Life & Links Vol. 1

Welcome to Volume 1 of Life & Links! Lindsey and I wanted to bring something a little more personal to our blog and loved this concept from What Karly Said.

We’re always sliding into each others DMs with links from all over the internet that put a smile on our face, inspire us, or make us think about something from a different perspective. Why not share them here?!

Some weeks the “Life” portion of this series will be a dialogue between us and other times it will be more like a “10 Things” format. Either way, you will get a little more of a behind the scenes and get to know us a little better.

What a perfect segway into “Life” these past few weeks. We’ve been feeling increasingly like social media was literally sucking the life out of us. We had to take a major step back and evaluate what we are really there for. You see without realizing it over the past few years we had started following all the same type of person. AND we were feeling the pressure to keep up with them even though it wasn’t ever in alignment with who we wanted to be.

In the past year, we’ve remedied this and I glad to say that my feeds are increasing in diversity everyday. Here’s the thing about coming out of an echo chamber though, the unlearning process is somewhat slow and painful. Many things that we are currently unlearning were presented to us from a young age as just the way things are. We’re realizing that “the way things are” looks very different across age, race, culture, body size, socioeconomic status, religion, and sexual and gender identity. And often just because it’s considered “the way things are” doesn’t mean it doesn’t need a complete overhaul.

However slow and painful, this unlearning and reeducating ourselves has been absolutely necessary and IS the power of social media. We’re still not 100% clear on our purpose but our desire is to empower, teach, inspire, and entertain. We’re also here to learn. To listen to and raise up voices different from our own. If we’re ever not doing those things, feel free or unfollow (or say something if you are marginalized and ever feel erased by our work). We realize that when you’re speaking in a way that is palatable to everybody, you’re actually speaking to nobody. That means not everybody is going to find this space is for them, and that is 100% OK!

Life

Jenne

1. Greyson graduated Kindergarten this month and I can hardly believe it! He had matured so much and had such an incredible experience this year. The atmosphere of his school and the teacher’s investment in their students growth blew us away.

2. The boys also had their end of the year showcase for their little gym. We’ve only been going for a month but the boys are loving it!

Lindsey

My parents came to visit Seattle for the first time earlier this month. We did a ton of the touristy things like the Space Needle, Chihuly Garden and Glass Museum, the aquarium, and a ton more!

My husband had a conference to attend in Austin, TX so I tagged along to visit my bestie in Waco. She showed me all the best places to eat and we went to Magnolia too! Texas is super hot and humid, but they have some delicious food and great places to see and people to visit 🙂

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Our fur baby Kami had to have some dental work done that turned into a lot of stress on her probably, but us too. She was scheduled for surgery with our vet on May 6th, but they had her under anesthesia and took x-rays and cleaned her teeth. When they looked over the x-rays they decided it would be best she sees a specialist for the extractions. Before they did the cleaning they gave her a pain medicine that ended up making her crazed, not sleep for 3 days, and develop a tremor. Thankfully all of those symptoms subsided and she was back to her normal self by day 5. We scheduled the surgery with the specialist for May 15th and asked them not to use that same pain medicine.

She did so much better on whatever they gave her! She had some swelling in her nose on day two of recovery (see picture) but that went away pretty quickly. She’s now two weeks post-op and doing so well. She seems like a much happier and lovey cat, and that makes our hearts happy!

Links We Love

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are leveraging their massive social following to raise awareness for mental health. Already following a number of the pages they are supporting and let me tell you it has been sooo good for me!

AOC bakes her concealer too, in the new Netflix Documentary. It is awesome to see a powerful woman unapologetic about the fact that she just plain likes to wear makeup. Who’d have thunk it?! A woman making a decision without caring what her peers think of her or how she could possibly get viewed by her opponents as “shallow” because of it. We’re here for it!

This was such a powerful documentary and is a must see regardless of your political party. These women candidates were truly for the people, unlike the majority of political candidates who accept money from large corporations.

I’ve been dealing with a lot of redness on my face so I thought I’d try out the Herbivore Emerald + CBD oil. I use it at night as my moisturizer and I can see quite a bit of improvement!

This post by Carla Borthwick has an amazing message. We spend too much time judging and critiquing people for their choices rather than just appreciating their efforts or educating them in a kind way. We all can do so much better for this planet and people but all we can ask for is progress not for perfection!