Good Angles Only in 2017

the picture to end all pictures. this was the last selfie i took in 2016 and i think it's my best one yet. but seriously, who randomly finds a bunch of these in their camera roll? just me? okay. fine. get out. 

It's 2017, bitches! (Sorry mom and dad. Sorry all of my other friends.)

You might be thinking this will be one of those year in review blog posts, but nah. It won't be. I just thought I'd share some random thoughts that I'm probably gonna try to ponder more in 2017. THESE ARE NOT RESOLUTIONS. Always strive to be better and stuff your face with pizza when you can't. Stuff your face with pizza anyway.

Here's my best nine or whatever the heck they are calling it on Instagram. Does anyone really care about these? Speak now and tell me why. They were kind of hard for me to see, and mine was a little disappointing. It made me realize that I post WAY too many things about Tyler like he's my chubby baby straight out of the womb. Weird analogy. Mommy issues, I guess.

But hey, as the captions say, thanks for liking my pictures. Even though some of you totally don't. I know who you are. You are fake friends. The fakest. FAKE. You know what else is fake? The top middle photo, I TOTALLY blurred some blemishes on that masterpiece. Sue me. Also, I'm sorry for calling you fake for not liking my pictures. I DIDN'T MEAN IT. I PROMISE. Too many caps in this post already.

What else, what else?

Oh, here's a mini review on my S'well Bottle. Are you ready? Here we go.

Get one. That's all. Just get one. They are worth the hype. ALL the hype. They are worth it and I have reached my water goals for the day and I think my skin is better for it, and I'm not putting that all on this bottle, because I have been trying a new face wash, but I know water helps. So yeah, get one. Get the 17 oz. if you don't want to carry a massive 25 oz one around. Which, I did find out is supposed to be for party drinks. Who knew?

You know what else is worth the hype? The matte black iPhone 7 plus. It's a thing of beauty, but it's a TOOL, don't worry mom, I remember that all my technology is a tool. Not a best friend that I can't stop looking at. Right? Right. Heh...I'm in love with my phone.

help.

TWO MORE THINGS THAT I'M IN LOVE WITH AND THEN I'LL STOP AND SAY SOMETHING INSPIRATIONAL. OR NOT. 

Baby Groot...or growing groot or just the best groot of all time groot. Best stocking stuffer. 

Game of Thrones coloring book. Super addicting. Super helpful when I'm sad that I can't watch the upcoming new season right now. 

Now for some finals thoughts about my life in 2016 that I've been thinking about. Oh no...are we slowing transitioning into a year in review post? I'll make it quick and painless and not too cheesy. No promises though.

2016 was a hard year for me. It was a beautiful year as I looked back on it and all the photos and moments I captured, but it was a hard year. Not the worst year of my life, but one with a lot of growing pains.

It was a year where I was supposed to develop more self-love and body positivity within myself, and I've been talking about this ever since I started this blog, and I've gone through hills and valleys and I didn't this year. And it's hard and it hurts. But I'm working on it. I just want to like my face and my hips and my stretch marks and the little pudge of fat on my stomach and the extra pounds i've gained. But I want to always be healthy and do healthy things. And I try, but this year I really got down on myself.

It was a year where I really had to determine my relationship with God. He is a caring and merciful person, but sometimes my fellow believers get me down. You could say this was the year I put too much faith in people and not in Him. I'm working on this too. I'm grateful for my calling which keeps me going.

This is already too long, but I just want to say thank you to everyone who has stuck by me and been friends with me through all my weird rantings and ramblings at work and when  we hang out. Thanks for liking my tweets.

Thanks for listening. Thanks for sticking with me. Really though. Thanks for loving me. Thanks for laughing at my stupid jokes. Thanks for loving a different Dani. Change isn't so bad right? Yes, it can hurt, but I'm discovering myself. And I'm discovering things that make me mad, sad and happy. I'm creating a voice for myself and I like it. Here's to new voices and new self discoveries. Here's to listening to cool music and watching amazing movies (La La Land and Lion BLEW MY MIND this past break). Here's to more of everything good. Here's to strong female voices of confidence, laughter and wisdom. Here's to overall more goodness in all of us.

HERE'S TO ME AND TYLER IN THIS PIC.

Here's to a mini cactus break:

And now for my best tweet of 2016. 

