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Caitlin Wallace Rowland Art & Design

June 5, 2014March 27, 2018

If you follow me on social media, such as Instagram, then you’ve probably seen me posting a lot of photos and updates lately about painting, my art exhibition coming up, and my art branding re-design. In just under two weeks, I’ll be exhibiting my art in a RAW artist exhibition in New Orleans. It should be a really fun event, so if you live in the New Orleans area, you should really think about coming! You can find out more information about the show and the artists participating, here, and you can see my profile and buy tickets from me, here. To get ready for the show, I gave my art portfolio website and branding a little update, which you can check out online, here.

To see more of my artwork, visit my art portfolio, here.

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Wedding * Two Years Later

June 2, 2014March 26, 2018

Drew and I have been married for two years today! (together for almost 7 years!) I blogged in more detail about the flowers, the bridal attire, the bridal party, and many of the DIY wedding projects I did, but then I got busy with school and never ended up posting about the rest of our wedding day. I’m sure if I had posted this two years ago it would be much more detailed, but here is a little recap of our lovely wedding day: (click to enlarge photos)

Photography by the wonderful Stephanie Susie of Stephanie’s Photography. See more of her work, here.

Summary of the day:

I woke up at my parent’s house that morning at around 6 am. My dad had a quick chat with me about the ceremony plans and then I washed my face, brushed my teeth, and grabbed my travel bag with my essentials in it and headed to town to meet Drew for a super quick breakfast before my hair appointment. We exchanged gifts with each other and talked about how excited we were. I had to rush out before I even had time to eat much because I was already late for my hair appointment. I got my hair done, then met my two younger sisters, Kelsey and Jillian, and my two best friends, Tonya and Jessica, at Dream Baskets in town. The girls had grabbed the box of sandwiches/chips/cupcakes from Julie (of Dream Baskets who was catering our wedding) for our lunch and then we headed out to the winery (Bella Terra Winery in Creal Springs, IL about an hour from our hometown) in a long caravan. I was driving Mom’s minivan loaded completely full of all the wedding decor and accessories.

The girls and I spent the rest of the morning decorating the winery–moving tables, putting out tablecloths & burlap table runners, filling glass jars with sand and candles, setting up the marriage advice/sign-in table, hanging curtains on the pergola, etc. Drew’s parents, two of his nephews, Taylor and Bryce, and my cousins Rick, Neva, and Gail all came out to help. Once decorating seemed under control, the girls and I went downstairs to do our make-up and finish getting ready (Blair and Evie showed up around then). Drew and the groomsmen showed up at some point around then too and spent a lot of the morning drinking and playing bocce ball outside. The guys went downstairs to get ready while the girls were taking pictures outside. After all the bridesmaids and groomsmen photos were taken, Drew and I had our “first look” photos. I’m so glad we did photos before the wedding because the winery wasn’t a huge space and it was hard to hide from each other. It was also really nice to do all of the bridal party and most of the couple photos earlier in the day so that we didn’t have to worry about taking pictures after the ceremony while guests were waiting on us. Our wedding ceremony wasn’t until around 6:30 at night, so if Drew and I hadn’t seen each other beforehand we would have barely seen each other at all on our wedding day.

The weather was absolutely gorgeous and the temperature was perfect (it was in the 70s). The ceremony was so beautiful and meaningful. My grandpa walked me down the aisle and my dad officiated the ceremony and told funny stories about us. Afterwards we took a few more photos as the sun set while everyone else started eating. Our food was fabulously done by Julie Kuppart of Dream Baskets and was a buffet consisting of some of our favorites: stir-fry chicken and vegetables, fettuccine Alfredo, Texas potatoes, several different salads, rolls, and an assortment of cheeses, veggies, and fruits. Our cake was simple (four tiers with loosely frosted white icing with fresh peonies stuck into it) and was made of several different flavors–chocolate, lemon with raspberry filling, white with strawberry filling, Italian creme cake, and Drew’s favorite marble cake. I had pre-made gallons of banana punch to be served with it. We also had the bar open serving lots of wine and sangria. My sister, Blair, and Drew’s brother, Wes, both gave speeches that made us laugh and cry. The evening was gorgeous with our DIY candle luminaries lighting up the outside and the music and dancing were so much fun (we had a violinist play at the ceremony but a DJ for the rest of the evening). The whole day went by so fast and Drew and I drove off from the wedding late that evening with a car packed to the brim full of presents with “Just Married” written across the back and cans tied to the back of the car (which we promptly stopped down the road and cut off because they were so loud). We spent the entire hour drive to our bed and breakfast replaying over the day and excitedly chatting about how well everything went.

