Looking Back on 2012, Looking Forward to 2013

As with everything in my life, this post is probably a little late. At this point, I've come to accept that as a daily reality and I can roll with it.

2012
I feel the need to do a "Year in Review" post just for my own memories, but honestly, I'm ready to look forward. 2012 was a ... different year for us. It certainly wasn't hard, but it wasn't easy either. I think it's those transition years that can seem the dullest and end up being the most fruitful when you look back.

Our year was characterized by studying, late nights of designing and managing our small businesses, studying, hours of TV-watching and couch cuddles with laptops and blankets and spots, and, well, studying. Although my masters was a million times easier than my undergrad degree, I didn't anticipate the incredible relief I've felt being done with it. Just the mental energy it takes to have your heart and mind in one extra place is exhausting. That just-graduated feeling still hasn't quite worn off. I hope it doesn't for awhile.

Logan's masters is WAY more rigorous than mine was. He took 15 hours his first semester (August-December) and if you know anything about grad school, that's A LOT! I took 9 hours at the most, and usually 6. He has been working his tail off. I'm pretty sure he's started keeping a highlighter in his shirt pocket just so he can catch up on his reading homework every second he has a chance. Amazingly, he will be done with his coursework in July/August and will graduate in December so we're praying the good Lord will bless him with an industry-related job around Fall. And then... who knows!

It seems our world has been consumed by assignment deadlines, papers, and text books so once he's done with his classes it feels like we can finally start our lives. That is so dramatic, but really. That's how it feels.

I'm not sure why 2012 was lackluster. We have absolutely nothing to complain about, and I won't complain about 2012, but suffice it to say I am full-steam-ahead and already excited about the glittering possibilities of 2013 and beyond.


2013
This year will still be categorized for us as a "transition" year, but not in the magnitude of 2012. We are both ready for a fresh start, and I think just a new year in general holds that for us. Logan will hopefully be officially closing his design business this year (providing he is able to find a new job), and forging into the world of information security. We're both really excited about this for a variety of reasons, but most of all I am so proud of him for following his heart and taking the plunge into a new career field. He is an incredibly hard-worker, and I have so many dreams for him as he continues to grind through these last few months of school. I know his hard work will pay off, and that God is guiding him through these tireless months, and I am just dying to see what comes next for him.

Lemon Tree is still thriving, and I'm still trying to whittle down my list of Lemon Tree goals for 2013. 2012 brought a lot of unexpected (good) change, and at this point I'm not exactly sure where to go next. I've recently hired a good friend to handle administrative work, and so far the future is looking bright. Barring some unforeseen drastic change of heart (or accidental pregnancy - HA!), I will definitely be staying in my Lipscomb job this year and continuing to pursue Lemon Tree on the side. I go back and forth between wanting to do Lemon Tree full-time, but I think I've finally resolved that until we have kids, I'm sticking around at Lipscomb. I love it so much, and I want to take advantage of the people, environment, work, and pay for as long as I possibly can. I don't think I would ever regret staying longer at Lipscomb and pushing back a full-time Lemon Tree career until kids. It makes a lot of sense to me I guess. So that's my story and I'm sticking to it! :)

Beyond our jobs, it's hard to say what else is in store for 2013 - which is what's so exciting. At this time next year, we would be happy to be in the exact same "place" as we are right now, or in a completely new one. We're leaving that up to God for now, and I guess we'll see what happens.


In all things, whether good or bad, I hope God is glorified in 2013, and our lives only point more towards His goodness and mercies. 2013, get at me!

Our (Spotted) Baby

[No, no babies yet. Hence the (disclaimer) in the title. Those will come in time, but please do not misunderstand the content of the post. That, my friends, is how rumors get started.]

I know you could never tell on Instagram, or Facebook, or Twitter, but we really do go through seasons with our dog. Just like relationships, sometimes it's just awesome and sometimes it just feels a little... off.

People told us before we got her, when we (Logan) were weighing the options (I was really just weighing the pros and ignoring the cons and begging Logan with cost projections and pictures of the cutest rescue puppies I could find online - even if they were in Arizona), that getting a puppy is a great introduction to parenthood.

