life lately

Life Lately – July 2023

| The Bee Life

It’s been over 100 days since I left my full-time, salaried job of 6 years, and said goodbye to the corporate marketing world after 11 years. Why? I started my own company! It was also just time, and in the past nearly 4 months, I’ve never regretted what I “walked away” from… and I don’t think I will.

I think it was within the first 2 weeks after leaving that I didn’t have the insatiable urge to want to drink on a weeknight… or at all really. I remember it would be Monday and I would just be ready to have a drink to relax and erase a little bit of the hectic workday. The other thing I noticed almost immediately was that I wanted to get out of bed in the mornings. I used to wait until 10 minutes before the workday to crawl out of bed and try to look presentable (if I cared) to settle in for 8 hours sitting in front of my computer/phone. It was crazy to realize how I normalized these two things as just part of life, but truly, they were a product of being unhappy.


As I mentioned, I started a company — and finally took a leap of faith in myself, one that I’ve been talking about for a VERY long time… especially to those closest to me, and that was working for me. Brass & Bubbles is my home organization company that was born out of a lot of soul-searching, pinpointing what truly makes me happy and leaning into something I am good at; which is helping people get organized, declutter spaces and make them beautiful and functional again. While I continue to grow B&B, I’ve also picked up a part time job at a local spot, walk dogs, and freelance for social media. Sure, my income isn’t steady or reliable, but I’m learning to adjust, cut back, and ultimately realize that what I had wasn’t it.

I’m so lucky to have a supportive husband, parents, family, and friends (even when a few of them look slightly concerned) who have been rooting me on from the very beginning and ever since.

Here’s to following your dreams, and finding your true happy! 🥂

31 Birthday Reflections

| The Bee Life

A year ago today, we were all just starting to process the initial impact of the coronavirus… we had hope that it would be a blimp in the year, and not actually consume an entire year or completely turn our world’s upside down. We had optimism and hope, even as schools, gyms, churches and restaurants closed down. One good thing that came of the coronavirus, literally hitting on my birthday, was that turning 30 didn’t hold the weight it did leading up to the day – the pressures changed (but I am sure they’ll be back soon enough!) And here we are, welcoming 31.

This past year my anxiety reached new levels, a new kinda of anxiety, which has made me finally make my mental health a priority, even if it took 8-months. I’ve learned to go with the ups and downs, and when I need to take a break and when I needed to push out of my comfort zones to better my mental health. I’ve learned when I need to communicate the pain, the struggle and where I am at in the moment, so that other’s know how I feel and why decisions are made. While, not a whole lot of this past year made sense, what was right, what was wrong — with so many different opinions and thoughts, it came down to doing what made sense for me, what made sense for B and I. And not all of those decisions probably made sense to others, and I know future decisions won’t make sense to everyone either — but we are still trying to navigate into some semblance of normal, and that is still going to be disjointed for awhile.

I hope 31 brings back more moments of normal. I hope that I can continue to grow personally, continue to grow more in love with B, create new memories, focus on friendships, look for the positive, share love, learn new things, start making new plans, celebrate the precious moments, while cutting out the negativity in any shape or form it may be. So here’s to 31, another year of possibilities and hope!

Weekend Roundup – July 2020

| The Bee Life

July was another rollercoaster month — but it had some lovely moments of normal. I think those are the moments I need to remind myself more of, those moments of normal.

