I Believe...

in Simplicity… plain and simple, that's how I like to keep things. I guess some would call that a minimalist, I just call it "I hate feeling cluttered". From my closet to my living space to the art I create, I live by KISS {Keep It Simple, Stupid}.

in the Inspiration of Nature. I'm an outdoorsy type of girl who loves to play in the dirt. I love being in/around mountains, they make me feel like a spec of dust and in turn make my little "problems" feel like a blip on the map. I love hiking up mountains in the summer and I love speeding down mountains on my board in the winter. I love water too, frozen or not, I love it all year round.

that LOVE makes the world go round. Yup, as cliche as that saying is, it's true! I believe in love…100%. Above money, your career, your fancy car…the relationships you share are the most important thing in your life. Life is all about the love you share.

it's important to be yourself, 100% of the time. If it's one thing I heard day in and day out while I was growing up from my father "if they don't like me it's their problem". Ha! My dad is one of a kind, but that saying still rings in my head and I wish more people learned this at a young age. I don't want a friend who is a carbon copy of what they were told is the perfect way to be. I want you, in all your quirkiness. Acting how you want, wearing what you want {even if you look like Punky Brewster}, speaking what you believe, and being comfortable to just be yourself. Be your own kind of beautiful...

Visual Thoughts

This blogging challenge proves to be a little harder than anticipated… How do I create when I don't feel the flow? I've taken many years of art classes & workshops, from drawing and painting to 3D sculpture & pottery, I have experienced just about every medium. At this point in life I have an idea on what might get my flow started…

1. Turn on some Moby

2. Start drawing/coloring/taking pictures.

That's right… it's as easy as stop thinking about it and just do it.

This quote at the end of the post was taken out of an awesome book that preaches just that method, stop thinking and start doing. The War of Art… it's a goodie for any and all creatives who sometimes struggle to harness their muse.

Today proves to be one of those days where It's hard for me to communicate through written word… so here is my visual blog post!

Peace, Love & Doing It,

April K

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Do What You’re About

Today's post is mostly written for my creative peeps, but may pertain to you, if you don't consider yourself as such, too. I remember as a first grader each class was brought into the cafeteria to take a test. There we were, spread out with dividers between each person. As a first grader, you don’t really think about why you’re doing something, you just do what you’re told. We were then given a piece of paper with a bunch of shapes and we had to finish the drawing of the shape into what we thought it looked like. Not knowing any better I just drew what I thought that shape should be. Apparently my drawings were quite different from everyone else’s.

It turns out this was actually a “creative competition” and because of my “unique” test results I was put into a special program for kids with large imaginations. It was called “Odyssey of the Mind” or “OM”  . Looking back as an adult having went through this it was such an awesome program and I was lucky to be apart of it for a few years. At the time I hated it…just like I hated school, my teachers or anyone who told me how to do things… I never understood why I couldn’t do things my way to achieve the same result… why did I have to do it their way? I was a very creative child who loved and did very well at art and using my imagination and who hated the traditional boring classes that were considered to be more important like Math, Science etc. I'm sure parent teacher conferences were interesting for my parents, my mom was always told by teachers that "April marches to the beat of her own drummer". I am a left brainer through and through.

As I grew older I realized that I was not the same as most of my peers nor did I think like them either. That scared me. I started acting more like them and trying to be “normal”. I remember having to take the creative test again and copying off of my friend Rae Lynn because I didn't want to be the "unique" one. I had turned into a girl just trying to fit in with everyone else {ooooh if only I knew then what I know now}. For some reason I saw my uniqueness as a bad thing, I think because I didn't understand how it was a good thing?  Both my parents are very creative but they never stressed how important my creativity is…  I think they faced the same thing I did, they didn’t realize how valuable it really is in life because it just comes easy for them. Needless to say I wasn’t asked to be apart of OM anymore, which at the time I was quite happy about.

As an adult now living off my own creativity, I am forever trying to put myself back into that mentality that I had in first grade. Not caring what others were doing and just doing what I think is cool… later dubbed “developing my own style”.  This is a scary thing when I’m trying to build a business and a brand all while staying true to myself.

I recently watched a TED talk {I love the inspiration they provide} and a line of what this one entrepreneur said really stuck with me. “Do what you’re about”

DUH!!!! why hadn’t I been doing this all along? It's so simple. Here I am watching seminar after seminar about "developing my own style" when all I've really had to do is just ignore what everyone else is doing?! Perfectly simple, I don’t know why that was so hard for me to figure out, but at least now I've been reminded and moving forward this will be my mantra. After all, your own thoughts, views, personality, decisions etc are what sets you apart from everyone else!