I can say with full confidence that this is 100% true. If you are a dog person, in the slightest, I highly recommend getting a puppy (young, so you have to wake up and lose sleep to take it out in the middle of the night and train and discipline it from an early age) to test run your parenting skills with your spouse. Not that we'll be parents any time soon, and not that it's the exact same by any stretch of the imagination, but I am so thankful for the problems and lessons we've worked through that we wouldn't have otherwise before having kids. (Do you go through seasons with kids, too? I wonder...)

But I digress.

Like I said, we go through seasons with Gracie. I think on the part of all three of us - sometimes she's just more loving, sometimes we're just more interested, sometimes we're busy and she's mad at us for it... and any combination thereof. But lately... Lately we are just smitten all over again.

I mean - how could you not absolutely melt over that precious little face? (For the record, the Hartline household does not condone clothing animals but I was playing a joke on Logan and let me tell you... it was worth it.)

When Logan walks in and her first instinct is to crawl up on the couch with him and bury her face in his chest - how can your heart not grow a couple sizes?

It doesn't help that I bathed her last night. So her precious spotted fur is as soft as her puppy fur was, and smells like Johnson's baby shampoo. I contemplated skipping work this morning so I could just curl up on the couch with her and watch TV all day. It's just that great.

I know. People think we're crazy. People think "it's just a dog" and I get that. She is just a dog. She will die some day (Logan reminds me every day so I won't need extensive therapy from the shock - I probably still will), and life will go on. But unless you have felt and known the love and loyalty and affection of a dog, I don't expect you to understand. I'm sure once we do have kids our love for Gracie will pale in comparison to the love of a child, but for now, she is our baby. And we love her. And we spoil her and we plan our schedule around her, and she is our family.

And I wouldn't have it any other way. She was one of the best decisions of our marriage.

The Power of a Desk

I know. It doesn't look like much. It isn't much, really. But I can't begin to tell you how this cheap little desk has completely changed my perspective on our life right now. (I took that five minutes ago, by the way. Sorry for the mess.)

Somewhere around a year ago I could feel the house fever setting in, and before I knew it I was having full out heated arguments with Logan over whether or not we could buy a house. It was silly. I was just overcome with this longing for an office to house my crazy supplies and creativity, and it grew into the house monster.

So after finally admitting to myself that Logan was, in fact, right, and we shouldn't buy a house just yet, I decided to make some changes. We gave away our old (wonderful) couch to make room for a smaller leather one. This was a huge facelift for our little apartment. We got a cool rug. We rearranged. I refinished our TV stand. We got some decorative shelves for the living room.

It was all coming together.

But for some reason it just didn't quite feel finished, you know what I mean?

With the smaller couch, we moved it further up in our living room so I could have a lot of space behind it (next to the big, beautiful window) to work on Lemon Tree stuff. My printers already had their own buffet back there, and the console table behind the couch serves as my work area when cutting and packaging... but I felt so discombobulated constantly hiding my supplies in the closet or buffet and digging them out again two days later.

I needed a desk.

I took off work the Friday and Monday of my website launch weekend (oh yeah, that happened!), and when I came home on Thursday our house was COVERED in boxes. I ordered loads of supplies so I could get all the upfront costs out of the way, and I had planned to clean out my craft closet and store everything in there - but, as usual, time had gotten away from me.

In a last minute panic and moment of sympathy for Logan, I decided to clean the house and organize all the closets before the launch. This was probably the stupidest decision I made that weekend - next to maybe going out in public after four days of sitting at my computer, unshowered, in my pajamas. In my naiveté I thought it would only take a couple of hours.

EIGHTEEN hours later I was STILL trying to get things organized and put away. It should have been a week long project. But I had started and I wasn't going to leave it unfinished before the launch (let's be honest - under normal circumstances I probably would have... Logan can vouch for this), so I kept begrudgingly plugging away. And amidst that hectic day of dumpster runs and breaking down boxes, I discovered I had the perfect place just begging for a desk. So I bought one.