I think that's all for now. Feel free to listen to Fast Car while reading this or Landslide. Either one works. Idk, you don't have to, those were just the two songs playing while I wrote this so it sounded appropriate. Here's to you fine reader. Have a great day tomorrow. It's gonna be a cold one. 

turtlenecks

i know, i know...eyebrows STILL struggling. i have a heavy hand and i know how to use it. but look at dat half smile though. and the beauty blender foundation. and that eyeliner wing. am i getting carried away? yes...yes I am. 

#RealTalk for a second here, I have always been a little self-conscious about my chin and round face. It's a shame, really, because I inherited my chin from my beautiful mom and grandma who both are my greatest role models and inspirations and girl crushes. How could I not dig my chin that came straight from the genes of the two best women on the planet? It's a mystery and it's one of those things that comes with being human. Is there a person out there that's not self-conscious about something? I wish I could make that go away because it's the worst and it keeps you from trying new things...like turtlenecks. My insecurity about my chin made me stay away from turtlenecks. UNTIL TODAY AND UNTIL I GOT MY COOL NEW HAIRCUT.

Inserting pic of haircut here:

JK then that would be two pictures of my face, and you can KINDA see the haircut above. Just look. Yeah...look straight into my big, brown eyes. Did we have a connection? I hope so. Did you notice that my inner corner shadow isn't blended. I hope not.

Anyway, so I got that haircut and I immediately thought, turtlenecks. This haircut would look super rad with a turtleneck. But then I also thought, but my chin. MY CHIN! My chin won't look good with a turtleneck. Well after seeing many of my cute friends in turtlenecks and perusing the online store called Janice/Jake/Jay/Jeffree/Jackson/Jean Period Crew I found one that I like. What does J.Crew stand for you guys? Someone tell me. And you can kinda see it in this picture.

And believe it or not, I LOVE it. I love, love, love it.

I am a convert to turtlenecks. I have a testimony of turtlenecks. Man Repeller was the missionary preaching turtlenecks and I was the investigator and I have been converted and I have also turned this into one of those mormon analogies that we are friggin good at. Would you look at that?

Here are a few reasons why I like turtlenecks now:

My chin doesn't look huge in them, and let me just say that i don't think my chin looks huge in anything...I think that's straight up my brain being a loser and making me see that. I am accepting my chin in turtlenecks and that's pretty awesome. MORE SELF LOVE. MORE TURTLENECKS. MORE STEVIE NICKS (she just came on while i was writing this.)

They keep you extra warm and cozy.

The one I'm wearing is oversized so you can eat lots of tacos in it.

They look great with haircuts that are to your chin.

And since I've only spent one day with this shirt, I'm sure there are more reasons why I'll love it but that's for another blog post. Not really, I'm not writing another one of these about turtlenecks.

So if you're still reading this and you're thinking...man I better try one of these things...here are a few links to get you started. Don't expect one for Christmas though, shipping will make that impossible for you. Afterwards though, then we can have a Turtleneck party.

How many times have I said turtleneck in this post? If you guess the right number, I will give you a free snapchat telling you how cool you are.

Now to the links:

The one I'm wearing. (I apologize in advance, it's only available in large and XL. Suckers, I wear those two sizes. ALL the turtlenecks for ME).

A classic, semi-fitted one to wear to church, you know the place where you make all of those analogies.

And finally, an outrageously expensive one that wouldn't look good on anyone except for Leandra Medine and the model in the picture. JK YOU CAN WEAR WHATEVER YOU WANT BECAUSE YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL AND YOU ARE WORTH IT AND YOU ARE A STAR.

So what do you think? Do ya think turtlenecks will still be a thing next month? Hopefully, because I just blew my whole life's savings on them.

P.S. I said turtleneck 18 times in this blog post.

whoa hey, who the heck are you?

This is me. This is how I look. Below I will claim that my eyebrow game has improved and this picture says the opposite. Just ignore that. Also, same glasses. Same face. Cool new sweater. Awesome bunk beds behind me. Total upgrade. I've made it in life I have bunkbeds. Are you still reading? Glad to have you here.

Well, well, well, how the mighty have fallen back to their old ways. What am I even talking about? I was never mighty. (Laugh here at my self-deprecation.) Laugh now.

