Wrapping Up Think Kit 2012 (Better Late Than Never, Right?)

Clockwise from top: My sister and brother-in-law's beautiful street in Florida; me and one of my best friends, Ellen, at a mini DePauw reunion (I promise I have other tops than that sweater); the BEST mac and cheese in the world at the OK Cafe in Atlanta; Palm trees!; In Daytona Beach you can actually drive ON the beach, which is kind of crazy.

December got away from me. I had a table at the Indy Alternative Gift Fair (which I really, really enjoyed) and had plenty of Christmas orders to fill. I also got to see some old college friends for an evening in Bloomington, which was a welcome burst of fun in the middle of the holiday chaos. Then I ended the month visiting family in the Nashville and Orlando areas.

It had been over a year since I got away for a prolonged period of time, so a week outside of Indiana felt amazing. Plus, I got to eat at the OK Cafe in Atlanta, a place my family accidentally found about 8 or so years ago when I visited Emory as a prospective student. If you're ever in Atlanta, please do yourself a HUGE favor and eat there. It's a funky spot on the north side of the city that celebrates good southern and homestyle cooking. They have THE BEST mac and cheese I've ever eaten in my life (and trust me, I've eaten a lot). This trip I also enjoyed crab and crawfish cakes, which were perfection.

But amazing mac and cheese aside, I missed out on the end of Think Kit. I didn't want to let it go without mentioning it again, so here are answers to a few of the responses from the rest of December:

Wednesday, Dec 12: Something Different
Try something totally different. Have something for lunch or dinner you don't normally eat. Make up a new recipe. What did you come up with?

I ate lunch with a Twitter friend I hadn't met in person before. Does that count?

Thursday, Dec 13: Your dream trip
Plan out your dream trip! Is there somewhere you really want go in 2013? Pick a place in Indy, or anywhere in the world.

New York City. It's been on my list for a long, long, long time.

Sunday, Dec 16: Learning
What new things did you learn this year?

I learned a few little HTML/CSS skills. I'm no expert, but it was great to figure out how to change some things on this blog and the On a Good Note website all by myself! 

Wednesday, Dec 19: No limits
If money, time or other commitments were no obstacle in 2013, what would you do?

TRAVEL. All over: The East Coast. The West Coast. London. Dublin. Paris. Venice. Madrid. I've hardly been anywhere in the grand scheme of things. 

Friday, Dec 21: New mantra
Write a mantra for the year ahead - how you'll approach it, what you wish it to be. How'd you arrive at the mantra?

I don't have a mantra per se, but I did pick a word to live by for the year. You can check out the full scoop over at The Zesty Digest, where I am a weekly contributor. 

Sunday, Dec 30: First step
What's one step you can take to support a goal you have for 2013?

Kick my soda habit! I'm on day 3 of no soda right now. I crave the carbonation but I'm trying to develop a love affair with my Georgia Dawgs water bottle. I purchased it a few years ago when I worked at a camp at UGA. I'm not a UGA or SEC fan, but I just pretend the color is for IU.

Monday, Dec 31: Looking ahead
What are you looking forward to the most about the next 365 days?

Improving--myself, my business ventures, my writing habits. Meeting new people. Trying to get organized. Working toward goals.

What's on your agenda for 2013? 

Charting My Time

It's not a secret I'm a huge How I Met Your Mother fan. I've followed the show since it began, and one of my proudest achievements in college was converting not one, not two, but THREE of my friends into HIMYM fanatics.

So when I saw today's Think Kit prompt--to draw a pie chart or Venn diagram of your year, possible activities: eating, drinking, sleeping, working, playing--I couldn't help but want to first make a nod to my beloved Marshall Erikson (played by Jason Segel, my future husband), who fights a chart addiction in one episode.

Therefore, here is my pie chart of my favorite bars and a bar graph of my favorite pies:

But in all seriousness, here's how I probably spend my time:

Does anyone else have a life that looks like this?

Creating Traditions

The holiday season is typically full of tradition, making today's Think Kit topic perfect: What new traditions do you want to start this year?

I don't have many traditions in place, no routine rituals or things I vow to do every year. Even the holiday season lacks consistency. My family tends to be on the road, with Christmas morning being at either my sister's or aunt's home. A few years ago my aunt decided to start a Christmas Eve tea for just the women. Last year, though, my parents and I opted to avoid the stress of tiring holiday travel and stay in Indiana, skipping out on tradition for the welcome opportunity to wake up in our own beds on Christmas morning.

Outside of the holidays I don't have many traditions, but one thing I'd love to do is make a yearly road trip with my friend Ellen (or any other friend who wants a little adventure!).