I learned that long weekend that a desk was all I ever needed to feel at home here. A space where I can spread my stuff, work through my thoughts, write, design, answer emails. A space that is MINE (and Logan's if he needs it) and doesn't double as a console table, a kitchen table, or my lap. I don't ever want to leave now. Since we got the couch I've felt like we'd finally really moved in but the desk really did it. The desk finished that process. We're here. We've nested. We love it, and we're not leaving any time soon.

Thank you, bargain desk. For providing a place for me to be creative and feel wholly at home. Thank you for teaching me that the grass can be just as green where I am, if I just look in the right places. And thank you for helping me get my act together before my website launch, when nothing else really could.

I love you, desk. Thank you.

(Oh, yeah, and Gracie proved early on that she loves the desk, too.)

My Better Half

Sometimes the only thing that will make me feel better when I'm not feeling like myself is not a hug, a prayer, or a word of encouragement. It's not a warm cup of coffee or a slice of pie or a phone call from a long lost friend. It's not new clothes, a clean house, or my dog (yes, I do mean that).

It's just my husband. To sit the corner chair in my office and remind me why I do what I do and that I am doing it as best I can.

It's just him. How did I ever get so lucky to have him?

Just As I Am

[Disclaimer: I should be working on two assignments right now - both requiring a lot of research and writing, both due in within 48 hours, both yet to be started. But there is something about sitting outside on our patio with a glass of water and a cup of tea, listening to the birds and the animals and the wind that just makes me want to write about something other than educational research. It's so healing, sometimes I just ache to write. I'm not very good at it, and I don't have very important things to say, but it helps. So I do it. Even when it's inconvenient.]

Similarly to Mary's verse that I wrote about recently, I've had another thought stirring lately. It stemmed from a conversation Logan and I had with a couple of friends of ours, but I don't actually remember what we were talking about. I remember sitting there, pretending to be listening but really just scanning my brain for the thoughts that currently persisted. I thought to myself, "Wouldn't it be funny if I was pregnant right now and didn't know it?" and, "What if tomorrow these dear friends of ours are gone - killed in a terrible car accident? How would we feel?" and, "I need to exercise more. Her arms look great... my arms don't look all that great. But, then again, they never really have. I should exercise more. Oh well."

From those thoughts, I started thinking of all the things I want to be but I fail at, but how these friends of ours and Logan, sitting in front of me, don't care about all of that. They just love me.

I realized in a moment of fleeting clarity that all I have to offer is here. Now. Just as I am. I can't offer the things I haven't done yet. I can't offer something I don't have, or haven't started - and no one is expecting me to. Sometimes I feel like I try to force change on myself by setting a milestone in place regardless of my progress. An analogy to this would be I buy a pair of jeans two sizes smaller because "I'm going to lose that weight." Does that make sense? Signing up to lead a Bible study isn't going to make me more spiritually mature. I'll just end up leading a Bible study when maybe I wasn't ready to.

Right now, just as I am, is all that I have. So what if I am pregnant and don't know it? The point is I don't know it, so it doesn't matter. If our sweet friends tragically lost their lives tomorrow (God forbid!), what does that matter right now? It doesn't because it isn't true.

I don't know if I'm making sense at all - in fact I'm confusing myself a little, but like I said before, I write because it helps me work things out. You guys just get to see the gritty process of that on paper. (My apologies.)

At any rate, I feel freed in that realization. I am here, now, with who I am with and I am who I am. That's not to say I don't need to grow and get better at certain things, but that is a process - and the present is not. I'm going to start operating on who I am instead of who I want to be. I think that maybe in doing that, I will, over time, become who I really want to be.

There. I feel much better now.

Treasure

I'm not sure why, but for years now this verse has stuck with me. I never really felt connected to the nativity story until a couple years ago when I guess I was just finally woman enough to identify with Mary. I was about to be married (that's the only reasonable explanation I have for suddenly feeling very connected to Mary) and for the first time in my life I was really contemplating the idea of giving birth to the savior of the world and how Mary must have felt.