Favorite Moments:

-Breakfast that morning with Drew and chatting about our excitement for the day. I wish this moment had been a little longer, but it was nice to have a sweet, quiet moment to reflect on the day and the meaning of it together before all the busy, craziness of the day set in.
-The unbelievably awesome weather and our awesome venue with such pretty views.
-Decorating and finally seeing all the elements I’d worked so hard on come together.
-Seeing everyone smiling, laughing, dancing and having a great time.
-Stories of my niece, Gigi, the flower girl, walking down the aisle and dumping all her petals in a pile at the end (I didn’t see since I was inside waiting to walk out).
-Walking down the aisle with my grandpa.
-Having my dad officiate the ceremony and dancing with him afterwards to Adele singing Bob Dylan’s “Make You Feel My Love” (the song was a little surprise I had for him and he teared up).
-Spending the day with all my favorite people.
-Sweet little meaningful and DIY wedding details.
-Finally being married to my awesome husband and our utter excitement at the day having gone so wonderfully!

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At This Moment

May 26, 2014March 27, 2018

I haven’t blogged here in several weeks, even though I’ve had posts written and ready to publish. I guess sometimes blogging gets emotionally hard–hard to open yourself up and put yourself out there where anyone in the world can read about it.

With it being graduation season, I’ve been constantly reminded that it has been an entire year since I graduated from Tulane. If you’ve been reading this blog for some time, you’ll remember that my college days weren’t the most fun. College was an extremely stressful and hectic time in my life. The stress of classes, studying late into the night, not getting enough sleep, worrying about if I’d make the grades to keep my scholarship, worry about making sure I was choosing the right major, taking the right classes, and starting out onto the right career path, combined with the stress of being far away from family, missing out on family events, feeling not settled in a new place, and all the other stresses that go along with that. Drew and I also started a business and got married while in college–both great things, but also ones that can add additional pressure to an already stressful life. Mostly though, college was a sucky time for me because I had a lot of health issues. Extremely low energy, headaches, acne, minor weight gain, Irritable Bowel Syndrome (AKA: being sick every time I would ever eat anything!), and a slew of other random symptoms. After finally seeing the doctor several times and also a nutritionist, I found out I had both hypothyroidism and gluten-intolerance. Being able to make adjustments to my life based on those findings helped out tremendously, but it was still a great relief to finally graduate and be done with school.

Now that I’ve been out of school for an entire year, I have to say that being out of school is amazing. This last year has been a really tough year in many ways–the loss of my grandpa, excessive family drama, hurtful relationships, but it has also been pretty incredible too. The slightly-depressed-college-me has made many strides towards a happier self this past year. Working in a great environment with amazing people, furthering my art career, working on home and crafting projects that I didn’t have time for while in school, just being able to come home from work and make dinner then sit and read or crochet or paint or DO ANYTHING BUT HOMEWORK is so completely amazing.

A month or so ago, Drew and I grabbed our camera and tripod and drove a few streets over to take a few photos of ourselves. Why? You might ask, as some of our friends did when we said we had been taking pictures. My reply: I want to remember us at this moment in our lives.

Us with our cheesy, laughing, goofing-around grins and awkward bear hugs. Us on State Street, the street I drive down every day to get to work and back. Us in this beautiful city that we’ve fallen in love with. Us at this awesome time in our lives when we are fresh out of college, working hard together to figure out our finances and pay off Drew’s student debt to live financially free. Us working on DIY decorating projects in our apartment together, figuring out our married lives and enjoying this time of being young newlyweds (Are we still newlyweds? It’s been almost two years!). Working, painting, cooking, creating. Living healthy and gluten-free. Excited about dreams for the future– buying a house and having babies, but being completely content in this moment.

