Working At Lilly

Recently, I have made a bit of a job change. Previously, I had been working at a local American Eagle store for about a year now. For a time, I loved it. The product, my coworkers, just the whole environment. I can't put my finger on what changed recently but something definitely has and I don't like it one bit. Perhaps its me that's changed. But now instead of being something I'm excited for, I dread going to work. I'm the kind of girl who has to love my job or I'm completely miserable. So I started lowkey looking for somewhere new to work, thinking it would be quite some time before I found somewhere I would be satisfied with. 

Also recently, I discovered that there was a Lilly Pulitzer store in the same shopping center where I worked. I didn't even know it existed instead I started exploring one day when I was too early for work. Best discovery ever. Walking into that store was like walking into heaven for me. I'm nervous about buying things online (and I didn't know Dillard's carried the clothing line as well) so I had never been able to purchase something from the Lilly clothing collection. Sure, I've had the planners for years. But this was a whole new gold mine. I was finally able to try some things on and walked out the store with a dress in my favorite summer print, Lobstah Roll. 

As the associate was ringing me up, we talked about how I was looking for a new job, she mentioned they were hiring. All I had to do was email the store manager my resume. I didn't think there was a chance in hell they would hire me. I just didn't feel like a Lilly girl. A few minutes into my interview, I got the great news that I had a new job. I feel its relevant to mention that my interview took place the day after I submitted my application, fantastic turn around time. The day after that, I started working. And on my second day, I got my keys to the store. Walking into heaven turned into getting to work there.

In my two days of working, I have felt more comfortable and loved than in almost a year of working at American Eagle which is really sad. I loved that job. It was my first taste of retail. But I always feel sooooo stressed out there and everything is always so chaotic. At the Lilly store, I feel at home. The girls all welcomed me with open arms and have been so accepting of me even though I'm still learning everything there is to know about the brand. This has been the kind of environment I have been looking for.

I feel so incredibly blessed to be working in the Lilly store here, though the idea of telling me boss I, leaving at my other job terrifies me. I have been there for so long that it feels odd to let go of that place. But I am excited to see where my new job takes me. Plus, now I have a reason to buy lots of Lilly (which I have already taken advantage of). And who doesn't want to wear Lilly to work? Hello, best dress code ever. 

P.S. Dillard's has great sales on Lilly stuff if you're looking for some summer stuff or basics to fill your closet. I picked up some shorts, a dress, and a romper all for under $200 yesterday. 

Love ya. 

Why I Deactivated

I don't know about you but I have always had a love-hate relationship with facebook. There's been a few times where I've deactivated or just made a new account - before their security options were decent. This time, it feels more permanent but who knows? It could last 2 hours or 2 years, only time will tell. I just did not feel the need to have the account anyways. I never read anyones posts and the only stuff I post comes from timehop so that seems kinda dumb. I never thought I would see this image.

Recently, I have started to try and simplify my life. Sure, facebook does not really complicate it but not having an account for thirty minutes and I already feel a little bit better about myself. Here's why:

• now I can't compare myself to all those pretty girls I'm friends with and can be motivated by own goals instead of trying to look/be like them
• no more pointless updates on people's lives that I stopped caring about 2 years ago
• I can keep in contact with my real friends by texting them or talking on skype, facebook was just an unnecessary middle man honestly
• maybe now I can stop using some apps as time wasters...who am I kidding? I'm still gonna spend every free second on my break scrolling through twitter
• NO MORE POINTLESS LIFE UPDATES...I do not really think I can stress that one enough

We have gotten to a point in our world where we are so focused on other people's lives and trying to compete with them by posting better pictures or better statuses or just better anything.
Newsflash: LIFE IS NOT A COMPETITION. And frankly, I am sick and tired of being forced to feel like it is.
I want to live my life how I want to, not because I am motivated to get healthy because all my "friends" are model-thin and gorgeous...but because I really want to be healthy and feel better about myself. Honestly, its cliche but who cares what anyone else thinks about you? So what if you can not see all the pictures from your friend's sister's best-friend's brother's wedding? Did you really care in the first place? Or are you trying to seem like more than you are?
By focusing so much attention on facebook "friends" and likes...we forget to give our real friends - you know, the one's that will really be there if thinks get bad - the attention they deserve. Friendships do not stick because you guys are friends on facebook, they do because you put time and effort into maintaining it.
This post went off on a tangent that I did not intend but I am honestly happy with what I am putting out there. Facebook really was a pointless time suck for me. I felt obligated to be friends with certain people just because I knew them in real life - that place where you step from behind the computer screen - or I worked with them or I went to high school/college with them. But they did not really matter to me, I did not care about their posts. I could probably count on one hand how many of my friend's posts actually mattered to me. Confession time: I usually ignore my mother's posts on there because they are pointless life updates and one-ups to the other parents she is friends with. Facebook turns life into a competition for me and that's not okay. Maybe its different for you, I really hope it is, because at one point in time...I really enjoy facebook and interacting with people that way. But I guess I am not the same person I was four years ago or even two weeks ago. I am thankful for those changes though. This is just step one on my journey to simplify my life and really figure out what matters to me in life.
Love ya guys.