I think this verse struck me because I am the queen of TMI. I mean, there's merit to being an open book, but I compulsively tell people about things they a) don't care about, b) don't want to know about or c) all of the above. Logan used to get frustrated in college because if I got him a really sweet/funny card, I would write my message to him in it and then show all of my friends how sweet/funny the card was. There was no privacy in the message I was sending him. That was a valuable lesson.

But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.

She was visited.. by an ANGEL.. and her response was to treasure everything that happened and ponder them in her heart. Not run and tell the first person who came to her mind, but treasure it. And ponder it. I would have put it in the newspaper for crying out loud!

The few times in my life I have mustered the self-control to keep something private I have felt enormously strengthened by it. Pregnant friends, conversations between Logan and I... It's empowering to have knowledge that is just your own, and it becomes so precious and valuable to you.

The few times I've done this, even if it's just something small, there is peace and understanding that comes as you contemplate something without sharing it immediately. In my experience, it allows time for God to speak to you about it before someone else taints it with their own opinions and perspectives. Or, worse, makes you feel dumb for even treasuring it in the first place.

As is the case with most of my blog posts, there's really no earth-shattering point to this post beyond just my own way of working through my thoughts, but lately I have felt convicted to treasure more things - to ponder them in my heart instead of yelling them to the world.

It is a wise and godly trait to choose your words and stories carefully.

When God gives me little gifts by way of nature or kind words, my immediate reaction is to pull out my phone and tweet about it. Why is that? Today I caught myself doing that and instead I put it back in my pocket and actually took a moment to take it all in, and enjoy the secret that God and I could share together. No one else in the world knows about it. Treasure.

In some way it makes me feel a little closer to Mary when I treasure things and ponder them in my heart.

What are you treasuring?

Rejuvenated

Friends,

Thank you for all of the encouraging and supportive words you sent my way regarding my last post. As some of you suggested, I took a short break last night to rest and do something I enjoy. Ironically, I chose to do some designing... but in doing so I was able to meditate on a verse that has been on my heart a lot lately.

For a variety of reasons that seem to encompass my skewed perspective and personal struggles right now, Romans 12:9-11 has been convicting me in more ways than one.

"Don't just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other. Never be lazy, but work hard and serve the Lord enthusiastically."

Particularly regarding my last post, I wanted to post some encouragement to myself in my office at work so I designed a little piece of the verse as a reminder of my greater mission in life.

It's not my best work, but it will be a much needed daily reminder. If you need some encouraging in your work as well, feel free to download it and post it somewhere for yourself. You can download a PDF here.

I'm learning through your thoughts and my own discoveries that this crazy schedule I juggle is full of outlets God has led me to, and full of ways to glorify Him. It doesn't matter what I'm doing as much as it matters who I'm doing it for. It's a lot easier to work hard and enthusiastically when I keep that in mind!

Thank you again for the affirmation, love, and prayers. I appreciate it more than you know, and I'm so thankful that God has given me an abundance of open doors in my life right now. I feel renewed and rejuvenated in your encouragement and support.

Happy living to all, and in all things may God be glorified!

A Question.

Lately I feel burdened by all that I have filled my life with. Wonderful, beneficial, great things.

But too many things.

My question is: how do I live a simpler life without giving up anything?

Is that even possible? Or do I have to give something up in order to simplify my life and be able to enjoy the moments instead of stress about them?

My rationale:

Work.
Right now, my Lipscomb paycheck is one of the few absolutes we can rely on right now in terms of money. Logan makes plenty freelancing, but it comes at different times and sometimes we just need to know that my pay check is on the way, without fail. Also, I love my job. I love the people and the work, and I feel valued there.

Lemon Tree.
I think this goes without saying, but Lemon Tree is my baby. I have worked so hard to maintain my business despite having a full time day job, and it's growing consistently. How could I just cut that off right now? Especially when it's my dream to stay home and bring in some income through Lemon Tree when we have kids in a few years?