Even the smaller things that make up this photo– my favorite turquoise quatrefoil necklace (a gift from Drew), my favorite leather boots (a Christmas gift from my Dad), the subtle black and white pattern of my shirt, the jewel tones I’m wearing, my favorite jeans and gold watch (I wear so often I have a tan line around it), and my hair in its completely natural state. Mr. Beard and Button-ups over there wearing his “tassel-y shoes” and the watch I got him for Christmas. Those things all make up our style right now too. (Although I can’t believe how hot it has gotten over the last month since we took this picture, it is definitely way too hot for leather boots right now!)

I feel like this photo perfectly captures a little glimpse into this time of our lives. And I want to cherish and remember it.

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Remote Box

April 10, 2014

Forewarning. This is sort-of a random post. I feel like the majority of my posts now are about recipes and house projects. It has been a while since I’ve posted about small little things. So here is one.

Welcome our new addition to the living room:

We took a quick trip to TJ Maxx this weekend and I fell in love with this little inlaid wood box with a Moroccan tile pattern. I love the pattern. It looks great on our bookshelves and I think the color is a nice contrast to all the blue/teal/turquoise in the living room.

But it serves a greater purpose. A purpose for which I have been searching for a box like this for years to fulfill.

It holds all (four!) of our remotes (one for the cable, one for the television, one for the sound system, and one for the Roku box). Having four remotes, two of which are only normally necessary for TV watching (the cable remote and sound system remote for volume), made it a pain to find a place to keep them before. They cluttered up the coffee table, fell off the arms of the couch, and none of our side tables had drawers to keep them in. It’s so nice to have a pretty little box to keep them in now! They are close at hand but out of sight!

P.S. You can see part of a crochet project I’m currently working on in the top photo. 🙂

P.P.S. My sister, Kelsey, and her boyfriend, David, got me a similar box for Christmas last year that is currently in our bedroom. It is smaller, black and white, and also has a similar Moroccan tile pattern. You can see a bit of it in this post. I’m totally loving little storage boxes like these lately!

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Healthy Banana Bread (gluten-free)

April 3, 2014March 27, 2018

One of my favorite things to make with over-ripe bananas is banana bread. Back in my gluten-eating days, I had a delicious recipe that I always used. Now that I’m gluten-free (and cutting other things like processed oils and sugar out of my diet), this is my new go-to recipe. It is jam-packed with delicious ingredients and makes for one pretty healthy banana bread. Hope you enjoy!

Healthy Banana Bread (gluten-free)
recipe adapted from this one

Ingredients:
-1 1/2 cups mashed over-ripe bananas (about 4 bananas)
-1/2 cup honey (or maple syrup)
-3/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
-2 eggs
-1 teaspoon vanilla
-1 1/2 cup oats, ground in food processor (a little more coarse than actual oat flour)
-1/2 teaspoon salt
-3/4 teaspoon baking soda
-1 teaspoon baking powder
-1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
-1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
-1/4 cup flaxseeds (whole or slightly ground)
-1/3 cup shredded coconut
-1 to 1 1/2 cups chopped pecans or walnuts
-1/2 cup chocolate chips

Directions:
1. Grease one large 9×5″ loaf pan and preheat the oven to 350º F.
2. In a large bowl, stir together first 5 ingredients (mashed bananas, honey, applesauce, eggs and vanilla).
3. In a separate bowl, combine the ground oats, salt, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, flaxseeds, and coconut. Add to the wet ingredients.
4. Fold in the nuts and chocolate chips.
5. Pour batter into the prepared pan and bake about one hour and fifteen minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean or with a few crumbs attached.
6. Let cool slightly and enjoy!

