Coffee Much

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I used to be that person that would pride myself on the fact that I wasn’t a big coffee drinker. WELP! This little stubborn soul has to admit….my boyfriend’s gotten me obsessed with coffee!!!

The only thing is….. when I lived in Arizona I LOVED DUTCH BROS!!! LIKE LOVE IT SO MUCH THAT WHENEVER I GO TO ARIZONA THATS MY ONLY REQUEST LOL. Here’s the thing, Dutch Bros. Is basically sugar coffee, my kind of coffee!

My boyfriend’s kind of coffee is not sugary at all. So we compromise ( more like he gives in) I’m that girl who will ask for extra pumps of syrup( Okay, okay I have my boyfriend ask for more pumps lol), I want my coffee to not taste like coffee. I mean have you tried Dutch Bros’ The Kicker, that is my kind of coffee! It’s literally screaming my name.

As for all the sugar, if you guessed I’m bouncing off the walls, Congrats! You are correct! LOL Good Luck putting up with me! When I eventually crash you will be praising Jesus for it.

It’s funny how everyone has different coffee tastes. I’m definitely no coffee connoisseur, I’ll drink any coffee as long as it doesn’t taste like coffee….ironic right? As I’ve gotten older, I realize I’m starting to rely on coffee in the mornings. I usually wake up at 5am and run 3-4 miles, but sometimes I sleep in until 6am since I work at 7am and it doesn’t take me long to get ready for work. So I drink coffee maybe once a week on weekdays but weekends for some silly reason, I drink iced vanilla lattes all the time; at least before 10am, sometimes before 12pm because I don’t have work.

There’s just something about the smell of coffee brewing in the morning. It’s not like an energy drink, it doesn’t work right away like BAM I’m awake. It settles in your tummy and warms your insides.  The one thing that sucks about drinking coffee, at least for me is that I can’t drink it past 10am or I’ll be up all night. I don’t get how people can drink it at 2pm and still be able to fall asleep? LIKE SHARE YOUR SECRET WITH ME PLEASE!

I am not a coffee connoisseur because I don’t drink coffee daily, thanks to my boyfriend it has become a weekly thing even a couple of times a week thing ( occasionally, if I am extremely tired) but I’m still not fully relying on it to wake me up. I don’t know how my aunts can easily drink several Starbucks Coffees a day, maybe it’s because they’re nurses. I honestly don’t know but man how do your stomaches handle it?

Last week I bought a ready-made cold brew coffee drink from Target and within half an hour of drinking it my stomach was not happy. That particular coffee drink didn’t sit well with me and I honestly thought something was wrong with my stomache. LOL All it took was a bathroom break and I was A OKAY. ( I know, I know sorry for the TMI…but I mean it’s coffee)

I’m hoping I never get to the point where I do a coffee overload, my mom said back in the day when she was working full-time during the day and going to night school…she literally lived on coffee….coffee, ramen and Twinkies ( I can thank her for genetics) But that over time, her stomach couldn’t handle coffee so she switched to tea. I don’t know how I would feel about that. I mean I always want an ice vanilla latte on weekends. I cannot live without those. LOL

At least for now I’m good with coffee, I don’t drink too much or too little; it’s just enough at least for me.

SO YAY FOR COFFEE!!!!!

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Stress Cleaning

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Has anyone ever developed a habit? Whether it’s good or bad you’ve developed it over time. You can’t explain how it happened but that it just did.

One thing that I developed in college was stress cleaning. Yes, I’ll repeat it. I clean when I’m stressed out. Out of everything I could do like I don’t know :stress eat, stress sleep, stress shop; instead I’ll start cleaning. It doesn’t matter if it’s 10pm or 10am if I’m stressed I’m going to clean something.

It was a habit that I formed in college, I don’t ever remember stress cleaning in high school. Maybe it’s because high school wasn’t bad compared to college. I’m not entirely sure but it’s one of my weird habits.

It has been a benefit to my roommates in the past. It worked out well because I usually roomed with someone that stressed baked. I stress clean; she stress bakes. It’s a perfectly simpatico relationship.

Not only would I clean the kitchen but if I was in my room…..I’d start cleaning everything from my dresser to my closet to the bedsheets.

Clorox kitchen wipes became my best friend. I love dusters they’re so useful. Lol I hate how dust just piles up even after dusting. Like where does it all come from? Like am I really that messy? I don’t get it!

