3/4 Way There! July-Sept

     Hi again! We're 3/4 of the way through this year, which amazes me because it's definitely been at least ten years since January. 

    Like I've done before, I'll start with the money. My savings are now $4,426! Which is crazy!! Considering my goal this year was to save $5,000 and I'm only  $574 away from that. I'm so so sooo proud of myself. I've also started other little saving accounts for things like an emergency fund, moving out, a vacation I have planned, and I've started putting money aside to pay my student loans after school is done. School doesn't even start for another couple weeks but there's no harm in getting a head start. Another thing I'm stoked about financially is I finally reached single (thousand) digits for my car loan. That means I've paid off close to $3,000 of it just since the beginning of this year. I would like to have it paid off before I move out, but I would be happy just to have only 1 or 2 thousand left by then. Then there would only be a couple more payments.

    A few hikes were accomplished, with my four-legged hiking buddy of course. Jeremy did these with me too, so props to him! 

1. Racehorse falls, I did this one with my parents actually which was a lot of fun. We don't do things like that together very much. The falls were stunning! 7/12/20
2. Olympia boardwalk, not so much a hike but I wanted to include it. 8/4
3. A trail in Anacortes that I don't actually know the name of. 8/12
4. Teddy bear cove. 7/22
   

5. Hovander Park, we did all the trails there. Absolutely gorgeous place. 8/28

6. Artist Point. Again such an amazing place. 9/03

7. Berthusen Park, all the trails thereas well. We've done this one a few times. 9/10

8. Gold mine Trail. We didn't get to finish this one because it got too dark, but we're going to go back and try it again. 9/2

    The next thing I did was tell my birthday story which was actually terrifying because it's a story I haven't told many people. It feels get to get it out though, as cliche as it is there's a weight off my chest about it and I feel like I can move on. If you want to read it, check out this blog. I got laid off from my waitressing job on my birthday this year (COVID really messed up the restaurant industry). Last year I got jury duty for my birthday though so my expectations weren't high. I have found a new job since so that's good.

    I wrote a couple blogs that I'm pretty proud of. There's one about Why it's hard to be a woman which being a woman myself it was easy to write, but I still did a lot of research for statistics and other facts. I wrote one about ways to help the planet that I also did a lot of research on. I know quite a bit about the ways that we harm the planet and what we can do to reduce that harm, but I still learned a lot while writing that one. Another one was about how to tell the difference between a healthy and unhealthy relationship. A Friend of mine told me that they should have young adults be required to read it in school, which was such an incredible compliment. I have another big research blog in progress but I don't want to post any spoilers about it.

    I tried a few new restaurants in town. They were all great! I differently want to keep this trend going and try every restaurant in town, with the exception of fast food. I have yet to eat at a Jack in the Box and I plan to keep that up as well. 

1. Panera in Olympia, which was so freaking good. Jer and I sat on the beach and ate it. 8/4
2. OVN pizza. This was a double date with some of Jer's friends, and they were incredible people. 8/21
3. On Rice. This one was a little too spicy for me, but it was good.
4. Fiama burger. I was craving poutine and since we still can't go to Canada this was the next best option. Nothing beats Canadian poutine though. 

    Another thing on my list was to eat outside at a restaurant, so we knocked that off.

    One thing that I've been wanting to do for quite a while now is to convert to a low waste lifestyle. I posted a blog about the zero waste swaps I've made so far. Since I posted that I've switched to a bar of shower soap instead of a bottle. I'm almost out of bottled hand soap as well so once thats gone I'll get a bar for that as well. The packaging is just a cardboard box so I love that. Next is an organic loofa, mine is currently plastic, but it's not at the end of its life yet so I'm waiting. Then I want to try deodorants, and moisturizers/lotions. Then make-up and that'll be it for my bathroom transition. I'll move on to kitchen stuff after that. 

    

    My plant fam has grown which I love. I got a Snake Plant for my birthday from my parents. 

    Then I got a succulent from Jeremy as a cute little surprise. 

    I love them so much! I can't wait to get more! I'm a plant whore, what can I say.

    For my birthday gift to myself, I got another tattoo, I got Jackson's paw print on the opposite ankle from my Colourful girls. 

    Words can't begin to describe how much these pawprints mean to me. I love both my babies so much, I miss Colours every day and I'm glad that no matter what she will always be with me.

A few other things I did these last few months were;

1. 8/25 I went geocaching or the first time and fell in love with it. I've gone numerous times now and found some real treasures. This one we found in Jesus central, can you tell?
   

2. 9/10 I got a floppy sun hat!! I've wanted one for so long, and it's adorable.

   

3. 8/20 Went swimming. I love swimming but I don't do it enough. We went to Whatcom falls and it was pretty busy there that day, so we didn't end up swimming where you would usually swim there. Instead, we found our own little private swimming spot which was perfect and I wouldn't change it for the world.
   