So what, give me a break. Like a kit kat or a cruise to the Caribbean. I'll take both.

How's it going? I'm fine. Let me just update you a little bit about little old me.

First things first, my eyebrow game has seriously improved.

Second things second, still got body issues. Still got some church issues.

Third things third, I'm in a lot better place though (LIKE A LOT BETTER, MOM!), so progress.

Enough of that number shiz, I'm really into snapchat. So not into Instagram stories. Because that's really important for you to know.

Still probs not into blogs that much, but I figure I need a creative outlet, because I got serious, and I mean SERIOUS post-holiday blues. Man, it's the woooooo-orst.

Hmmm...what else? Oh I'm currently trying to curate the best christmas music playlist in the world. It's a work in progress, but it's going to be a beautiful masterpiece. You can't really have a lot of repeats. You can't have too much cerebral progressivey stuff, and you def can't have too many cheesy and dramatic "Mary Did You Knows" you need just the right amount of classy old-timey songs straight from Bing's blessed mouth to get a good playlist going, and I'm working on it. You have to work on it, sometimes a song will come up and you gotta remove it because it's just not working that time, but then you miss it and have to add it again. Anyway, what was I talking about? Seriously can't remember.

Hillary lost the election. That was a big bummer. Can't talk about it anymore. Just had to mention it.

Oh and since Trump is going to be the president for the next whoever knows how long, I need to switch over to Wordpress. The two aren't relevant to each other, but maybe it's time to make good changes in my life. I say I'll make the switch, but who knows when I ever will. My ability to keep blog promises is loooooow and slow like a crock pot sunday dinner.

I'm also thinking of trying turtle necks. They seem so cool and every girl at Man Repeller wears them, and I think I can make it work.

So if you want, you can read along with me as I try turtle necks and talk about lame stuff or christmas presents which aren't weird OR LAME!

Who knows, tomorrow I might feel completely opposite of what I do now because I'm feeling post-holiday blues and this whole revitalization of a blog will be yesterday's Tasty video.

Ok, I think that's all. I'm trying to think of cute, yet minimal ways to decorate for Christmas so if you got any, lemme know.

Alright, now that's all. That's all. Stay gold!

currently

I love these types of blog posts. They are easy to write and just plain fun because you get to share all those little details about yourself that probably no one cares about but you want to do it anyway. That's what blogging is all about, right? Talking about things that people really love or talking about things that are totally pointless and that only you care about. This is one of those posts.

So I'm currently...

Listening // Fleetwood Mac's Rumours and ABBA's Gold. For Valentine's day Tyler got me a record player and the vinyls of both. He did a marvelous job. I'm obsessed.

Reading // Modern Romance by Aziz Ansari. It's taking me awhile but it's so interesting and not what I expected. Oh, and it's funny. I love funny books written by funny people.

Working // at Wallaroo Media. Full time. It's so different and I can't believe I've started this phase of my life. However, I enjoy it despite the feelings of stress and self-doubt I feel on a day to day basis. Any tips on how to be a mentally healthier human are always appreciated on this part of the internet.

Watching // West Wing and The Bachelor. West Wing is strictly for dinner time because it's easy to watch and it makes me feel smart. The Bachelor for when I want to be like every other girl in America and watch women who are so much more capable of doing other things make fools of themselves on national television. But I shouldn't judge because they are all there for the right reasons.

Wearing // Brown lipstick straight from the '90s. Black boots. High-waisted jeans. Oversized tunic shirt that looks more expensive that it really was.

Craving // Pizza. But when am I not craving pizza? But for real. For a long time, I didn't crave chocolate in fact thinking about eating it made me sick, but today we got chocolate from my mother-in-law in the mail and I realized how long it had been. I almost ate the whole bar.

Wanting // This sweater. This shirt. These boots. This plant. This planter. This print. This vinyl.

Feeling //  Ready for a long weekend. Aren't long weekends just a blessing sent from the Lord above?

Doing // Not necessarily doing these things but I want to. I want to grow my own plants and learn to cross stitch. I said I would in 2016 and I haven't yet.

marbles

Just two months ago, I discovered the magical place that is Hobby Lobby. Remember when people were trying to boycott Hobby Lobby? Well without getting into opinions and fighting words, I just have to say I'm glad that fell through because Hobby Lobby is the shit. 50% off frames and wall decor? YES, please! Ceramic faux taxidermy? Give it all to me! Lots of stress because you want everything and you only have ONE 40% off coupon? #Accurate. Let's just say that Hobby Lobby has become as toxic to a woman's wallet and her personal relationships as Target.

