Pay It Forward (Also, The Reason I Won't Make Resolutions Anymore)

Welcome to 2015, everybody!

This year, if you've read the title, I've decided not to make a resolution.  As I was driving home from work this afternoon, I was thinking about all of the resolutions I've made over the past years (lose weight, read more, etc.) and how I've always seemed to fail to keep up with them.  This year, I've decided not to set myself up to fail, because I'm almost positive that I will fall short of whatever huge plans I make.  It sounds pessimistic, however, it's been a habit of mine to overshoot and over-plan and then feel bad about not meeting those sometimes difficult goals.

So, instead of making resolutions, I have decided to take part in the Pay It Forward initiative and give to people in hopes of inspiring them to do the same for others.  My friend, Hillary, on Facebook posted this idea and the way to get involved on her page and I couldn't think of any reason not to join.

In addition to the Pay It Forward goal, I've decided to set small goals for myself to strive for this year.  I've signed up for a gym membership back in November, did really well for about three weeks, then stopped going.  I'm hoping to make it to the gym at least once a week this year, which is totally doable, and I'm hoping to stay motivated and maybe increase that number once it starts to warm up and I'm not so sleepy anymore.

Goal #2 is always to read more, because I read a few books last year, but nowhere near what I would like to be.  It's hard when life gets so busy, but I'm hoping I can fit it in somewhere.  I just need to make a list of a few books that I'm 100% interested in so I can stay motivated to finish a book in less than three months time.

Other than that, I have some bigger things I hope to get to this year, like going back to school, planning some bigger life changes, but those kind of things are being taken in stride and are kind of being played by ear at this point.  We'll see how it goes!

Do you have any goals or resolutions for this year?  Let me know if you're taking part in paying it forward this year, I'd love to see what ideas everyone has.

YouTube Discoveries

In this last year, I (along with my sister, Hannah) have made some major steps in the world of YouTube.  At least that's what I think about the work we've done.  In the past 10 months, we have made a total of 47 videos, gained 84 subscribers, and have racked up an impressive 12.461 views as of this morning at 9 AM.

It's crazy to think that this all started out as just one video I made to entertain myself when I was living with a roommate who worked constantly.  This, so far, has been a rewarding and really fun and exciting side project for me, and I always find myself wishing that I had more time or better equipment to work and experiment with.

In the coming year, I'm looking forward to discovering more methods and creative ideas to enhance the channel and the content we come up with, and I already have a huge list of ideas to accomplish this coming year.  Here are some videos that have done the best this year, and I really hope to get some feedback from everyone so we can further improve our videos!

The Walking Dead, Mid-Season Finale (Season 5)

Sugar Skull Face Painting

The video that started it all: Emcee Inspired Makeup from Cabaret

Hope you enjoy these as much as I've enjoyed making them!  Happy Holidays!

What I've Learned From Gift Wrapping

Every year I wrap gifts. I wrap gifts more often than I even realize because, with my family, there's a birthday in literally almost every month. But then comes the holidays (for my family, Christmas) and everything explodes with ribbons and tape. 

Now, you would think with how often I wrap gifts that I would have some sort of actual system or plan going into the ordeal that is wrapping gifts for 6 family members as well as friends and my significant other and his family. There isn't. There hasn't been for as long as I can remember. It's really just a total mess, so here are some lessons that I have relearned again this year about gift wrapping:

1. Metallic wrapping paper often reflects light and makes mistakes less obvious.

         See? You can hardly tell this    needed two separate sheets of paper.

2. Make sure all of the supplies you buy to wrap gifts are unwrapped before you start. Nothing is more annoying than trying to pry open a fresh roll of tape while holding your perfectly flat paper against a gift.

3. There are two kinds of people in this world, those who hate curling ribbon, and those who can never have enough. (There's never enough curling ribbon.)

4. Simple can be the best looking, and obviously easiest, way to go about it. "Brown paper packages tied up with string" is definitely back in style and takes the guessing game out of matching colors.

5. Be prepared to lose everything. Put down the scissors, pick up the tape, spend 15 minutes looking for the scissors again. There's teally no winning unless you are insanely organized, which I am not.

