list of all the reasons I love Joy.. and then it just came to me...

Here are some sneaks..

Gesh! My friends are so inspiring.

I hope you are feeling blessed and inspired today too:)

xoj

Little green bird hits the street.

So, after months of stress, worry, sewing, and obsessing over detail, it finally happened.

This weekend was Hearts and Crafts and let me just tell you...

amazing.

It was such a beautiful opportunity and experience. With some of the most talented people in the 585 making lovely handmades for people to enjoy.

I'm not gonna lie, my table looked rocking. Big thank you to Joy, staying up till 2 AM the night before making finishing touches on stuff and setting up a "mock" table in my living room. She knew I would be way too stressed and nervous in the morning to even think straight.

She was right. Freaking out from the moment my feet hit the pavement outside my car, its intimidating to see everyone else's beautiful stuff and great table layouts. But you just have to be confidant people will appreciate what you have done.

And they did. Whether they bought stuff from me or not, I dont think one person came to my table without smiling or saying something really sweet. It was so uplifting. Just to have interest or to get paid for something you have loved doing ever since you were a child. It was just such a wonderful feeling.

Some personal highlights..

I brought this awesome mirror that I found at a flea market and I loved seeing people put on some of my stuff and fall in love. Some girl asked me if it will be weird to see people walking around Rochester with my stuff on, I said it will be such a compliment.

I didn't want it all to be about making money, I wanted it to be about fun. So I made little mustaches on sticks to give away for free. It was WONDERFUL. People loved them and so many people came by just to get them, so many laughs. It was awesome to look up and down the street and even in Javas, with so many people playing with them and enjoying. So fun.

I had this old phone phone on my table we kept pretending to answer and talk on, and one of my customers walked by and did it too, so funny.

When I sold one of my little girl dolls, the man said "she's going to texas and will be greatly loved", some people just get it.

But one of my very favorite parts was all my friends who came down to support. (Seriously guys, I love you.) And just hearing them say how proud they were of me made my heart so happy. Jonny even brought me some "rock soup" which was perfect for the chilly day:)

It was the perfect first craft show experience. Everyone was so warm and happy. So many warm drinks, laughter, and crafts all day long. I sold SO much stuff, and just had a really magical time.

Big thank you to Lisa Barker for all her hard work to make such a neat thing happen in Rochester.

Thanks again to Joy for snapping a few pictures for me. Wish I would have taken more with everyone but my head was totally not there. haha

Ill try and post some close ups of some of my goodies later. Thanks for following on this adventure with me, totally cant wait until the next one.

Any of my extras I think I'll try to put up on etsy this week. I had amazing business cards Jonny had made me so I know people will be checking in on that:)

Really grateful to everyone who helped with anything, set up, cut stuff out, my sanity, making me actually leave my house for a break, bringing me coffee, business cards, or just for support, love you guys dearly.

all for now,

green bird.

Another Secret.

I took these pictures in May, but I forgot to make the post, golly.
Did I ever tell you I collect minis?
Ya, minis.

Minis are what I call teenie tiny treasures.

I have been collecting them since I was a little girl. The tinier the better. I used to carry them in small trinket boxes, or sometimes just a few in my pocket (which I still generally do).

And I don't know what it is but whenever I find something very very small, I can barely withhold my *ekkkks*

The thing is my friends and students have learned I collect these things, so my collection expanded greatly over the years.

I just love them and always wanted to display them, so for my birthday a few years ago my good friends Adam and Sarah built me the beautiful case you see pictured. I know amazing, right?

Well, anyway back in stinkin' May, Jonathan came home for a visit. He said he just couldn't resist getting me this mini..

I KNOW. I almost passed out from cuteness!

It is a vintage mini Hit camera, and you'll never believe it actually used to take film at one time!!!!

This little darling instantly won my heart and climbed to one of my top five favorite minis.

So there you have it, just another reason I am incredibly weird:)

Xoxo- j