High Five for Friday: May 29

This was a difficult week, and I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling that way, with what has been going on here societally (ranging from the utter disregard for coronavirus precautions in some places to another horrific murder and subsequent riots). Trying to find the good, rather than just being overwhelmed by my own helplessness, is a challenge. But we press on, helpless or not, so here is the mundane sparkle:

• FLOWERS! As always, haha. If it’s spring/summer, you know flowers are going to be in here. The iris in our own yard has bloomed, so I got to bust out my DSLR and be a total creep because that’s acceptable when you’re creeping on your own flowers!

Also, these beautiful, almost neon purple rhododendrons are in bloom throughout our neighborhood. They’re my fave—I wait for them every year!

Pictures never do the color justice though ☹️

• I almost made a friend on Tuesday! I was sitting at my desk, which is right in front of a window, when I saw a cat come waltzing down the street! What the what? She then tried going through our yard, but I, of course, went out to be the welcome wagon! 😂 She actually seemed to consider befriending me but then was like NAH BYE. So close and yet so far!

• Speaking of friends, now that I’m befriending villagers in Harvest Moon, it seems I’ve accidentally made several of the town’s bachelors fall in love with me! Oops? When they reach certain levels of love, they’ll bring you a gift, and I’ve gotten an, um, wide variety of gifts so far: orange cake, a ruby, green earmuffs, honey, topaz, and cold medicine. 🤷🏼‍♀️

• Not that my music interests aren’t all over the place all the time, but somehow, I’ve gotten on a real vintage Sesame Street music kick lately? I hadn’t heard “Put Down the Duckie” in years, but it is absurdly catchy, even as an adult, and when Ernie does put down the duckie, the band really starts swinging! And I had somehow never heard Stevie Wonder’s seven-minute rendition of “Superstition”! Like, DANG. Not only is it phenomenal, props to Sesame Street for letting this diverse group play a popular rock/funk song on a show for kids.

• Lastly, OOF THESE MEMES. I felt them in my soul. When can we get a do-over for 2020?

(Aside from the obvious fears and frustrations, I have actually been doing fairly well with the stay-home orders and hope to have a post up soon on the topic of my mental health during this time.)

Hope you have a great weekend! xo

High Five for Friday: May 22

Well, it’s been a wild week around these parts. I don’t think I’ve known what day it was at any point, so it’s a miracle this day-specific post is going up! 😂

One contributing factor to the craziness is that my uncle passed away suddenly last weekend. Even though he’d had serious health problems over the past few years, it was still a shock. My dad and my uncle were very close and golfed together often, so I have a lot of fond memories of the funny things they would say or do on their outings. And my uncle would always get to our house about 40 minutes early, despite my dad always being late for everything. 😂 Funny memories seem to help in times of grief.

Setting that sadness aside, there were still some things that brought the sparkle this week:

(FYI: I make a small commission for purchases or clicks made through links in this post.)

• I finished a book! Like a good English major, I typically never read anymore, but I really wanted to read something during these quarantine times. (If not now, when?) So I read a YA book that I loved in grade school. (I had gotten a bunch of my favorite random ‘80s-’90s YA books off Amazon years ago.) I can’t say that I loved Term Paper as much as I did in sixth grade, but it was still pretty good and a page-turner! I blew through it in a little over a week, which is a miracle because I rarely finish books I start—even if I like them!

• I’ve reached the last challenge in the main storyline of Harvest Moon! …except that that means I have to make friends with TEN villagers so they’ll tell me their wishes. Ugh! How exhausting! The only villagers I had befriended before this were the purple-haired dude I’m trying to marry and the guy with the headband who fixed the bridge and mine cart for me. So now I’m running all over town, delivering herbal tea and seashells and tomato juice to various people, in hopes of making friends. But we’re all still “acquaintances” at this point. 😫 The only ones who are my true friends and have told me their wishes are… the purple haired guy and headband guy. 🤦🏼‍♀️

#whywerefriends

• A bunch of things I had ordered in April finally arrived last week in a two-day span, so I did what any girl would do—FaceTimed my bffl and did an “unboxing” of sorts! 😂 Some of it was not very exciting (like prescriptions that came in the mail), BUT I did get this sweatshirt from Aerie, and it is super-soft inside! (But not in a fleecy way… it’s pretty lightweight.) I really like it but am a bit conflicted that maybe I should have gotten an S instead of an XS. The reviews made it sound like it was quite oversized, so I sized down, but I wish the XS was just a smidge baggier.

• I can’t believe I watched the entirety of The Bachelor Presents: Listen to Your Heart. But Pops loved it even more than I did. On Tuesday, out of nowhere, he was like, “I’m still upset we didn’t get to hear Rudi sing Whitney!” HAHA! True dat. (Luckily, she did sing a bit of it on Instagram the next day.)

• Lastly, I tend to listen to music on YouTube while I work because, that way, I can pick a specific song and then skip like crazy afterward (even though it will usually automatically either play songs in the same genre or play songs that I’ve played recently). Admittedly, most of my choices lately have been in the realm of disco… but literally, every time, YouTube will inevitably start playing “Shake Your Groove Thing.” YT is apparently very invested in me shaking my groove thing regularly! 😂🤷🏼‍♀️🕺🏼

Hope you have a great Memorial Day weekend! (When my mom told me that Monday is Memorial Day, I could.not.believe it.) xo

High Five for Friday: May 15

Hi guys, happy Friday! I’m not really sure what to do with these posts now that literally nothing is going on. But I also like having this space so I can drop in weekly and say hi, so here we are!

