Pop and lock it like a prostitute. That will be the most amazing thing ever said at a Point Loma event.

My fashion show was yesterday, and the entire thing seems like a crazy blur now. I somehow got everything finished, but an hour before the show. Yesterday involved a lot of stress, no sleep, smashing a dress with a hammer, and falling off the stage in 5 inch stilettos. I'm feeling that fall in my lower back today. The best part about the night though was seeing all my girls grow as friends, having a blast goofing off and being themselves. It was also a huge blessing to have so many of my friends come to support me. Dana really outdid herself on the event, Culy warehouse is a fabulous venue. Shelly made amazing red velvet cupcakes and we danced the night away. Today I have to go back to work, but thankfully much later than I normally do. I feel like I've been hit by a bus after the marathon that was the last week, but it was all worth it. Most of my pictures turned out blurry, but as a whole, everything was amazing.

I am flawed, but I am cleaning up so well

It's the eve of another fashion show, and I'm stressed out as normal trying to get things done. My dreams are often bigger than my time allows, especially two days before. I should have finished weeks ago, but unfortunately it seems I can only function under extreme pressure and time crunch.

I've decided it's just the nature of the artistic beast. Doing conventional design just doesn't fly with me most of the time, and some of my best stuff comes to me at 2am when I'm digging through fabrics and wrapping them around myself to get ideas.

I have three major gowns to make still, and a few less complicated pieces I would like to get done. Nothing like flying by the seat of your pants.

Which one will you be, the black or the white?

Sometimes people change.

Sometimes so much that there's nothing left of what there was before.

We are not genius, but we have genius

Some days just read like a post out of failblog.

Other days you go to Denny's with wet hair, then spend your morning with no power, singing along to 30h3 while your roommates drink beer and color in Disney princess coloring books.

I paint my fingernails coral fusion pink and get it all over my face.

We walk to grocery stores with our eco-friendly Luna crossbody bags and bird watch and see secret passageways through trees.

Late nights and tea and talking and Dashboard playing through the stereo.

Vindicated always makes me slip into a peaceful state, combatting the messy family divorce addressed publicly on facebook.

It makes you wonder, what's the next thing that will change?

“We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.”

You love surprises. Be inspired by that. Keep the secret until the surprise is whole. Feel no pressure if it doesn’t work out, because it is completely unknown except to yourself. Breathe deep and lose yourself in the passion of creating. Nothing else matters, and your gifts won’t be fully realized until that becomes truth. When you actually want to get up early in the morning to work on something, then you know it’s your passion. Don’t feel suffocated because what you’re doing isn’t perfect yet. Perfection is in the eye of the beholder. Remember Margiela. Actually doing something is important, more important than waiting until you feel ready to make a perfect try of it. Because nothing is going to get to that point without a lot of tries and mistakes first. Step out the front door and don’t look back. Fast from the things that hold you down and steal your time. Embrace the random whims that come into your mind, and don’t be afraid to have complete disjointedness between endeavors. Only then can it be made cohesive. Listen to Eisley and pin up old memories and sketches and photographs amongst the wooden slats of the space you make your own. You’re only 22, the pressure your feeling should not be made crippling, only inspiring in a way that makes you want to make every day and second count. Go to bed each night knowing you did everything you could to make your life a story worth telling.

"How did you get sober?" "I closed my mind, and I willed it to be."

I'm coming to find out that working in fashion retail is brainwashing. I realized this when Jaime pulled out a bright teal sweatshirt that said "Emu Farmers" with a picture of emus on the front, and I fell in love with it. Who needs 200 dollar shirts when you can have a thrift store find like that?

This week has been a really interesting journey, because I finally got so tired of being in a rut in life that I decided to change a few things. I gave up coffee and alcohol, and started meeting with an amazing mentor that is the most encouraging person I've ever met. She lets me vent out all my crazy life conundrums and speaks volumes into my life from the Lord. I've been praying for contentment within my job, and for peace about where God wants me to live, and I feel like this prayer is being slowly answered. It started with walking in the back alley near my house and smelling the night blooming jasmine. I fell asleep smiling to that smell, because the outdoors are so near and dear to my heart. In the midst of crazy everyday life, finding joy in God's creation is always simple fulfillment. Maybe I do belong here. I have such an amazing community of friends here, I have a great job, and I love my church. As much as I gripe and complain about wanting to be somewhere else, I feel like that is beginning to fade. Two nights in a row, I fell asleep smiling, just because I was happy to be where I was.

Church was amazing this morning. We're doing a series on how to be a spiritual leader, and every Sunday blows my mind. I listen to the podcasts of the sermons several times over during the week because there is so much to soak in. I LOVE being a part of a church that is seeking desperately after God's will in everything. I know that God is so faithful in my life to lift me up when I'm down, I just have to let Him do it.

Now my roommate and I are reverting back to middle school days, which may or may not include Spice Girls and Christina Aguilera music videos... I can't wait for our other roommate to get home, she finally met her hero Brian Wilson this weekend. It's going to be a shriek fest, I can feel it.

There is no such thing as an unwritten life, only a badly written one.

Night Jasmine is blooming.

It's the perfect setting to have the windows wide open.

And to dance alone by candle light to Jimmy Eat World.

I love it when the Lord refreshes my soul.

I feel like I'm in a sauna with the Blue Man Group

Some days you wake up after bad dreams with a head cold, and you just have to count your blessings.