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Fabric Covered Bulletin Board

March 31, 2014March 27, 2018

I didn’t take any before pictures of this bulletin board (bad blogger, I know!), but it was just your average cork-covered, wood-trimmed, basic office bulletin board. Now it looks like this:

Less than a yard of fabric (home dec from Jo-Ann’s), some brass tacks (I used ones like this that I also bought at Jo-Ann’s), and a few staples in the back and voila! A much more sophisticated office bulletin board. Seriously though, this was a super easy project. Iron your fabric, cut it about 2 1/2 inches wider on each side than your bulletin board, lay flat, space out your tacks, push them in place (as you keep the fabric taut and the pattern aligned), then use your staple gun to staple the fabric around to the backside. Add your hanging hardware to the back and you are finished.

I love the crisp look of the tacks and the fabric stretched all the way around the frame. A high-impact look for little money!

It looks great here in my home office, but I actually made it for my work office. It adds a little bit of interest to my otherwise boring work office!

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White Cheddar Crackers (gluten-free)

February 16, 2014March 27, 2018

These white Cheddar crackers are a nice, crisp, crumbly, buttery stack of goodness. An easy, homemade snack great with cheese, dips, or by themselves! I particularly like this recipe because it is easy and uses simple ingredients that I always have on hand in my kitchen (and can easily be tweaked to make various other flavored crackers!). These are so much cheaper to make than your typical $5 box of gluten-free crackers!

One thing to note– the texture of these crackers is a little more buttery and coarse (sort-of like shortbread without the sweetness), so it might be a little different than your gluten-containing cracker of choice. I really happen to love that crumbly texture though!

White Cheddar Crackers (gluten-free)

makes about 50 bite-sized crackers; original recipe from this cookbook

Ingredients:
-1 1/2 cups brown rice flour
-1 tsp garlic powder
-1 tsp Italian seasoning
-1/2 tsp salt
-6 Tbsp (3/4 stick) cold butter, cut into small cubes
-3/4 cup finely grated sharp white Cheddar cheese
-1/2 cup cold water

Directions:
1. Combine brown rice flour, garlic powder, Italian seasoning, and salt in a food processor and process until well blended.
2. Add butter and cheese, pulse until coarse crumbs form.
3. Add water; process until dough forms.
4. Divide dough into 2 pieces, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 20 minutes.
5. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
6. Place each ball of dough between two pieces of parchment paper, roll out to 1/16 inch thickness, and then refrigerate another 5 minutes.
7. Cut dough into squares and place squares onto prepared baking sheets.
8. Bake for about 15 minutes or until golden and crisp.

Enjoy!

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DIY 12-Foot Long Double Desk

February 9, 2014March 27, 2018

Last week I shared our recent office makeover, including the DIY 12-ft long double desk we built. Today I’m here to give you the how-to so that you can build your own.

This really is a pretty simple DIY project (especially compared to our DIY Old Door Console Table that we built from scratch), that even the less-DIY-savvy of you can do pretty easily.

I had been thinking about this project for a while, so I already had an idea of what I wanted (here are some similar desks that I used for inspiration: this, this and this), so I measured our space to see what would work best and then made this quick sketch to show Drew. He was on board immediately (he was ready to overtake the room that had long been only my office) and we came up with a plan.

We started with a trip to IKEA (the closest IKEA to New Orleans is in Houston, TX, so we made a weekend trip of it), where we purchased three of these BESTA bookcases, along with these feet for the bottom of them (the BESTA bookcases have a variety of feet options, so you can change up your look if you want something different). ***SEE UPDATE AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST FOR UPDATED INFORMATION ON THE BESTA PRODUCT LINE & LINKS.

Once we were home, we cleaned out the room, painted it, and then put our bookcases together and placed them where we wanted them in the room. The spacing of our room turned out perfect for these! We set those couple boards on top to mimic the desktop, just to make sure the height would be okay. It really depends on the height of your chair, but for me, the desktop is a touch higher than I would have made it for myself. However, I’m sharing this desk with my husband, who is a big guy, and the height is perfect for him. (I’ve been sitting on a pillow in my chair, which makes it the perfect height, but I’m going to look for a taller office chair at some point.) You might find that you don’t actually need the legs on them to be the right height for you. (The BESTA Bookcases without legs are about 25 1/4 inches tall, with legs ours are 29 1/4 inches tall.) With the desk top attached, our desk turned out to be a total of 31 inches high.

