Summer 2021

I don’t post very much anymore, no reason except I’m busy, but I have to say, this is an amazing summer! Some highlights!

1. I/We have been getting together with friends so much, in backyards and patios and occasionally inside a restaurant. I don’t know who reads my blog anymore but if you follow my Facebook, it probably looks like we’re not socializing, but we are! It’s just that I have made a decision to no longer post socializing on Facebook. I remember a time in my life where I felt so alone, and every time I scrolled Facebook and saw people socializing, my heart broke. I’m an adult. I’ve also seen this happen to teenagers. I’ve made the decision that posting socialization on Facebook doesn’t benefit me any, I’m enjoying time with my friends whether or not I share it on Facebook. However, it does have the capacity to hurt others. So, I have become much more mindful of what I post. Especially during Covid, when so many people have been so lonely, and so many relationships have been fractured. However, personally I have worked hard on nurturing positive supportive friendships, and spending time with my friends as much as possible…but just for us, not for social media.

2. In other good summer news, I applied for a supervisor position, and got it! It’s probably a one-year contract, starting at the end of September (these details are not completely confirmed, but what is confirmed is that I will be filling this position)! I am so excited to take this next step in my career, and hope that I will have a lot to offer the workers I am supervising, the clients they support, and the organization I work for. I’m sure that they have a lot to offer me as well (I am always learning!)! I also have to admit I’m pretty terrified, imposter syndrome is real and alive!

I have to say, and the absolute worst at interviews. I babble way too much, but don’t say enough.

So in my efforts to secure this position, I did some research and ended up watching a lot of the videos by self-made millennial, and using her worksheets to prepare for my interview. I am so happy I did so, not only did I get the job I wanted, but I got the most amazing initial feedback from my interview! I’ve always known that I’m good at what I do, and could be good at whatever positions I applied to, but I’ve always struggled with showing that side of me to my interviewers. This time, I shone! If anybody is looking at a change in their career, and worried about the interviews, I strongly recommend giving her YouTube page a follow!

3. For the 5th year I’m participating in the Great Cycle Challenge to fund raise for kids with cancer. My road bike is broken and I haven’t been able to get it repaired, so I will be writing 350 km on my spin bike. If you’re interested in sponsoring me, please do so. Here’s the link.

4. We’re going to British Columbia tomorrow. So excited to finally travel again and see a new part of Canada!

About friendship

Over the years I’ve had good friendships, and bad friendships. I’ve had friendships come and go. Over the last few years I’ve worked very hard at repairing friendships that were damaged, particularly when I was going through depression a few years ago. I also have a few friendships I’ve let go far too long.

I’ve done research, gone to therapy, and followed friendship experts. I’ve also paid attention to how things feel. What makes me want to repair a relationship, and what makes me question why I keep trying (spoiler-I hate losing people, even those that clearly do not value or respect me. I need to work on that. )

In this time I’ve learned a lot about what makes a good friend, that I want to be and try to keep, so I decided to share that.

People often complain about friendship issues, challenges making and keeping friends, even well into their middle age like me. So here are some tips!

1. Stay in touch. If you forgot to stay in touch or you’ve been busy, it happens, but get back in touch. Don’t make excuses about how busy your are or your problems…we are all busy and we all have problems. Just reconnect.

2. When you know something is wrong, ask about it, check in on it, show sincere concern.

3. When something is good, be happy, and show it. Sometimes jealousy or bitterness can get in the way of this (and it’s obvious even if you think it isn’t), push it aside and be happy for your friend’s good moments.

4. When your friend reaches out, respond. It’s a horrible feeling to reach out to someone and be ignored. Doesn’t have to be that minute, but probably that day.

5. If they ask you to do something, don’t leave them hanging. Sometimes the answer has got to be no, but at least answer. If you really value the friendship, and the answer is no, suggest another time or at least say that you would like to do it another time If you’re not in the right space to start scheduling.

2 blow dryers

As one only has to peruse this blog to see…making my curls they way I like is a process involving a lot of time and product. This is because even though my hair is naturally curly, it is also very fine and thin. If I don’t do my full curly routine, my hair is just a frizzy lumpy mess (If you look at my recent sunglass post, that’s exactly what happened in the middle picture!)

