Thoughts on Working Out

This may not be a revolutionary statement and you may have heard many people spout this cliche before but I have a love-hate relationship with working out.

Wild, right?

My dedication to working out comes in ebbs and flows. I consistently worked out when I had a gym partner, then I didn't. Then I got addicted to spin class, then I burnt out on it. Then I jogged a bunch for the summer, then it got cold. By November I hadn't used my gym membership in three months (meaning my $44/month was going to great use).

I started feeling some symptoms of the Winter Blues when it started to get cold and out of sheer desperation for some sort of energy I dragged my butt to the gym. It was at this time that I decided I was going to master the stair climber.

In the past I have enjoyed the stair climber just due to the fact that it was so hard that it made you feel like you'd worked your butt off in as little as 3 minutes. The problem was that I wasn't truly using the stair climber properly. I would clasp my hands to the side rails and put the majority of my weight on my arms effectively making the stair climber a heck of a lot easier than it's mean to be. Basically I was cheating myself through poor form (see example below):

I decided that I would finally master the stair climber even if it meant starting with just a couple of minutes at a time.

I looked up proper form for the stair climber and promised myself that I would walk straight up next time, with my hands lightly placed on the rails for balance only. What that meant was that my first trip on the stair climber was exactly 5 minutes and ended with me wheezing for air. But I did it.

I made a plan to increase my time slowly like so:

Session one: 5 minutes, level 7
Session two: 5 minutes, level 7
Session three: 7 minutes, level 7 (pause at minute 5 for a rest)
Session four: 7 minutes, level 7 (pause at minute 5 for a rest)
Session five: 7 minutes, level 7
Session six: 7 minutes, level 7

A slow progression but progression nonetheless!

<< My first time on the stair climber >>

It's March now and I'm at 16 minutes, level 7. 5 minutes now feels like a dream, although it all still feels hard most times and I continue to wheeze by the end of each climb. My goal is to make it to 20 minutes and then I'm going to work on climbing higher. I like to see how many floors I get to and equate that to an actual building (the Eiffel Tower is 108 floors, the CN Tower is 147 floors, the world's tallest building is 160 floors).

<< My most recent trip on the stair climber. I'm half way up the CN Tower!)

I've also signed up for two races this year in the spring and summer and am going to work on getting my run times faster and my run lengths longer.

I still have trouble getting myself to the gym most weeks but I feel like I'm finally seeing it differently. Working out is a chance for me to re-energize myself. I know that when I'm feeling incredibly tired for no good reason and the cold of winter is getting to me that if I get myself to the gym I'll feel better within minutes. I also have a goal that I'm working towards that kills me to skip out on.

This still doesn't work some days and I still struggle with all the fun things that come with being a human bean trying to enjoy their life and take care of themselves and just plain find a way to be comfortable in my skin and happy more than not- but it's a thing. It's a thing I'm accomplishing and failing at and continuing to try to accomplish and that's good enough for me.

When in doubt I'm going to continue to be like Chris Traeger and make a fun, beautiful goal like running all the way to another planet:

<< I love him so much >>

From the desk of:

Taylor Brown

Human Bean 

Book Club

I don't know if you know this about me...but I'm a reader.

I consider myself such a reader that when I saw Joanna Gaines wearing a "Book Club" sweater I went ahead of scoured the internet for one of my own. When I couldn't find myself one I went ahead and had one made (see above!). Seriously, check out @customlymadewithlove on instagram. I sent a grainy picture of the sweater I was looking for and we worked together to make the sweater of my book-loving dreams. And it was such a great price!

Who am I kidding, if you read this blog knowing I'm a reader may be the main thing you know about me since my annual book review is my most (and only) consistent blog post.

I l-o-v-e writing my annual book review and sharing all the books I've spent the past 12 months immersing myself in but I also don't think it's nice to be so dang greedy with my book selections. I think I should share a bit as I go!

That's why I'm going to share what I've been reading so far this year and what I want to read. That way we don't have to wait a whole year for some book recommendations! I'll still share what I think of my books at the end of each year but I thought this could be fun!

Each year I make a goal for myself to read 12 books. This year I'm doing really well with my goal! I'm already on my 6th book this year! Last year I hadn't even finished my first book until March (or maybe even April!).

