blogging

We went to the Botanical Garden

One of my most recent summer adventures included taking us out to the botanical gardens. It was a bit out of the way because the gardens are in the middle of Brooklyn, but luckily, having a car helps get around at ease without feeling like sweaty popsicles in the humidity. But my timing was perfect, mostly because I had planned to visit during the park’s free admission hours that the garden offers and finding parking wasn’t as hard as I anticipated. I was mostly nervous about the parking but once there, the street cleaning rules were just about over. So, I left my parking spot with peace of mind that I wouldn’t be paying a 45-dollar parking ticket. 

As I walked through the entrance, on the left of me, was the garden’s gift shop. As I quickly glanced at it, it had a few plants for sale and other gardening-like supplies, lined up outside of the shop. Although I planned to check it out before I left, I was exhausted by the end of my walk through the garden. The landscape was wide and lengthy with such an interesting variety of plant species that I wouldn’t have seen before. The first thing that greeted us was the Japanese garden and its layout design brought a feeling of peacefulness and calm, which was new and very much needed. The lake was a greenish color with multi colored koi fish grazing the surface of the water. A little description box inside the gazebo described koi fish to symbolize good fortune or good luck along with perseverance especially during adversity. 

Another favorite location that I spend most of my time in, was the Cranford Rose Garden. Every corner of the rose garden was picturesque with a variety of hues popping out of the seas of green. I was in bliss but couldn’t help but imagine how much more vibrant and fuller the roses would be if this were a different time during the season when they were all in full bloom. The garden had a mix of old species of roses that were common before the 1860’s which was a unique fact. Some were small and some were large with variations of white and pink, but one color was missing from the bunch, red. Sadly, I didn’t see any and I was hoping to stumble on a big bush of them, but I found nothing. Which made me wonder in which season do they grow in because as of yet, I haven’t found any bushes with vibrant large red roses. 

I had to pick my battles and after a while it became difficult to guide my toddler, while angling a camera just to catch a moment and trying to embrace my surroundings. I needed to shift my attention and really just enjoy this time with my toddler. I think she enjoyed it although probably didn’t understand what she was seeing. But it inspired me, it was beautiful, inspirational and peaceful, which is a good prescription after a stressful week or a month. Even just for a few hours to de-stress could make everything feel anew. I saw people laying on the grass and reading, some were just sitting and staring at the sights while others were aiming to capture those perfect photographs. What I believe made it more peaceful was that we went in the morning. Mornings are by far the most peaceful times of day, once you’re up, your senses are just coming into focus and that awakening can feel refreshing and enlightening. Another odd thing is that, the garden hardly echoed the loud sounds of the usual heavy traffic around the garden’s location, the middle of Brooklyn, New York. It’s as if the plants observed the sound and echoed bird sounds instead, which seems like quite a bizarre phenomenon.  

Please, don’t stare at my stats

It’s interesting how psychologists and mental health gurus preach about not placing value on the number of likes or views on social media, but if academic success is based on a number. Is it not the same thing? Both could be argued are irrelevant to each other, yet both have an underlying concept; that personal value or worth is derived from a number. personality and charisma contribute as well, but what makes you shine or stand out from the rest are the stats or specific quality so refined that can be measured by some metric. sports are all about analytics and major trading franchise decisions are based on those numbers and in one of my classes titled industrial psychology, the professor had a whole lesson on resumes and cover letters. It was surprising to hear that most hiring decisions are again based on the number of points that a resume generates by decision maker and just recently, my mother-in-law, had expressed to me that she needed to review resumes for a new hire and she based the applicants worthiness by the number of points she gave the resume… it went full circle and told myself isn’t that interesting. If even resumes get graded by number of points, what isn’t measured by a number? And is it possible to grow in a career without tracking success through numbers?

I understand that not everything is based the numbers, but why do we spend most of our lives working to achieve those targets. In the United States and in other countries in South America, for many of us, unless some unusual circumstance, we’ve gone through the twelve plus years in school and have only ascended to the next level because we achieved the requirements that was measured by specific target numbers. I am starting to believe that it’s not wrong or a negative to compare a skill or success by a number, but it’s odd to me how there are mixed messages about the topic. It’s important for people to focus on other traits like those involved with, I don’t know, behind human, understand how to show respect and how to act when you are getting respect, being nice to whomever you happen to interact with and not just because they might be an important person, but because it’s the right thing to do, even if you don’t feel like it.