The month started out with a travel first for B and I — although we were only heading to see my parents, we traveled in a different way than we ever have before. A 73-feet RV! Luckily we didn’t have to worry about driving, so we had a stress free and relaxing ride hanging out with the family. It was massive, and was even bigger once it was parked and stretched out. Once we arrived to our parents, this allowed the fam we traveled with to stay in the RV while we stayed in my parents house — it worked out perfectly!
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Luckily we were with family that we’ve seen off and on throughout the last few months — keeping our bubble consistent, but we headed in for my aunt’s beautiful backyard wedding. I know this is the exact scenario everyone has been reading about to avoid for the last three months – I wouldn’t lie if I didn’t say I was anxious about it, but I was also excited to see everyone. We all shared concerns, but we all have been safe, have limited our foot print and continue to take proper safety precautions. The first night together we spent playing corn hole, listening to music, playing games and eating delicious summer cookout food. It was a lot of fun and great being together.
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The next day was pretty low key before the wedding. Luckily, the wedding was hosted in my cousins very large backyard. My aunt looked absolutely stunning in her BHLDN wedding dress too and their ceremony was so perfect and shared a lot of special moments between L&A. The wedding guests were pretty much everyone we had been with the night before, so not a lot of new people interacting or mingling and those that were new kept their distance and masked up. We also kept up our intense corn hole tournaments going once the wedding festivities were complete — as it got pretty competitive before we all called it a night and just sat around the fire. Other wedding highlights included fun with the pop-up Polaroid photo booth, eating delicious Nancy cake, Chromatic, Midnight Train to George and getting a surprise firework display since the wedding was on the Fourth of July!
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The rest of July was filled with knocking out a few backyard projects, that I can’t wait to share with you in the coming weeks. We’ve also had a hot July summer days, so it’s been some sweaty afternoons and evenings – while taking advantage of early morning tee times, I think we golfed almost every week in July! We’ve been soaking up patio dinners and front porch nights while enjoying refreshing beverages.

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Life Lately – The Month of June

| The Bee Life

Hey Bee Readers — Are you still with me? I know it’s been a minute, but I needed to take a minute. A long minute. I have also started and stopped writing this post, trying to figure out where I wanted to go. But, I think the best way to reflect and share life lately, especially from the beginning of the month, is by sharing a long winded Instagram post from June 8th.
LifeLately-beelifeblog(1)OK. So now how about the rest of life and what’s been going on for the entire month of June?! The month of May seemed like a slow ease back into visiting with people, while the world slowly opened back up and breaking out of our strict quarantine. But June… there were weekends in June that were packed visiting with friends and family (socially distant, smart and safe, of course) and a bit more old normal, that seemed to come in swift and fast. And for me, a little too swift and fast. I’ve been dealing with some new social anxiety and mixed feelings about it all. But at the same time, these moments have been refreshing, they’ve been needed — but the breaks have been needed too.
LifeLately-beelifeblog(2)So let’s talk about the much needed old normal and fun stuff. Here are a few June highlights: A nice weekend with my parents, lots of burgers and eggs (not together), an afternoon stroll with A + B, doggy play dates, a fun pool day to celebrate Father’s Day, Moz’s birthday, fun impromptu neighbor hangs and even a golf date with B!

And here we are, the end of three full months of corona, four if you want to count all of March. And we’re still living in and navigating this “new” normal. B and I are still working from home, with no major plan of returning from either of our companies — so we’ve mentally adjusted to that mindset. We’ve also been keeping busy with house projects and new plans, itching to go somewhere on an airplane and also praying for a bit of of the old normal before the end of the year (wishful thinking, I know).
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I also needed to reset mentally, reset the creativity, reset the goals and priorities and focus on life. As I mentioned, I have some fun things and cool reveals I’ll be sharing in the coming weeks, while trying to still stay creative and inspired outside of the office. How have you continued to stay inspired? Is your work life back to normal or are you still rocking the WFH office?

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Weekend Roundup – May 2020

| The Bee Life

May has been tough, but it’s also had some glimpses of normal — well, what used to be normal. And it’s also had glimpses of “the new normal” as everyone seems to be calling it. May has been a month of slowly starting to see family again, some in normal ways, some in different more protected and distant ways. May has seen some lows and it’s seen some highs. May has also been the last month of the temporary hope of this thing all being over, because this new normal definitely isn’t going away anytime soon. May has even had a few WTF moments.
MayRecap(1)We started the month off with a little road trip to finally see my parents.  It was much needed on both sides. The best part was we were able to make it there in one trip, and hunkered in over the weekend with lots of eats, drinks, board games and laughs and still able to maintain social distance from the world. My mom even surprised me with a homemade birthday cake, so we finally got to celebrate a belated birthday since our big plans in March all got kiboshed. It was great to be together in person, instead of 4-hour virtual chats, and as I mentioned, a much needed visit.

