This trip comes at a unique time in this season that we find ourselves in... my emotions are mixed as it is difficult to leave home with the loss of my precious daddy. I know some of you understand and I do appreciate your prayers as I step out in courage.
I hope you will please take a moment to read about the #10000in7days campaign (click HERE) that I am hosting this year as part of this trip and donate as the campaign will be soon closing! Thank you so much for considering donating to this!
Happy Monday friends! I hope that you had a restful and restorative weekend. It is hard and almost impossible to believe that we are finishing up the last few days of July and approaching August right in front of us.
The last couple of weeks for us have been filled with some very difficult things and decisions my mom had to make. Anyone who has lost anyone understands the overwhelming emotions that are faced in times like this and the stress of how it affects everything. In this past week mom and I also committed even more to fight for defiant joy...and among the tears there have been some incredibly beautiful moments as we have fought to look for them.
I have marveled that there are certain situations where for whatever reason people may not be able to step up and embrace the season that you are in the way you wish or thought they would...this is hard. There are really no other words for it and if you let it, it can cause a bitterness that runs deep...but if you defiantly look for joy there are people who have met us in deep dark painful moments where texts and calls (thank you so much Traci, Tammy, and Zoey) have allowed my tears to flow freely.
We have been beautifully embraced and fed by honesty, intimacy, and love this past weekend in a variety of different ways. Starting Thursday evening with the most lovely dinner invitation (thank you again Donny and Debbie so so so much!), then visitors chatting for hours with us under the cozy white lights in comfy chairs with loved ones, friends who come at a moments call to help with situations that feel overwhelming, Jeanne and Leanne and your listening and encouraging words and time, Susie and Bob for keeping us laughing and so many others who have brought light into our hurting hearts. Thank you to those of you who are making us feel fiercely protected and loved...my heart is incredibly grateful for the kindness and compassion.
"I’m not talking about cooking as performance, or entertaining as a complicated choreography of competition and showing off. I’m talking about feeding someone with honesty and intimacy and love, about making your home a place where people are fiercely protected, even if just for a few hours, from the crush and cruelty of the day."
Happy Saturday friends! I am so excited to share another new junk journal that is now available in the shop! This Fly High Vintage Junk Journal is now available for purchase! (You can find it HERE!)
This beautiful Fly High Vintage Junk Journal is a sweet vintage colorful Lovers Dream. I love the vibrant colors of the book, and the book pages, and then the coordinating scrapbook paper! When I came across this book last winter in a cute antique book shop I knew it would make a special Junk Journal!
This beautiful vintage Fly High Junk Journal is made from a 1970s book with tons of vintage charm. With approximately 150+ pages of quality and beautiful scrapbook paper, vintage children book pages, ribbon (both vintage and bespoke modern pieces from around the world) and pretty surprises, this Junk Journal will create a treasured keepsake for a lifetime and can be used throughout the year.
With this Fly High Junk Journal you can easily add in pictures and quick notes so that you can remember the special days forever. This Junk Journal would create a treasured keepsake for a lifetime! One of my friends was saying that it would make a perfect going off to college gift which is a great idea or a special gift for someone entering their senior year of school. No matter how you would use this junk journal it would be precious. *smiles*
If you are interested in this Fly High Vintage Junk Journal you can find it HERE! You can find one of me talking about the junk journal on the shops instagram page by clicking HERE! A video of this junk journal will soon be available on my Youtube page which you can find HERE!
Happy Saturday friends! I hope that you have a wonderful weekend!
Happy Friday friends! I hope that your week is finishing up well. As I been mentioning the last several weeks, I am sharing some of my favorite recaps from my trip to Alaska last year as I hope it encourages each of you to take a road trip in this beautiful part of the world! It is hard to believe that we leave in less than two weeks for our trip and I am in deep last minute preparation for our upcoming trip this summer! I am so excited to see so many new things and share them with y'all on Instagram and here on the blog!