6. Don't stress too much about how it looks. If you're awful at wrapping, there are always gift bags (and most stores will wrap what you buy for you). Also, the paper will end up on the floor and in the trash later anyways, so who care of it's not smooth or covered in tape or a weird color? The gift and the thought are what matter most.

If your had any revelations while gift wrapping this year, I'd love to hear the ! Happy holiday everyone, and happy second night of Hannukah!

Belated Thanksgiving

Happy super-belated Thanksgiving! My sister, brother-in-law, and nephew were visiting for the last couple of weeks, not to mention the crazy amount of work to be done getting ready for Christmas and New Year's Eve, so it's been a little insane around here.

Two weeks definitely wasn't enough. He's the cutest. If you want to see my family's Thanksgiving MashUp, you can find it here!

I also started a new photo challenge for this month, since I kind of ditched the 365 challenge from earlier this year.  If you'd like to see the progress so far, you can find the pictures on my Instagram @divinemisse02.

What have you been up to? Do you have any fun holiday plans coming up?

Nice To Meet You(Tube)

Hello, again! Two posts in one week?! Unbelievable!

Now, I'm not sure if I've ever shared a link from my YouTube channel here (I know I've left links for my playlists here before) but I've started to actually make my own videos! You can find them HERE, or search 'Divine MissE' through YouTube itself.

I am taking suggestions for new ideas for videos all the time, so please feel free to leave a comment either here or there and let me know what you'd like to see. There are also links to my Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest in the video descriptions of each video, if you'd like to check any of those out, and I'm looking forward to linking both my videos and blog with each other so they don't feel so separate anymore!

Welcome Back!

So, there's really no excuse for how long I've been gone. It's been a long 7 months but I'm ready to come back now and get this thing going again. However, I suppose I owe anyone who had been reading this before an explanation of sorts, so here it is..

The reason I stopped writing here was pretty complicated. I was living in Oklahoma with my sister and my brother in law, who recently welcomed my awesome little nephew. I was in a relationship for two and a half years that started to completely fall apart. The distance from the situation as well as anyone to discuss the issues with who knew the guy were extremely straining, in addition to the tensions due to lack of sleep from everyone in the house was too much for me to handle and I was then offered an ultimatum: come back to Connecticut and we fix this, or stay there and we'll call it quits.

In a hindsight kind of way, I stupidly and selfishly quit my job, left my family behind, and went home to try to make things work. I now know how stupid that was, because only two weeks after returning home, the relationship was ended. Done. 

We tried to make the end something we could look back on happily for both of us, but after all is said and done, I realize how ridiculous the whole situation was. Regardless, for a while after that, I was mourning the loss of the best friend I had relied on for years and a boyfriend who will more than likely never speak to me again. But to each his own, I suppose.

So, after a more than long enough hiatus, I was working a lot of evenings at a bakery and not really functioning properly. I've met someone new through that job, unexpectedly, and we've been together for 4 months. We've spent an unreal amount of time together, which would explain the lack of posting for the last couple of months, but things are changing now for the better. 

So, after a long-winded explanation, I'm ready to start "new". I've been uploading videos to YouTube for a while now, which has taken up a bit of time but I've been having a lot of fun with it and hoping to expand a bit more as I learn things. You can check out my videos (many of them involving my sister, Hannah) by searching DivineMissE on YouTube. 

I hope everyone's been doing well the last half-year I've been gone. Let's do this, and welcome back.

Today, I Believe...

• That sometimes all you need is time, space, and coffee to power through the days ahead.
• Relationships are amazing and worth a lot of your attention, but never lose your head in them.  They may be the person you end up spending your life with, but your true friends will be there even longer.
• Endings are sad and scary, but there's always hope to fall back on.  It's never too late for a new beginning.
• Finding new music that you instantly love is one of the greatest pick-me-ups in rough times.
• It really is okay to eat an entire half of a cake while you're mentally unstable.  Just make sure, when you come back around, you do an extra lap or so around the track.

Happy Monday, everyone.  I hope you've all been well! (Or are getting well after the onset of seasonal allergies have kicked in).