So I was at Hobby Lobby yesterday and I was waiting in line. They are having a huge home accents sale, so people were crowding the place. I was waiting in line and in front of me was this really put together mom. She reminded me of my favorite mom, and that is my mom so I was really admiring her, and at her feet was her EXTREMELY well-behaved son. (This is the highest compliment I could give someone because there are A LOT of wannabe-famous mormons at Hobby Lobby and a lot of their sons and daughters are tiny little terrors dressed in baby moccasins.) But not this little guy. He had on a nerdy little polo shirt with brown, scuffed laced shoes. His pants were those cute cargo ones that your dad might wear, only they were little kid size. He was adorable, and I really loved that his mom didn't care about him being dressed in baby moccasins, because baby clothes are pricy and that baby was going to learn to love hand-me-downs. Did I just ramble about baby mocs? Yes, yes I did. Anyway,  so I was really into watching this kid because he was not only cute, but he had a great vocabulary and he was very obedient to his mom with her pretty hair and put together aura. And it was really helping me not turn around and tell the two moms behind me to stop railing on their eyelash extension girl for not being able to fit them in.

And I was able to witness the sweetest thing. It was a "faith in humanity restored" moment. The little boy, who didn't wander to far from his mom, but was very eager to stay close to help her and ask questions about different items in the store and in her cart, he wandered over to those things I like to call "last minute temptations." You know, those cash register line stands filled with sour candy, chocolate, yarn, buttons, magnets, pokemon cards, mini toys that are a choking hazard, 3M hooks, twine and washi tape, and for some reason you find yourself needing a pack of pokemon cards because maybe, just maybe there will be a holographic charzard in there.

He was poking around in those last minute temptations and he reached for a bag of marbles. It was the prettiest bag of marbles you could ever see. Marbles of every color. Marbles of every size. Marbles straight out of those old movies that your mom taught you to love. The most beautiful bag of marbles your eyes could behold. His eyes became wide with wonder and awe. He clutched the bag and looked side to side. He looked up at me and then quickly looked away (little kid embarassment is the cutest thing ever). He looked down at the floor. Back at the marbles. I could tell his mind was whirling around and he was trying to find the words to say.

Would he gather the courage to ask his mom? Or would he place the bag back down? Would he hold the bag close and slowly inch his way back over, maybe just maybe catching his mother's eye and gaining her seal of approval? Would he loudly play with them to get his mom's attention? How would he react if his mom said no? Would he throw a fit like the other kids around him? Would he smile and say, that's okay mom, I don't need them? Or would he shed tears over that beautiful bag and would those tears create a revolution inside of me and make me buy that bag for him?

I saw all of this run through this child's mind. I even saw him make a decision.

He stood straight up, the marbles grasped firmly in his hand and he marched over to his mom. But not a cocky march, like a "I know what i'm going to do" march. He stopped right in front of his mom, held the marbles up and looked her straight in the eye.

She smiled a lovely and warm smile, "Marbles!" she exclaimed. His face lit up, "Marbles!" he replied.

And without asking, his mom said, "Are there big marbles in there? If you promise me there are big marbles and you'll share with me then you can get them." (For some reason, big marbles are the creme de la creme of marble bags.)

At this point, I was wheezing, I had so many feelings. My heart was a puddle of love juice.

The little boy smiled the biggest smile and hugged his mom's leg saying "thank you thank you mom, I promise I'll share and I promise you can have the big marbles and I promise I won't lose them and I promise I'll always be good. I promise mom, thank you thank you."

That little boy held that bag of marbles so close to him that his mom nearly had to rip them out of this hand to pay for them and it was the most tender thing I saw all week.

Now, I don't know how everything went from there. For all I know, the kid could have dropped all of them in the parking lot or he could have turned into a little twerp as he got in the car, but that little kid was a big example to me of how grateful and excited I should be about my life.