In 2010 Ellen and I both spent the summer working for branches of an academic camp. She was in Durham, NC at Duke while I melted (literally, it was incredibly hot) at the University of Georgia in Athens, GA. At the end of the summer I picked her up in Durham and we embarked north on a Virginia adventure, spending time in Virginia Beach, Williamsburg, and the beautiful University of Virginia in Charlottesville. It was the perfect way to end the summer before our senior year of college and it was the first time I got to experience the freedom of vacationing as an adult. We've briefly talked about doing another trip in the future but have never made concrete plans. Maybe 2013 is the time to take the leap.

What are some of your road trip adventures? And what traditions do you want to create in 2013?

Think Kit Catch-Up: Community Involvement, Inspirations, Things I Made, and How I Unwind

Life frequently gets in the way of my blogging habits, thus I am officially behind on my Think Kit posts.  Here's a condensed catch-up on a few of the past prompts before I get into today's topic:

Day 5: Interview 3 people about their favorite moments of the year. Share what you heard.
Yeah...didn't get to that. I spend most days with two cats instead of people, but I can assure you their favorite moment involved a switch to Fancy Feast for one to two meals a day instead of a diet of only hard food. But tell me, fellow humans: What moments made your year fantastic?

Day 6: How do you want get involved in your community this year?
I don't volunteer much and I'd like to change this, probably by doing something with kids. My first year at DePauw I loved getting to visit a local elementary school and read to kindergarteners through one of the university's community service programs. It was a fun break in my hectic day that I unfortunately couldn't work into my schedule the rest of my time there. Doing a similar volunteer opportunity would be great.
 
Day 7: What do you want your life (or your kitchen, your job, your x) to look like? Create your own inspiration board.
This office. Or maybe this one. This Pinterest board also says a lot, as do most things I pin on Pinterest. Want to see more of my glorious pinning skills? Follow me and On a Good Note!

Day 8: What did you make this year? Whether work-related or something more personal (like a song, craft project, or work of art), share your process and the end result.
I designed a lot of things this year, including cell phone cases and new note card designs. My design process usually involves spending a lot of time looking around at Etsy or other sites to get a spark of inspiration, especially when I'm working on a project where the person I'm designing for has no idea what thet want. My favorite thing I did this year design-wise was probably this moving announcement post card for my lovely friend Julia. It was so much fun to create and I was obsessed with the finished product!

And finally, today's Think Kit prompt:
What did you do this year when things got hectic? How did you unwind?

Confession: I stress easily. I'm a worrier. My friend Ellen can attest to the number of ridiculous things I was concerned about or stressed over during my four years of college.

Between On a Good Note, twentysomething Indy and other freelance projects, there's ALWAYS something that needs done. My mind is constantly turned on, and countless nights when I've gotten all cozy under the covers, ready for a beautiful 8 hours of sleep, my mind has turned into a hampster in a wheel. This is most likely because I'm a night owl glued to my laptop most evenings, choosing to work in the night hours over the mornings when I rarely function before 10 a.m. Working or having intense business conversations before bed is probably not the best way to get into a sleep zone. A lot of times, though, I find myself bored and feeling guilty that I'm not doing "insert important task/email response here." That guilt leads me to remain "on" a lot of days and nights.

Unwinding is not always part of my process, though I need to make it a better goal to set aside designated work time and playtime next near. Which leads to the ways I want to unwind more often:

• watch a movie or TV show without my laptop open and without looking at my phone
• read in glorious silence for an hour
• listen to music
• workout
• talk to a friend without doing some other type of task, like contemplating an email response in another tab while having a Facebook chat
• spend time outside of the house with a friend

Have I done things on this list this year? Yes, I have. Though most of the instances are few and far between. In the warmer weather I had a few week streak where I got out and took a 2 mile walk through my neighborhood while bopping along to Mayer Hawthorne. It was a great way to think, but I let deadlines and to-dos get in the way of continuing on with the walks, unsuccessfully making it part of a normal routine.

Perhaps next year I'll figure out some brilliant work/play balance where I successfully accomplish everything without a drop of procrastination and have plenty of wonderful unwinding time--both solo and in the company of my fabulous friends. Until then, I'm off to bed, where I'll probably contemplate my task list for tomorrow.

How did you unwind in 2012?

The Best Decision I've Made This Year

What is the best decision you've made this year? A move? A career change? Something smaller and simpler, like trying a new item at your favorite restaurant?

Today's Think Kit prompt invited me to contemplate the great decisions I've made throughout the year on both a personal and professional level. In the long run there have been quite a few, but probably the best one I made was launching twentysomething Indy.