Also- please take a moment to read about the #10000in7days campaign (click HERE) that I am hosting this year as part of this trip! Thank you so much for considering donating to this!
I am so excited to continue to share about the road trip we did through Alaska and today share pictures from the Worthington Glacier Ridge Hike in Thompson Pass that we did!
As a bit of background, this specific hike was actually not on our planned list of hikes and was added in spur of the moment after we arrived at Worthington Glacier which I am so glad happened! Sometimes those moments on trips are the best - aren't they? The ones that you don't plan for, but happen and they end up creating some of the most precious memories, which is definitely what happened on this hike!
As we were exploring the Worthington Glacier (that I shared about HERE last week), I kept looking up along the high ridges and peaks by the glacier itself and seeing people who were hiking. It looked so neat and I immediately wanted to hike it.
So, I said to Ali, "let's hike on up there". Now Ali was a bit skeptical which I understood as it was very high but for some reason I thought it would be incredibly easy. *hahaha* I kept looking and said, "Ali, we can totally do this- there are kids up there that are hiking around like it is nothing" and so after a bit more convincing, she agreed and off we went up the trail.
Yes, I admit it- I am typically the adventuresome one who wants to grab every moment and explore everything. I think it comes from being sick for so long and wanting to grab onto every moment of life possible... but I am digressing...
So off we went onto the trail... now two quick things that are making me giggle even as I type these words. First, the sign that is in the pictures above clearly states that this trail is steep, primitive, and difficult... but both of us in our excitement of this adventure never saw the sign until we came back down the mountain.
Oh...and second and the "children" I said that I saw... they were all adults. Hahaha. We literally saw one child coming down the trail in the entire adventure... the rest just looked small because of how high up they were! I actually asked someone at some point who was coming down as we headed up- "are there more children up there"? They looked at me like I was crazy! Hahaha. I am laughing out loud right now.
To clarify- yes... the trail is steep, primitive, and difficult. I definitely wouldn't recommend this if you aren't used to doing some sort of climbing/hiking. As I am re-learning about hiking and healing with my body, I did find this trail to be difficult. It wasn't the hardest trail per say as far as length... it was more that it is definitely very steep - especially as you reach the upper portion of the trail. Because it was steep I definitely recommend a good pair of hiking boots/shoes for this trail if you go on it to give yourself some "grip" for portions of the trail that are primitive. If you are looking for a recommendation, I love my Merrell Women's Moab 2 Mid Hiking boot. They have are awesome. You can find them HERE.
The trail is approximately 2 and 1/2 miles (round trip) and features beautiful views that are absolutely priceless all the way up of your hike. In these specific pictures we were only about 1/4 of a mile into the hike and already were starting to see beautiful views that were incredible!
As we rose in elevation it looked like we were ascending into the clouds.
One thing that I read about the trail (after we hiked it) was that many people begin the trail and return before they finish it. That is definitely easy to do in my opinion. I remember as we got to this point in the hike and I thought- oh we are almost at the top... and we still had a ways to go!
Looking out and we appeared to be so high... and yet we still had beauty that we were going to meet!
We got to the top of that portion and saw that the trail continued up and up some more. Look at how close the glacier looked at this point! It was gorgeous!
After hiking a bit longer I turned around to look out and was stunned at how much more we were seeing. It was simply stunning.
There was an old song that we listened to as children growing up, "climbing my mountain" (I actually wrote about it HERE) and the words from that song kept going through my head as I hiked.
Do y'all see the waterfall in this picture? *happy sigh* I have a little love affair with waterfalls.
The beautiful Worthington Glacier getting closer and closer!
And then we came up to this point in the trail... the last section... I feel like the picture doesn't do it the justice that it deserves. It was difficult... steep... and really hard.
And then we made it to the top and I was simply in awe. I was speechless, overcome with emotion... and had lots of tears.