I got home from hobby lobby excited to use my frames and repot my plant with the cool new concrete planter I got from my outing. I started unwrapping my frames and inserting the pictures and everything was going smoothly until the back of one frame wouldn't snap back in. To make a long and necessary story short, I exerted so much force trying to get the back to snap back in that I broke the frame in two. I was furious. I nearly threw the frame across the room. Thinking I was a genius, I ran to my trusty hot glue gun. I managed to piece the frame back together and I started gluing. Finished and smug with success, I went to pick up the frame, except it wouldn't budge from the counter. I had glued the frame to the countertop and that frame refused to budge. Somehow, I managed to unbind it from the counter without breaking it. Except, the paint of the frame came off and stuck to my counter. After going at it with a spatula, it came off and I was ready to stick that damn frame to the wall.

Except my 3M hooks weren't sticking, in fact, they peeled off the frame almost instantly. Completely frustrated and upset I set the frame aside, I needed to cool down. I'll just go repot my plant I thought.

To make another long story short, I killed my plant in the process of repotting. Killed is probably exaggerating but it might as well have happened. I ended up on my kitchen floor angry and surrounded my a hundreds of little leaves and a completely dismembered plant and a pot filled partially with soil. That feeling of joy and faith in humanity and myself that I felt earlier had vanished and I was a loser.

A very ungrateful loser. The plant has been set aside (in the trash). It was beyond saving, I'm telling you. The frame, I set it against my bookshelf. It looked nice. And my pride and ingratitude sat in my throat. I sat myself on the couch and remembered the marbles. How excited that boy was for marbles. How excited I should have been to even go outside that day. To be able to buy frames to decorate my walls. To have a gorgeous plant that I got to take care of for a little while.

You might think this sounds dramatic and corny, but those things are significant. The little things, the little bag of marbles in our lives are significant. We all have bad days and it's sometimes necessary to pout and cry and throw a fit, but after you're done throwing a fit, be like the little kid who got his marbles. Is that a cheesy, mormon analogy or what?

Be as happy as the kid in hobby lobby with his bag of marbles because they are significant and being grateful for those little things in life, despite crappy misfortunes happening around you, is good for the soul. Gratitude is good for the soul.

And that is all I have to say about marbles.

Enough

Me in an absolutely posed selfie that I legitmately thought would be something an insta-famous person would do. Sincerely was about to post this, until I realized how stupid I looked and how dumb my thought process for the whole thing actually was. This now lives on this blog and the selfies folder on my phone. May we never speak of it again.

Our home teachers invited us to dinner the other night, and I really like my home teachers, so of course I accepted the invitation with grace and hustled on over to their place to stuff my face with the most delicious baked and breaded pork chops with mashed potatoes and caesar salad on the side. During dinner, we started having a conversation about the pressures of social gatherings and social things in general. And with all conversations about social things, I feel like it all goes back to social media. So we talked about how much all of us hate social media. I work in social media, friends, I am social media. Well my job is social media anyway, but not the kind where you share those stupid and really fake articles or those "You won't believe what happened after this girl started singing" videos or even those "please feel sorry for me" or " my hubby/wifey is the sweetest most perfect person in the entire world" posts. We do the business and analytical side, and maybe every once in a while we get to create something totally cool and send it out for the world to see. I mean, we do share cool articles, and create awesome content so I should give myself some credit here.  Nevertheless, social media is more foe than friend to me sometimes.

Now, we all came to the conclusion that social media really is what you make it. I mean, you technically choose to feel bad when you see someone with their completely bleach white photos with perfect potted plants, perfect hair, teeth, husband, food and children that haven't even been born yet, but you just know they are going to be perfect because their instagram theme is on-effing-point. Yeah, you choose to feel bad about that stuff, but let's hashtag REAL talk for a second here.

We. Have. All. Felt. Bad. Or. Inadequate. Looking. At. Someone's. Social Media. Feed. (Periods added for emphasis and attention and annoyance.) We all have. And if you deny it, I promise you from the bottom of my cold, black heart that you are lying. I know you are. Because as much as we love social media and we love keeping in touch with those high school friends that we never talk to ever, we also secretly/not so secretly hate it. And might I add that we all secretly want a million likes and a million comments saying, "goals." So when we don't get them and we see all those insta-famous moms and singles on mountains and wavy-haired girls with those comments and likes, we all feel bad and feel a little bit of bitterness. Even if social media is what you make it, we all still feel bad.

