The Little Things

A lot of times, I think we find ourselves writing down the big things when we think about what we're grateful for - but we often forget about the random little things and how wonderful they can be as well! Don’t get me wrong, the big things are incredibly important and I am as grateful for them as I am for the little things, it's just that the little things are often what gets left in the dust after a crazy Thanksgiving holiday. As I mentioned in my review from earlier this year, one of my favorite parts about my Day Designer is that it has a little gratitude box that reminds me to write down something I'm grateful for each day. As you can imagine, over the past year, I've created quite the collection of little things I'm grateful for, so in honor of this Thanksgiving, I thought I'd share some of the things I've put in that little gratitude box!

I'm Grateful...

• For music! It has such an incredible ability to lift my spirits. The song I'm currently playing on repeat is this amazing cover.

• For all three of my amazing space heaters, because, well, winter :P

• For sunglasses! For those Mondays when I’m on public transport nursing my coffee and it's too early in the morning to make awkward eye contact with strangers.

• For little pink cat noses!

• For nude matte lipsticks. They. Are. Amazing.

• For french fries. This one has made multiple appearances in the gratitude box because every time I eat a solid serving of fries, I thank my lucky stars that one amazing day, someone decided to throw potato sticks into a deep fryer - YUM.

• For the heavenly combination that is avocados + salmon. I've been eating it every morning for the last month and I cannot stop.

• For my hair! I think we all complain about our hair too much (i.e. too frizzy, too flat, wrong color) so I'm trying to do a 180 on that sort of thinking and be thankful for the fact that I have healthy hair!

• For advil, because cramps are no joke.

• For peppermint mocha flavored creamer because it makes every morning feel like a Christmas morning!

• For the ability to fall asleep quickly. I can't imagine what it's like to have to stare at the ceiling for 10, 30, 60 minutes before falling asleep so I'm incredibly thankful that I'm usually out within a couple of minutes!

• For days when my body is sore because this means I have muscles and I'm actually using them.

• For New Girl, the only television show that both my boyfriend and I can agree on watching because we both love it.

• For laughs because nothing in the world is happier than the sound of a laugh.

After typing this up, I've realized just how many of these are food related...oops! What can I say? The way to my heart is clearly food. Gratitude is definitely something that I'm still working on since it can be hard to think of good things when I've had a rough day or I'm not feeling 100%. Even on those days, however, I have to remind myself that awesome things like french fries and space heaters still exist – regardless of how my day is going – and to be grateful for them!

Wishing you all the happiest Thanksgiving ♥

Ditching Subscription Boxes (For Now!)

I still have one more box coming up, but after that, I'll be ditching subscription boxes…at least for now! This is a bittersweet decision for me because I absolutely love subscription boxes. They have been such a fun experience for me over the past couple of years. What's not to love about getting a surprise present in the mail every month?!

I've decided to change things up, however, because I'm not sure that the value of the subscription boxes I've been receiving are truly worth the prices I pay for them. Value is very much subjective and just because a hat is listed as $58, doesn't mean that it's worth $58 to me!  When I really challenged myself to take a good look at the value I was getting out of subscription boxes, it didn't seem worth it given my current financial goals. While the retail value of the items I am receiving is always quite high, they weren't necessarily products I would have picked out for myself.

Now, receiving products I wouldn't have picked for myself could be considered a good or a bad thing! It allows me to try new products I wouldn’t have otherwise known about which has helped me discover tons of new brands and interests! At the same time, however, it also lands me with a ton of products that I don't necessarily need nor use. I know that it's impossible to curate a box that everyone is going to like, so this is in no way a reflection of the quality of the subscription boxes themselves, but more so a reflection of the personal value I place on subscription boxes.

In order to get the best of both worlds, I'm going to try to be more open minded about trying new products in different categories that I might not normally try but using the $$$ I used to spend on subscription boxes on purchases that I can select on my own. Although I might not get as much retail value out of the items, I know I'll get more personal value out of the items because they'll be items I'll be much more likely to use!Instead of doing subscription box reviews, I'll start doing monthly budget posts to show you what I've purchased instead!

There's definitely a lot I will miss about subscription boxes. The fun surprise of not knowing what's in each box, What I'll miss most about subscription boxes is the "gift to myself" feeling! It always feels like Christmas morning when I receive a colorful subscription box in the mail. Self-care is something that is a high priority in my life and I've always found that subscription boxes are a great way to feel like I'm caring for myself!  For now, however, I'm trying to be more proactive about managing my money and setting budget limits for myself by re-budgeting that money into a "happy" budget where I hope to get more value out of that money while also getting the same types of products that I would have received in a subscription box.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on the topic of subscription boxes! Did you find subscription boxes to be worth the price tag? What are your favorite subscriptions? Who knows - maybe in a couple of months, I'll be back on here blogging about how much I missed my subscription boxes after I decided to cut them out of my life! :P 

Sharpie Pumpkins!

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Cutesy dutesy fall activities, here we come! I love doing any and all crafts that correspond with the seasons/holidays, but carving pumpkins is not my forte. I've tried my hand at carving pumpkins many times, but it never goes quite the way I planned! So, this year, I decided to try my hand at some sharpie pumpkins instead of the traditional carving - and boy am I glad I did. I am so happy with the way it turned out! 

What You'll Need:

• Sharpies: It's best to get multiple + a variety of different sized sharpies. 
• Medium Pumpkin (Or whatever size your heart desires!)
• Old Nail Polish (especially sparkly ones!) 
• Printed Design - optional
• Vis A Vis or Dry Erase Marker - optional

To pick my design, I browsed through some fall-themed handlettering and calligraphy. Some of my favorites: {Happy Fall}, {Hello Fall}. You can pretty much choose whatever design you'd like! Similar to what you'd do for pumpkin carving, you can print out a design, trace it with a vis-a-vis or dry erase marker (these are erasable if you make a mistake!) and then go over your design with your sharpies! I decided to try my design free hand instead of using a traced design.  

I recommend having multiple sharpies of each size because the sharpies start to dry out a little when coloring in the design. When they start to dry out, throw them in a cup upside down and use your other sharpies while you wait!

Last (and my favorite) step: adding the nail polish! I've hoarded about a million bottles of nail polish at this point and at least a quarter of them are goopy and difficult to use - but they're perfect for adding pretty accents to pumpkins! I used a gold polish to paint the entire pumpkin stem and parts of the lettering to add a nice sparkly touch!

Overall - I'm incredibly happy with the way my pumpkin turned out! So much so that I think I might be done with carving for good! Except I'll definitely miss munching on the pumpkin seeds while carving :) What are your favorite fall crafts? Have you tried sharpie pumpkins? I'd love to hear what you thought of them!