life update: summer edition

It makes me super sad to realize that I haven’t blogged anything in over a month. What the heck? I used to blog outfits every single day, which slowly turned into just a few times a week, which now has apparently become not even a monthly thing. How did my life become so chaotic, busy, & prioritized to where blogging fell off the back burner & is now stuck somewhere behind the stove in a crevice that is unreachable? I have no idea, but today I’m sticking my hand into the dark crumb infested crack to pull blogging back into the heat of the kitchen. 

At the begining of summer a lot of things changed for me. I had recently started a new part time job, was in the process of dropping a significant amount of weight, & was switching local church locations. I don’t like change. I’m horrible with it. I wasn’t ready for new coworkers with double the hours I had previously worked in a new place where I was unfamilar. I wasn’t ready to have a newly transformed body that I actually liked heading into skin season & I definitely wasn’t prepared for all the stares & smaller sizes that seemed to be a packaged deal when you drop almost 30 pounds. Mostly, I wasn’t emotionally ready to give up ministry & a church where I served alongside my best friends also known as my brother & his wife. Three curveballs were thrown my way all at once & when life only allows you one swing at a time, it’s kind of difficult to know which one you’re gonna hit out of the park. I felt like my eyes were so focused on what was coming my way that I completely forgot about the things that I already had on my (home) plate. So many things fell through the cracks while I tried to figure out how to balance all the newness in my life & it totally affected my mood & outlook on things I once loved so passionately. 

The past three months I have loved working two jobs. It can be hard being scheduled for roughly 43-50 hours of work a week. But the reward, besides monitarily, are so sweet. I have gained some pretty sweet coworkers, ya know, the one’s I was so scared of meeting, & I thoroughly enjoy spending my weekends with them. And the days that I spend as a nanny are some of my favorites as well. There’s just something about the beginning developement of the human mind that intrigues me & I would never trade spending time with babies & toddlers for anything, ever. It helps a ton that my kiddos are so sweet & cute too. But I was busy. A busy I never knew I could enjoy. I had no time to be creative with my outfits & had to resort to a more functionability route with my looks. I had never had to do that before. When I felt I couldn’t wear whatever I wanted I lost the desire to share my looks with the world, or ya know, you & Instagram. So I stopped documenting them all together. Literally. And oddly, I didn’t freak out if I had a “good outfit” & didn’t catpture it. It was weird, because outfit posting was who I was or at least who I thought I had to be & I didn’t know how I felt about not caring about it much anymore. But eventually I saw that I needed to be freed from something that I didn’t even realize I was enslaved too. But I do miss it a ton! So I’m vowing to get back into it no matter what it takes!  

My weightloss journey is an awkward one to talk about. Even calling it a “journey” is weird for me, haha. But it’s true. I’ve never had a body that I loved or even really liked, despite how confident I may have come across regarding it. Being a fashion blogger puts you in a very vulnerable spot. I literally display my body for you all to see, or at least the clothes on it, & say here it is, don’t judge it please. And let’s be real for a sec, no one likes their body. No one. If you say you do, you’re either lying or completely full of yourself. It’s okay to admit. You don’t have to stay there, but admiting it is a good thing. You can either wallow in hatred towards yourself or change for yourself. It wasn’t until I chose that I wanted to change my body for myself that I actually did. I’m all about loving the body you’re in, but I also understand that within the statement ‘I love my body no matter what anyone says” there still lies a desire to want your body to be different. And that’s okay. Change comes at different times for different reasons for us all. My change happened & it happened so drastically that everything seemed to change all at once. I all of a sudden had no idea what size clothing I wore because instead of things not fitting me because I was getting too big, things were not fitting because I was too small. So weird & such a mind blowing thing to experience. Going from being a girl who only wore oversized things to hide the fluff was now only wanting to wear form fitting things to show her shapely stuff. It’s weird, I’ve never had a shape before & I totally do now. But what’s even weirder & mostly dumb is all the stares, comments, & double takes you get from the opposite sex just because you’ve slimmed down. What a-holes. Like, was I not good enough before? I wish there was some sort of laser explosion thing you could cast off in front of dude’s eyes that would make them temperarily go blind whenever they look, honk, gawk, or drool over something that isn’t theirs, including cheesecake. Like, I like my respect right where it is, above my chest & away from your dis-. Haha, that was a good one. Anyway, bodies are weird. Life is weird. I’m still trying to figure this one out because I really want pizza all the time, but really don’t want to go back to the way I felt before. So this change is good, but still freaks me out!  

This last summer change has little to do with anxiety/seperation issues from my brother & sister in law & more with that fact that it’s forcing me into a more independent life. Ya know how I said I don’t really like change, well I hate doing things on my own, out of my comort zone, & in unfamiliar places even more. If life would allow me too I would never leave my bed. I would just forever have solo pizza parties, dances breakouts, & movie marathons in my room until the end of time. I’m serious. That would be the perfect life to me. Just kidding, I’d have to leave at somepoint for fresh donuts & sunset pictures of course. So yeah, I don’t like people & prefer being alone. But wanna know something completley contrary to that? I do no good all on my own. I’m horrible at that too. So leaving my two buddies who have very similar human interaction habits as myself was forcing myself to be strecthed so far in ways I never knew I was even flexible enough to bend. And guess what? I’m somehow getting better at it. Well I mean, I have better days than others. But I’m venturing out in my city on my own & I’m surviving. Sometimes surviving means just showing up, while other times it’s me walking away from a situation saying “who the heck was that girl & where did she come from you crazy talkative overly confident nut?” But most days are just me showing up. And I’m okay with that.

So this is a fashion blog, right? Where are the outfits?!?! All you’ve talked about so far is basically your fear of change & how afraid you are of it in every aspect of your life. Ya, thanks, I know… I’m getting there! I was just updating y’all, chill girl. Here it comes… So what’s next? So what now? Summer is about to be over & that means a new season is coming because well, science. And with the new season approaching & all the change that comes with it & I’m talkig weather change here, which is something I can actually handle guys, I don’t wanna miss out on the chance to share outfits with you. Fall is my favorite season all around & probably my most favorite season to style as well. So I’m shaking up my life a bit more & creating a re-vamp on my blogging schedule & how I’m gonna be doing things around here. So expect more consistant posts containing anything from outfits, style tips, want lists, life hacks, & just my emotional self (clearly). Here’s a peek at my favorite summer go-to outfit, harem pants & a simple black tank. So comfy & exactly what summer calls for; simplicity. And it’s good to see that not much about my style has changed, still sportin the black & white looks!  

Top; H&M Pants; Ross Clutch; Ross Flats; Old Navy

It’s been one heck of a summer. And one that I can honestly say has been my best one yet. Things have changed. I’ve changed. Things are continually changing in my life, *insert Home Alone scream here. And I hope you’re still willing to follow along on this journey as everything only continues to get crazier & more complicated. I appreciate every single one of you who are brave or weird or insane enough to want to read what my little mind thinks up. Good luck & may the odds be ever in your favor.

-abbey kay

P.S.

 Shout out to my girls Jessie, Nicki, & Ariana who’s “Bang Bang” song was on repeat the entire typing of this post. You can blame them for any/all of my insanity.