Next, we made our final plans for the top, measuring to see how long we wanted our desktop to be. Our wall is about 12 feet long and we wanted the desk to be slightly shorter than that, to give it room to actually fit in the space (it is a free-standing desk, not a built-in, so it doesn’t need to be completely flush against both walls). We decided 140 inches long would be perfect for us. We made a trip to Lowe’s and bought three 2x8x12 untreated pine boards and had them cut down in-store to 140 inches. When choosing boards, make sure you lay them flat on the ground in the store and pick ones that are as flat/straight as you can find. (We had some issues with one of our boards being warped because we didn’t check them well enough in the store!) After we got them home, we gave them a good sanding to smooth the surface and also to remove any stamps/marks on the wood. Make sure to also wipe them down and remove any dirt/dust before staining.

We are still really happy with the finish of the top of our Old Door Console Table, so we used the same method and same stain for this project as well. We used Minwax Pre-Stain Wood Conditioner, 2 coats of Minwax Wood Stain in Dark Walnut, and (later, after the desk top was attached) we gave it three coats of Rustoleum Water-Based Polyurethane in a Satin finish.

I would recommend staining your wood outside or in some other well-ventilated area. Since we live in an apartment, we were forced to do this inside (with the windows open and a fan blowing the smell out), but it was still pretty stinky. After the stain has cured for a day or two, then you can start attaching the top boards together.

We used these long metal connector bars that we found at Lowe’s. We used 4– one on each end of the desk and one in each open space (where our chairs go). Make sure you pull the boards together as you screw these in, to prevent large gaps between the boards.

Once we had the top boards connected together, we measured out our bookcases, put them in the right places, then set the wooden top on top of them. We left a couple inch overhang on each end and each open chair space is 32 inches. The bookcases are only 15 1/2 inches deep, whereas our top is 22 inches deep, so there is a 3/4 inch overhang on the front lip of the desk and about 5 1/2 inches of space left behind each bookcase (which has turned out great for storage of art materials!).

Once we had everything situated where we wanted it, we used these small L brackets to attach the top to the bookcases. There is a slight gap between the bookcases and the top on ours to accommodate the curvature of the wood (no wood is perfectly flat!), but when making your own, you might find that you don’t end up with as big of a gap there (one of our boards was slightly warped). The weight of the wood also holds the top down, so we didn’t think it needed more attaching than a few of these on each side of the bookcases.

After everything was attached and together, I gave the top 3 coats of Satin finish Poly and let that cure for a few days.

So happy with how it turned out! It is the perfect space for Drew and I to work. We each have plenty of storage space in the bookcases and lots of work space on top (with plenty of space between us so we don’t bother each other while working either!).

It also makes the perfect use of the space in this room. It might be a 12 foot long desk, but it doesn’t feel like it takes up very much space in the room! I still have room for my easel/art stuff on the other side of the room with plenty of open floor space to spread out in the floor if I’m working on a crafting project.

See more images of the room, here.

Budget Breakdown:

IKEA (BESTA Bookcases ($46.75 x 3 = $140.25) and BESTA Legs ($8.50 a pair x 6 = $51.00) family discount pricing + 15.78 tax) : $207.03
Wood for desk top (3 2x8x12 boards at $7.43 each): $22.29
Metal Connector Bars (4 at $2.80 each): $11.20
Metal L Brackets (3 packs of 4 at $2.27 each): $6.81
Stain/Wood Conditioner/Polyurethane/Foam Brushes: already owned (but would be around $30 to purchase if you didn’t already own these)
Screws, Sandpaper, etc… already owned (but would be around $10 to purchase if you didn’t already own these)

TOTAL: $247.33

$250 isn’t bad for a 12-foot long desk for two! Plus we sold Drew’s old desk on Craigslist for $100, so that brings our out-of-pocket cost down to under $150!

One of my favorite projects that we’ve done together and we are already getting a ton of use out of it! Yay for pretty projects that increase our productivity!

P.S. We did plan ahead and made sure that whatever connecting methods we used (the metal connector bars and L brackets) could be disassembled rather easily in the future to move to a different house. We also thought ahead before we bought our 12 ft long boards and measured to make sure that we could even get them in the house. Some things that you also might want to consider before building!

