My Word 2014

Last year I decided to follow in Ali Edward's footsteps and create a word that sum up what I wanted to focus on for 2013.  {You can read about last year here.} I never followed up on if my word was achieved. Well, I think so...considering I was too busy to blog for a year.  My word for last year was "Actualize." Some ways I actualized:

* 37 events produced and coordinated by What a Whirl Events {up from 12 the year before!}

* Grew my networking base

* Focused on developing a truer since of self. 

* Grew in my spiritual walk 

* Started the ball rolling for a huge company relaunch

My word for this year is..........

Maybe a little predictable, but a very true word for me right now.  This year I will aspire to "whirl" a little more and have a little more fun. I want to truly celebrate the bliss in life! 

So here's to whirlin' in 2014!

1 year

Well, since it has been almost a whole year since I updated this blog I figured it would be nice to do a year in review to kick us off on a new year! Here's to 2013!

January:
.

It snowed in Alabama.  It's a rare thing and the whole state shut down

We also went to Mayor's Ball, an annual fundraiser for the Boy's & Girl's Club. But I have no pictures :(

February:

Frannie had one awful haircut! 

It was also my birthday, but I was so tired that we didn't really do anything this year. 

March:

March was crazy! Not only did our spring wedding season kick-off, but I agreed to create note card sets for 700 women for Girlfriend Gala! It was a lot of work and I {and Ashley} was very excited when it was over! 

 

But, I kind of LOVED my table this year! "Girlfriends, Till Death Do Us Part!" 

That would be a wedding dress made entirely of coffee filters. 

April:

Launched Local Love Magazine Online!! 

Was fortune-less

May:

This little bit was a crab in The Little Mermaid

Shoots for the digital edition of Local Love Magazine

I lost 30lbs...too bad they all came back. 

7 weddings in one month.

June: 

Nothing really exciting but work 

July: 

Someone backed into my parked car. 

The launch of Local Love Mag!

I learned to play chess. Which in our family is a very big deal. 

August: 

These pretties got married! 

September: 

The great turkey attack

Bama Football!

3 more weddings

October:

A lot of family times

The Government Shut Down.

The worst eye-infection that could have happened at the worst time! 

November:

Gadsden Service Guild Rummage Sale

Line started at 3:30am!

 I got to be volunteer coordinator for the Community Thanksgiving Celebration

Over 4400 meals served to our local community on Thanksgiving morning!

Lucy needed a lot of attention this month

More weddings

December:

6 Christmas Celebrations

Yummy Cookies at the Service Guild Christmas parties

Peace out 2013! 

My Word.

I've seen this post a few times in the blog world and decided to participate this year. A word for a year is a lovely little idea started by Ali Edwards. Check it out here. The idea is to pick one word that will surround your year and life. 

My word this year is....


Actualize.

So many times I have ideas that I want to see start rolling or things I want to do. So this year my plan is to actualize or realize my personal goals' potential and start making things happen! (I would also love to actualize some profits!! haha). 


Here's to 2013!!

Free Printable

Enjoy this free printable for the new year!

Just visit the link and download. This is made to print on 8x10, but can be printed on 8.5x11 and trimmed. 

Download Here

New Year, New You

Happy New Year to you and yours!

The Holidays

Christmas has always been one of my favorite holidays. With the lights, the treats, the presents and Christmas music starting well before Thanksgiving for me normally.  This Christmas was a little different.  Christopher and I have always been lucky to have the same viewpoint when it comes the holidays. It is about spending time with family and not about the presents.  We have always went very minimal when it comes to our personal presents and looked for that perfect gift for others. (I am a pretty savvy shopper if I do say so myself, so when it is time to buy a present I am usually the one who does it.)  We end up playing dirty Santa 4 times, presents for the little ones on my side, presents for everyone on his. It gets stressful! 

This year we decided to do the holidays differently.  Normally we bounce so much throughout Thanksgiving and Christmas that we don't get to visit everyone very long. This Thanksgiving we decided to volunteer for United Way's Community Thanksgiving Luncheon.  Susan asked if I would help with volunteer management so I knew I had to be there about 8 am and didn't know how long we would be there. (Christopher worked parking. Poor Thing.)  We decided we would attend the ones that we could make and really enjoy the day doing something we have always talked about doing.  It was an AMAZING day.  Over 1,400 plates served in about 4 hours!  It was such a blessing to me to be able to see so many people just joining in fellowship. I teared up several times after watching exchanges from volunteers, guests, and minglers.  I've always said I wanted to leave Gadsden one day, but I am truly thankful to live in a community that is so involved with everything.  About 2:30pm we rolled out.  I was exhausted! We headed back to get showers and see what was going on with the respective fams.  We decided to just go to my Grandaddy's which is down the road and see family that isn't in town all the time. 