I won't get too in-depth about any of these books but I will tell you that two are re-reads of a couple of my favourite books (so that means I dang-well like them!) and the rest have all been winners so you can't go wrong with these picks!

Let's do this!

Books read so far in 2019:

1. White Oleander- Janet Finch (Re-read)
2. Nobody Cares- Anne T. Donnahue (Um hi, Anne went to my highschool- at a different time than me- and lives in my hometown and this book made.me.feel.seen even though we have literally never crossed paths).
3. Homebody- Joanna Gaines (I mean, duh!)
4. Stranger in the Woods- Michael Finkel (Fascinating)
5. Survivor- Chuck Palahniuk (Re-read)

Current read:

Educated- Tara Westover (a recommendation from my sister!)

Books I either already have or plan to read:

1. White American Youth- Christian Picciolini (Already purchased)
2. Adjustment Day- Chuck Palahniuk (Favourite author- enough said)
3. How Not to Kill Your Houseplant- Veronica Peerless (I need this so badly)

I hope this has given you some great inspiration! Now we're in a book club together except we will never discuss the books together and you can just wait until December to hear what I actually think of the book. I mean, I can't think of a better Book Club, personally.

Happy reading, pals!

From the desk of:

Taylor Brown
Book Club President

Joy, or Something Like It

I do not like winter.

I don't like the cold, I don't enjoy hot chocolates, or snow shoe-ing, or skiing, or big puffy jackets and all of the additional winter related fa-shun.

I used to- once upon a time, when I was finished with my day by 3pm and I had the afternoons to feel the sun through the windows while I napped and binged on snack food while watch CSI.

Now I'm more in the category of drive to work in the dark, drive home in the dark, don't leave the house once you get inside of it. Basically, a seasonal hermit.

This change in lifestyle (from relaxed teenager with no idea of what it took to keep that house warm, stocked with junk food and cable ready, to an adult who just wants to feel the sun on her face every once in a damn while) has made it harder for me to get through winter. Some may call is Seasonal Affect Disorder, some may call it the Winter Blues. I've got them.

That's why I can easily convince myself that winter is never going to end (even though it most definitely will) and last month I was able to have a conversation with myself where I decided that nothing in my life brought me any joy.

Now, like I said, I'm wrong about these things, of course. But I was able to tell myself that piece of nonsense and actually believe it, even if it was only for a little while.

Also full disclaimer: I am happy. I know in the grand scheme of my life that I am happy. I love my home, home life and the people and animals who live in it. I generally enjoy my job and I have great friends. I also have a warm house, food to eat and yadda yadda yadda. But I did realize that I wasn't feeling *joy*.

Now, joy is a word we're overusing in this KonMarie world but I don't mean the joy we're supposed to feel when we pick up an item of clothing. I mean the joy of lying in the grass with the sun warming your face, or the joy you feel when you pick up fresh dhalias from the market, or when you feel excitement about meeting up with some friends. The small, inconsequential little joys of everyday life.

So I made a list. I made a list of all of those teeny-tiny things in life that bring me joy. They were simple. They didn't even include the big things in life like the people I love because I don't need reminders about the happiness they bring me. I want to remember the tiny things that make life special. I wrote all those things down, and I'm still writing them down when they come to mind. Just thinking of them makes me feel a little happier.

The next thing I'm going to do is invite those little joys into my life. I want to buy plants and nurture them, I want to grab a big cup of coffee and a good book and sink into the relaxation of a lazy afternoon. And when I'm doing those things I'm going to notice them. I'm going to slowly immerse myself in warmth of them like the feeling you get while lowering yourself into a hot bath.

I know this isn't the cure to the winter blues and this definitely doesn't make up for real, genuine struggles but I think that if we all just took a moment while we're swinging in a hammock listening to the trees, or listening to our favourite songs with our handsin a the warm, soapy dish water and thought to ourselves "hey, this is pretty great" that we could get a small piece of joy and hold on to it, at least for a little bit.