Mother’s Day consisted of a masked and mostly socially distant family gathering with our in-laws and supporting local to shower our mom’s with some special gifts. We also attended not one but two of our first virtual college graduations for my younger cousins, and even a virtual wedding (technically the last day of April)! The virtual graduations definitely had their advantages, beyond just being a new concept — but it also gave us an opportunity to actually attend and participate in these moments when we might not have been able to travel to them before (pre or post corona).
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More May highlights included lots of walks with Moz and even a few car rides to the Starbucks drive thru for puppachinos. We’ve also been perfecting our breakfast sandwich making skills, including grilling bacon on the grill in a cast iron skillet along with grilling out local meats from MeatboxLocal to help mix-up our dinner menu. We’ve also finally gotten around to planning a few fun house projects while also reaching out to contractors for a few not so fun projects. We’ve been admiring all of our flowers budding and blooming and all the beautiful green with all the rain we’ve been getting. B and I also celebrated 9 years together with burritos and a brisk walk. We’ve also had fun counting down the days until when we can get our haircuts… which is now only one more week away! The weather also started to feel a lot like summer, so the weekends have been spent outside, like all day, every day — which has been really nice.
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The month of May was also a big month for the state of Ohio as they started the phased re-openings early on in the month of May. I was actually surprised at how much started to reopen so quickly. Dentists, veterinarians, retail, dine-in at restaurants, salons, hair dressers and gyms have all been able to reopen (among many other things) this month. And it’s been interesting to balance and start having conversations with family and friends to understand what everyone is comfortable with as things reopen.

As much as I’m craving for getting back to “normal” and back into a routine, there is still a major fear factor — although it’s not a fear of even getting it, it’s the fear of potentially spreading it and also other people’s perception along with trying to be responsible for our community and those who are close to us. It’s a very weird time, but luckily there were a few moments of normal — so I hope that continues to be the case as we jump into June. And hopefully, we can get a trip in still this year. What were your May highlights?

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Latest Obsessions 05.20

| The Bee Life

The weather is finally starting to break and it’s been so nice to spend weekends, evenings and even a few working afternoon outside in the sunshine and warmth. With quarantine and remote work continuing, I’m starting to get transition my mindset a bit more to try and embrace all of this a bit more. It’s been a roller coaster of emotions and mental health strain which I’ll be sharing more about on my Fitness Friday this month. So, with trying to transition my mindset, I’m trying to stay busy by planning for a few projects and a few other things I love, while living in workout pants and sports bras.

Mini Office Makeover. Fun fact; our home office wasn’t ever intentionally set-up for designed to be an actual home office. I know typing that out makes it sounds really stupid – but it’s true! Up until recently, B and I only occasionally work from home and would just set-up shop in the dining room or living room. Our home office was designed to be a fun space that serves as another guest room and home to our sports memorabilia. So I’m brainstorming on some easy, cost-effective ways to make this a bit more inspirational, fun and creative for a more long term working space. I’m thinking pink, and I’ll leave it at that.
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Anything Bravo. I would just like to personally take a moment to thank Bravo (and bubbly), for giving me some sense of sanity and a mental escape throughout this super weird time that is quickly becoming the “new normal.” B and I have rewatched the entire series of Vanderpump Rules, even as this latest season wraps up. And my two favorite housewives series are now on, RHOBH and RHONY, along with Andy being back with his virtual WWHL which are still enjoyable.

Some Backyard Plans. Our back patio is pretty set and perfect, besides adding some seasonal plants around to spruce up the space a bit more. B and I have talked off and on about doing some additional privacy-scaping in the back area, but just haven’t gotten around to it. So I’m sketching up some plans to pitch to B, since he is jones-ing to get that project going. We’ve also chatted about adding a floating deck and hot tub… so we will see how that all fits in.

