06 February 2017

christmas in the blossom park pad

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I'm so beyond late posting these photos, but our first Christmas in The Blossom Park Pad deserves a post of it's own, so here it is! One of the best parts of having my own home now is decking it out for each holiday or special occasion.

Neither me or Madi spent Christmas at home this year, so we didn't get a big tree like we had originally planned. We did, however, decorate our little baby tree with lights and ornaments, and I think it turned out pretty dang cute. 

The day these decorations had to come down was a very sad day indeed. 

05 February 2017

a year in review {two thousand sixteen}

This post is so late now that I really considered not even posting it. But 2016 was a big year and I love having these "year in review" posts to look back on, so here I am, in February, summarizing all that 2016 was to me.

Where do I even begin?

2016 was one hell of a crazy year. More hell than crazy, to be honest, but wasn't it like that for everyone? 

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The year started out pretty rough. I've already touched on this in a post, so I won't go into too much detail here, but depression kicked my butt for the first few months of 2016, and it's taken almost the entire year to recover. 

Once March came around, and I had started to come out of the fog, I had made the decision to ditch Nanaimo once and for all. I needed a fresh start and I needed my best friend, so I decided to move to Victoria. Madi and I were well on our way to moving out into our own place by April. We house hunted for a couple of weeks, then moved into The Blossom Park Pad on May 1st. We lucked out with the sweetest little basement suite. We have the best landlords and it's in such a great area. I love our little home so much and couldn't imagine a better first place of my own. 

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2016 was the year I started, and dropped out of, college. On May 2nd, a day after moving into our new house, I started the Spring semester at Camosun. I spent most of May and June studying chemistry equations and drinking coffee by the gallon. I nannied the sweetest little boy in the mornings before I went to school, and I had a good little routine going for me.

The semester was over by the time July rolled around. I started nannying another little boy for a different family and started working at Shoppers Drug Mart on evenings and weekends. Most of my summer days nannying were spent in coffee shops, at parks, or at the beach, and it was really nice to have a job that took me outside every day.

August brought with it an amazing trip to California where I visited my sister for the first time in almost three years. It was a much anticipated trip and I was so happy to be out travelling again.

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School started back up in September, and by October I was drowning in algebra equations. My classes were going really well despite the heavy work load. By November, something snapped though, and I had an epic mental breakdown. I ended up dropping out two weeks before finals, which seems a little nuts to me now, but it just goes to show how messed up my mental state was in those days.

I have absolutely zero regrets of dropping out. The second I stopped going to classes, I felt infinitely better and more at peace. School just wasn't right for me yet, and that's ok.

We also got a cat in November. We rescued a 6 month old tabby from a local animal shelter, and named her Olive. She's the best little cat in the whole world and we love her so much. I can't even remember what our home was like before she was in it.

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In December, I quit my job at Shoppers and spent a week over Christmas with my family in Vancouver. I haven't spent that much time with my mom since I lived with her when I was seventeen, and it was so nice to have so much quality time together.

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And that's 2016 for ya! It was a complicated year with lots of issues, but it also held lots of exciting new things, and a lot of good memories. I'm happy to put the year behind me, and hopeful for a better year in 2017. So far, 2017 is off to a much better start.