Masters.
I am done in December. DECEMBER. And it's free! So why would I quit my masters just a couple months short of completing it... at NO cost whatsoever?

So what do you think? Do you have an answer? Am I just being stubborn, or can you offer me a solution? Or is the solution to grit my teeth and get through it until December when grad school ends?

Honestly, guys, I feel like I'm losing my mind.

And my heart in the process.

Gungor Overcame Me and I Had to Write It Down!

Late have I loved You. Beauty so ancient, so new. Late have I loved you. You were within me but I was outside You.

And it was there, that I searched for You. 
It was there. That I searched for You.

Late have I loved You. Beauty so ancient, so new. Late have I loved you.
You were here with me but I was not with You.
It was there that You found me, it was there that you found me.

You called and You shouted, You broke through my deafness. You flashed and you shone, dispelled all my blindness, You breathed Your fragrance on me. You breathed Your fragrance on me. Late have I loved You...

Late have I loved You.

I drew in Your breath, and I keep on breathing, I’ve tasted I’ve seen, and now I want more, cause You breathed Your fragrance on me. You breathed Your fragrance on me. Late have I loved You!

(God is so good, and near, and alive, and working!)

Wait, am I an artist?

Sometimes I find myself caught in a love affair with creating (and the fact that I get paid to do it!), and I am surprised and amazed.

I think about all of the little decisions it took me to get to this point, and how lucky (blessed) I am to be where I am, doing what I'm doing.

I think of it like a divine maze (if you will). I could have turned one of three ways and I feverishly and somewhat randomly chose one of those three directions, and then one out of three of the next, and so on. And somehow I happened to chose the most perfect school for me. And somehow I happened to chose the most perfect major for me. And somehow in those two things I met the perfect man for me... and found the perfect job for me... and found the perfect city for me...

Clearly there is something else at work here! How wonderful it is to look back and have nothing but awe in God for the path that has guided me to this present moment. I literally (yes, I mean it in the.. literal.. way) cannot take credit for even deliberating over those decisions! I assumed I'd go to Lipscomb because my brother did - I never even took a tour or looked at other schools. I thought I was kind of decent at doodling, so maybe I'd enter as an art major - I didn't even know what Creative Suite was, much less taken a serious art class.

I mean, it just blows my mind!

And then after I get over how surprised I am with how absolutely perfectly God prepared me to be an artist, this feeling of absolute and pure joy washes over me at realizing that He made me able to create. How loving of God to think me up and decide that He would entrust me with a small glimpse into the joy He experiences through His creation. How generous of Him!

On a somewhat unrelated, but somehow related, note: I am discovering what it means to be a professional creator.

I think the fact that I am a professional now snuck up on me. I still think of myself as a learner, because I am, but that doesn't mean I'm a student anymore (despite my best efforts to pretend I am one). I actually feel equipped now to give advice to other art students, and I think they can actually learn from it.

I am developing my own ideas on what being a professional designer looks like.

I find myself doing the things my professors always taught me that they do - the things I never felt were important enough to do as a student. The things I wrote off because I was naive and thought I would in fact have a great idea every time (WRONG).

I swoon over the perfect script with the perfect kerning. I watch tutorials. I read new ways to do the things I spend too long doing. I practice memorizing more keyboard shortcuts so I can design faster. I read. I teach. I learn from those around me. I sketch. I share. I save inspiration for days of creative block.

I have a process.

I just can't believe that I do these things that I never felt were important enough for me, and of course (as my professors probably professed) I am kicking myself for not doing some of these things earlier! (Minus the swooning over scripts... my bank account hates me for that.)

I am coming into my own.

In some strange way, I feel like I have a relationship with these programs I use, and I am thankful for them and treat them well and in turn they help me make my little meager dreams a reality.

I think that really stems from this joy and passion that God has planted deep within my soul for creating, and the thankfulness I feel for having the tools to do it at least as well as I know how right now.

It is a weird and etherial and kind of verging on abnormal state of mind but I love it.

I just love it.

Thank you, God, for making me a creator.