March 2019

If you follow me on social media, you may already know that I struggle with Seasonal Affect Disorder (also known as SAD, aptly enough). It has been particularly bad the last couple of years. I’ve tried the vitamins and the special light, but they don’t really seem to do much. I try to make sure I’m getting outside when I can and exercising, but it usually just means I’m sobbing during my at-home Pilates workouts. The brutal truth is that I’m just sad and tired pretty much all of the time. As an enneagram type 4, that is pretty much already my low-grade baseline year-round, so this time of year is PARTICULARLY HARD. I met with a dear friend early in the year who walked me through some self-care practices and brainstorming several lists of ways to feel better during this time and it just really helped so much. 

One of my favorite things I picked up this year was heading to an indoor garden conservatory here in Chicago once a week, where it’s warm and humid and green. It lifts my spirits TREMENDOUSLY. Once I had gone a few weeks in a row in January, I was feeling a lot happier and more energized and so my visits kind of dwindled. I’m finally making the intentional time to go back this week and am really going to try to make it a priority. I’m trying to remember that self-care isn’t just for when you’re seconds away from snapping in half. That it’s much more effective if you do it preventatively, right? If you’re feeling even a little bit like me this winter, I want to help you out with some self-care this month:

• I’m telling you about my practice of making seasonal bucket lists, as a way to ritualize and look forward to each season (planning for the future always helps lift me out of the hopelessness of winter)
• I’m sharing my favorite self-care items with you this month!

My best friend and I started this tradition of making seasonal bucket lists a few years ago. We would get so excited about each change of the season and all of the new foods and activities that came with those changes and we’d sit down together and make lists of all our dreams for that season. In the fall it was things like, “make pumpkin bread,” “go apple picking, “ “watch You’ve Got Mail with pumpkin spice lattes.” In the summer it was things like, “have a beach picnic,” “try making homemade ice cream,” “sign up for a 5k.” Before I was a designer, I’d looked around online for a cute bucket list template that I could buy, but I really couldn’t find anything. So we’d just write them out on computer paper and hang them on our fridges.

I’ve been designing my Seasonal Bucket Lists for about a year now. I started with Summer Bucket List, which was originally created as a swag-bag item for my favorite craft show, Show of Hands Chicago. I had so much fun creating it- coming up with all of the little phrases and taglines and little seasonal illustrations, that I decided to keep making them, one for each season. Truth be told, they have never been huge sellers, but they’ve been my little pet project; something I just love making so much, even if it’s just for my own artistic enjoyment. I just finished the spring list this winter, completing the set. Until this point, they’ve only been available as a download on my Etsy shop, but now I’m working on printing them and packaging them up as a set of four. I like to imagine that they’d be a really fun gift. If you include them with an inexpensive 8x10 picture frame and some wet-erase markers, the recipient can keep them all in the frame and rotate which one is in the front. They can write their lists on the glass or plastic with the wet erase marker and then save the lists from year to year. They can also jot down their memories on the back and date them as they add more over the years.

The printed and packaged set will be available as part of my spring collection, releasing in April. I will definitely let you know when that whole collection is available in next month’s email. Until then, the lists are available for purchase as downloads on my Etsy shop. EXCEPT, because you are all my favorites and so special to me, the Spring Bucket List is available for you to download for FREE below!

Here are my fav self-care-ish things for March! I brag a LOT about my home cold brew but it’s only because it’s the BEST COLD BREW EVER. I’ve tried all of the “this is the best Pioneer Woman recipe involving cheesecloth and a giant roasting pan of coffee sludge on your counter for 36 hours” and to that I say NO THANK YOU. My good friend, Kristen, introduced me to the Toddy Cold Brew System about two years ago and I have never looked back. I’ve made this with the cheapest possible can of coffee at Trader Joe’s and it is still DELICIOUS. Plus, it’s super easy to use and I get about a week’s worth of iced coffee out of a batch. HIGHLY RECOMMEND. *It should be noted that this makes cold brew concentrate and it should be added to water or milk or you might have a heart attack. It’s all in the instruction manual 🙂 My second favorite March thing are these Enneagram mugs from my Instagram friend, Being Sara Dixon. They are so witty and funny and she has all kinds of adorable enneagram products in her shop. A form of self-care for me are delightful objects to look at and this one just makes me smile every time I take a sip from it. Also, ACCURATE, Sara. I’m NOT like enneone else.

I looooooove these Mental Health Reminder pins from my friend, Jini and Tonic. I love Jini’s focus on feminism and mental health and I love her commitment to representation in her work. And finally, my total favorite form of self-care are bath bombs. I love to light a candle, put on a good playlist, and soak in a hot bath with a fizzy, yummy-smelling bath bomb. I do not discriminate with bath bombs, but my absolute favorite ones come from Basin because at their locations at Walt Disney World they have hidden Mickey ones, which I stock up on every time I’m there (which, if you know me, is a LOT. Disney World is actually my favorite form of self-care, but that’s for another day, I think). The one pictured is called “Wishes,”which is what the fireworks show at Magic Kingdom used to be called and is one that I grab every time I’m at the Disney Springs location- it’s the only “Disney-ish” one available online, but all of their other scents are amazing as well. 

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