Travel Daydreaming. Flights are so cheap right now. It’s been really easy to daydream and want to plan and just book a flight. Airlines are also still offering no charge rebooking fees (at least Southwest still it!) so it’s eliminating some of the potential risk. It’s just so hard to plan right now, and it breaks my heart to think we might not travel on an airplane this year — but I’m still hoping.
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So you’ll be catching me this weekend making some plans, getting inspired and definitely watching some bravo while sipping some bubbles and daydreaming of the day that we feel safe to fly on an airplane again and explore the world. And I’m still obsessing over Target Drive-Up, it’s been well over two months since I’ve actually stepped foot in one.  What’ve you been obsessing over lately?

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A Day in the WFH Life

| The Bee Life

Today marks 60 days since I was last in my office working and 60 days straight of working from home. It’s taken a bit to get into a routine, from coffee to lunch to working out and 9 to 5 work — but I’m finally in somewhat of a rhythm? My routines have completely changed from when I was going into the office, for better or for worse.

Morning Routine. I’ve had a really tough time waking up early and getting in my morning workouts — so I’ve been sleeping in a bit later than normal and loving every moment of it. Usually B and I sit with our coffee and chat the morning away before I head upstairs to jump on my mornings calls and starting my work day. But let’s back up to the coffee, office life consisted of Starbucks almost every morning (yes, I’m saving so much money in quarantine) — so I switched to the VIA Instant Packets from Starbucks. B likes K-Cups, but they honestly don’t do anything from me, but the VIA Packets are a good enough fix! I’ve also enjoyed using all my coffee mugs — we usually don’t use many of them, so I’ve been digging deep and making sure the rotation is on point.
WFHlife(1)My Office & Assistant. This is truly the first time our home office is being utilized as an office! It has definitely helped having a dedicated space to go up to and I always make sure to kiss B, good-bye before I head up. I was able to bring my mouse, keyboard and monitor when we left the office back in March, and that has been a huge help with work productivity. My Moz girl has been an awesome office assistant, lap warmer and occasional Zoom bomber! She loves when I have lunch too, and has definitely picked up a few social media tricks.

WFH Wear. I’ve been absolutely loving wearing athleisure-wear and comfy clothes throughout the day. Big comfy sweaters, lots of headbands and yoga pants have been my go-to, also wearing my workout clothes throughout the day gives me no excuse to squeeze a workout in during lunch, the afternoon or right after the workday. Don’t worry, I’ve had a few days where I’ve put jeans on, a nice shirt and even some make-up — yes the jeans still fit, so that is at least something!
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Week Night Evenings. We’ve been having some good weather evenings with sunshine, so we’ve been making sure Moz has been getting her walks in — even when the weather isn’t looking so great. The sunny evenings have also been a new go-to favorite for getting my workouts in too, and much better than our basement. I also haven’t been a hurry, because we have all evening and just another day at home to wake-up too!

I’ve come to realize that it might make sense to invest in an Nespresso machine, because I really miss my expresso is my coffee every morning. Bravo has also been keeping me sane during quarantine — B and I have been rewatching Vanderpump Rules, RHOBH and RHONY just started and of course we’ve been loving the current season of Pump Rules. I also want to continue to focus on my diet — but more to come on that in my next Fitness Friday post!