In some ways, measuring stats is an easy identifiable way to get an overall view of skills or achievements and makes those great achievements that much more recognizable to someone who may not know you yet. Besides this logic, since I started my bachelor’s degree, I’ve challenged myself to be ultra-ambitious. I’ve placed this pressure on myself to achieve all A’s in all of my classes. I’m stepping up to the challenge of aiming for all As, cause truth be told, I’ve never been that student or that studious to be worth As. I’ve got to admit that has always been a contributor to me believing I couldn’t amount to anything. Deep down, I know it wasn’t true, but my confidence would dictate something else. perhaps this is the reason why I do correlate success with numbers because for so long, seeing my status and lack of academic achievements, I would get partially depressed over them and it would make me feel insecure about my future.

It’s definitely a debatable topic, but what do you think? do you believe we are valued by our stats? if we shouldn’t care about the number, why are we constantly evaluated with numbers? do our paychecks resemble those numbers? what do you think?

Green or Emerald

Finally, little by little, I think I’m getting back to my creative self again. It’s difficult to manage creative thinking with the more logical and reasoning side. For some time now, I feel like I’ve lost that creative thinking side of me. My most recent college semester was really demanding and for the first time in my academic career, I didn’t take some sort of art or self expression coarse. Here’s what I mean, since high school I’ve had some sort of art class that forced me to constantly create something and therefore, I’ve consistently forced myself to think creatively. Reflecting back, it feels like a blessing and curse.

Its a blessing because I got a chance to change my routine, to try a different side of myself that I didn’t understand very much. But within my new degree, most of my classes consist of business courses. I’ve come to realize and compare how much more differently it forces you to think, yet creative courses can take you around the universe and back. Literally the sky’s the limit on your imagination. But taking mostly business coarse’s is a curse because its like building a new muscle, building a new set of skills is tough the first go-around. Luckily the more frequently I use it, the more it becomes second nature and then it starts to feel like it is on autopilot. The only thing is, I’m not bombarded with the types of scenario’s studied in class to consistently practice what I’ve been learning. A skill truly develops once its practiced frequently, but how do I get there without being forced to utilize it?

Here’s a picture of my new nail polish, my logical side would call this green and if I’m being political, then I would say dark green. But I can also call this color emerald. Emerald, a quick google search describes it as the color that encourages growth, reflection, peace and balance. Apparently, the verdant tones reflected in the jewel are tempered by a cool blue that symbolizes a steadfast bond. Isn’t that description beautiful and coincidently describes this post perfectly.

The Pink Lip

Today, I promised myself to try something different and to get out of my comfort zone. Lately, I’ve been going back to the same makeup look. Each time swearing that this time, I might look just a bit different, then the look from the day before. My current everyday makeup look has me feeling uninspired and slightly bored.

Seeing that I already own a few lipstick shades, but never use, I thought that I should give a bold reddish lip a try. I have the shades, along with the fear of testing it out and going outside with it on… does that make me sound a bit silly?… Probably…

After applying the matte red lip shade, my immediate reaction was to take it off. But then I stopped myself for the sake of not wasting time putting. I kept everything else light. My eye makeup minimal, enough concealer to cancel my trouble spots and focused more on contouring along the sides of my cheekbones and forehead. Lips were my focal point and I was nervous as I spread it along my lips.

My fear of testing red lipstick came from believing that I looked weird with it on. I had this internal worry of judgement. When I asked myself if someone had actually told me that red lipstick didn’t suit me, then is when I realized that I was being my own self critique and being a harsh one too! But once I really let go of these insecurities, I asked myself what am I really afraid of? So what was the worry?

Once I really embraced this bold lip look, I felt focused and oddly, empowered. In retrospective, putting on lipstick and wearing was not weird, but rather the boost of confidence I felt, seemingly out of the blue was. It’s funny how that works.

Thank you for reading my blog post! I’m curious to know if you have had a similar experience with makeup? If so, what inspired you to give it a try regardless of these insecurities?

Like always, have a great day!

Starting a Bullet Journal for 2019…

In the beginning of this month, I told myself I needed to find something to track my progress, track my habits, track my activities. The little details of my progress were the breadcrumbs I wanted to leave a trace of, as I improved… yet, I struggled with trusting myself to commit because I had no clue as to where to start and what to try.

One time, I had tried using different journals for each goal category. But different journals work if you can remember what you actually put in them and where you last left them. Also, the added task of reminding yourself to keep updating them. It felt chaotic and messy, making the task of tracking uninspiring and burdensome.

