So, I turned 26 a month ago. How did that happen?

In early June, I started thinking about my “30 before 30” list…and how much I’ve accomplished, and how little I’ve accomplished at the same time. So much has changed since I last updated the list (freshly updated, btw)!

So much has changed, and yet I was thankful for this list; it serves as a good reminder of a) my 23 year old self and her desires, b) the fact that many of these things are still at the core of who I want to become as i get closer to 30 and c) the fact that life moves quickly, and it’s very easy to wind up without as many accomplishments as you’d hope.

So these are the things I’ve been thinking about in the months before and after my 26th birthday.

The single-most thing I am loving about my twenties is that I’m really learning a lot about myself. I love it, because I’ve never been so confident in who God made me. I think I got pretty lost in my own expectations of myself for most of my teenage years and early twenties. At this point in my short life, I’m officially in my upper twenties and almost every expectation I had for my life to this point has been completely slashed.

So I’m left without any more expectations (which, by the way, felt terrible when those were in the process of being ripped from me) but it’s really quite freeing. I’m just free to grow and be myself.

And with that realization in hand, I look at my little list and smile, because much of the list still accurately represents me as a person. I love that. When I wrote the list, it was with an air of dreaming and whimsy – so I’m thrilled that many of these things are who I’m growing into, because back then…it was only somewhat of a dream.

Using some items on the list, here’s a little life update for you – since it’s been so long since I’ve updated the blog.

We’re working toward paying off our debt, we had none, but then we decide to by a nice, almost new commuter car after we moved to Seattle. We’re hoping to be able to pay it off completely within about a year.

While paying off our car, we’re also saving for a down payment on a house, which could take a while depending on how we end up buying a house. Houses are so. stinking. expensive. here. But rent is also expensive. We’re currently occupying 3+ rooms in Bryan’s parents house and it’s been really great to be able to save a bunch of money in the meantime.

We crossed over the 5 year line of marriage back in May – and what I’ve also realized is that it feels like we’ve been in transition for over 5 years as well. College, transferring colleges to help plant a church, moving across the country, the beginning of Bryan’s (slow-climbing) career. Yes, transition seems like a fitting word, don’t you think? But, of course, now I’m realizing that life will always, always, always feel like transition, even with miniature calm moments. So I’m starting to be done defining life as such.

I continue to be ambitiously crafty, but I still feeling like I have a lot of growing to do there as well. I can pretty much knit or sew anything now, but now I’m left to the decisions of what I want to knit or sew. I’m slowly figuring out my aesthetic when it comes to these things and I’m working on “my eye” for design, which hasn’t been extremely strong up to this point.

Overall, life is good. So very good. We’re enjoying each other, enjoying Washington and enjoying the ride of adulthood.