farewell to gold.

today is my 28th birthday. twenty-eight. a fairly boring number, if you ask me, but i think i am going to like it that way for a bit. in honor of my 28th birthday, and because i haven't updated my blog in a while, i'm going to take a little journey through my 27th year. 

one year ago, november 27th, 2017, i celebrated my golden birthday. as i awaited this date with much excitement and anticipation, i discovered that many people aren't even familiar with the concept of a golden birthday. but i dreamed of my golden 27th birthday for my entire life, and boy, was it worth the wait. 27, my golden year, was a woolly mammoth of a year. 

for my golden birthday, my incredible mother and sister threw me a combination birthday party and bridal shower at Dante's wine bar in Omaha, NE, my hometown. in my memory, this was as perfect a day as i've ever lived. i was surrounded many of my oldest and dearest friends, my family, and most importantly my grandmother katharine, seated to my left in this photo. my grandma had turned 97 just a month and a few weeks prior to this day, and she seemed to be doing very well. but when i said goodnight to her this day, she said "if i don't ever see you again, may God bless you." i didn't know it at the time, but that would be the last time i ever saw her in person. i have felt a lot of regret over not being able to say goodbye to her in person one last time, but as i look back on this perfect last day we had, my feelings turn to gratitude and love, and regret seems to wane. 

so yeah, 27 was a mammoth of a year for good and bad. i lost my grandmother, the last of my living grandparents. around that time i also lost a few friends for a various reasons, and i left both of my jobs (i had been working 46+ hours per week). 

at 27 i finally started working as a hospice music therapist again, and even though i had to quit my first hospice job in order to move across the country, i was lucky enough to get a second new job in st. louis, where i will hopefully be happily employed for the next several years. 

at 27 i traveled to nyc and philly a few different times, fell deeply in love with baltimore, and made some of the best friends of my adult life on the east coast. 

at 27 i started posting my outfits on instagram, and opened myself up to a world of new people and experiences by starting this blog and expanding my social media presence. 

at 27 i also moved across the country, bought a house, got married (wedding post still soon to come), chopped off all my hair, and wrote my comprehensive masters exams. 

27 was a damn good, damn challenging, damn woolly mammoth of a year, and i'm so grateful to have lived it. 

here's to a 28 that's a bit more relaxed, filled with home projects, weird outfits, many more blog posts, and hopefully several big steps toward finishing my masters degree. 

until we meet again, friends, stay gold. 

xoxo,

Kathryn, with dogs.