After watching a few Youtubers like Amy Landino and Tasha from one big happy family, I started to feel more prepared to tackle this new journal journey! i decided to reuse a simple Mead spiral notebook, along with different colored sharpies and a few sigma micron pens. I gave it my best artistic typographical attempt for each page heading. Being able to inject a bit of creativity feels refreshing and new, almost therapeutic. I added a section for my long term goals, (micro) February goals and, most importantly, my daughters goals. Other important sections included habits to maintain my health and one dedicated page just for brainstorming content. Lastly, a page dedicated to reminding me of the most mundane tasks needed for the household.

Its never to late to start talking about goals and the different ways that one can use to prepare and tackle them. The small steps completed daily contribute to strengthening those bigger goals. With that being said, I hope you are ready to tackle 2019 because we’ve still got eleven more months to go to make a real difference

Thank you for taking the time to check out this blog post. I hope you find this kind of content inspirational or insightful. What are your goals like for 2019? What are you doing to keep track of them?

Until next time!

Multicolored leaves

Is it still considered Fall after a snow storm?

Probably not, but neither am I really sure and currently to focused on finishing this post to stop writing just to google it. I still consider this time as Fall because the trees still have leaves on them. Albeit, not as much but non the less, they are still hanging on. I find it inspiring to see how many different colors the leaves turn into. Then how the ground is littered with these multicolored shades of yellow, brown and reds with a tiny streak of green. Sometimes I ask myself if these leaves would be a good source of material for creating art pieces. I wonder if someone has already been so bold to ask themselves the same thing and actually make something beautiful out of them. I’ve picked one up just to examine it; to observe the array of colors, to feel the texture and to admire its irregular shape. To bad it’ll be gone soon before I take the time to make something beautiful out of them myself.

Just like seeing how pretty the burgundy hue of the leaves were, I was equally pleased to see how nicely this thrifted Topshop burgundy wool coat fit on me. The arms were not to long or tight around the armhole. The material was in good condition, minus the signature thrift shop scent. The lining was in decent condition, shiny and smooth and the pockets had no holes. It had a detachable black faux fur Peter Pan collar that looked like it had seen better days. I was impressed. The pros were greater then the cons and that made me happy, so I took it home.

Golden brush strokes

As my family was walking home after visiting our local Salvation Army, we stumbled on a pretty simple wall. It was simple, at least, compared to the other abstract and intricate street art walls surrounding this simple one. The wall was painted black with different brush strokes scattered over the black paint. In the center, what I’m assuming, was the artist’s graffiti signature drawn in a goldish brown hue. It was extravagantly minimalistic but with a pop because of the contrasting colors. It caught my attention from afar and drew me closer to observe the work, very much like an art gallery. I liked that it wasn’t overly conceptualized but neither was it a “wall flower”. The work had a balance while adding balance to the collection of street art surrounding it.

Naturally, I felt it would make an interesting backdrop. I didn’t notice the artists credentials or maybe I just overlooked it. But if you ever find yourself in Brooklyn, take the J train to Brooklyn and get off on a stop called Myrtle ave. Walk a few blocks south and you’ll spot it by making a left in the corner of the Papa Johns pizzeria.

I know I should have taken a picture of the street art by itself. I apologize. I only hope that it won’t distract you from being inspired by my very casual outfit of the day. My rain coat is from Nike. The black fleece pullover, a gift from a family member who traveled to Colombia. The black leggings from Pink by Victoria secret (although a size too big on my petite frame). The navy blue faux leather sack bag was thrifted from a Salvation Army across town. It’s been my favorite go to bag and it’s in great condition. I only wish I knew the brand. Yet again, do I really want to know? Lol

A white t-shirt and trousers

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A plain white t shirt is an essential basic top in my closet. It’s like a blank canvas and (mostly) everything in my closet compliments well with it. For this look I was inspired by fashionista I stumbled on in Instagram. I paired my white t-shirt with a pair of thrifted straight leg palazo trousers, which are slightly to long and oversized for my frame. What’s interesting about The trousers is that they are made out of silk with a chevron kind of print. Silk trousers? That was new, so felt like they needed to come home with me.

