recent lessons

Things i've learned in the past few months and in no order of significance...


1) if signing up for a new financial responsibility such as a a car or apartment, make sure you still have A LOT of wiggle room for the unexpected
2) finally understand the importance of living beneath your means
3) don't spend a lot of money on faded jeans, their filled with bleach and won't last that long
4) dont waste time with people who don't make you happy, time is too precious
5) make alone time a priority to regain focus and perspective
6) attitude is everything, even if you don't feel like it, if you tell yourself enough you will believe it
7) growing up in a bubble/sheltered environment was a good thing
8) maybe if prayers aren't answered, we should ask God what He wants
9) mom is wonderful
10) call dad if you need to be cheered up
11) sleep with a noise machine if you have a creative mind and live alone
12) when wearing light colors do not eat anything tomato based or that can stain
13) mom is right, always make the bed-gives a fresh start
14) dont eat out so much, its a lot of money and also makes eating out no longer a special occasion and hello LBS.
15) if you have a porch, make sure you have chairs
16) if the temperature is 65-75, turn off the ac/heat and open the windows

a time to laugh

If you were to tell me where I would be today, a year ago, I wouldn't want to believe you. In fact, I would cringe. And at the same time, today I'm so happy and have realized strengths I didn't know were within me. A year ago, I was head over heels in love with the same of my dreams and afraid to be alone. Now I'm single, living in a studio apartment by myself, at peace and happy. To say that the past 6 months have been the hardest time period of my life is true. To say that I have grown and become a better person through it by facing fears and rejection is very true.

It's so true how if you tell God your plans, you will hear Him laugh. It's taken me awhile to hear his laughter but I am now. At first it was cruel but now I'm discovering peace in His plan for my life. I have a key chain on my set of keys that has Jeremiah 29:11 on it, my favorite verse. Someone gave it to me at my high school graduation, 6 years ago. I would stare at it every now and then reminding myself when things were going good or astray. More times when things were going astray. The other day I was running out the door off to work and it broke off my key chain. I was in a rush so I grabbed it and threw it in my cup holder as I dashed off to work. This was God tapping me on the shoulder so I could hear his laugh. Majority of the time we ask for hope when things are going bad. I know I begged for hope this past year, whether it be for my job, finances or my heart. It's so easy to get caught up in the begging that when we have it we don't recognize it. I was given hope and a future just like He promised me. In that moment when the keychain broke I knew He was trying to tell me something. It was to stop, look around my life, look back to the past and see that girl then look at myself now and hear His joyful laughter. "There is a time for everything...a time to weep and a time to laugh" (Ecclesiastes 3) I went through the time of weep so I can now walk through this time to laugh.

day 13: trivia nights. day 14: backroads.

day 13

It's really easy for days to blend together. With the new daylight savings change, which should be reworded, it's easy for work to seem like that's all you do because you get off and it feels like bedtime. This is why I'm thankful for weekly trivia nights with friends to drink beer, eat pizza and ruffle up the useless facts in our minds. It's a great way to feel like I social life and not just work.

day 14

Biden is in Atlanta tonight and literally every road is crazy. I got off work at 7 and cars were not even moving around my building. Luckily I like to think and drive so I've learned random back roads and was able to cut some corners and get home in 30 minutes...to do laundry. But I'm thankful for those dark back roads no one is fully aware of because I was able to keep my sanity tonight as well as feel like I outsmarted the traffic which is always a victory.

day 11: vets. day 12: shelter.

Day 11

"Everybody gave something. Some gave everything" Words from my father when thanking him for his service for veterans day. I'm so thankful for all the men and women who serve our country everyday and sacrifice their lives for complete strangers.

Day 12

On this cold night I am also thankful that I have shelter and warm place to go at night. It's something that is definitely taken for granted and greatly missed once it is taken away.

day 10: getaways.

 A change of scenery always helps for a refresh. Last night a group of friends drove up to North Georgia to do some corn mazes and hay rides. We stayed the night and ended up playing cards late into the evening. We woke up late then went for a hike, enjoying the beautiful the fall weather and scenery. Afterwards we ventured to a knock-off Germany town for our own version of "Novemberfest" which was a beer when we got distracted by a stray dog walking in the middle of the street. The rest of the evening was spent walking the dog to his what seemed abandoned and slightly creepy Victorian mansion. Since no one was answering and there was a light on upstairs we figured we did our duty, left the dog and literally ran back to the town. We settled down over some warm funnel cakes and hot cocoa before heading back home.

It was the perfect refresher before starting the new week. Getting away helps change your pace of life, especially living in the city and then going to enjoy the quietness of the mountains. It was a great reminder of simple joys in life, even if it was just taking the time to look up and admire the blue sky.

day 9: saturday mornings.

Today I am thankful for Saturday mornings. Especially the very lazy ones. After an exhausting week, waking up without an alarm bundled up under layers of blankets and surround by pillows...pure happiness. What makes it even better is just laying in bed with coffee brewing and eating chocolate cookies made last night...it's going to be a great day.