Peace, Love & You Doing You,

April K

Trusting The {Pregnancy} Process!

I am really happy that I decided to start posting about my pregnancy here on the blog because I’ve had SO MANY women reach out to me telling me their stories and sharing their experiences. It’s so awesome for me to experience while I’m pregnant but just to hear these stories, in general. What’s even cooler is a few of my past brides are now pregnant and it’s become a real “bonding” experience! I love talking about this with all you ladies, so if anyone has anything to add to any of these posts, by all means, share with us all! Pregnancy is a very unique experience for every woman.  In my experience, there seem to be 3 categories of pregnant women:

1. Those who absolutely love being pregnant and want to do it over and over and over again. {accounts for maybe 5% of the population}

2. Those who don’t mind it but can think of 100 things that are way better.

3. Those who absolutely hate the process and it doesn’t agree with their bodies.

I would pin myself as a category 2 pregnant woman, though each stage of pregnancy I really struggled with something within myself.

The First Trimester: It was May when I found out, which immediately means no more drinking… right before the hot summer time. Ooo was that hard! To go all summer, the long hot days, with out one ice-cold brew to quench my thirst. Talk about a challenge! I also struggled with fatigue… I’m talking I was a narcoleptic through and through.  I have SO MUCH respect for those pregnant women who trudge into corporate day in and day out; I know my sister told me she used to go out to her car and nap. I would be sitting at my computer editing away and it would set in… I could just put my head on my keyboard and pass right out. Suddenly my hardwood desk was the most comfortable spot in the house! In addition, the fit and trim body that I’d been working on for years was starting to vanish. There went my 4 pack abs {I mean who really can get the last 2 abs on the bottom to show without being crazy about it?!} bye bye to my fit legs and waistline. I simply looked like I had raided the shelves of Dunkin Donuts for the past 3 months. Talk about sexy!

The Second Trimester: Finally, I was getting my energy back gradually and starting to go to the gym. I was energetic again and feeling great, just in time for the majority of my weddings to take place. I was running around these weddings like “it ain’t no thang”. I still wasn’t over the whole not being able to drink thing, but I did let myself have a glass of red vino every now and then.  By the end of this trimester I was finally starting to grow my belly, which really made me happy and I truly started feeling pregnant, feeling the baby kick for the first time and all. Perfectly named the “honeymoon trimester” it was just that for me. Happy, glowing, energetic and eating every type of fruit in sight, this isn’t so bad.

The Third Trimester: Ooook, when is this gonna be over? Clearly pregnant with an ever-growing belly to prove, I am still feeling energetic at the beginning but that dwindles down by the last month. In my last month I’m pretty tired, not as tired as the first trimester though, but I've definitely been hibernating. I don’t sleep at night because you have to lay on your side and that causes my bum to go numb {sciatica}. I get up about 5 times/night to pee and in between tossing and turning my body simply just doesn’t want to sleep. There have been nights where both Justin and I are completely wide awake, we got up and ate breakfast at 4 a.m. Mother nature is really gearing us up for what is about to happen. The baby is getting heavier inside of me, which is causing lower back pain. The only relief I’ve found from aches and pains of pregnancy, is doing prenatal yoga. I bought the DVD of Heather Seiniger’s Yoga Pregnancy and it’s helped my sciatica and lower back pain as well as the small aches and pains that come with the whole package. Those once, wee flutter kicks, now feel like she’s droppin’ ‘bows into my rib cage and finishing me off with a 1-2 sucker punch to the gut.  Let’s just say, I don’t think she’s dainty by any means! haha.

Pregnancy is definitely not only a physical process but also a mental process. From watching yourself grow larger and larger right before your very eyes is enough to drive any woman mad! TRUSTING IN THE PROCESS…this is a phrase used among the creative realm I work in… but it’s certainly true of pregnancy. I have consistently been telling myself “you’re not fat April, you’re pregnant” but it’s hard not to feel like a 2 ton beached whale while you're getting out of bed or up off the couch. I think for me it’s the lack of being my normal fast moving and flexible self, I feel stifled and stagnant. Now I TOTALLY understand why old people move so slow… their poor bodies. I miss the gym, I miss lifting weights, I miss running… did I ever think those words would come out of my mouth?! In the time it used to take me to run 4 miles I can now only waddle/walk 1 mile… and at this point {2 weeks away from due date} I can’t walk very far at all unless a bathroom is on the way! {Oh and btw, I totally pee'd my pants on accident for the first time the other day… lol this will happen once or twice to all of you still in early pregnancy… and when it does I hope you laugh your ass off}.

