Project Reconnect 2012

I decided NOT to do a list of New Year resolutions for 2012. Instead I have created project for myself…Project Reconnect 2012. I decided that this year I would try my hardest to reconnect with others. Over the past year between my depression and beginning my own business I have lost touch…lost touch with friends and family. But most importantly I’ve lost touch with myself.

This year will be about reconnecting with old friends. Trying to mend fences that were broke down from my lack of attention. Friendships only work when there are two people to work on them…and I have been lacking in my attention. I am not close to my family and over the years my friendships have helped to fill that void for me. But battling depression has made this difficult. It is like I have been a bear in hibernation…instead of me just crawling away to sleep though a season, I have been away for almost a year. I have hidden out and when I do have energy I have given all of that energy to my new business.

But I need more than just a business to make me feel whole. I need confidants. I need people that trust me and that I can trust. I need girlfriends that I can get silly and drunk with. I need friends that accept me as who I am and love me. But I need to reconnect and put more effort into it if I expect to be able to get any of these things back into my life. 

(I have also been lucky to have a few girlfriends that have stuck with me along the way...the deep dark way that is depression. And I am thankful for them. More than words can even begin to express...without their love, support and friendship I could not have made it through the past year. To you gals I love you more than you could ever know. Thank you for being there for me to cry on your shoulders and thank you for helping to pick me up when I fall.)

I also need to reconnect with myself. I need to take more of an active role in living my life. I need to work on me. I will do better at putting myself together more. Taking more pride in my appearance…I truly believe that looking good will help me to feel good about myself. Over the past few weeks I have worked on cleaning out my closet and getting rid of my grubby, slouchy, lounge around clothes. I found myself wearing them day in and day out…and because I was wearing them it was so much easier to just stay at home and lounge around. I didn’t want to go out looking like I rolled out of bed, so it was just another excuse to just stay home and hibernate.

I need to cook more meals at home. Not because I am setting a goal of loosing weight, but because I LOVE to cook at home. It’s something that makes me so very happy. I love creating new dishes to share with friends and neighbors. I love creating delicious sweets that I can bring to work. It is a way to get me back to being me. But I also think that cooking more meals at home will also be a great way to get some much-needed family time. Time for my husband, son and I to sit down together, break bread and talk. Talk and decompress from the day’s stresses. And we can reconnect.

I also will be reading more. I love to read. I love to learn. And I have missed it. I love getting lost in a novel…connecting with characters, letting my imagination get away from me. It is something that I long to do again and I will. But as I said I also love to learn and I will be reading books on things that I want to learn how to do or how to do better.

And I also will take more time to blog and reconnect with my blogging friends. Because I have learned that blog friends are real. Some of the only people that I have managed to not loose over the last year were some amazing blog friends. My girls Laura and Branson have been wonderful about checking in on me and keeping up on what’s going on. And I truly appreciate them for that. But I also want to reconnect with some of the other wonderful women that I have “met” online that I let slide on by because I wasn’t present enough.

But I am back. I will be baking and posting recipes. I will be talking more about my life, my family, my job…my hopes and dreams. And sharing photos along the way. I also will be better about visiting other bloggers and commenting instead of just lurking on their blogs. Its time for me to start joining in on the conversations and stop just standing in the corner observing everyone.

But blogging for me is also a wonderful creative outlet. I LOVE writing and for me blogging is almost like keeping a journal. It’s a way for me to get out what I am feel and thinking and share it with others. It is a way for me to get back to myself…the myself that I love. The one that is happy and outgoing. The me that is fun and loving. And I miss that part of myself. So in 2012 I will be working on reconnecting both with my friends but also with myself.

So here’s to 2012!! And the start of Project Reconnect…

#7 - Thankfulness Challenge

Hi...I am doing a Thankfulness Challenge for the month of November.

If anyone is wanting to join in please do...There isn't any linkup.

Just pull the badge art (at bottom of this post) and put it in your post.
 

#7 - I am thankful for the internet and what it has brought me!

Blogging, Mom websites, Facebook, Twitter...they have all helped me to make some amazing friendships. While some of them are in cyberspace only...others are now friends in real life also. Some of my closest IRL friends are rekindled friendships through Facebook. While others are mom's that I met through websites dedicated to mom's and motherhood.

The internet is an amazing place that really brings people that otherwise would never get to meet together. I have met amazing ladies that help me with photography questions, some that helped me when I was starting my photography business, ones that have encouraged me when I'm feeling down...and I do the same for them! I may never meet these women (and a few men) in person, but I consider them my friends.

iTunes Winner!!

I just pulled the winner for my little giveaway! And the winner is...

Comment #5: At Home With Michelle!!

Congrats Michelle...please make sure to contact me to claim your prize!

 

New blog design, a thank you & a give-away!

I am so excited to finally unveil my new blog design! I have been working with Laura over at Eight Days Design on it and I am absolutely in love with my new look! She did such a great job of creating something that is so very me and it also shows my personality perfectly. If you are looking for something new...definitely check her out!

I also wanted to thank everyone for following and reading my blog. I can't believe how much it has grown over the past few months and just this week I tipped over into the 200 followers realm. I was so completely surprised and excited to see that happen...I just wanted to say "Thank You" to all of my followers and readers. You make me so very happy with all of your comments and kind words on my posts and recipes. It makes the time that I spend on here worth every minute. I originally started my blog as a way to keep in touch with my family all over the country and I never thought that anyone else would care about what I have to say or do.