***UPDATE 12/3/15: Several people have asked if IKEA still carries the BESTA bookcases, since my original links above don’t work. IKEA still does carry them, but they have changed a bit. When we bought ours, the frame and shelves came together as a “bookcase” that you could choose to add feet to, but now they come in different parts so that you can customize/build the exact piece you want (they have doors and drawers available instead of just shelves!). You buy the frame, shelves, doors, drawers, feet, etc. separately. I believe this frame is the equivalent of what I have: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/20245964/#/30245850. But here are some other helpful links:

Frames (different sizes): http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/categories/departments/living_room/12151/
Doors and Drawer fronts (different sizes): http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/categories/departments/living_room/12152/
Interior fittings: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/categories/departments/living_room/12158/
Accessories: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/categories/departments/living_room/12159/

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Office for Two

February 2, 2014March 27, 2018

The last time I shared photos of my office/studio, it looked like this:

It continued to look like this until about a week and a half ago. Now it looks quite a bit different (but we’ll get to that in just a second).

The room was great before. It was pretty. It was functional for storing my things. But I felt a little like that was all it was being used for. Just a room to house my stuff. During college, it was great to have this space to myself. I needed a quiet spot to write papers and do homework. However, now that I’m out of school, I found that I didn’t really use the space as much anymore (only when painting). I still work some from home, I still blog, and I still spend a lot of time on my computer, however, I found this space to be too quiet (and lonely) for me to work in very often. Since Drew and I both work away from home during the day, we only get to spend time with each other at night and on the weekends. If I spent all that time working in here, with him working in the other room, we would never see each other. So we would both end up bringing our computers into the living room where we could work together.

So we decided to give this room a little makeover. One that would make it work a little better for both of us. Now it looks like this:

I’ve always loved the look of double desks (especially since Drew and I both do a lot of work from home that we need office space for) and I’d been envisioning one for this room for a long time. This wall is just the perfect spot for it. (Inspiration: this, this, this, this, this and this.)

We built the (nearly 12 foot long) desk ourselves using Besta bookcases from IKEA (outfitted with these legs) and wooden 2x8x12 boards that we stained/sealed/and put together. A longer post coming soon about exactly how to DIY one of your own. (We did a few things differently, but our process was very similar to this one.)

We ended up painting the wall behind the desk with chalkboard paint (Valspar from Lowe’s) and it is one of my absolute favorite things about the room. I’ve always admired chalkboard walls and I love the functionality of this one (inspiring quotes, to do lists, etc.) and the gorgeous statement it makes (I’m so into high contrast these days!). It took about 3 coats of paint to cover our wall and even though our walls are bumpy plaster, it still works great. If you do this in your own home, remember to “season” the entire wall with chalk dust before using (it makes what you write on there easily erasable without leaving an impression of what you wrote on the wall), but I will warn you that it makes a huge mess! Totally worth it in the end though.

The other walls in the room are painted in Grey Ghost (Valspar from Lowe’s) in a satin finish. I love the contrast of the black chalkboard wall with the lighter grey walls and the white bookcases, etc.

I’ve found lately that my style is changing quite a bit. I’m into really high-contrast and neutral spaces (black, white, grey, gold, and wood), with just smaller bits of color (and I would even like a little less color in here, but I’m working with what I’ve got — LOVE this office), patterns, abstract art (when wasn’t I into that though), elegant but with a more casual feel (love the imperfect to do list and the art taped right on the wall), contrasting textures (matte black wall with satin grey on the other walls, smooth white bookcases with an imperfect wooden desk top), a little old with a little new, and a little bit of quirk. This is definitely my favorite room in the house.

See more of my office/studio inspiration on my Pinterest board, here.

The room feels so much bigger now! Not only is it such a better use of the space in our small apartment, and more functional, but it also provides so much extra storage and organization. It is so nice to have a desk with shelves. I didn’t even know how much I missed that before with my open desk. The small gap behind the desk bookcases, between the wall, is also great for storing art paper pads, unused art frames, etc! A nice little accidental perk!