I even got into using healthy alternatives such as a vinegar and water mix to clean the bathroom and kitchen or Dr. Bronner’s Pure Castillo Soap! It’s like God sent, you can use it for laundry, cleaning the kitchen to even using it as shampoo! Like hello, ya girl over here likes saving the moneys sooo yaaa that stuff is awesome!

I’m 100% positive that stress cleaning is therapeutic for me. LOL I literally feel so much better after cleaning and clearing things. It’s almost like I’m compartmentalizing stuff….ya know, like now that I’ve cleaned this room…life is so much better but at the same time I’m avoiding what’s actually stressing me out.

So in a sense there’s some good and bad to this random habit. For one thing, it helps me keep things clean and tidy all the time….but on the other hand it’s a mechanism I use to avoid the actual issue that’s stressing me out.

We all have our funny little habits that make us who we are. I’ll probably continue to stress clean and it will probably benefit my boyfriend when he gets his own place. Hopefully he doesn’t get an apartment with carpet lol because I for sure will be stressing vacuuming the crap out of it. LOL

Here’s to owning up to my stressing cleaning ways may your habit benefit you as mine does for me…not all the time but most of the time.

Oh my Keto

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Soo when the new Tomb Raider came out, I fangirled over Lara Croft, the Alicia Vikander version. She’s petite like me so of course I wanted muscles like hers!

Fast forward to me going on the Keto Diet because well I wanted to be badass like Lara Croft….yaaa it’s been a struggle.

Last time I posted about the Keto diet, I was not in a relationship sooo I had more time to look at what I was eating to follow the Keto diet. Funny thing is well dating….you eat out a lot and well I was slowly going downhill with the strict diet.

Oh my oh my…right? Uhhhh inner me is upset that I didn’t stick to the diet for that long. But hey! I can get back into the rhythm of things! My problem is now I need to meal prep to help better my chances of getting back into the routine.

Granted I won’t be in a very strict Keto diet since I do run and I’m slowly getting back into lifting weights ( baby weights right now….I need to take baby steps)

Since I work longer hours now, it’s hard to make meals for the Keto diet. I really need to go to the market! Lol so I’ve pretty much just been eating whatever my dad makes which is definitely not Keto friendly at all. LOL

To think I have a whole Pinterest board dedicated to the Keto diet! I’ve been planning to make all the recipes I pinned and I hope I actually get to! Maybe once everything settles down in my life I will, but for right now I’m taking baby steps getting back into the swing of things.

Oh well! I’ll be back on my Keto diet by the end of the year hopefully! Unless the holidays mess it up again. LOL we will see.

Fantasy Feeding

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My friends came up with a term a couple of years ago, I honestly don’t know if they made it up but it’s called “fantasy feeding.” According to them I’m a big “fantasy feeder” which is completely accurate, I might even be the queen of it out of all my friends.

Fantasy Feeding is basically jumping the gun on relationships( your own relationship and/or your friends lol) like when my friend starts dating a guy I’m usually the one that asks if I can be a bridesmaid right away, even though they haven’t even been dating that long.

That’s an example of what we mean by “Fantasy Feeding” I pretty much start planning their futures and mine…….in a sense we all do.

It’s normal to want to know your future or at least have an idea of how your future is supposed to be. Instead the future ends up being an unknown, life takes unexpected turns and always keeps you on your toes.

A couple of years ago I “fantasy fed” a little too much about one of my friendships. You see we both liked one another and everyone knew. Me being me, little miss “fantasy feeder” I could see us dating and see a whole future. Basically I could picture myself spending the rest of my life with him. Well, all I can say is it’s better living in the moment than living in the future.

As it turned out, he wasn’t ready to date. Hearing “I just want to be friends right now” was not what I had anticipated. I did not handle that well it was like “ARE YOU KIDDING ME RIGHT NOW? WHAT WAS THE POINT OF TELLING ME YOU LIKE ME IF YOU WERE JUST GOING TO FRIEND ZONE ME?”

So our friendship took a break. I spent two days sitting on the couch watching chick flicks like Disney’s live-action Cinderella. It sucked. I sat there replaying over and over in my head how it could have ended differently.

How we could have been together but alas I had to settle for being just friends.

You see I did what a good majority of us do. Instead of living in the present…I started living in the future, planning the future.

I think we can all agree on that….we do sometimes “fantasy feed” we do sometimes get it into our heads of how it’s supposed to be. And the truth is, it doesn’t always turn out the way you plan.

As soon I realized that I indeed wasn’t living in the present but instead too busy planning my future. I took a step back. As for my friend and I, I’m happy to say we are still friends.

