It felt like the end of summer crashed down on me! One day everyone was in shorts and the next we were bundled up tight. Thankfully I haven’t had to change up my skin routine too much. What worked for me in the summer is working pretty well now for my autumn skincare. It’s always amazing to find a year round routine but I need to test it during the winter before I can make that claim! Allow me to…
Today is World Mental Health Day and this year’s focus is suicide prevention. According to WHO’s Suicide Prevention Data, “Close to 800,000 people die due to suicide every year, which is one person every 40 seconds. Suicide is a global phenomenon and occurs throughout the lifespan. There are indications that for each adult who died by suicide there may have been more than 20 others attempting suicide.” That’s a number that’s far too high for the age we live in. One…
I tend to be way too hard on myself. The other night I was talking to Sander about how I wished I had a time machine. I want to be able to go back and tell my younger self to focus more on drawing. Sometimes I believe that I could tell a lot more stories that way. I often forget how much joy writing brings me. But when I see what artists can produce, I want to mope about how…
It’s officially Halloween season! Halloween is my favorite holiday to celebrate so I’m excited for this whole month! Now I know that it’s a holiday about spooks and pranks but those are all fictional. No zombies rise from the grave and no vampires stalk victims in the night. But that doesn’t mean that monsters aren’t real. Monsters are very real, and the scariest thing about them… Is they’re often humans. These are the real horror stories. I’ve been devouring nonfiction…
We all know that The Netherlands supplies much of the world with beautiful flowers. But how much do we know about what goes on? According to the Royal Flora Holland website, they do about 4.6 billion euros in transactions and deal with 12.1 billion plants. There are over 30,000 species of Dutch flowers and plants involved. Those are huge numbers! I had no idea those statistics would be so high! It’s no secret that I enjoy plants. I can care…
I’m pretty good at buying things that I need and resisting things I want… That is until it comes to nail polish. It’s an obsession where I just can’t help myself! I usually spend at least a month debating on the pros and cons of buying a new shade. And while I do pretty well at saying no, there are definitely times where I just have to say yes. And the wonderful thing about Autumnal nail polish, is that there…
Now that life has gone back to normal, (my mom and brother are back home safely. They had a wonderful European tour!) I can return to my regularly scheduled life. This means copious cups of tea, studying the art techniques of masters (aka my favorite artists), and reading like crazy. The first week of autumn has hit and so have the rainy days. I’ve been posting a lot about reading because I’ve got Nanowrimo coming again this year. While I…
The past two weeks have been a bit stressful and hectic. A family crisis can come at the worst of times. We had planned to visit my family but an emergency in Sander’s family forced us to cancel. So what’s the best that you can do when life hands you lemons? You make lemonade of course! Take a deep breath First of all don’t panic. If you aren’t in danger, then perfect. If someone is in danger, keep a calm…
I know we still have about 2 more weeks until Autumn officially hits us but I’m excited now! When I lived in California we only had one season: summer. Sure, it got a little colder in the winter but living in The Netherlands has shown me what seasons are all about. And now that my favorite season is just around the corner, I’d like to share my favorite Autumn themes! Halloween clothing I’m not talking about crazy costumes and wigs.…