With that said...onto my give-away!

As a way to say "Thank You" to you, I wanted to offer up a $15 iTunes gift card as a gift to my readers. 

There are three ways that you can enter, giving you more chances to win!:

1) Leave a comment on this post. Tell me anything...a little tidbit about you, about my new blog design, tell me that you love me.  Really, anything...just make sure to leave a comment.

2) Follow my blog & leave a comment letting me know that you are a follower of my blog. If you already follow me, just leave a comment stating that.

3) Follow me on Twitter and give me a shout out to tell me that you are there. There is a link to twitter on the left sidebar. Once you have done that, leave me a comment to tell me that you follow me on Twitter.

The contest will end at 8pm Arizona time on Sunday, April 17th and I will pick a person at random! Make sure that you leave a way for me to contact you, as I will email you if you won. Good luck!

Meet Me On Monday

So I am trying something different today! I came across a post on another blog that is a weekly blog hop called "Meet Me on Monday." It's just a little fun activity to answer questions about myself. So here I go!

This week's questions:

1.  What is your favorite way to eat chicken?
2.  Have you decorated for Christmas yet?
3.  What is your favorite article of clothing?
4.  Do you pay your bills online or write checks the old way?
5.  Do you make Christmas cookies?


1) What is your favorite way to eat chicken?

My favorite way to each chicken is fried. I LOVE good, homemade fried chicken. Now, I don't have it very often because it is so very bad for you...but it is so very yummy!


2) Have you decorated for Christmas yet?

Yep! But I am still in the process of getting everything up. The tree is up, the nativity scene is up and some other things inside, but I still find myself doing a little more everyday. My hubby has gotten the lights up that go on the house, but he is still working on the other lights that go outside.


3) What is your favorite article of clothing?

Definitely my lounge around the house yoga pants. They are holy and way too big...but they are so wonderfully comfy! And while I may never (or actually SHOULD never) wear them out of the house they are by far my most favorite item of clothing!

4) Do you pay your bills online or write checks the old way?

I always pay bills online! It is so much quicker and easier than having to write out a check, put a stamp on it and then drive to the post office.

5) Do you make Christmas cookies? 

Heck yes! I love to bake and the holiday season is just another reason to hit the kitchen and bake up a storm. I also always make baskets of Christmas cookies for my neighbors as gifts during this time of year and I can't wait to try out some new recipes that I have been collecting! Looking for a recipe to try out for Christmas? Check out my eggnog cookies...they are delish and absolutely perfect for Christmas!!

 

Poor Neglected Blog & A Link to a Giveaway!

Sorry I have neglected my poor blog this week, but I have just been busy enjoying and living my life! Nothing super big going on, just loving in my little boy, reading books, catching up on my DVR (ps. I think the DVR is one of the best inventions in history!), spending time with my hubby and and just trying to get through this last little bit of summer. I think everyone in Arizona gets this way at the end of summer...a little lazy and sluggish and daydreaming about being able to get outside again without melting.

Photo from Fresh Cut Flours

New Blog and a Giveaway!
My good friend Melissa's mom just started a new blog. It's called Fresh Cut Flours and it is for her amazing sugar cookies. (Isn't that just a great name for a cookie blog?) Make sure to visit it and enter her drawing for 1 dozen of her absolutely beautifully decorated cookies! I promise you that if you win, you won't be disappointed...her cookies are not only a work of art to look at, but taste amazing! (I know personally how good they are...I think I have eaten a few too many myself, and my hubby is absolutely addicted to them!)

New Recipe Coming Soon!
Lastly, this afternoon I have been baking some banana bread (with some extra special help from my little one) and I hope to have a recipe for it up soon. It's a new recipe for me and I am crossing my fingers that it tastes as good as it smells!

A new {creative} endeavor

So I finally took the plunge and decided to put myself and my work out for the world to see…I started a second blog that is for showcasing me: Jen Schell Designs.

It is a blog dedicated to my love of graphic design, photography, décor, crafting and pretty much anything creative. I have wanted to do this for quite sometime, but I have been so nervous about it. It’s one thing to do my graphic design work on a small scale, doing little ads and production work, or to take photos that I show to a handful of people…but it is entirely something different to put my creative ideas and my personal work out in the world where people can comment on them and critique me. It also feels so different to begin to promote and market myself. But, I am ready to finally begin trying to get some freelance work and I feel that this blog is a good way to start working towards that.

While I might act full of confidence and bravado, deep down I just want everyone to like me and what I do. I know that not all of what I do is to everyone’s taste and there will be people that do not like what I put out there. But I have decided to just do it and take the good with the bad, and I will grow creatively from the feedback that I will get.

Along with putting my own work on the blog, I also will be posting things that I feel are inspiring to me. Anything is game…home décor, new authors, great songs, imaginative logos, amazing photographers and graphic designers. I also want to show what helps me to be me and hopefully to also inspire anyone that reads my blog to be creative also.

So I hope that you will follow along and support me on this new venture…it’s a little daunting and scary, but I’m pretty excited about it!

Welcome!

I am so excited to begin my new blog. I know that not many people will follow this or care what I have to say, but it will be great to have a place for me to share what is going on in my life, my feelings about things, musings about life and some great photos of me, my friends and family! Welcome to anyone and everyone!