This room has come so far from the before pictures in this post!

Now I’m on to the search for a larger rug for this space!

****UPDATE**** Want to build your own DIY Double Desk? Check out the how-to, here.

———————

Sources:

My desk chair is from World Market, Drew’s wooden desk chair was thrifted, baskets on the built-in shelves and the middle desk shelf are from Target, other smaller baskets on desk shelves are from Michael’s, rug is from Target, curtains I made out of sheets from TJ Maxx, easel is from Craigslist, pink curvy glass lamp is from Home Goods (got it on vacation years ago in Charleston, SC), standing lamp is from Target, shelves DIY built-in out of IKEA Extra-Deep Billy Bookcases, Painting Taboret is IKEA kitchen cart, big white ornate frame with painting inspiration pics is thrifted and turned into bulletin board, big ornate gold frame is thrifted, elephant print on bookshelves is from this Etsy shop, Live Simply print from this Etsy shop, small purple/yellow print on bookshelves we got in Portland, OR but is Old School Stationeers, green elephant piggy bank is from Urban Outfitters, glittery gold frames on wall are from Michaels, prints in them are prints of my paintings, wooden abstract painting on desk is by me, two taped up paintings on my side of the desk were bought at an estate sale and painted by Pierce Jonassen, taped up painting on Drew’s side is by me, crewelwork embroidery in gold frame was thrifted, white ceramic turtle is from West Elm, gold plant pot was thrifted, silver desk lamp is from IKEA, and rose window print is from here.

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Reflections on 2013, Goals for 2014

January 1, 2014March 27, 2018

Are you excited for the New Year? I’m always incredibly excited to start a brand new year. I’m a pretty self-reflective person all year, but there is just something special about starting over in the new year with goals and plans and dreams of what lies ahead.

I’m particularly excited about this year because it will be my first full year out of school. I’m pretty excited about all the new possibilities in life now that school doesn’t take up the majority of my days.

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you might recall last year’s New Year post. I didn’t set a lot of goals for 2013, but the ones I set were pretty big ones. 2012 was a big year for us, considering we got married, Drew graduated, advances in work and our business happened, but it was a hectic year in school for me filled with some health issues and the start of some financial issues. Our goals for 2013 were for me to graduate from college, find a job, drastically change our health and diet (I went gluten-free and cut out a good deal of other not-good-for-me-stuff) and to drastically start on changes in our financial life by embarking on Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover. I’m happy to say that in 2013, we did a really good job at sticking to our goals and changing those things.

2013 (recap)

-Big Health Changes. I went gluten-free, and once I did, I found that gluten (or at least wheat in particular), had been the cause of a lot of digestive problems for me. Once I cut it out of my diet, I immediately noticed that I was no longer having major digestive issues and I’ve noticed a huge change in my energy levels. I feel like I have much more energy and I feel less sluggish. In addition to wheat, I cut out white sugar (I try to only use honey, pure maple syrup, coconut sugar, or raw sugar as sweeteners, but even those I use rarely), milk (I still eat cheese and a few other dairy products, but just sparingly. I use almond milk to replace regular milk), soy, most corn products, and any other overly processed foods. I try to limit my grain intake of the grains I do eat (brown rice, oats, quinoa, buckwheat, etc), and eat a lot of meat, vegetables, fruits, nuts, and seeds. I’ve been at it for an entire year now, and it is amazing how much better I feel and how much the health issues I had have really minimized (read more about the issues I had in my last years New Year post). I have also lost about twenty pounds over the last year. I’m really passionate now about eating intentionally for your health and would highly recommend it to anyone, especially if you have health issues! I found that once I rid my house of the foods I shouldn’t be eating and ate healthy for a few weeks, I stopped craving foods I shouldn’t eat and it became easy to stay on track. Now, I don’t even really have to think about it, eating healthy is definitely a habit for me, rather than a challenge.

-I graduated from Tulane with a BA in both English and Studio Art! I also had my work in my first art exhibition, my BA show at Tulane! Both of these were huge events for 2013, and I’m so happy/relieved to have them in the past. College was a really stressful time in my life and I couldn’t be happier to have those days over with. I’ve so been enjoying the less-stressful lifestyle of being out of college.