I intended to wear the trousers for casual days but Ive been told that it actually makes me look very formal. When I looked in the mirror that’s not what I saw and I kept wondering as to why would these trousers would look formal. Could it be the permanent crease in the front? I couldn’t answer that question, until I saw myself in them through pictures. Now I knew why my husband kept referring to them as my business casual pants. I might wear them with kitty heals next time lol

Lavender Floral Linen Maxi Dress #OOTD Inspo x Kodak Moments at the Park

Honestly, I wasn’t going to share these pictures because I’m very hesitate to put my daughter out on the internet… I get a little scared, for creeps or something or another. She’s the biggest, toughest and most influential person in my life currently, so why would I not show off what I love the most and spend most of my time around? so I just told myself “why the heck not post it!” especially since Mothers Day is right around the corner so this post fits right in with the timing lol (plus, I took all the pictures myself which took a lot of work to manage all the different hats to get the best kodak, candid shots I can manage while multitasking) 

I fall in love if the item inspires me or takes me by surprise with en eye catching print or fabrication. I’ll take it home even if it fits a little weird on my body shape. I felt really lucky to find this beautiful maxi linen lavender floral dress at a thrift shop. I’ve been thrifting a lot more then usual and I really love it because it sparks my imagination with all the different variety of choices and affordable price tags! I like to take my time and evaluate everything just because it is second hand after all and some items need to be investigated before a final choice is made.

I enjoy how fitted this dress is but I’m not a fan of how maxi it is (although I did at first). The buttons are starting to give me a problem by popping off every time I squat, which is super annoying! I might trim it to make it into a cute mid thigh length dress for the summer because it just feels like too much dress for such a small petite frame like mines.

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Honestamente, no iba a compartir estas imágenes porque tengo muchas dudas de poner a mi hija en Internet … Me da un poco de miedo, por horripilantes o algo así. Actualmente es la persona más grande, más dura e influyente de mi vida, ¿por qué no mostrar lo que más amo y pasar la mayor parte del tiempo? así que me dije “¿por qué diablos no lo publicaste?” especialmente porque el Día de la Madre está a la vuelta de la esquina, así que este artículo encaja perfectamente con el tiempo (más, tomé todas las fotos yo mismo, lo que requirió mucho trabajo para manejar todos los sombreros y obtener el mejor kodak, tomas francas administrar mientras se realiza una multitarea)

Me enamoro si el elemento me inspira o me toma por sorpresa con una impresión o fabricación llamativa. Me lo llevaré a casa, incluso si se ajusta un poco a la forma de mi cuerpo. Me sentí muy afortunado de encontrar este hermoso vestido de flores maxi lino lavanda en una tienda de segunda mano. He estado trabajando mucho más de lo habitual y realmente me encanta porque despierta mi imaginación con todas las diferentes variedades de opciones y precios asequibles. Me gusta tomarme mi tiempo y evaluar todo solo porque es de segunda mano y es necesario investigar algunos elementos antes de tomar una decisión final.

Me gusta lo ajustado que es este vestido, pero no soy fanático de lo maxi que es (aunque lo hice al principio). Los botones están comenzando a darme un problema al estallar cada vez que me pongo en cuclillas, ¡lo cual es súper molesto! Podría recortarlo para convertirlo en un lindo vestido a la mitad del muslo para el verano, ya que se siente como demasiado vestido para un marco pequeño y pequeño como las minas.

 

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a flower crown for baby girl

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ugh, she’s learning how to walk

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a loose button for ventilation lol

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Book of The Month x L’art de la Simplicite by Dominique Loreau x Lifestyle Changes

For this month I’m picking something that’ll teach me about a new lifestyle attitude. This new lifestyle change is guided by L’Art De La Simplicite: How to Live More with Less by Dominique Loreau.

I found this book while searching the aisles of the public library and once I noticed the title, I wanted to take it home right away. I didn’t believe books about minimalist living were even written so I got really excited once I saw the book. Lately, I’ve been in the mood to change my beliefs and attitudes about my current lifestyle. I understand that its not going to happen overnight but I just want to know more about what it would feel like to become a person who desires less compared to excess. Plus, I loved the cover and how cute yet simple the font and overall look was.

From reading this book, I want to learn how to stop wanting more things that aren’t going to make a huge impact in my future and embrace living with less. Its hard to manage not wanting to have the most latest thing or having something for a sake of convenience simply because you can afford it. Since becoming a mom, I’ve had to let go of my full time job and find something part time which drastically cut what I was used to spending. Now that I have to adjust for bill payments, eating healthy, saving and the needs of a growing baby takes a toll financially. I know that this time and these moments will pass and eventually my small family will be in a different position in the future because we have a lot of faith in the actions were taking now, but I’ve got to stay in check, daily, so all the bills are paid for on time. So I want to understand the tricks or attitudes that would place one to desire less and place that energy towards things will matter in the long run! Do you know what I mean?

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