This is my 2019 recap through my camera roll. I was trying to do this on a monthly basis for awhile, so I’m really excited to see everything from 2019 in one glance. I take TONS of pictures, and this should be fun. Can you guess home many pictures I took in 2019?? My iPhone camera roll is telling me 4,180… but I know it’s more than that if you count all of the weddings, family session, and business type work I did. Whew, it’s been a year!
It's easy to feel down, think you've accomplished nothing, compare yourself to others but that's not the case. We've all accomplished so much... here you are and here we are! Still alive, still happy (or trying to be), still making the most of every situation. I shared a post on Facebook the other day that said “I know we are in the yearly recap phase of social media and everyone is announcing their biggest wins, but please don’t compare yourself and your progress to others. If your biggest achievement was just staying alive, then that’s a win too.”
While a lot has changed from the beginning to the end of 2019, it feels as though everything is the same. Trevor and I have had each other through all the ups and downs, and that's all that matters. We moved from Kansas City to small town Indiana, we traveled back and forth A LOT, we sold a house, we moved two times in one year, we quit our jobs, and we pursued our passions.
January
This was a month of risks. We decided officially that we were moving. It was a HUGE risk because we didn’t really have jobs lined up back in Indiana. We knew what we wanted to do, we knew we weren’t really happy with where we were, and we decided to dive right in to the unknown and make a change. We listed our house this month. We were really open about it on our YouTube channel too! There were videos about it going under contract, and then that falling through, all before it finally sold.
February
February was officially moving month. Even though our house wasn’t officially sold yet, we decided to pick a date to move anyways. It was really refreshing to feel like we had control over this one thing since everything else felt like the great unknown. I put in my notice at work that that was going to be the last day—I quit my job and it felt sooooo good! Through it all Trevor and I were trying to keep as positive as possible, but I know now looking back at this month that we were truly scared. We have 3 or 4 moving vlogs on our YouTube channel if you’d like to check those out for more details about our journey.
March
We were officially moved… and mostly settled. But it still felt like a euphoria that we were back with my family. I remember doing a lot this month. There just seemed to be a million more things we could do with tons of friends and family. We went on a Wine Tasting Trail, drove all the way back to Kansas, hung out with more friends, working a few weddings, and officially sold our house.
April
In April I focused a lot more on work. I was trying to set up an actual routine and not just live by the seat of my pants. I was still working some weddings, but I needed to figure out a structure that would last. In my April Recap post I even said, “April was a month of few accomplishments, but it was a month with much going on. Looking back through my calendar, scrolling through my camera roll, and glancing back at my vlogs on our YouTube channel, I am able to see that I really got a lot done during this past month which makes me happy and content.”
May
I’m pretty sure we traveled to Kansas TWICE this month. I had weddings already booked from before we moved that I had to work on different weekends. One time when traveling back we swung by Chicago to go to a Cubs game celebrating Mother’s Day with the whole family. Also, at the beginning of the month Trevor ran his first half marathon with us. It was literally miserable… there’s no way to sugar coat it. It rained the entire time, we hadn’t trained at all, so it’s easy to say we kind of hated it, haha!!
June
June is my birthday month. It started with us still in Kansas, so I got to celebrate my birthday there. We had a joint party for Trevor and I with some friends, good food, and his family. Trevor’s birthday is always the last week of May and mine is the first week in June. We’re literally only 7 days apart, so I love celebrating our birthday’s together. When looking back through old videos and blog posts that happened in June, nothing stood out as super important. It makes me kind of sad that I didn’t document as much… this month really shows how not documenting meant memories lost.
July
Oh, the month of selfies. This was the month of trying to be an IG baddie. There were lots of photoshoots with Olivia, self-time photos, and a lot of photos of me. I made a commitment to step up my game this month—I wanted to focus on my blog, on my instagram, and on YouTube in general. We vlogged every single day this month and did a sort of Vlogmas in July kind of thing. I think it’s a new tradition that we will carry on into the year too.
August
In August we announced we were moving AGAIN. The tiny home we were in before we moved to where we are now was never supposed to be permanent. We tried our best to make it work for us, but it was just too small. When the duplex of our dreams opened up that I’ve been waiting forever for, I was over the moon excited. I knew that this would probably be our last rental before some day building or buying our own house again, so it made me happy knowing me we were in a place that I could see myself staying at for a long time.
Some other fun things we did were: the Pedal Bar in Indianapolis, Trevor’s mom came to visit for a week, Blake had her last first day of high school, a couple of our friends stayed for a weekend, and I booked a few more Family Sessions (which was a new thing for me at the time). We also got a huge new mirror for our new house, which meant even more selfies than last month.
September
We started out the month in Kansas with a Bobby Bone and the Raging Idiots show at the Kansas State Fair where we sat FRONT ROW! It was amazing. After traveling back home, we had about 2 days before we left again to spend a three day “weekend” at the Blue Chip Casino for our 1 year anniversary. It was amazing. While we traveled quite a bit, I took the time to reflect, learn, and really figure out my life. At this point in the year I was feeling a bit down—my business was growing but financially we were not as stable as we used to be and Trevor and I were feeling the pressure. It was a new adjustment that hit me hard and made me do some deep reflection. Thankfully, I have amazing friends who gave me guidance and helped me through.
October
My mind shift towards Memory Keeping became really apparent this month. I was constantly thinking about taking pictures, recording video, capturing all the moments of myself and of others. I focused a lot on my business and wanted to push hard to make memory keeping my full time job. We didn’t post on our YouTube channel near as much as we normally do, but I liked that when I was scrolling through my camera roll we still captured so many memories that way. We watched my sister play on her travel softball league all the way in Ohio, we celebrated my dad running the Chicago Marathon for the 9th time, we adopted a kitten, and we partied it up at Purdue with my sister, Sara, for Halloween as gnomes!
November
In November we posted quite a bit on YouTube, but I don’t really have many pictures to show what we did. The pictures I do have to show you guys are really special. There’s firstly the ones of Trevor and I with the poop hat on—we wound up buying it from WalMart, haha. Then I have more photos of Grizzle and Ash being the most adorable brother and sister. I have too many to share on here, so I just picked one. The final pictures are from Thanksgiving where I was taking some great pictures with my big nice camera. We started Vlogmas right after this, so I may have been prepping for that and not in the mood for pictures, who knows. To see more, check out my InstaGram too!
December
Welcome to the month of Vlogmas! A YouTube trend in which we vlog every single day during the month of December. Most of our memories of the month live there, and again, I don’t think I really have too many pictures to show for it. So, just check out the Vlogmas playlist on our YouTube channel! Even the pictures that I do have to show you down below are just taken from vlogs anyways. Also, I wrote a blog post talking all about documenting during the holidays… it’s one of my favorites AND has more pictures for you to look at, haha.
Whew what a year!! I cannot believe that I took over 4,000 pictures (and I just went through then all). It’s crazy how so much has changed when you compare the beginning of the year to the end of the year, yet so much of it all still feels the same. If you’d like to see the video version of this recap, then please click play below. I love reflecting on my past and making positive changes towards the future. What do you think we will accomplish next year?