My home teacher's wife is absolutely beautiful. She's totally adorable. She's one of those girls who just looks the best pregnant (she is pregnant) and she has pretty manicured nails and pretty hair and the best personality. And I want to be her friend and tell her funny jokes because she is one of those people that laughs at all jokes even if they are not funny because she wants you to know that you are funny. She really is the nicest human and it seems like she has nothing to feel self-conscious about, but she said to me during that dinner that every time she looks at pinterest or instagram she feels really overwhelmed. She feels like she doesn't and will probably never ever measure up. She gets overwhelmed because she feels like she needs to have the perfect house (with that on-point gallery wall), the perfect closet (with those valentino rockstuds), the perfect husband (with that man bun) and the perfect everything else (you know, kids dressed in outrageously overpriced clothing from companies with names like Finn&Olive, for example). And I am sad to say that I couldn't say that I didn't know how she felt. Oh how I wish we could all say that we didn't feel that way. She and I don't feel that way all the time. I mean, that would get really exhausting, but more than once a week we feel that way.

We feel like we don't measure up and we never will. But I know that's not true. And you should know that too. It's not true.

We can't stop those insta-famous or blog famous people from posting or being who they are. I'm sure a lot of them are great people and I'm sure they have a lot of crap that goes down in their lives. They just have extra validation from the internet. We don't need that validation. We really don't. And they don't need it either. (Don't get me wrong, those people we see all the time all over the internet aren't bad people, I promise I don't think they are bad people. I know a few positively lovely and wonderful internet famous girls that I am glad to call my friends. Please don't think I hate them. I don't.)

So we all came to a conclusion that night. We first decided that we are enough. We are more than our social media accounts.

I told her that she is beautiful and wonderful and enough. She doesn't need to be anything more for the internet. And we exchanged words of encouragement, but then she said that she wished there were people on the internet that were "real." Real is so relative sometimes. Like what defines real? I could say I'm real, but I also sometimes whiten my instagram photos and I sometimes take 50 selfies to get the right one and I even sometimes stage my photos and think long and hard about captions. DON'T TELL ME YOU'VE NEVER DONE THAT!

But I get what she's saying. We need people who are willing to admit that they feel the way I just described above some days more than others. We need people who are size 10's and 12's and above and still try to work out because they want to be healthy not necessarily because they NEED to lose weight. We need girls who are size 00 through 9 to talk about about how no one thinks their bodies are "real or normal" when they are. We need to start a healthy discussion about women building each other up. We need people who are completely open and unapologetic (but not Donald Trump unapologetic, in fact stay away you all trumpians). We need people who sometimes have a bad day and want to write about it. We need all kinds of people. We even need the insta/internet/blog-famous ones. We need each other.

And most importantly we need to remember that despite what is trending, or what is popular. or what boots you SHOULD be wearing from H&M because they are #goals...despite ALL of that...

We are enough.

We are.

So maybe I'll try to be one of those "real" people. That's what this blog was intended for anyway. Let's see how we do.

And even if I fail, I am enough. And so are you.

Ready

Hello there my dearest friends!

2015 was an interesting time for this blog. It was kind of a dark time. My soul ached a lot and I didn't write a lot and I didn't do much. In fact, I just forgot about this darn thing because sometimes you just can't bear your soul to the whole entire world. And that's really okay. And sometimes you're just tired of the same old thing. And sometimes you're tired of talking about your body and all of the hard things that you are going through mentally. That's just the thing.

The thing was that in 2015 or at least the last 6 months of 2015, I didn't want to write. I didn't want to talk about anything. I didn't want to share so much, because I really needed to disconnect. Disconnecting is a good thing sometimes. So I think I'm going to come back because I think I'm ready.

I'm ready to share again. I'm ready to write again. I'm ready for the possibilities. Possibilities are the best! I'm ready to rant about how I want a dog but I can't have one. I'm ready to say how I feel. I'm ready to tell you about things that I love and things that I WANT! Yeah, I'm selfish. I'm going to talk about things that I want. I want this place to be a no-pressure zone. Pressure is the worst. Yeah, it's necessary sometimes, but a no pressure blog? Yeah, I'm all about that shiz. No pressure to post every day. No pressure to talk about certain things. No pressure to make everyone happy. Let's do it.

I'm ready.