And where you go we'll follow.

So, we took a road trip/bus trip/crazy trip to Chicago. On July 6, we embarked on our first ever Roaddron, with none other than the Cauldron, for the Sporting KC vs. Chicago Fire game. And boy, oh boy, it did not disappoint.

This was, essentially, our schedule:

Saturday - 8 AM: Depart for Chicago
6 PM: Arrive in Chicago
All night: explore the city, drink all the beers, sleep

Sunday, 10 AM: Leave for the game
11 AM: Arrive at stadium. Is that a minimum-security prison? NOPE, just Toyota Park.
11:10 AM: Tailgate while everyone gets sunburnt because hello, sun.
2 PM: Get escorted by security in to the stadium, where we proceed to sweat our faces off.
5 PM: WIN
(Monday) 3 AM: Arrive back in the motherland

There are literally so many things I could say about this trip, but really, I just can't describe how amazing it was. Traveling to see our team put out the Fire...there's nothing like it.


Snickerdoodles for the road, because c'mon.


This would be Jimmy John's, delivering a crap ton of sandwiches to us on the shoulder of an on ramp. Yep.


I will say, I have missed the gratuitous bean photo ops.


Down by the river.


Oooooh baby, I love that boy.


BAM. Chicago.


Oh so sexy.


I title this "We're coming for YOU, Chicago."


The part where my husband said, and I quote, "I'm a salty sailor baby." I die.


Just some proof that our stadium is better.

And in case you were wondering about the title of this post, there's a cheer that goes as such:
We love ya / We love ya / We love ya /
And where you go we'll follow / we'll follow / we'll follow /
'Cause we support the Wizards / the Wizards / the Wizards /
And that's the way we like it / we like it / we like it /
Wooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh / Wooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh / Wooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh / Wooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh

That moment when your dreams change and suddenly you're like, "Oh, crap..."

Let's talk dreams.

Or maybe a better phrase is 'life goals'?

Because I have had more life goals than years I've been alive, and in the past year especially, I've learned how terrifying it is when your goals change, and you realize that your life isn't what you thought it would be, and you kind of feel OK with that, but you're also thinking, "Crapsicles. I need to have all the answers because LIFE."

The spark that lit the fire for this post: Almost as soon as I knew that my man was thee man I wanted to spend forever with, I had a plan (type A all the way). We were going to get married after college (January 7, 2012, what what?!), move and find jobs (done and done), work a few years (getting there) and then start thinking about the possibility of a little soybean somewhere around 25ish.

And then, over the course of many moons, I decided that maybe that plan wasn't so much exciting for me as it was terrifying. Not just for the possibility of becoming parents at 25, but because I kind of anticipated more things happening that didn't. For one, I was unhealthily overcommitted and over-involved in college. I kind of thought that, when I got married, that passion for being involved would just sort of...die. And it didn't. And the more I got into my career, the more I kept telling myself that I needed to start making something of myself. And I realized my goals and the timeline for those things had changed.

...Terrified.

We've also got the whole 'what on this planet am I doing with my life?!?!' thing. I'm very blessed to love what I do and those I work with. But. I am a realist (or maybe a glass half-empty person, which have you), and I know that there will most likely come a point in my life where I leave what I'm comfortable with for something I'm not comfortable with. And then I think I'm crazy because why on earth do I ever want to leave what I love and feel confident in, but it's this thing called 'growth/professional development/a career' and it needs to happen.

The beauty of life is that it's always changing and full of surprises, and the ugly is that it's always changing and full of surprises. Life is scary, and the fact that not even I know exactly what I want to be or do or accomplish is ridiculous. But I tell myself I'm 23 and I've got time and as long as J.Crew doesn't take all my monies, everything will be alright.

Thank you for reading my attempt at poking a little fun at how terrifying can be. Why cry in a corner when you can laugh out of fear?

I'm alive, I promise.

You guys, I know.

It's been crazy bananas long since I word vomitted on the interwebs.

I've got at least four excuses, but they're just mediocre, so let's skip that and jump right in, shall we?

Marriage is super. Can't tell you how hard it is to believe that it's almost been a year and a half - como se what?! Some exciting things are percolating in Casa de Swanson (NO. NO, parental units/friends placing bets - I'm not preggers). For one, we're crossing our fingers that in six months, we'll be packing up our apartment and moving to a bigger nest...like a house! Probs just going to start out renting because buying a house is lots of monies, but hey, there are a lot of $20 bills that could be found on the streets between now and then. Also, the housing market [insert statement that makes me sound like I know what it's doing].