To summarize, my routine:

1. Wash or co-wash and condition hair

2. Comb through in shower

3. Rake in curl activator (my fave=AG recoil)

4. Scrunch in 2 layers of mousse, gel, or 1 layer mousse and 1 layer gel. (Fave mousse=cake curl maker. Fave Gel=Giovanni LA)

5. Pat dry with T-shirt

6. Plop

7. Diffuse with blow dryer (about 20 minutes)

8. Air dry for 30-60 minutes until hair is 100% dry (the inside takes a while because of all the product…but no matter how long I blow dry, it never dries), once dry it is hard and crunchy.

9. Scrunch out the crunch.

Phew. It’s a lot! I love the look, and it worked for me before Covid, because I would let it air dry in the car on my way to the office or my first client visit of the day, but working from home it doesn’t work well since I often have to be on video first thing and I like to sleep later when I’m working at home.

Straightening my hair takes less than 10 minutes since it is so fine and thin and takes no product but heat protectant. So…that been happening a lot lately.

Which brings me to the point of this post, which is reviewing 2 blow dryers!

The first one is the blow dryer that has gotten me through the past few months, Revlon has a blow dryer like this that is a very popular, however I chose this one on Amazon because it was cheaper and has great reviews. I love it! I can take my hair from towel dried to fully dry in six minutes, and I don’t have to use a straightening brush or iron afterwards. When I blow dry my hair straight with a normal blow dryer and round brush, I need to use something else after to get the shape. This does it all!

However, the blow dryer of my future is the Dyson supersonic! I have eyed this blow dryer for a long time but never got one because I could never ever ever spend $500 on a blow dryer, and because I really didn’t think I could justify it since my hair is so fine and thin. However I saved up enough SDM optimum points to buy it, and decided to go for it because now with my new working at home routine, I have less time for my hair and really want to dry it first and wear my hair curly the way I like it!

I love it! I do not particularly think my hair looks better or worse after using it than my normal curly routine, but it is so fast! I did my normal routine today and then diffused with it for about 10 minutes, that was literally all I had to do! My hair was 100% dry and ready to scrunch, I didn’t have to wait for it to air-dry. I do not like the phrase “It’s worth the money” because I find it a very privileged phrase that doesn’t recognize that sometimes the money just isn’t there (also, I have often had very good luck with lower priced alternatives). However, it was definitely worth the optimum points! If you have hair that takes long to dry, and are in a position to purchase this blow dryer, either in some kind of points program or out right, I definitely recommend it! It is lightweight, quiet, and super fast! The one caveat is that I find the diffuser very small. That’s not a big deal for me because my hair is not very long and I don’t have a lot of hair, but if I had piles of long curls, I would probably try to figure out how to make my black orchid work on it (Lots of people have figured out how to do this with magnets!). I haven’t tried straightening my hair with it yet, but I probably will in the next couple weeks…Just for testing purposes though. Now that I can wear my hair in my favourite curly style, quickly, I will be back to that!

Big sunglasses…the addiction

I’m really into big sunglasses! I’m not into spending a lot of money so I got some inexpensive ones. I love changing them up! I may have a couple more on the way…(Including a Stella McCartney pair I found at Nordstrom Rack!)

The first ones are from Amazon, the second ones a friend picked up for me at Costco (These are so cute, and polarized!), the last ones I literally have no idea where they came from! I found them in a drawer in my bedroom and decided I like them!

(Ignore my hair in the middle ones, I was trying something new that clearly did not work!)

What I wore

I went to the office yesterday and today, a year ago that would’ve been normal, now it is super exciting and a reason to get out of leggings!

I wore two of my new favourite pieces:

Yesterday I wore grey Frame Le High Skinny Jeans (With a Noisy May sweater).

Today I wore a ruffled BB Dakota sweater (with black Citizens of Humanity corduroy jeans)

I loved both looks, made me wish more people were at the office! That said I did see a few colleagues that I haven’t seen in a long long time, which was so nice and felt so normal in spite of the (not pictured) masks!