Listopia

DayZero Project seems like the kind of site that everyone knows about but no one talks about, its a shame. If you have never checked it out then you really should. It makes you want to do things you've never known you wanted to do. Honestly, it helped me get my mind around all the things I've always wanted to accomplish but never had the organization to.No silly gimmicks or hidden methods, that's just it. It really makes you see all the things you've always wanted to do and get to it. That way you can start accomplishing goals instead of just thinking about them. Over the years (yes I've been on the site that long), they have added new features. Each one better than the next. In case you are one of the people who don't know about the awesome site, let me fill you in.

• You make a list of 101 goals you want to complete in 1001 days.
• There's a feature to add goals to a list called "someday" for those things you want to do but don't see yourself finishing in the next 1001 days. Things like "get married" or "write the great American novel."
• In case you are lost on ideas, there's themed lists of ideas.
• You can also pick categories and choose between two different ideas.
• Or there's always been the list of most popular goals.
• More recently, they have added an option to have more than one 101/1001 list which makes me happy because I always end up with too many ideas to fit on one by itself so I need many...I'm an overachiever. 

That's really all there is to it, one of the simplest ways to organize your life goals, silly or serious. Years ago, right after the site started really taking off, a friend recommended it to me when I was struggling with figuring out which of many goals I really wanted to accomplish. I felt like I wasn't doing anything with my life...reality check, I was only 16 at the time. The weight of the world was already getting a little too heavy for me. But this site honestly helped me see the big picture of what I wanted to accomplish in the next 1001 days. My list is a mix of silly and serious goals that I want to do. Here are a few of my favorites:

• #6 - Leave an inspirational note in a book for someone (done): I left a note in an Encyclopedia of Satanism that I found at the library, it said "You are beautiful and I hope you smile today."
• #14 - Don't speak a word for a day: I don't know if I'm going to be able to do this one because of my inability to shut the hell up.
• #24 - Get a New Year's kiss (done): Though I may not be with the person that I kissed at midnight, it was a wonderful thing to turn the person I was dating and be able to kiss him as the New Year started thinking the rest of the year would only get better (I was wrong, we broke up less than two months later).
• #31 - Build a sandcastle: I know that this makes me a child but I really want to do this because its one of my favorite things to do at the beach but I always feel so embarrassed as a 20 year old building a sandcastle in front of a bunch of people.
• #56 - Answer "50 Questions That Will Free Your Mind": Try it, I dare you...this one has been hard for me, that's the only reason it hasn't been done yet.
• #81 - Stop wearing makeup (done): For about a year, I stopped wearing makeup all together except for like tinted moisturizer. I felt really confident and then I started working with a bunch of gorgeous girls and being in retail so that ended pretty quick. But I still don't wear nearly as much as I used to.
• #100 - Say "I love you": I will be honest, I've only said it to one guy before and really meant it. I've always wanted to find that special someone that I could say it to and know that I actually love.
• #101 - Make another 101/1001 list: Of course this has to be on here, though I will admit that I'm already half way through making the next one.

I've been going through my dayzero list today and adding some new things, also removing goals that just don't apply to my life anymore. I wrote all the ones that I still want to complete in the notes section of my new planner, it actually filled all three pages. I'm ready to get rocking and rolling on this list. I want the next five months left in 2014 to be fantastic. What brought all this to mind was TSC's post about lists and why they rock. I swear I'm not obsessed with Lauryn or anything but I do think her posts are lovely, she's a great inspiration to me.
Until next time!!!
Love ya guys.