I guess Thanksgiving gave us some "holiday cajones" :) so we decided to SKIP Christmas.  I really thought more of our family members would be upset when we said we wanted to take the only free days we had and take a vacation.  Well, off we were! We spent Christmas Eve-the 26th in a cabin in the woods and couldn't have asked for a better Christmas. No presents. No distractions.  Just a peaceful few days!

It was kind of sad to come home to the normal graze but at least we have a new year to look forward to. :) It wasn't too awful to come home to these faces, either!!

Challenges

Ever looked back on the year and think "Good Grief!"?  Well, that's where I am right now.  As look back this year I cannot believe the who, what, when, where, and why of this year.  Not only did I leave my job and start a company, but so much has happened to change my perspective on so many things.

I started 2012 thinking that this was going to be my year. The year I made changes to myself and my surroundings.  After feeling "stuck" for so long, I was ready for that jolt of excitement. And boy did I get it. (I just didn't realize that it would change my ENTIRE life.)

I trucked along pretty steadily the first part of the year and into early summer. Then May hit. It and few following months are ones I would love to forget.  When you decide to go into a situation and know that it is going to be a struggle you make certain bets with yourself. By this point I want to be here. If I do this I will get this. And so on. Then you never get that token because it doesn't come as fast as you wanted. Then you add in personal struggles that are still continuing to this day and you end up steadily heading toward a nervous breakdown. Been there and Done that.  (No t-shirt or commitment papers, but that would be a great vacation!)

You expect challenges. What don't expect are how big they will be.

I've always been pretty introverted (shocker, right?).  I overly plan and overly dissect everything. Always two steps ahead of everything and everyone. I think it is part of the OCS (only child syndrome) that makes you need to perfect everything. You don't have siblings to be the smart one or the talented one or athletic one. You become all of these things. Which is probably why most of the nation's big wigs are only children.  You are born with laser focus.  Which can be great on a project or task, but can be horrible in your personal life. When a certain challenge (or series of unfortunate events, Lemony Snickett had nothing on me. I could write a very large book) came to head this summer I shut down.  I couldn't do anything but stare. Stare into my overly processed and overly planned future. New house by 30, trips and huge vacations to destinations you dreamed of, baby by 32, career off the ground and billionaire status by 35 (even I can kid :) ). So I stared into the dancing abyss of my future. I felt like that weird part of Willy Wonka where the images are spinning as they travel through the tunnel on the boat.  Watching everything you thought to be true turn out to be false and feeling that your life is falling apart. Out of control.  We've all been there at one point.

So you do what you know. You research. You obsess. You get mad. You go insane. Then if you're lucky you snap back.  You realize your story is not new and that you are not the only one that will ever have to overcome something.

Challenges. No matter how big or small. They all affect us.  Someone's challenges may be cast onto you to help them or for you to learn.  Your challenges may affect someone else.  Regardless, we all deal with things differently.  You can try to get through them or to learn from them.  My motto, for lack of a better word, has been "If I can get over this hump and learned something or help someone else then it was worth it."

I've learned a lot. A lot about myself and a lot about others.  Never judge the path someone takes to get to a result.  We all judge. "Can you believe she wore those shoes?" "How dare he not think about that?" But the roads are different for everyone.  Some are straight and some wind on for years.  But each person's path is theirs to deal with and focus on.  I've also learned to do what I want. I'm over perfectly perfect. Does that mean I won't do my best? Absolutely not. But, it does mean that I am going to enjoy this short life for everything that it's worth.  I've also learned that people will hurt, disappoint and break you to make themselves feel better.  Let them. It's when you are going through the darkest of times that your true colors show.  Your relationships change when you change.  Most end up being for the better in the long run.  Most importantly, I've learned that you are the you that you want to be at that moment.  Life is so flawed and to be able to look at it as such a process at a young age instead of at 40 or 50 and having to reflect on many things I would change is an amazing thing.

Challenges. They suck. Fight it. Cry over it. Pout over it. Then embrace it and kick the hell out of it.  You will always end up winning in the end.  :)

 

8 months

No, not what you are thinking.

It's been 8 months since I made the crazy decision to quit my day job and go to work part-time and start to make this event planning thing actually happen.  8 very long and, at the same time, very quick months. There have been horrible days when I thought this was the stupidest thing I have ever done, but those are quickly outweighed by the great days when I get to work with a client.  It's a hard and stressful job, but it's the most rewarded I have ever felt.  (Not financially by any means because I am sure the IRS will take 99% of what minute amount that could even be considered a profit.) Here's to the downward twist into 1 year as a viable business!

My office today

One of the perks of working for yourself...

Working on a wedding for this weekend at this lovely site in town.