Happy Saturday!

Day 8: movies.

Do you ever get out of a movie and your heart is soaring? I went to go see "About Time" tonight and it was incredible. If you haven't seen it, you need to. You'll laugh out loud and then you will cry....I cried to the point where I realized I probably should have waited for this to come out on DVD where I could watch it at my apartment. Regardless, it was incredible. Movies are incredible. It's the one thing that can take us away for a moment and be a fly on the wall of someone else's story. It's also a great way to relax. But, yay for movies!!! Especially "About Time!"



It was "about time" someone made a good movie...and pun! (HA, couldn't resist, cheesiness done. over and out.)

Day 7: my mom.

If you've met my mom then you have probably met one of the happiest people in the world! Seriously, just walking through the front door as a complete stranger she could make you feel like she's waiting her entire life just to meet you. My dad, her children and grandchildren and any person in our lives are her most prized possessions. My mother takes lemons and makes a whole assortment of any delectable lemon dessert you can imagine. I am so grateful for this gift of hers because it's how I grew up and it is something she has passed down to me.

She's my example of how I look at life.

Day 6: life friends.

My best friend, Lisa, just got engaged a week ago! We've been best friends since we met on our first day of first grade when we got paired up in line together because our last names both started with "D." Needless to say we've been through life together. From trying on our first sleepover together to going to prom. It's been one of the greatest treasures life has given me. Tonight we were on the phone talking about venues and wedding details when the tears started to come for the both of us. It was another pivotal moment in our life that our friendship was sharing. It made me realize how thankful I am for Lisa and the love of so many of my great friends. Life would seriously suck without the love of friends. We need these people in our lives who have made the choice to love us. Who choose to stick around and love us when we go through our bratty years of high school, crazy nights in college and bring us back to reality when we get too caught up in the hustle of life.


So today I am thankful for all of my great friends who have helped me live life. Life would suck without y'all.

Day 5: this blog.

Today I received a "friendly" reminder that I had to go pick up my contacts that had been delivered to the store 2 months ago...I guess life got ahead of me (opps). But conveniently there's a Barnes and Noble in the parking lot of my eye doctor so I decided to wander. I wandered through the travel section looking for ideas on where to vacation next. Then I traveled to the next aisle, the Christian section. I read a few title but then I realized I wasn't in the mood for self-help. I read the titles of new releases then looked at calendars. Then I looked at magazines and the feminist in me got upset when I saw "Women's Interests" compared to the "Men's Interests." So I marched over to the Men's Interests, picked up Bloomberg and started to reading it upwardly so people would notice that women are interested in business too! After I felt like I made my point I made another loop to the travel section then into the cookbook section because I was hungry. I only liked the cookbooks with pages that had a cool texture but realized I would probably just do an online search of anything I wanted to cook so $40 would be a waste.

I don't know why I just rambled about my really boring adventure through Barnes and Noble on a Tuesday night, but I did. So I'm thankful for this blog where I can.

day 4: co-workers.

Often times I can get caught up in work that I forget to take some time out of the day to just talk and laugh with people I work with. Today I was pulling samples for a meeting in the morning and started to overhear conversations about movies and hot male celebrities so I decided to stop for a break. It was a nice reminder of how much I really enjoy the people I work with and even though I left a bit later because of the break I don't regret it. It's a huge win to not only have a job I enjoy but more so to do it alongside great people.

day 3: fall in georgia.

It's hard to ignore the beauty in Georgia right now and it's hard to resist just driving to admire all the new colors. Fall is in full bloom, the air is crisp and the leaves are every color you could imagine. So today I'm thankful for the beauty of fall in Georgia!

....I'm also thankful for the crunchiness of the leaves that puts enjoyment into every step. :)

Day 1: Reunions. Day 2: Home.

Day 1

There's nothing better than seeing friends you haven't seen in years and being able to catch up. Last night I was thankful to go to two dear friends engagement party, one who I grew up with and the other was my college roommate. I'm grateful for the friends who will always be in your life everyday but I'm also thankful for those friends who come in and out every few years. 

Day 2

This morning I woke up in the bed I grew up in, needless to say I was at my parents house. It becomes strange once you're on your own, have your own place (which is another thing I'm so grateful for, but another day :)) to come back to your parents. It's no longer the bed that you're use to sleeping in and the noises you forgot your house made. But at the same time there's a great comfort of waking up to your dad singing in the morning, something that occurs every morning in the Dittmeier household.

I'm grateful to have another house to always come back to. To get refueled on love or great food or both. To have 2 incredible parents at home that will wait up for me just to see how I'm doing when I stayed out late with friends. There's always a comfort in the house you grew up in. So today I am grateful for home, which today is at my parents house.

Make today a good day.