After that incident I started living in the present. I moved on. I still “fantasy feed” but not as much as I once did. Every once in a while I will freak out over a friends new relationship and bug her if I can be her bridesmaid ( I’m sorry I can’t help it, I love love!)

But I’ve opened my eyes and realized that it’s so much better living in the present. Unexpected things happen. Life takes you on crazy adventures you would never even fathom.

I “fantasy feed” and I might always “fantasy feed” I have had some crazy fun memories and I’ve had some painful ones but it hasn’t kept me from giving up completely on “fantasy feeding.”

We all think we know what love is supposed to be like. We all think it’s a certain way and it can only happen at the right time, but love just happens. It stops for no one.

I “fantasy feed” because I want my friends to be happy. I want them to find love but also I grew up watching chick flick and Disney Princess movies that tell you how it’s supposed to be. But in reality life isn’t perfect. Love is complicated not simple.

I know one day, I’ll give up “fantasy feeding” most likely when all my friends are happily married. But as for now, I’ll still be “fantasy feeding.”

Semi- Minimalist

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A while ago I talked about becoming a minimalist; at least my definition of it.

I am proud to say that I AM GETTING THERE!!!! 🙂 lol

I have not only put half of my closet on Poshmark and donated some. I have taken another step and started getting rid of books! For anyone out there that is also a bookworm; I feel ya. I love the smell of books. I don’t know why but there is something so satisfying with opening a brand new book or even an old one and just smelling that book smell. I love it.

SO I MADE HUGE STEPS!

I got rid of over a dozen books and even cds and DVDs cuz let’s be real I don’t listen to them anymore and I mainly use my Bf’s Netflix account anyways.

It just feels so nice accomplishing little goals, granted my closet is still jam-packed with clothes I’m selling on Poshmark but every time someone buys stuff I get a tad bit excited that one day when I open my closet door, it will be clear and clean!

I have become unattached to pieces of clothing. It’s like a fresh of breath air. Yet, there are times I falter; like when I get a great deal on Poshmark….I buy things…not often but I can’t let go of a great deal! ( I’m only human after all!)

This has honestly taken almost two years to do. At first it was just a thought. Then a discussion with my best friend. Until FINALLY I put my big girl pants on and decided to attempt to clear out my closet.

It took me roughly 8 months to actually take action on what I said I would do. Why? I didn’t know where to start! At the time I was so overwhelmed with all the stuff I owned that I had no idea where to begin.

A little advice….start with clothes lol always start with your clothes.

Why? Well, for me personally starting on clothes was the hardest thing to do because I get emotionally attached to clothing. I’m not even kidding if my friend gave me a sweater even though I rarely wear it…I keep it for sentimental reasons. Yet, it just takes up space in my closet. So I started on the one thing I had the hardest time getting rid of…my clothes!

Advice I’m always told that you should do the thing you least like first and welp this was that one thing for me.

So in a sense it worked out pretty darn well for me, but patience is a virtue and it didn’t happen with a snap of my fingers.

I really had to just pile things in the giveaway pile and the Poshmark pile and not second guess myself.

I had to be okay with spending time getting rid of stuff. I spent several hours during the weekend and an hour or two after work on weekdays deciding what to keep and what to lose.

In a way it’s therapeutic. Out with the old and in with the new! If you’re attempting to be a minimalist or even a semi- minimalist like me good luck and find out what works best with you.

I’ll check back in sometime soon and hopefully by then my closet is cleaner! Fingers crossed!

More than just a Runner

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One of my passions has always been running..it has helped me get to where I am now. It has helped shape the person that I am. It wasn’t always easy and definitely not always fun (especially the college days)  I fell in love with running because it was my social life and it was my stress reliver. But things change and we evolve.

By the time I was 18 that changed, I went to college, had new teammates and a new coach….suddenly I was constantly in trouble: from the way I ate to my bubbly personality was a problem. I was no longer allowed to be me; but instead a robot. I felt like I was in the military. We needed to dress the same at practice, never smile, and never talk. We were scrutinized on how we ate and how we looked, to the point that being unhealthy received praises.

Running has always been a part of my life and always will be; but college changed it all for me. I used to love competitvely running but as soon as I got to college it was a different story…constantly being told you are replaceable and never good enough dug deep and turned my confidence into concern. I was surrounded by negativitity, my once love of staying all day at cross country meets and track meets turned into I could spend my time doing something more with my life.

Running was a risk I took in high school that gave me an abundance of opportunity but as I have gotten older the truth is I love running but not the same as I once did in high school. I always loved track more than cross country when I was younger but now  I like road races more, I like running in nature, I like doing things on my own terms and my own time.