Work is great. Love my job and coworkers. E likes at least one of those things (two points to whoever guessed 'coworkers'). Not going to lie, the past few months have been a little strenuous for Eric. Huge project + unreliable coworkers + hard programming crap = no dice. But he's a champ and pretty much amazing for working so hard. And there's always pie.

Corporate challenge. You probably haven't heard of it, but it's been sucking my social life dry the past month and a half. Since the beginning of May, I've learned to play racquetball, tennis, soccer, softball, disc golf, I'm running my first duathlon tomorrow, and I'm also learning how to swim the butterfly in two weeks. Ridiculous? Yes. But I've gotten to know a few more people at work, and I've conned myself into substituting corporate challenge sports as workouts. Muahahahah.

Favorite things in my life as of late. Perrier, with lime, specifically. San Pellegrino. Yogurtini - strawberry kiwi sorbet loaded with fruit for liiiiife. Freeze pops every...single...day. This skirt. These cleaning products (slowly transitioning my entire supply!!!). These shoes. This wine. This collaboration. This publication. Any of this jewelry. And of course, duh.

Speaking of, Sporting KC. We're not talking about how we've lost the last four home games, because my blood pressure instantly rises and hello, I'm 23 and have always had good blood pressure. But seriously, what the dump, defense? Jimmy can't do your job and save goals. Moving past it - on July 7, the man and I are taking part in a Roadron to the Chicago Fire game, where we will hop on a motor vehicle with a bunch of other SKC-obsessed peeps and road trip it to Chitown for the Sporting vs. Fire game. It will be crazy and possibly the quickest semi-long trip I've ever partaken in. So much excitement - expect a post later.

Alright, peeps. You haven't missed much, but I've certainly missed blogging. Happy to say I'm baaaaack

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1 year - whaaaaaaat????

Holy poop, Eric and I have been married a year.

...Excuse me?

Yes. One year.

Obviously, this is crazy town.

Clarification: the fact that it's already been a year, not the fact that we made it a year. Although that could be argued, maybe...?

I've been thinking about trying to do a "all the things I've learned in my first year of marriage" post, but 1) thinking of all of those things is hard, and 2) there are so many...?

I will, however, tell you one thing we learned when trying to figure out how we were going to celebrate our anniversary. We tried and tried to plan a weekend trip or something super romantic, and we came up with nothing. No ideas. No exciting trips that wouldn't cost two appendages per person (why is traveling in winter SO expensive for how unenjoyable it is?).

So the weekend before our anniversary, we stopped stressing about making our anniversary super romantic, and decided to do something we still enjoy - snuggle on the couch, watch a movie and eat cake. And it was perfect.

Lesson learned - don't put tons of pressure on yourself to come up with a super awesome plan for celebrating. If it's stressing you out to plan something, go the simple route and let yourselves focus bask in how awesome your relationship is and how much you love each other, because you should definitely love someone if you marry them. Just sayin'...

And we had cake!

Christmas in pictures

Guys, how was your Christmas? I'm finally getting around to posting some Christmas pictures. Ridiculous, I'm aware.

We spent Christmas in Indiana with Eric's family. Lots of fun happened, even after our day in the city.

























friends // pretty presents // presents under the tree // Amaretto & Coke // Sangria I made // ...more alcohol/where my bro-in-law took over the camera? // HUGE flame // presents! // for sure stealing that wrapping technique // Munchkin // Munchkin + wine // a glimpse of the Dr. Who sweatshirt

I love the holidays. ::sigh::

Friends, games & drinks

My good friend Mike was in town this past weekend for a conference. He brought along his friend Nicole, whom Eric and I decided is pretty amazing essentially right after meeting her. Which was awesome, considering they crashed at our apartment. 

Between Mike and Nicole's conference, and my and Eric's jobs, we hung out as much as we could. Saturday night was freakin' sweet - we went out for thee best barbecue, came back, I made margaritas and then we played Settlers.







Like I said, pretty.freakin'.sweet.

...

Some days, a big glass of super sweet/juice-like wine and a good book can make some really crappy things seem less crappy.

Today was just sucky. I'm not going to expound on the details, but it was one of those where you just want to go to sleep so that the day can be done. Fighting the urge to do just that, I poured a huge glass of some blackberry cab and sat down with a book. Let it be known that no, I was not drunk, and no, I don't recommend always drinking when you have a bad day. But if I'm entirely honest, the physical motions of sitting down with wine and a book definitely helped calm my anxiety.

Cheers to good days and hoping bad ones are far and few between. Really, I just wanted to share a picture of some wine and Christmas ornaments in a bowl.