Oh ma nature, you’re getting the best of me right now.  I know it’s all in the process and I’m trusting the process will bring me a happy and healthy baby girl!

Peace, Love & Waiting....

April K

The Cell Phone Cleanse

One of my New Years resolutions is to stop being a slave to my phone and to stop wasting time on Facebook. I've often thought of downgrading to the run of the mill "drug dealer" phone that can simply take incoming and make outgoing calls… and that's it. Before making that drastic change {because sometimes I do need to answer client emails on the road}, I tried this little cleanse first… here are my results. Step 1: Preliminary “leaving the phone behind”

I am sick of being so attached to a stupid phone, which is more like a computer that takes over my life. I need to be spending LESS time with my phone and MORE time with people IN PERSON or via Skype for those long distance folks! I need to be focused on what I'm doing and to stop and smell the roses.

I was so accustomed to looking at my phone for no reason. It was like an involuntary thing, even if I were in a conversation with someone in person, I’d look at my phone and listen at the same time… how rude. One thing that really started to annoy me was that if I was alone, waiting for something or someone I’d immediately go on my phone to distract myself. I think this is a horrible thing for an artist to do. Artists of any kind should double think the next time they do this, you are a visual and creative person, you need to be paying attention to your surroundings. I personally have the need to look around, observe things, shapes, colors, shadows contrasting with light, people's expressions, all the little details that an average person coule care less to notice. I felt I needed to take in the life that I’m living and be more present and aware.

So now, when I leave the house with Justin, I leave my phone at home. This wasn't THAT hard for me considering I was so fed up, it was rather liberating. After a few weeks, low and behold, I'd come home to a screen full of missed calls or text messages but guess what? No one died because I didn’t answer right away. As a matter of fact, no one even noticed! It has since been so liberating leaving home with no phone. I no longer feel like I’m a slave to whoever wants to get in touch with me when it's convenient for them. If it's important they'll leave a message for me to call them back, plain and simple.

Step 2: removing the facebook app from my phone

Admittedly, this was really hard for me at first. I would go on facebook while lying in bed, the first thing I did in the morning and the last thing I’d do at night (Justin would not like this). I’d even bring it into the bathroom with me… what? What is wrong with me? PUT THE PHONE DOWN APRIL! As crazy as it sounds, by removing this app I was one step closer to taking my life back and treating this phone for what it is… a phone! Not a lifeline. I would still go on facebook, but only when I’m sitting at a computer.

Guess what happened after that?

THE WORLD DIDN'T END!

I would go on facebook a few times a day if I was sitting at my computer or sometimes not at all. No more wasting time on stuff that I don’t even care about! Facebook has started to become more annoying to me than anything.  And what’s more, a portion of the people I’m “friends” with on Facebook I’ve never even met in real life! How’s that for a reality check, um April, how about catching up with people you’ve actually met in person.

Step 3: Well apparently all I needed was a 2 step cleanse

Over this month my phone has really faded into the background of my life. I’ll leave it in the other room, not hear it or pick it up and I’m completely fine with that. I have voicemail and can call people back and believe it or not, it’s totally acceptable by those who call me! And guess what, no one cares that I don’t answer their text messages as soon as I receive them. I no longer feel like I’m slave to this mind numbing piece of plastic.

I’ve started to bring my real camera with me when I go out instead of using the camera on my phone {also one of my goals}. This has allowed me to practice the art of photography rather than the art of iphone snapshots.

I have been skyping a lot more with friends and family, getting that sweet facetime in.

I have become more focused on what I'm doing.

I’ve become more aware and present in my own life from day to day. I don’t live my life in front of my phone anymore. I am more aware of what’s going on around me; I notice details and the little things again. I'll have small talk with the lady at the cash register or the guy bagging my groceries. I make it a point to say Hi to people in passing. I know I probably sound uber dramatic, but man, this was really happening to me and it needed to change.

So...I challenge you, my trusty reader - who may be facing cell phone addiction, to take this challenge. Start out small and take baby steps, you’ll be amazed at how much better your own life is and stop living life through your phone or facebook.  If you’re brave enough to actually do this I’d love to hear your story and what actions you took and how it affected your daily life moving forward.

Peace, Love & Focusing on what matters,

April K