-We made major debt pay-off progress! We started the Dave Ramsey debt snowball plan at the beginning of the year and our goal for the end of 2013 was to have Drew’s car and credit card debt paid off. We paid his credit card debt off last spring, and even with some set backs (like $4,000 worth of dental work for Drew) and me not working for most of the year, as of this month (January 2014) we will have the car paid off! I can’t wait to write that one last check! I’m really happy with our progress so far and I’m excited to step it up and get cracking on those student loans in 2014!

-I started working! In September of 2013, I started my first out-of-college job, as the Web & Publications/Communications Coordinator for a local church. I really love what I do (mostly graphic design, but other web/media work as well) and I couldn’t ask for better people to work with. God really blessed me with this opportunity and I’m so thankful for the opportunity to make money in a truly enjoyable and rewarding job.

-Drew also switched jobs, somewhat. Drew is still doing pretty much the same thing he has always been doing (being an IT Director in charter schools), but while he used to work in a contracted company for the schools, now he works directly for one of the schools he has always worked in. This brings along several benefit perks and means he isn’t stretched quite as thin between schools as he once was. He is still, of course, working for our business, P.S. Designs, as well.

2014 (goals)

-Better Life Balance. When I was in school, classes took up my days and homework/studying/paper-writing/novel-reading took up my nights. Now that I’m working, work takes up a good part of my day, but there is still time left in the evenings that I never had before that I can now use to focus on things I really want to do. Reading, blogging, craft projects, cooking, decorating/home projects, painting, etc! I want to try my best to make the best use of that time I have and enjoy it while I can. Learn what I have time for and what I don’t, what is a good use of the time I have and what isn’t. I want to try to keep a good balance between work and activities I enjoy, so I don’t get burnt out of my job as easily as I did with school. I also want to continue to make time to cook healthy meals, time to exercise, time for church/bible study, etc. I want to continue to be healthy in a well-rounded way.

-Expand Learning & Education in Different Ways. Now that I’m out of school, that doesn’t mean that my learning process stops. I want to continue to learn all of my life, and now is the perfect time to really focus on doing that in different ways. Reading more, maybe joining a book club, continuing to paint and build my body of work, learning even more about the design software I use every day, getting better at using my Wacom tablet, taking a calligraphy class, etc.

-Incorporating Exercise into the Everyday. Just developing a better exercise routine in general, whether that means more stretching/floor exercises in the mornings before work, attending more Pilates classes, going on more walks/runs in the neighborhood, playing Frisbee/tennis at the park, just making exercise a more natural part of my life.

-Focus on Our Marriage. We do already, but I really want us to take the time to really enjoy this time in our lives. We will only get so much time together just the two of us before we decide to start a family, so I really want us to cherish these moments as a couple before we expand our crew and the chaos grows!

-Gluten-free Baking. Now that I’ve really gotten good at eating only the foods I really should, I would like to expand my cooking repertoire of what I can do with those ingredients. Trying different recipes, different GF flours, experimenting with gluten-free bread and doughnut making, healthy snacks, etc. I would also like to educate myself better on different foods and their nutritional contents. I would also like to get better at buying/eating organic.

-Debt Pay-Off. Drew had to take out quite a bit of money in student loans to get through college. Our goal for 2014 is to completely pay off the loans in Drew’s name and begin to pay on the ones in Drew’s parents name. I have confidence that it is going to be a good year for our debt snowball plan!

-Consistent Branding and New Opportunities. Last but not least, I’ve got a few ideas up my sleeve for 2014. A few things I’m interested in trying out, creatively expanding into. I don’t want to give all the details away now, but you’ll see. Part of that includes creating a more consistent brand for myself as an artist/designer across all areas and media (my blog, art portfolio, social media, etc.). I’m excited for the opportunities this year has in store and where those creative opportunities could lead!

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What are you looking forward to in 2014?

P.S. It is a bit of a tradition to share my old year recap and new year goals on here. See here for 2013, here for 2012, and here and here for 2011.

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