I've been living at work since I got home from Las Vegas Monday night, but this weekend has lots of fun Cali nights in store. I'm looking forward to line dancing, going to Vin De Syrah for my belated birthday party, and to hanging out with my wonderful old roomie.

God is pretty cool... he has put a really neat mentor in my life that I get to meet for coffee every week from here on out. He also gave me peace about not moving home.

And, Chianne gave me the sweetest rose bush for my birthday, I got to plant it so that it stays alive until I kill it with my brown thumb. I'm trying not to do that.

I ordered Regina Spektor's Far album, The Weakerthans Left After Leaving album, and the Brothers Bloom DVD yesterday, so it's like Christmas waiting for them to show up! So much fun to be had.

When my wife puts her cold feet against the back, it makes me go through the roof! brrr.

Being patient is hard.

But I'm glad I've found something worth waiting for. And that for friends in life that help me realize that.

Late night conversation and Death Cab.

Favorite.

Home is a long way from here

I look at a day off in a completely different light now. Today I woke up late, made coffee, read a few chapters in Matthew, then embarked on a creative endeavor. This starts with popping in the Heima DVD from Sigur Ros, which will literally change your life once you watch it. Or at least make you want to go to Iceland in a bad way. Then it continues with pulling out the pile of clothes Buffalo didn't want to buy from me, and chopping them up into pieces.

I spent the first part of my afternoon making a skirt and a dress out of two shirts that I have, because I've been encouraged to make some new things recently. I've been having such a hard time making the time and space to actually do it the past few weeks, but I've also realized I don't feel complete unless I'm doing something creative. It's a part of who I am, and who God has made me to be. There's something empty about not using the gifts God gave me.

In other news, San Diego Airport is going to start having a non-stop flight to London soon. Why does this matter? Because my apartment, as well as hundreds of other houses and buildings are in the flight path of the airport. We already deal with constant interruption of the planes during the day, and the new jets are supposed to be much louder. Therefore, as a stipulation to having international flights from San Diego, the airport has to provide soundproof doors and windows to everyone in the flight path.

What? Do they know how man doors and windows that is? This part of the city looks like a nicer version of a Tijuana slum hill. It's a hodge-podge of random apartment buildings, alleyways, and houses from every era, all extremely close together.

I only mention this because they started installing new windows in a few of the apartments in my complex. I watched them from my window this morning.

tonight...

I love the conversations that happen in my life.

We talk about racial issues. How religion and sex interact with one another. Eggs.

And also, why do people from other countries sing with an american accent? Lisztomania by Phoenix, case in point. When they talk... strong French accent. When they sing... none? Why is this? Lily Allen and Kate Nash have accents when they sing. I don't get it....

Just some thoughts.

Cabaret? Is that like the wine?

Roommates.

It's one of the things that shapes you the most during college and the single years afterwards.

I have two right now.

We live in a one bedroom apartment a mile from Ocean Beach.

Stef is the cynical realist with a super sweet heart beneath it all.

She's going to law school soon.

Megan is the sports fanatic with blonde hair who's secretly black beneath it all.

She's getting her masters to be a P.E. teacher.

Together the three of us are very different, but this has been my favorite place to call home since moving out. I laugh all the time, I love coming home, and I appreciate them for being good sisters in Christ.

We sleep on the floor in our lovely bedroom. It's like a sleepover every night. And if we happen to all go to bed at the same time, we don't fall asleep for hours because of how much we giggle. I feel sorry for the man that lives next door.

Our little home is full of warm candles, hilarious quotes from Megan, Yoga Booty Ballet and Workout with Bob, movies, back alley finds, and love.

I know I'll always look back on this as one of the most fun times of life, and it reminds me that God has a purpose for everything. This season of life has turned out far different than I expected, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. I'm not sure quite yet where God wants me in the long run, but for right now, I'll enjoy hearing the ocean outside my window.

Zandra isn't drinking water today, She believes going to the bathroom is a waste of time.

Adjustments are the worst part of life. Something changes; sometimes drastic, sometimes small, and then the whole world seems altered. Changes are blessings that wear the disguise of discomfort and awkwardness. It's also interesting to me how we can't wait for things to change at times, then realize afterwards how good we had it before.

God's timing is significant. It is always right, always good, and often very different from ours.

I love that about God.

Life just seems to have a new feel to it that is hard to explain. I went home for Christmas break incredibly worn out and ready for an emotional respite. My home in Vegas is a place of love, craziness, good food, amazing friends, and memories I will remember forever. The fullness of being with friends you cherish and family you adore are more is more than words can express.

I miss it terribly.

At home, God started to work on my heart. He began to chip away all the pain and worry and stress that had built up since the fall. He began to show me my heart is worthwhile, and that life can be completely unexpected. He began to show me that healing can come to even the worst of pains.

And then I got a job. And someone started to make me feel alive again. And then before I knew if I was driving through a blizzard after the most amazing New Years of my life, listening to Regina Spektor with Meg, and knowing it was clear that everything was about to change.

I de-enrolled from Point Loma Nazarene University. I shed a tear or two then went to my favorite local coffee shop. I worked my first paid 40 hour week. I opened myself up to God moving me wherever He sees fit. And I felt cared for, not used or abandoned.

God is good even when I am not. Even when I am tired. And even when I can't see where He's leading me.

I just trust Him.