Running has opened the door for me to take risks. It has helped me continue to take many risks and sometimes I fail but I always get back up because running taught me that. If it wasn’t for running I wouldn’t have taken the risk of moving to a different state and giving another college team a chance to change my mind about collegiate coaches/teammates.  I wouldn’t have risked moving back home and into the unknown if I hadn’t taken a chance on running. I wouldn’t have taken a risk starting up a blog and a YouTube channel if I hadn’t taken a chance on running.

The truth is running turned into one of the best things in my life.

It opened doors I dreamed about as a little girl; yes, I got to go to my dream school and represent it. Was it what I anticipated? No, it was a horrible experience but it was a life experience that taught me that it doesn’t matter what people think of you and say to you. What matters the most is how you see yourself.

It took me several years to get what those coaches told me out of my head and the funny thing is neither one of them are in my lives to this day and by the grace of God never will be in my life again. I am grateful for all the verbal put downs because it taught me that bad times are only temporary and that you are a hell of a lot stronger than you thought. It prepared me for the ups and downs of life. It taught me to be calm during storms in my life and it taught me that no matter what happens to continue to perservere. It taught me that I deserved better, I deserved to be surrounded by positive people who truly care about me. It taught me that I have a voice and I matter.

Running has inevitably taken a back seat in my life, it is no longer in the drivers seat. I don’t freak out over how many miles I run a week, I go based on how I feel and how it makes me feel. I no longer compare myself to other runners, to be honest I stopped following a ton of runners on social media for the sake of my mental health.

I rarely run with people who only care to talk about running because I have evolved I want to talk about more than just running because I am more than just a runner. I have other interests besides running,  I have a full time job while having two part time jobs that I consider my hobbies and running is my me time, my stress reliever, my inner peace.

I am proud to say I love running and that I am a runner but I am so much more than just a runner and I am becoming the person I am meant to be.

Of course with the help of running opening doors and even opening my eyes to the possibility. So always believe in yourself even if at times it is hard. You have to power to change your future and look at every setback as a lesson, look at every heart break as a blessing in disguise, just like the name of my blog I still believe that everything truly does happen for a reason.

It Takes Two

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In my quest to become more of a minimalist….which has taken over a year. ( I know….it’s  trial and error over here figuring out what works best with me…everyone is different) I am not the type of person that can look at clothes and throw it away just like that. I have emotional attachments to things….you can ask my boyfriend (LOL) I named my car Barry  ( for Blueberry LOL) and he is slowly dying but I don’t want to give him up…..and I won’t until he is completely dead.  We’ve had a ton of memories.

So I have had to get the help of my boyfriend who quite frankly is a minimalist. Literally before we started dating I had no idea that he is a minimalist. I really didn’t think I had a huge problem with stuff until I saw his closet and his room. Granted women tend to have more stuff…..because well guys don’t generally wear dresses…at least not as much as me, nor do they typically wear bras but……this is a learning process and unfortunately it’s been a slow learning process for me.

I figured I need someone to keep me accountable…like for reals…..I used to be that person that literally went on Instagram to online shop. It became a big problem. Since my boyfriend has been helping me…..I actually have gotten better. One of my favorite online clothing stores was actually have a huge blow out sale because they are moving warehouses sooooo EVERYTHING was like $14.99. It is a girls dream!!! And yes, I added a ton of clothes to my cart but I told myself to not buy them…to wait on it and thanks to other women….most of the things I wanted were out of stock when I checked my cart back an hour later. So YAY!! It’s the small victories guys!

To speed the process my boyfriend has even agreed to raid my closet of all the clothes and stuff I should get rid of.  I am putting things in piles to sell on Poshmark and piles to donate to Goodwill. So far…… I have a couple of books to donate to Goodwill and I have a ton of boxes that I can put stuff in.

My only concern currently is that my boyfriend and I will argue over what clothes to let go and what clothes to keep. I currently have 25 dresses….which is (for me) a big deal because I am that girl who owns a ton of dresses. LITERALLY, a year ago I had over 60 dresses. It was bad. So this is a fresh of breath air, unfortunately I also have a ton of running clothes and shirts…..those have been surprisingly much harder to get rid of but my boyfriend is brutally honest on clothes he thinks is ugly so this shouldn’t be too bad.

Let’s hope by next week my closet will be clean and spacious. I am actually sitting here getting super excited about it. ( I know it’s kind of lame but hey it’s the little things remember) 

For me…. It’s gonna take two of us to help me become a minimalist. Fingers crossed that it works out for the best.