For those of you who knew me way back before this blog began... before sickness altered life in unique and long-last ways than you know that I have a complete love affair with hiking and being out in nature. Not having the ability to do these things these last seven years has been one of the hardest things about this journey... and the source of many behind the scenes tears.
Despite some well-known doctors saying that I would never be able to hike again (or walk properly at one point), this has remained a dream that I continued to fight for. It started SLOWLY with learning to walk down our hallway, to months just walking to the mailbox (which exhausted my fragile body), to small walks around the neighborhood (often leaning on someone) to finally starting to jog & run again in small bits last summer. And then this summer...has held some miracles... including hiking this "steep & difficult" trail while I was in Alaska.
I have been thinking about this hike a lot recently. Yes, the views we're stunning, but at the end it was such a narrow & steep incline that only one person at a time could hike to the top (or go down). So you had to wait & as I stood there waiting I started sobbing. I wasn't at the top yet, but could see it was so close. And then it was my turn & I made it. All of the years of getting to this point hit me & I just cried.
It has also given me pause in reflecting on this stage of the healing journey...able to start to enjoy some long -awaited moments & yet held caught in an undetermined waiting period for others (including completing treatment, a full-time job, etc). The waiting is a dance I am still learning and yet like this hike will have an ending more stunning than I can imagine.
So as I walked down this steep, primitive, and difficult trail I found myself changed in deep ways. And as I pulled the car out of the parking lot and back onto Richardson Highway I knew that that hike had impacted me more than I could have ever imagined.
Whatever hills or mountains or steep, primitive, and difficult paths you find yourself on today... keep pressing on friend... the ending will have a beauty and view you can't imagine.
"If you can find a path with no obstacles, it probably doesn't lead anywhere."
"When everything feels like an uphill struggle, just think of the view from the top."
Thank you for stopping by and reading about our Alaskan road trip! If you are interested in watching the video from this area than check out the Thompson Pass Area Video by clicking HERE!
PS- If you are curious about the specific details of the road trip that we took throughout Alaska or if you are planning a similar road trip (or just want to see and dream about visiting the beauty!) I hope the information below is helpful. You can read all of the posts from the trip by clicking on the links below:
// 5 Reasons You Need to Take an Alaskan Road Trip//
Chugach Mountains (Alaska 1-South Drive): // Scenic Seward Highway Drive (Turnagain Arm Drive)// Along the Matanuska River on Alaska 1-South// A Beautiful Lake Adventure Near Chickaloon// A Cloudy & Beautiful Drive on Alaska 1-South//
Chugach Mountains: // Eklutna Lake//
Cooper Landing (Kenai Peninsula): // Kenai Princess Wilderness Lodge Nature Hike//
// Kenai Princess Wilderness Lodge //
Denali State Park Area:// Denali Highway Video// One Last Adventure on the Denali Highway//
// The Denali Highway: Part Two // The Denali Highway: Part One//
//The Drive to Cantwell// Mt. McKinley Princess Wilderness Lodge //
General Alaska Tips: // 5 Things You Must Know Before Driving in Alaska //
// Best Alaskan Books to Purchase for Your Road Trip //
// What to Pack for an Alaskan Summer Road Trip //
// Why You Should Dream About Visiting Alaska //
Girdwood: // Winner Creek Trail Video// Winner Creek Trail //
Hatcher Pass Area: // Hatcher Pass Video// Hatcher Pass // Little Susitna River //
Homer (Kenai Peninsula) Area: // Homer Video// Homer Spit// Homer Lighthouse// Bishop's Beach//
// A Brief History of Homer //
Thompson Pass Area: // Thompson Pass Area Video // Worthington Glacier Hike//
//Worthington Glacier//
// Among the Alaskan Fireweed on Alaska 4-S: A Beautiful Symbol of Hope in the Hard Seasons of Life //
// A Brief History of & Drive on Alaska 4-South of the Richardson Highway//Klutina River//
// The Beginning Drive to Thompson Pass//
Wrangell-St. Elias Park Area: //Copper River Princess Wilderness Lodge //
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