Candidly Kristen #3 – March 2018 & Goals Recap

Hey, friendly friends! Happy Holy Week & weekend! I hope you’re doing well :). It’s been a minute since I posted here, but I hope it gave up time to catch up on all my extra posts from spring break! Things have been a little extra crazy in my life lately, but I’m talking about that today! If you haven’t seen one of my ‘Candidly Kristen’ posts yet, you can read the first few here and here! In these posts, I just talk candidly about the last month and all things Kristen, candidly! I always want to be honest and transparent with y’all, because if you’re here, I consider us friends. In these posts, I can step down from the focused-blog-posts and just write.

• New blog header for KristenShane.com
  • Whatdoya think? I’ve been changing and experimenting with headers, logos, and layouts (oh my!) since the beginning of Kristen Shane, and I’m still not totally in love with my current website design, but I’m also not sold on buying a new fancy theme. I love graphic design, so I love creating graphics and headers! I loved the watercolor from my old header, but I recently purchased the whole package of the cursive font (because it’s lovely and also because I love supporting fellow small-biz-owners!!) for my blog, so I wanted to make good use of it!
• Best month for blog views ever?!
• AND best views for one post ever?!
  • Honestly, I wrote this post from my iPad mini during my delay flying from Tampa to NYC… I probably wouldn’t have even written it otherwise! It’s always amazing to me to see how things work out when we’re least expecting it.
• Spring break!!
  • Before jetting off to NYC for a girls’ weekend with my mom & older sis, I spent most of the week at home with our two pups, and spent the week pretending I was a full-time blogger… It was some much needed writing-time-for-the-soul, but tough to come back to the reality of college post-spring-break.
  • Spring Break Posts:
    • 5 Songs to Add to Your Christian Worship Playlist
    • Dance Marathon at FSU
    • Why We Should Have Child-Like Faith
    • A Day at the Florida Strawberry Festival
    • Lauren James Collegiate Collection
• Crossin’ off those March goals!
  • You can check out my post about my goals for this past month here if you’d like!
  • I actually didn’t finish a few of the goals, like studying for the LSAT, reading 3 books, or starting my ticket scrapbook. However, I did accomplish lots of other things which is reason to celebrate. I plan to study for the LSAT after the semester is done in May, and I have started prepping my ticket scrapbook to start then, as well. Goals are great, but they aren’t the end-all-be-all! I love setting goals, but it’s important to remember they don’t define us or our successes or progress 🙂
  • I did just learn of ThriftBooks, which is the ultimate site if you’re a bookworm like me! They carry so many books for even cheaper than Amazon! I just made a order of 4 books for about $12! They also offer free shipping over $10, what more could you ask for?! This isn’t sponsored, I just can’t believe I’d never heard of ThriftBooks before. (P.S. You can get a 15% discount on your first order if you click here! Here’s to saving money 🙂
• Ups & downs for prayer journaling
  • While I haven’t been keeping up with writing as much in my prayer journal as I’d hoped in my 2018 Goals, I’ve started writing daily again and it really is so good for my soul. Like I’ve written about before, I don’t believe there is a ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ way to pray, but I do believe that God always puts us exactly where we’re meant to be. Because of this, I don’t get too worried when I’m going through the lower parts of my cycle of faith, because I know I’ll always come back around.

  • In the dark, we can better see His light.

• House decorating galore
  • There was a bunch of sturdy wood furniture left behind when we bought this house, and it has been on my list to get to painting some of it, basically since last February. After getting so many higher priority house-things done, I finally painted and distressed our coffee table. I’ve never painted or distressed furniture before, so it was a big learning experience. One of my friends came over  lovingly helped me paint the first coats (true friendship, y’all) and then I finished it on my own. My sweet little home has been a work in progress for so long, but I absolutely love it and love having little projects like this to keep making it my own. In decorating, I’ve been going for a ‘light and bright’ vibe, with pink (of course) and pastel accents. We have some other white-distressed furniture and décor, and with my cute little new white TV-stand-cabinet, the white table fits right in! I may do a full post about how I DIY-ed this table, because after lots of time researching, it was actually much easier than I thought!
  • I also found some large abstract-watercolor-modern-art paintings that were on clearance at HomeGoods, and were the perfect pieces to hang on the giiiiant wall above my staircase. I’ve been looking for the just-right piece to hang on the big wall up the stairs, so these were such a fun find. Pro tip: find two of the same abstract pieces you like, flip one 180° and hang them side by side! I also added a little extra gold paint over the gold already on these, for a little extra shine (and so I can technically say I painted them ;).
  • I had one of my sweet little baby plants die from not enough water over spring break, but of course that meant it was time to re-grow the #plantfam with the most beautiful addition. I have a skylight in my house that makes the perfect-happy-plant spot, so I’m sticking to heartier plants that take full sunlight, like succulents and this pink beauty!
• All around, March was a little crazy.
  • I’ve had some happenings that are a tad too personal to share all-over-the-internet, but I have talked a little bit about what’s been going on over on my Instagram, if you’d like to see my daily happenings there!
  • Like I’ve talked about before, I’m getting my bachelor’s in two and a half years total, so the pressure is even higher for me to get all-the-things done. This is my second year of college, but since I’m graduating in December, it’s basically my sophomore-junior-and-senior year all rolled into one, which is just crazycrazy, y’all. I wouldn’t want it any other way, but it’s definitely a little wild to see how fast things are going, but also so exciting to see so many years of hard work coming to fruition.
• Okay, this is about to be at ‘Candidly Kristen’ as it gets 😉
  • I have always loved to write. And since I was old enough to even know what ‘working for yourself’ was, or that owning your own business/doing your own thing was possible, that has been my big crazy dream. Sure, I’ve planned things for myself, and I’m still planning on becoming fancy-sophisticated-lawyer-Kristen someday, but I still have this dream that someday, I’ll have my own business and be my own boss. Be it writing, blogging, or owning/opening my own business, believe me when I say that it is going to happen. This great-big-kinda-dream isn’t the easiest thing to chase after or even wrap my head around, but this month I’ve felt so reassured that this is a part of me and that this is something that God’s calling me to be. I can’t explain it, but I cannot ignore the obvious tug on my heart-and-soul to keep this dream alive whatever it takes. I don’t know where this will take me, but I love where I’ve come so far and I hope that one day, I’ll be so glad I didn’t give up or pack away my great-big-dream, like some people do. It’s going to happen, and I’m going to keep working towards that big goal. If you’re looking for a sign to chase your too-big goal, I hope this can be it. You’re the only one stopping you, friend.