    
4. 7/10 We star-gazed. This is a funny story. So we were in Blain and we decided to star-gaze so we went to this little park. It was pretty chilly that night, but it was fine we snuggled. So we had a blanket we put down on the grass and laid there, out of the way of the sprinklers. The stars were beautiful. Then we both got this feeling that we should probably go because we were worried about the sprinklers. I shit you not the second we got up the sprinklers turned on. If we would've waited a minute longer, we would've been soaked. Which also would've been pretty funny, but we were already freezing so I'm glad that didn't happen.
5. 9/3 We stood on a mountain. We went up to Artist's Point and it's so gorgeous up there. there's nothing like a mountain view to make all your worries seem small. 

That's so incredible!

    I got a new cushion for my Papasan chair off amazon because the old one was gross even when I bought it I got the chair used so it was a great price but the cushion was rough. The thing is, I have a horrible record with buying things off amazon (obviously I don't support amazon anymore because fuck Bezos). So the cushion I bought ended up being smaller than anticipated and I was pissed. So I sent it back and decided to just make a cushion cover for it myself. and it's not my best sewing job but it looks better than it did so...

    I also got a new chair for my desk, I was using a fold-up one for so long and it was really uncomfortable to sit on for long periods of time. This is also a fun story. So I was on offer up and found this desk chair labeled 'lumbar support chair". It was the right color I wanted and it was an actual desk chair so I got really excited. Jer and I went to pick it up yesterday, it turned out that the lady was just selling the little lumbar support for it... So that was disappointing and I was pretty sad about it not gonna lie. I bought it anyway because I didn't want to flake on this lady. Jeremy could tell that I was pretty bummed and he suggested stopping at this little thrift store on the way home. This man guys, I love him. So we stopped and we found the perfect chair! 

    

    Look how cute it is! It's really comfortable too so that's nice.

    We went to Anacortes on august 12th and the plan was to geocache there, but we realized that we didn't really know how to at that time. So we ended up walking some trails and getting some food. So it was still a great day. 

    We went on a road trip to meet his parents on August 2nd, and I love them already. We toured around and went to a few cute little towns. We stopped in Olympia, Westport, Ocean Shores and Lake Quinault. Westport was my favorite, we found a cute little beach alcove and snuggled on the rocks.

    In Lake Quinalt we planned to hike and we started to, but then we heard some kind of big animal and both said fuck that. So we went to the river, found a heart-shaped rock, and put our feet in the water. That is one of my favorite days we've spent together.

    One thing that I started doing which I absolutely love every single second off, is documenting the family history for my grandparents. I plan to do it or all four of them. It's just to get to know them better and learn about my family. So far I've just done some of it with my mom's parents, and then I'll move onto my dad's. I'm going to write blogs about it once I have all the information. Apparently my papa was quite the trouble maker in his youth, which I wouldn't have previously guessed. I love it so much.

    I read a book called "The book of joy." Which s about the meet up between the Dala Lama and Archbishop Tutu. This book is so far my favorite I learned so much from it in regards to emotions and how to handed them and just how to create joy in yourself. I can say for a fact that I have handle situations differently then I maybe would have before reading it and I'm really proud of that. The book I'm reading now is "The 5 love languages" by Gary Chapman. So far it's great, I've determined what mine and my babes love languages, and I'm looking forward to implementing them in our relationship.

    I watch quite a few documentaries. Documentaries are my shit. 

1. "13th" 7/9. Highly recommend. It's about race discrimination.
2. "Fahrenheit 11/9" 8/30 Also great, it's about how Trump got elected and thankfully the potato himself doesn't have too much screentime.
3. "Inside the garbage of the world" 8/09 This is a zero-waste documentary and it's fantastic!
4. "Before the flood." 8/12. This is Leonardo DiCaprio's climate change documentary. Love this one.
5. "Bernie Blackout." 8/20. This one pissed me off but not in a "this movie sucks" kinda way, in a "the government sucks" way.
6. "Cowspiracy" 9/10. This one is about the meat industry nd how it effects climate change. 
7. "What the health" 8/25. The same guy who did conspiracy did this one, so it's the same format just a different topic. He does an incredible job.
8. "Earthlings." 9/1. This one guys... I've seen it multiple times before and it never gets any easier to watch, I highly, highly encourage everyone to watch it at least once in your lifetime. I will warn you it's probably the worst thing you'll ever watch, in the best way. We need to witness the horror of what we do to aminals. We need to make it known so we can end it. There's absolutely no need for any animal to suffer the way that they do. If we treated people that way we would all be in either prison or a psychiatric hospital for the criminally insane.