The Skinny Confidential

Yesterday, I read (and I mean just tore through it) The Skinny Confidential: A Babe's Sexy, Sassy Fitness and Lifestyle Guide by Lauryn. The book has been sitting on my wishlist for a couple of weeks now but I couldn't rationalize spending the $16 (+shipping) for the book even though that's an extremely low price for a book like that. I love Lauryn's writing and her blog, its been a huge inspiration to me to get fit and be healthier in my lifestyle choices. I happen to have some Amazon giftcards so I decided to get the Kindle edition for $9 which seemed even more reasonable to me. Eventually I will probably purchase the hard copy as well because I find the book so aesthetically pleasing and prefer physical copies of books anyways. Basically, if you have any interest in a clean and healthy lifestyle (with some cold, hard facts) you should check out Lauryn's book. I mean the e-edition is under $10 which is a total steal for the book in my opinion.

(Image from Lauryn's blog)

She walks you through how to love yourself, how to eat in a healthy and clean way, exercises that actually work (OMG!), clothing tips and have to find your own style, makeup to fit your style. Lauryn spends the whole book sharing her knowledge of clean living and finding a way to love yourself. Both are things that I love in the book. I think its full of things that every girl needs to hear (and some guys too) just to live a happy life. She has learned some amazing things in her life and has no qualms sharing the tips and tricks that she has picked up during that time.
I appreciate the book and it makes me love the content on her blog even more, I am always excited to see a new post pop up on my feed from her. The posts actually teach me something and have a friendly tone so I don't feel like I'm being talked down to in the slightest (one of the biggest things I hate about some of the bigger bloggers).
Go give Lauryn's blog and her book a good look, you will like what you see.
Love ya guys.

Novel Days

Oooops, I made a pun. 

In my last post, I did mention the fact that I was beginning to write a book despite the fact that I was having a myriad of issues when it came to writing anything. This book has been in the works for about three years now because I do not know exactly what to do with it really. I have about 20,000 works of it written already, just sitting in my google docs with no idea what to do with it. The problem is that I started kinda near the end of things so now I am having to go back to the beginning and start there. For those that write, not the easiest task. Almost harder than just starting at the beginning in the first place in my opinion. The book is...quite personal. It makes me feel egotistical when I talk about it because the book is more of memoir than anything else. 

Who would want to read about my boring ass life? To be honest, I have no idea. I hold the opinion that no one will actually want to read it when I have finally completed it. But I am writing it nonetheless. Its one of those things that just needed to be put into words, to get it out of my brain. My life has been far from average, despite my being frighteningly average myself. I have survived through things, complicated situations, harmful relationships...just so much that I want to share with the world. I have always felt that I could help people by making them feel less alone in the world, perhaps if someone else in the world shares the same experiences that they do, it will make it more okay. When you survive through terrible circumstances, it changes you and makes you afraid to share those things with other people. You constantly fear being rejected or shamed for what you have been forced to endure. I have found that by sharing my experiences with people has made them feel better about their own lives, made it easier for them to accept their past and move on from it finally. That is one of my ultimate goals in life, to help others.

While helping people certainly is not the career path that I am pursuing, it is still extremely important to me. My dream is to be a writer, to actually be able to make a living off my writing and publishing books. I know that is an unlikely senario but I would still like to put my memoir out there for people to read. Whether they decide to actually do so is up to them. As John Green has said on multiple occassions, books belong to their readers. Once I publish the book, its not really mine anymore, it belongs to the general public. What they do with it and take from it is completely up to them.

But yeah, I have not had a lot of motivation to complete anything recently but I have been pushing myself to get in better shape, to take better care of my body, eat healthier, just do more with my life in general. Part of that is to finally finish this book that has been sitting around, uncompleted, for close to four years now. That is just unacceptable. I might not have ever finished a writing project in my life, but this is one that I fully intend to pursue. 

I will finish my book...eventually.

Love ya guys.