When I was younger I planned to move to New York and work in magazines. Somewhere along the path to get there I realized it wasn't for me. I let go of the dream, but not entirely. My love for writing and storytelling--and of course Indianapolis--left me wanting something more more. That's where twentysomething Indy entered the picture.

Running the site has been a great creative outlet while giving me an opportunity to interact with some really great people. The response has been better than I could have ever imagined and I'm grateful for the awesome team of writers that have decided to jump on board. Like with a lot of my projects, there's a ways to go before it reaches its full potential. But I honestly can't wait to see where it will go and I'm so ecstatic I get to go along for the ride.

People I Want in My Life in 2013

Being self-employed right out of college has its ups and downs, but the main down has to be that my social opportunities become a little limited. I work weird hours, I work from home, and I don't currently live in the heart of a thriving social mecca (something I hope to change in 2013). My dearest friends are all spread out, and when you're on the shy side like me, this combination of factors makes meeting new people a challenge.

This year I made some strides in my social life and I'm glad to have added a few new friends into the mix. But there's always room to grow, right? That's where today's Think Kit prompt comes into play:

"If you could meet someone new in 2013, who would it be? Or would you rather spend more time with someone you already know?"

Wonderful friends from DePauw.

In my fantasy world, the response to that question would be simple: Jimmy Fallon. I desperately wanted to go to his show when it filmed in Indy for the Super Bowl, but alas I was not one of the lucky people who won the ticket lottery. I ended up writing this letter to Jimmy on my other blog--complete with a lovely On a Good Note tie-in--but still, nothing (how rude, right?).

Since I don't live in NYC (or my little fantasy world that involves cocktail parties with Fallon, Tina Fey, and Amy Poehler), the real answer to the question isn't that specific. I want to meet new people in general, people who continue to build on my growing post-grad community, people who can help me grow professionally, people I can help with my skills, and people that, in a nutshell, will add a little more fun to my life.

As the old Girl Scout song goes, though, "make new friends but keep the old." I do have to say that while meeting new people is fantastic, I love my friends. I can't imagine my life without them at this point, and spending more time with them--especially those that currently live far from here (Tacoma, DC, Louisville, etc.) would make my 2013 a pretty great year.

What people make your list?

The Get Unplugged Challenge

Today's Think Kit prompt was a challenge to "[u]nplug for an hour, a half day, or a whole day. Choose a time that feels a little uncomfortable. How did you feel? What did you do? Reflect on your experience. How much did you unplug this year? How does this experience make you feel about unplugging in the coming year?"

I won't lie: I'm addicted to my phone. Then again, who isn't really? I've only been in the land of the cool smart phone kids for about a year and a half, and I already have a hard time imagining my phone not being a natural extension of my hand. Not being able to check emails for new orders or customer inquiries, or respond to Facebook messages from close friends or Tweet a cute picture of my cat? Now completely unthinkable.

It's silly, really, that I've grown this attached to this tiny piece of technology that I lived so easily without just a brief period of time ago. But it's the first thing I look at in the morning when I'm still all cozy under the covers, scanning my Twitter feed and email inboxes to see if there's anything important I need to know right off the bat.

Today I did the same exact morning routine, which led me to today's prompt. Normally on a Sunday morning I would get out of bed, grab my phone, and settle in for a morning/afternoon of HGTV while I continued to catch-up on my social media channels. But this morning I left the phone by my bed, ventured into a silent living room and...sat down with a book.

Photo via Anna David

I was an English major in college, and while that should mean that I am rarely without a book, the reality is that the whole reading for class thing kind of burned me out. I've been trying to pick up more books for fun, but lately I've found myself sifting through blog posts or business books more often than not. The other day I was at my local library (a place I could dedicate an entire wonderful blog post) when I stumbled upon Falling for Me by Anna David, which just happened to catch my eye as I turned down an aisle to look up a book in the computer. I can't put the charming memoir down, and, to my surprise, I stayed unplugged a full two to three hours. Even after my sister interrupted the silence with a call, I returned to my comfy spot on the love seat where I kept reading well into the early afternoon.

Being unplugged felt kind of refreshing. When I finally did pick up my phone to check a few emails and read tweets from my friends, it almost felt a little overwhelming. I wanted to crawl back into my peaceful book zone, but alas I had things to accomplish today.

I haven't spent much time reading or staying unplugged this year, but today's experience makes me wish for a return to the days before social media and iPhones and all that jazz, days when I spent my afternoons content with a pile of computer paper and a box of Crayolas. Maybe I'll do that more in 2013.

What about you? Do you unplug every now and then?