We all want to make the good days last and the bad be nothing more than a blink. "Wake Me Up " or if you want to go back a few years to "Wake Me Up When September Ends" are clear examples of songs that speak to that. Add a great melody and there's a chart topper.

Lately I've been thinking about the movie "13 Going on 30," all she wants is to be 30 where everything will appear to be better and life will be figured out. When she wakes up one morning as a 30 year old, she discovers that life is okay but she missed out; on the good and bad. And she was still a 13 year old girl that had not faced life. 

I was talking to a friend the other night about how we need the hard times to appreciate the good times and we also need those hard times to make us the person we are meant to become. Equally important we need the good times, as well as embrace the good times. My sister-in-law, Brooke, told me one morning to "make today a good day." I doubt she meant for it to be my new motto but it has. (Thanks Brooke!) I've realized that life is a choice. Every minute. It's choice to be happy and how we view things. Life is never ideal but we can choose to make our attitudes ideal. 

And with this thought and November starting tomorrow I'm going to give my 30 days of thankfulness another shot! Last year I think I made it to Day 10 and then got distracted by food or something. But here's to another effort of choosing to see the good, in the good and the bad.

Oh, HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

I AM AWESOME!

A friend sent me this video earlier today and I can't stop pressing repeat.

Maybe because every word spoken feels like its what I need to hear right now. But the part that made my heart take off was when he started talking about women in the bible; Ruth, Esther and Mary. I feel like so many times I read the bible and I read about these women and my resounding thought is "okay they were special, but I'm not them." That's true I'm not them but this video made me realize that the love God had for them is no different than the love he has for me. Right when he starts talking about the strength they all had it occurred to me that their strength wasn't theirs, it was God's. All these women were broken and full of heart break and yet God was by their side.

The best was the ending message that our duty is to find that women God has called us to be and set her free! Probably one of the scariest, hardest yet most fulfilling thing to do.

Highly recommend this video...good to have on permanent repeat while getting ready for bed and maybe I'll even play it again while getting ready for work!

Night.

"when you realize that you'll never be this young again but this is the first time you've even been this old"

Thank you Pinterest for actually being able to put into words what 23 feels like, because T.Swift's 22 wasn't cutting it.

It's been awhile, but I'm back!

I miss blogging. It's always been something that I can use to release ideas, frustration or even put things into perspective. I was reading back through this blog and my blog from my internship, "Colleen Dittmeier. Nautica Intern."and remembering all that had happened and lessons learned. Now I'm going through another life stage, starting a new job just out of college, living in a apartment, trying to stay on a budget and attempting to save money. I'm learning how to cope with the fact I'm done with school and I'm working full time. I'm learning how to balance family, friends and boyfriend but still trying to branch out of my comfort zone. It's been 5 months since graduation and it has already gone so fast with so many memories that I forget to cherish. That's why I named my blog "Heart of Chambray"-to remind myself that simplicity is refreshing and we don't need the fanciest wine (though it is nice) to be happy and to create the moments. The moments are created with our hearts being open to now. 

30 days of thankfulness. day 12.

On this rainy evening I'm reminded of thankful I am for 

rain.

Rain is one of the best ways to make us slow down and relax. It's funny because everyone associates rain with gloominess but if you look at people when running in the rain and dogging the rain bullets there is a smile on their face. Rain makes things beautiful. It cleanses, it grows and it makes us appreciate the warmth of the sun. As Luke Bryan says "Rain is a good thing!"

30 days of thankfulness. day 9. day 10. day 11.

A little behind but not giving up!!

day 9. 

On Friday I remembered thinking a lot about the past and reminiscing on 

memories. 

Some made me laugh, some made me roll my eyes but overall they were great to recall. I am so thankful for all of the moments I have been able to experience throughout my life and I am happy to remember them today. It's an achievement to look back on the past and be able to say that you were are a better person for having experienced that. 

day 10.

On Saturday I had so much fun going to my best friends holiday showcase for the company that they have dreamed up and it has become so successful! I am so proud of my friends and they have gone above and beyond the already high expectations I had of Velina.  It made me realize how thankful I am for 

dreams.

Dreams are what drives us to become a better person than who we currently are. To go after the desires of our hearts. They help bring purpose and excitement into our lives. Without dreams, we would have no drive. 

My Velina purchase...love checking the time now :)

day 11.

On this Veterans day I am thankful for all 

those who serve our country.

They are doing something out of the ordinary and defending complete strangers with their lives! Without our veterans our lives would be so different. Thank you to all those who serve and being such an example. 

Special shout out to my father, Captain Dittmeier!!! Semper Fi!

30 days of thankfulness. day 8.

After class being cancelled today because my teacher was sick, 2 friends locked in their rooms due to being contagious and everyone around me coughing I realized that I am thankful for my

  health. 

But not just being in a current healthy state where I have normal body temperature and can breathe normally. I am thankful for being in good health where I can go to school and do normal day-to-day tasks that I take for granted. 

Note: Wash your hands, there are germs around us!