I Didn't Know Writing Was So Stressful

Well that's a bit of a lie, I guess. Its just all been getting to me recently. Since I could form a proper story (let's call it second grade), I've been writing. There are more notebook and flashdrives filled with half-done stories laying around than I care to count. Never a finished one. I can't think of one project that I've ever completed. Not even my short-stories are actually finished to a point that I'm content with. Don't get me wrong, as a writer, putting something out there that you are 100% happy with just isn't going to happen. This isn't a perfect world. Recently, I've had all this motivation to write but all of my old story ideas seem over-done or over-thought (partially because they've been floating around in my mind for years by this point). There just isn't anything coming to mind when I want to write. When I say that, I mean working on a novel, of course. Though, I'm not going to lie, working on this blog has been incredibly difficult as well. This is my third or fourth blog in the last two years, I just can't seem to stick with anything. I'm always changing what I want in life or what I want to write about. I felt like that was too confusing for my readers, which I had actually amassed a little bit of a following on my previous blog. But the content I was putting out there didn't sound like me, it wasn't something I particularly cared about...I could just write about it in a manner that made people think I did. Not something I'm completely proud of but whatever, that's in the past. That's the reason I started this blog in the first place, so that I could write about things that mattered to me. At the time, that was Magic: The Gathering. But now that I am in one of my phases where I'm burned out on playing MTG, I feel like I should still be forcing out posts about the subject even if I don't want to. That's not at all what I wanted in my blog but I have yet to find a real grove. There's such a stigma that you have to have a themed blog in order to do well but I realized that I don't care how many people read my blog. If there's just one person that likes my posts then its all worth it in my mind. So I guess what I'm trying to say, in a long, round-about way is that I'm going to be changing things up, trying to write more about things that truly matter to me. Things that I have a passion for. This week, I love the Kim Kardashian: Hollywood game but don't worry, I won't be making a whole blog post about that...Now that I say that, it sounds kind of tempting but I will try to resist the urge for you guys. There might not be an overall, consistent theme to my blog but I hope to start putting out content that I am truly proud of and am passionate about. Sorry for this rambling mess, I know that most (probably no) people will actually read this but it was something that I needed to put out there.

In the meantime, between working max hours in retail and working on a book (I will get there eventually), hopefully I can find some worthwhile things to post about.

Love ya guys.

Addicted to Deck Building

We already have five EDH decks between us but I guess that just wasn't enough...we are already plotting out the next one. This time we are going with Mayael the Anima, its the kind of deck that neither of us have played before. Plus, we can't stop building! Honestly, it become my favorite part of magic in some aspects. I love finding the perfect cards to fit together, those little uncommon combos. Just searching through thousands of cards to find the right ones for your deck. Sure, I still enjoy the game or I wouldn't bother investing money in it at all. Deckbuilding though...there's nothing else like it.
Here's the tally of our decks so far:
1) Izzet: mid-range, control; commander is either Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind or Niv-Mizzet, Dracogenius (he switches between the two depending on how he feels like playing). Its certainly not my favorite deck, its actually my least favorite to play because of how complicated it. I don't mind having to do a lot of thinking while playing, otherwise I wouldn't bother with MTG in the first place. But he has made that deck complicated for the sheer purpose of challenging himself and I ain't about that life.
2) Mono-black: mid-range, control; commander is Endrek, the Master-Breeder. It hurts me to actually admit that my baby is control because I think that's one of the dirtiest words in magic but I'm finally coming to terms with it. I have between 20-30 kill spells, I think its time to start accepting that its basically as bad as blue control.
3) Selesnya: mid-range, token based; commander is Trostani, Selesnya's Voice. When I first started playing EDH, this was the deck that I was matched up against the most and with how much life it gains, I hated it. We had a standing rule that if he got over a hundred life, I scooped. It was almost impossible to knock him down, my kill spells couldn't keep up with the amount of tokens he was producing. Now its one of my favorite decks to play because its so much fun to put 13 kitty-cats on the battlefield with White-Sun Zenith (I totally did that today...multiple times).
4) Golgari: mid-range, scavenge; commander is Varolz, the Scar-Striped. Not a super big fan of this deck but he absolutely loves it. I just don't like the scavenge mechanic that much but it might just take some getting used to. I also used to avoid artifacts like the plague and now my decks are chalk-full of them. It definitely does its job and gets Varolz big and scary, then throws some trample on him and steamrolls anything I throw in his way. Despite my dislike of it, I can't say its not a good deck; it does what its supposed to.
5) Five-color: mid-range; commander is Cromat. Affectionally called "fun stuff" when we first started building it because we threw a lot of things we loved into it. Theres three out of the five titans, all the good cascade cards (one of my favorite mechanics), and Chromanticore just to name a few. This is the deck that we have spent the most time on recently, trying to get it league ready. Its by far my favorite, surpassing my first EDH deck which will always hold a fond place in my heart...
There are a lot more decks to come in EDH for us, I'm sure of it. We just enjoy the format too much and deckbuilding for it is like letting a little kid into a candy shop. One of the reasons I dislike standard, and even casual play, is that the pool of cards can be so limited. I like playing cards from all different sets. The mixture of old and new into creating something makes it so much more fun to play, throwing things together that were never intended to be played in the same deck. EDH is just a fantastic format and I'm very much looking forward to the league that my local shop is hosting next month.
What's your favorite format? Who is your favorite general for EDH? Any suggestions for me to make any of our EDH decks better?
Love ya guys.