HAPPY FRIDAY!!!
As requested by Abbie, here are five random facts about me.
If you're my friend in real life, how many did you already know?
1. I am 50% Dutch, my dad was raised on a tulip farm, and my mom majored in horticulture (she's from Iowa). Even my 11 year old sister has a collection of violets and plants in her bedroom (and she has named them all). BUT DESPITE ALL THIS, I struggle to keep houseplants alive. It's really sad. This is a picture of the tulip bulbs we gave out as wedding favors that I successfully forced to bloom by keeping them in the fridge for a few months! I am so proud, even though we got less than half to flower and they're all different sizes and kind of sickly looking.
2. Another thing I am very proud of is my little Etsy shop. It has been a source of constant inspiration and joy for the past two months and has kept me from getting depressed because of winter and my underemployed status. I'm throwing all my energy and time into it and I think it's (slowlyyyy) starting to take off! I've been learning a lot as well, which I will definitely share in future post. Oh, and I am beyond excited to start painting custom wedding invitations. If you know a recently engaged person, please send them my way!
3. I will drive myself to succeed at everything I do because I hate feeling incompetent (see #2). When I fell in love with the subject of Geography, I earned a full ride to one of the top graduate programs (Penn State, now infamous). In college I had a crush on a cute pole vaulter, so in order to spend more time near him I joined the track and cross country teams (see picture of me pretending like I'm athletic...actually competitive running is the biggest thing I've "failed" at haha). I may have usually been the last runner on the track, but I did end up married to that pole vaulter! I've never been dismissive or embarrassed by my successes because I work so hard to get there. I think women put themselves down too often, and we should just own up to our personal awesomeness.
4. In college I was in a fraternity. Yup. Technically it was a "sister fraternity" (Sigma Alpha Iota), which basically means sorority, and it was a national music frat. Here's a picture of us in our collegiate matching t-shirts on the night of our senior bar crawl. Keepin it classy!
5. I am an introvert and glad to be one, despite feeling like we live in an extrovert-centric world. INFJ on the personality tests, although I don't have the psychic powers it says I should. If I click with someone (or have a couple glasses of wine), I can be extremely chatty, but usually I come off as quiet. I'm definitely not shy though! Ben is also an INFJ which is kind of cool since we're apparently only 1% of the population.
And here's a bonus round: My best friend Ashley (our moms were pregnant together so we were internally bonded for life) and I shared a childhood goal to become pediatricians when we grew up, and I was planning on going to med school until I was 19 years old and discovered geography. Now I do research on trees, teach little kids about nature, and knit and paint for a living, but Ashley just got placed for her residency in pediatrics and I am so proud of her! And also glad I dodged a bullet because I am definitely not meant to be a doctor, although I know I could have been one (see #3).
What are some random things I don't know about you?