From the desk of:

Taylor Brown
Joy Sparker

Build Your Own Industrial Shelves (Plus A Short Novel About Our Home)

When we first moved into our house I pictured turning it into a "home" to be a quick and easy process, much like you see on HGTV, in particular Fixer Upper. Mostly I just wanted the house we bought to be turned into a Joanna Gaines original in 6-8 weeks without any effort on my part. Oh and it would be great if it was fully furnished to my liking, thankssomuch.

What actually happened was obviously, quite different (besides the part where we went away on vacation after the renovation and came home to our house painted a stunning navy blue by Jordan's parents- who I'm forever grateful for!)

Instead of a crew doing all the #demoday work Jordan and I spent the entire summer we moved in tearing the basement to the studs and rebuilding it as an apartment. When I say Jordan and I, I mostly mean Jordan. I had very good intentions at first but eventually I was begging to mow the lawn in 40 degree heat instead of being forced to pull one more nail out of the studs. It was a hell of a summer that ended with Jordan, his brother, and I insulating the entire basement over two nights in the Fall with fiberglass falling into our eyeballs. What.a.dream.

We eventually did get the basement finished and our reward was a pre-planned trip to Europe. When we came back from Europe we still had a heck of a lot of painting and cleaning to do but we were almost there. (Side bar: during this whole renovation Jordan worked his ass off going to work all day and slaving away all night. He basically pushed himself to the limit ripping up floor tiles, getting on the roof and putting his body in danger the whole time. In the last couple of days he bent over to pick up a pencil and pulled his back and we still laugh about that to this day.)

This extremely long-winded story is to say that by the time we had finished turning our basement into a legal apartment and moved our friends in as our very first tenants we had little to no interest (or cash) left to work on our part of the house. I put things on our beige walls, sighed over our chipped and stained laminate counter tops and wiped grime from our back-splash free kitchen. But it was ours.

Fast forward two years and we've been working really hard bit by bit to make our part of the house ours. We've painted our walls grey (with an absolutely gorgeous navy blue statement wall in our living room, which I love), we've change our counter top out for butchers block, subway tiled the back-splash and repainted, framed and changed the hardware on the cabinets. Our house is finally living up to the fixer upper finish, not just the before!

Now that the frame of the house is living up to my dreams, I'm still working on getting the contents of the house up to snuff. That includes some furniture that I'm planning on axing (your days are numbered, boys), a dresser that is getting a new coat of paint, and some of the things we originally put on our beige walls that went right back up when they were painted grey.

Exhibit A: our chalkboard

This chalkboard was a hand-me down that I decorated the first night in our house. For some reason it was very important to me that I get that done and hung immediately. And it served us well. At minimum it gave people a chuckle occasionally. But it's time in our life was over. I had my eyes set on some shelves and since we had some leftover wood from making our headboard I was able to sway Jordan into building them with me!

We obviously had to have a never ending conversation about the height, placement and width of the boards. At the end of it we still couldn't come to an agreement so we decided to do what any millennial would do: take it to instagram!

Jordan's preference was option 1 and my preference was option 2. I don't want to brag or anything, but my choice won. (Okay I'm bragging, I have impeccable taste).

Now, if you want to know how not to go about building shelves, you can ask experts Jordan and I. We spent our entire Christmas break going to every Home Depot, Home Hardware, Rona, Lowes, and everything in-between trying to match up these dang pieces. Our shelves included four pieces: a foot, a pipe, a topper and a bracket. We originally bought everything to fit a 1 inch pipe because that was the only size where we could get six sets of all four pieces. Well, we got the pieces home and realized they weren't long enough for our wood! (Measure first people, don't estimate, and also don't measure, lose the measurement, and say "it's okay, we can eyeball it").

We scoured the hardware stores for longer pipes and it took us six stores but we finally found what we were looking for. We finally got them up on December 31st and congratulated ourselves on being the most productive people of 2018.

I am completely in love with these shelves! They turned out just how I imagined and if I do say so myself: I think I styled them dang well.

So the moral of the story is: life is not like a 40 minute HGTV show, you'll probably never move into a home that looks exactly how you want it to be from fixtures to furniture and you sure as hell won't be able to make it exactly what you want without a little time and patience.

Our home still has a long way to go, but it's getting there. Until then I'll just be over here dreaming up the next headache I'll be badgering Jordan into!

From the desk of:

Taylor Brown
Demo Day Diva