2016 Fashion Recap: A Challenging Year in Review

2016 has been a crazy year for so many of us and I am no exception. From the blog perspective I have had so many opportunities to meet new people and work with brands I love and I couldn’t be more grateful. I love the theme of ‘things I have learned in 2016’ and for me there was 1 big lesson: I learned we are capable of so much more than we think we are and even if the circumstance that showed me that wasn’t ideal I am grateful for that lesson.

For those of you who didn’t know, my now husband was gone from April until the end of October this year away for military training. Long-distance had never been something we had done before and after 3 years of seeing each other almost every day it was quite challenging. I work full time and commute at least an hour and a half each day to work and on top of that we have a loveable husky named Chester who couldn’t be home all day. On top of that my husband left behind his small business which I also had to step into the helm of, oh ya and I also had this little side project called BloggerNotBillionaire.com. Needless to say it was a lot and compounded with the inability to speak to him for the first 2 months of this journey I was basically a one woman show figuring everything out. I would be lying if I said there weren’t a plethora of breakdowns and moments where I just didn’t know how I possibly was going to handle everything, yet somehow I figured it out. The scariest thing about him leaving was the question of ‘how do I do this all on my own?’ but I shouldn’t have been worried. I learned that I am probably the #1 biggest critic and skeptic when it comes to my own abilities and that isn’t productive. Often friends and coworkers would ask, how do you do it all? and my response was, no clue, you just keep going.

As the summer progressed I found ways to delegate things and find more of a balance in my life, scheduling time in the evening for myself and on the weekend for friends became a priority. This blog became a touchstone for me, as silly as it may sound having so many people to ‘speak to’ via the website and social media kept me focused on my goals and moving forward. Did I mention we were planning a wedding as well? As Summer rounded to an end I started traveling a ton visiting my husband as often as I could in Arizona. A confession here: I had never flown or traveled by myself prior to this summer and while terrifying at first the experience was liberating and empowering, I loved it and I learned a lot as well. Finally at the end of October I flew down to get him and we drove home to Seattle from Arizona. Withing the next two weeks we flew to San Miguel de Allende for a friend’s wedding and the week following that we got married back home in Seattle.

To say this year has been a whirlwind would be an understatement and while during the process I would have given anything for it to end, now that we are home and back to a settled normal life, I would do the whole thing again in a heartbeat. What I learned in the past year in managing a life meant to be split by two people is how much I was capable of that I never knew was possible. The strength we find in the moments when we feel like we can’t keep going and yet there is no one there to pick you up but yourself is pretty incredible. I am less afraid of the unknown than I was before I and I am definitely less risk averse. I am empowered. The beauty of now having my husband home is that rather than settling back into a half of something, together we support each other and make each other even better versions of ourselves.

In honor of this crazy year I thought it would be fun to look back at my style evolution over the course of the year on the blog. The first block at the top of the page are posts done while my husband was home, the middle posts (most of the year) are from when he was gone and the last block, at the very bottom, are when he came home. I can’t write a year end post without acknowledging the lady who got me through those fateful 7 months will scheduled blog shoots and an ear always ready to listen. To my photographer and best of friends Katie Miyagi, thank you for everything. You kept my going this year by helping me keep this blog going so thank you for everything.

Happy New Year everyone, oh the things we will do in 2017. I can’t wait. Thank you all for following along, this blog wouldn’t be what it is without you.

Cheers-Rebecca