31 years ago today ...

I was born in Connecticut, where i then lived for 17 years before heading off to college in Vermont.

I have so many goals for this decade of life.

I don't know if they'll happen; we can only plan so far ahead, I've learned.

Maybe these:

marriage
motherhood
learn guitar
write and publish a book
learn to ride a horse
home ownership
a real vacation
travel abroad, either for work or adventure
a year off from working at all
more challenging sewing and knitting projects
my own garden
move back to New England? (pulling hard for Vermont!) but i don't know ... i also truly love it here in Kentucky
daily yoga practice/maybe become a yoga teacher
daily meditation
become a better blogger and photographer

for now, i'm happy to be working in a career i love (if you're new to my blog, i'm a first-year AMI trained montessori primary teacher, with 3-6 year olds in my class), in the great midwestern/southern town of Louisville.

i was thinking today, yet again, how much my life has changed since i started this blog back in march of 2008. i was desperately seeking "another way" to live. i found it here, i'm slowly crafting my own version of life and not some corporation's/advertiser's/politician's. i'm not following the majority.

there are so many more steps i want to take, that i feel like i've only made baby strides so far. but that's just not true. what i'm most proud of, is that since that day i started the blog at age 28, i've done the following:

grew a basil and a chard plant for one season
started cooking from scratch
moved from a vegetarian to a 98 percent vegan diet
became a yoga regular
got rid of my television, and much of my clothes and furniture. stopped caring about whether or not i lived in a "hip" neighborhood and settled for renting a nice house in a quiet neighborhood with space in back for a garden (hopefully this spring!) and cheap rent, allowing me to soon save money and build up an emergency fund
committed to paying off my credit card debt for good using the dave ramsey snowball method
stopped buying so many useless gifts from big-name shops for people, and pared it down to locally-produced, fair-trade, handmade items
learned very basic knitting and sewing skills
began using the public library again for the first time since (gasp!) childhood


that is a lot of progress for just under three years, right?

i read so many of your blogs that share the common themes i've become so interested in -- growing food, raising children in a nurturing, imaginative, creative home environment, beautiful and inspiring photos, finding beauty in the simplicity of everyday life, whether it's a hand-stitched tea towel, a warm cup of coffee on a porch, a vintage flea market find, knitting and sewing projects -- and they keep me inspired on a journey that's hopefully starting to look similar. not in a keeping-up-with-the-jones' way, but in a way that holds the way i want to live up to me like a mirror, keeping me honest to myself and reflecting all the light there is too see.

happy birthday to me, an old soul to be sure.