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Easter 2020 Recap

| The Bee Life

All of us around the world and U.S. altered our Easter traditions this year — stayed away from family, didn’t attend church and opted for workout clothes instead of our Sunday best. This year is already making to be one for the books and I know this Easter will also be one of those moments that is talked about years from now. We definitely missed spending time with our families this year but tried to make the most of our this untraditional holiday, which I hope is one of the few holidays affected by this pandemic.
Easter2020(1)I woke up pretty early, for no good reason — so I took the opportunity to take Moz for a car ride to the Starbucks drive thru for some hot coffee and a puppachino for Moz! She got her Easter treat and loved every minute of it. We had a pretty low-key morning, sipping coffee and catching up on Little Fires Everywhere before cooking our yummy brunch. We had plans to make my parent’s waffle recipe, had bacon queued up and even mimosas ready to go 🥂! Waffle’s is my families go-to holiday brunch breakfast and always paired with bacon and hash browns — we opted for some eggs instead of hash browns. While we ate our brunch, we watched Easter mass
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Once brunch was done, I snuck a nap in with Moz. And woke up to the weather shaping up and the sun peaking out — making for a beautiful Sunday afternoon. I made myself get out for a 5-mile run, which felt pretty good and was much needed after over indulging in our delicious brunch. I even got to see my aunts by chance on my run and from a 6-foot distance for a quick hi! When I got back, B and I took Moz for a nice long walk — enjoying all the blooming trees, flowers, fresh air and sunshine while Moz was just loving life, smiling with her tongue out the whole time.  Luckily we were able to maintain good social distance during our walk, and even while I was on my run — as I’ve opted to just run in the road to avoid the sidewalk traffic, especially on the weekends. As you can see, my Easter outfit consisted of PJ’s and activeware with zero make up and some pretty great hat hair.
Easter2020(3) We spent the rest of our day FaceTiming with our parents and a few other family members catching up, sipped on a Manhattan and had a super fancy Easter dinner with a DiGiorno pizza and salad and finished the night watching the latest episode of KUWTK.  We made it a pretty great day (minus breaking a dining room chair and champagne flute 🙃), enjoying the incredible sunshine and weather, had the perfect mix of active and relaxing while eating some pretty great food — while  documenting the day to family/friends via pictures and texts.  How did you send your Easter?

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Baking during quarantine? Check out this easy bundt cake recipe!

Latest Obsessions 03.20 – Quarantine Ed.

| The Bee Life

I think it’s time for a little fun, anyone else feel the same way? As I’ve mentioned in a few of my last posts — things have changed pretty quickly these last few weeks especially in the state of Ohio, but I’ll share a bit more of all that in a upcoming recap post about March.

Anyways — since social distancing, self-quarantining and virtual happy hours are quickly becoming the new norm, there hasn’t been a whole lot to do, or a whole lot that we’ve wanted to do as this pandemic continues to creep and sweep into communities and the nation. It’s so important that we continue to remain as positive on all the changes, so that is why I’m sharing with you my latest quarantine obsessions.
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Getting Outside. Sadly, we live in Ohio which means March/April weather is always hit or miss and I’ve gotten a little jelly of the quarantine folks on the West Coast or down South who are out riding bikes or just sitting in the sun!  But, stay positive! We’ve still been making it a point to either bundle up and get Moz out for a walk, or even pop down to nearby parks for some new scenery that helps break up the day and is 100% fresh air intake.

Workout From Home (WFH). Much to my dismay, I’ve embraced working out from home but also to my coaches credit has become somewhat easy since he’s been sharing free workouts online that are mostly body weight and easy to do at home! The best part, is if you’re looking for some more WFH routines, you can access all of them on my coaches YouTube channel. A few of my favorites so far have been the Cardio Fat Incinerator, Body Weight Workout, and the Post St. Patty’s Day Blitz (good if you’re a bit hungover!) Need a little added Fitness inspo? Read my latest Fitness Friday post to get motivated.

Game Night. This should be no surprise, but board games are making a come back! And I even like to throw in a few card games, because we have a few go-to card games that we love to play (Kings in the Corner + Blitz) when we’re just sipping on some beverages, listening to music and hanging out. On the docket for this weekend is playing LIFE! B and I have never played this game together, so it’s fun this will be a first for us.

Not Planning for the Future. I am definitely a planner — and what makes me even more scared is everything that just gotten cancelled in March and now quickly becoming April being queued up and squeezed into 8 short months. *smiles* Yes, we still have a few trips we need to reschedule and figure out, but for now I’m just letting things be and hoping we can start planning again soon, but for now eliminating that stress and just not planning anything (it’s sort of refreshing – at least for now!).

A few other things we’ve been trying to do to stay close to home is ordering in-store pick-ups as much as possible, ordering UberEats from a few of our favorite local spots to give them as much love as possible.  We also stocked up on a few supplies so that we could tackle a few house projects, which I’m so excited about!

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