    I also watched a lot of Ted Talks, as I've said before I only put the ones that really resonate with me. The Ralph Smart ones aren't Ted Talks but they are equally informative and beneficial. 

1.  "Overcoming the fear of love." By Trillion Small. This one made me cry because it hit home like a ton of bricks, I have never connected so well with a ted talk. It really made me realize why I do things that I do when it comes to love. 
2. "Every argument against veganism." By Ed Winters (Earthling Ed). This one also made me realize a lot, he made some excellent points on why becoming vegan is not only the most ethical but the most sustainable way of life as well. 
3. "How to resolve unresolved issues in the subconscious mind." By Ralph Smart. I love his videos, he's a little out there sometimes, but he makes amazing points. I highly recommend his youtube channel.
4. "10 rules of a relationship." By Ralph Smart. Again, incredible.
5. "How to make stress your friend." By Kelly McGonigal. I watched this one for my school orientation. She made great arguments about why stress is good and why we should accept it. Which you're probably thinking, stress is horrible for your health, just watch it a tell me if you still think that.

    A tremendous amount of cooking has been done these last months and I've developed a love for it. I've wanted to be vegan for so long, so freaking long. A while back I was a vegetarian and I loved it. When I moved home I started eating meat again because that's what my family eats, but I feel guilty everytime because I know what I'm eating. I'm eating pain, and fear, and death. I don't need to eat that to survive. So there been a battle inside me for months now because my views and my actions aren't aligned. However, I can now say that I'm in the midst of transitioning back into vegetarianism and I love it, eventually I'll be vegan but I understand that it takes time and I'm okay with that. Jeremy has been so wonderful with this and he is doing it with me, which makes it so much easier. Having someone who is going through what you're going through is a beautiful thing. We did most of this cooking together, some meals are vegan and some aren't.

1. Lasagna Roll ups- 10/10 Made these with my mom.
2. Smoked salmon scramble- 10/10 Sooo good.
3. Parfaits (some vega some not)- 10/10 These have become a breakfast staple.
4. Chicken Ceaser wraps- 10/10.
5. Quinoa salad-8/10 This was the first time we made quinoa and we fucked it up. It was soggy, it was still edible and it tasted fine but the texture was meh.
6. Broccoli cheddar soup- 10/10 This was so good, I've made it a few times.
7. Chia seed smoothies + spirulina- 10/10 Smoothies have become a vegan breakfast stable as well.
8. Vegan quesadillas- 10/10 These fell apart a little bit but they were so good.
9. Lemon-garlic salmon- 10/10 This was my first time cooking fish and I think it went well.
10. Vegan crepes-11/10 these were perfection! I've never had regular crepes before so I dont really know if they compare but they were amazing.
11. Southwest quinoa bowls-10/10 
12. Portabella mushroom pizza- 7/10 We used vegan cheese for these and I dont know about that.
13. Vegan mac and cheese- 4/10 It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great. I think maybe I messed up though be use I've had this recipe before and it was great.
14. Chicken stirfry- 8/10 I made this more for my family than for me and it was okay.
15. Gnocchi pesto stirfry- 10/10 This was yummy!
16. Mediterranean quinoa bowls- 11/10 This is my absolute favorite thing I've mad so far, omg it was good.
17. Butter garlic chicken-8/10 Not bad.
18. Balsamic Brussel sprouts 7/10 They were good but I prepared them wrong.
19. Vegan spaghetti-10/10 So good!

    Working out hasn't been great, I miss the gym a lot. Hopefully they can safely open soon. I've done some home workouts and yoga but nothing intense, it's really hard for me to do it at home. Going for walks or hikes has been my substitute for it but it's not enough. I'm still losing weight but I think the change in my diet has been the main factor. I'm down to 160 pounds so I've lost 7 pounds this year, which is great and I'm proud of myself. I would like to lose more though, I'm still not totally comfortable and in love with how my body looks. Unfortunately I didn't take before pictures, but I have a picture from a few months ago and then one from a week ago and I think you see a bit of difference in them.

This is the "before"

And this is the "now"

    Other than my papasan cushion cover I didn't really make anything these last few months. I did some painting though. I did a galaxy painting for my nephew and I started a few other paintings that I haven't finished yet. I did do one painting project that I liked. Jeremy and I went to beach to watch the sunset and we found a seashell that was quite pretty see we snagged it. I ended up painting the sunset that we saw in the shell, and I really like how it turned out.

    As for photography I did something new. My mom and I did a photoshoot of my sister's little family and I've never done a photo shoot of people before so that was pretty cool. The pictures turned out really well. I took other photos too, I post my favourite ones on Instagram, if you want to check them out.

    That about sums it up for my last three months, I'll do my final check in at the end of December. Thanks again for going on this journey with me and I'll be posting another research blog in a few days!

-Courtney.