How was your week? Mine was actually quite lovely, aside from an anxiety attack on Thursday night. 🙃 Pops has been out of the house a lot this week, and as much as I love Pops, having some alone time after two months of 24/7 togetherness has been MAGICAL AND MINDBLOWING. And all I’m doing is working and playing Harvest Moon, haha. (Although EXCITING HM NEWS: I got a new lamb and actually gave it a creative name: BaaBaa O’Riley! 😂) Oh, and I went on a few walks and saw some pretty flowers! My mom and Kristin’s mom unknowingly tag-teamed and convinced me to get one of those apps that can identify plants. (They’re usually my go-to plant people, but I’ve been stumping them lately.) So I might actually be able to identify the flowers/plants I post about now! Like, this is spiraea. Who knew?!

At least I knew this was a rhododendron. (Okay, or azalea. One of the two!)

How was your week? Hope it had some sparkle, and I hope you have a great weekend! xoxo

High Five for Friday: May 8

Well, this was a strange week, even for this strange time! Let’s see what brought the sparkle:

• Not this first thing, but it did color the week. Two people that I know died. Now, I hadn’t talked to either one in years, nor was I ever really close with them, but their deaths still hit me hard. Perhaps because, in both cases, I know a lot of their family members and feel for them and wish I could share my condolences in person. Having just gone through this with Kristin—and having the heartbreak of that loss still very much a part of my daily life—it’s devastating that other people that have to go through it too. And mind-boggling that the people who died just… aren’t here anymore. That I’ll never hear about them again in the present tense. It just made for an odd, somber week.

• Now that we’re done talking about death, let’s jump to trauma, shall we?! 😂 (This will be more positive, I swear.) In my yoga + trauma writing class this week, we looked at trauma in the context of a character’s journey in a story. That journey starts out on a linear path, with the character thinking that their life is always going to continue as it is now. Buuut then something happens to knock them off-course. That imagery dovetailed perfectly with some things that I’ve been talking about in therapy lately. I know who I was before trauma, and I know who I became afterward, and it feels like I completely lost the person I was before—almost like she died. But this week, I’ve noticed glimpses of the fun and carefree attitude that I had a kid, before anxiety began to rule my life. Is it possible that my “old” self wasn’t totally lost? Maybe I can still access and channel her carefree spirit. ❤️

• Speaking of fun and carefree things (YAY), I have been playing A LOT of Harvest Moon: Animal Parade lately. (Who needs Animal Crossing?!) I’m starting to build up my farm, and I’m an excellent animal namer:

My animals are Chicky, Quacky, Lamby, and Pudge. Inadvertently kinda similar to Ms. Pac-Man’s ghosts (Winky, Pinky, Inky, and Sue)! 😂😂

• I’ve also been enjoying Kalyn Nicholson videos again. (I get on these kicks with YouTubers where I’m super into them and then I just… lose interest.) I love vlogs in general, but gf is the queen of b-roll—all of her videos are gorge.

• Lastly, is anyone else watching The Bachelor: Listen to Your Heart? It is pretty delightful trash, in the great tradition of The Bachelor. I mean, it’s really just a lot of this with the occasional song mixed in:

LOL OK CHRIS

Hope you have a great weekend! xo

High Five for Friday: May 1

IT’S GONNA BE MAY. Oh wait, it is May! How did that happen overnight? What even is time? 🤯

Let’s see what brought the sparkle this week:

• Remember those disinterested cats from last week? I saw them again over the weekend and caught them attempting to, oh, break and enter??

Orangey is for sure the ringleader.

• I also saw these guys on a recentish walk…

And look at them now! 😍 This house has a bunch of gorgeous rhododendrons and azaleas that I just love and creep on every year!

• Remember the yoga + writing class that I’m currently taking? In last Sunday’s class, the writing assignment was to make a mind map for a story, which I don’t think I’ve ever done before (at least not formally), and I LOVED it! I was able to really get into a creative mindset and see so many unexpected and interesting connections! I felt like Aimee and Top Heavy Steve in Sex Education, haha!

• I was running out of hair gel, so I placed a bit of a treat yo’self order at Sephora, and it arrived last weekend. Here are the fun things I picked up! (The purple one is actually sheer, don’t worry! I am a boring lip gal through and through!)

Lilah B. Luxe Lip Oil Mini Duo | Tower 28 ShineOn Jelly Lip Gloss

• Lastly, here’s something funny for you. I’ve been posting my comfy OOTDs over on my Instagram (Come follow along!), and I had a special visitor on Wednesday. EEK! Check out the video in this post for an outtake! 😂😫

View this post on Instagram

Feeling some blue and green today! 💙💚 Also, it’s a miracle I got any decent pictures—swipe to the third pic to see why. 😬😬😬 . . #ootd #outfitoftheday #whatiwore #comfycozy #stayhome #workfromhomefashion #americaneagle #aerie #primark

A post shared by Jess (@jessie_face4) on Apr 29, 2020 at 6:47pm PDT

Hope you’re hanging in there, and have a great weekend! xo