Hello World!!!  Sara here!  This week I got a violent but quick little stomach bug and had to miss a day of work for the first time this year.

Which is a BIG deal for me.  I made it until almost April without getting sick!!!!!! Wahoooo!!!!

In general, I’m feeling SO MUCH BETTER IN EVERY WAY!!!! But I am not immune to viruses and sometimes you catch the bug that’s going around!  I hate missing work.  First off,  I love what I do!!!  I love my bosses, my team, my meatball, my clients…basically everything and everyone!!!

 

I am also REALLY busy at work, which I love,  so I hate not being able to come in.  With clients and mentoring, it is so important for me to be present…literally!

Last year (probably more like the past 3 years…30ish years!?) I really struggled with my health.  I felt really awful a lot…especially with my knee pain pre and some post surgery.  So, to turn this corner  and have these long stretches of great health, feels really inspiring and makes me so hopeful for an even healthier future!

So leading up to the bug, I went shopping at Aldi without a grocery list last Sunday, so I bought from memory things for chicken chow mein!!!  Have I told y’all I love shopping and cooking!? So good!

 

This week was also the beginning of Mega season at work which is a fun and busy time, so this week I for sure needed to meal prep!!!  Somebody look at all this yummy!

 

I am doing this round of inspiring meetings with all of the stylists by myself (all the more reason to bounce back quickly from sickness) and I love it!!!  I love getting this 45 minute solo time with each and every Sammie Cole stylist.  Y’all know I love 1 on 1 time!  So Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday flewwwwww by!  I started feeling bad on Wednesday, but Thursday morning I just couldn’t even stand up straight.  I tried to weather the storm, but I lost haha.  I called in and rescheduled my clients and spent the rest of the day on my bathroom floor.  It took me until 4:30 in the afternoon to get downstairs and attempt to drink water.  I was so exhausted and terrified to eat anything.  But self care is so important so I went to bed super early so I could get ALLLL the rest. The next morning I got up and got ready for work.  I felt a lot better!!!  And also so glad to be out of my house and back at work!  The only food I had in my house was…you guessed it Kelly Whitley…salad!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  And boiled eggs and bacon…barf!  So I grabbed a mini bag of cashews and headed out the door! I braved really eating once I got off work!  No picture of the sad bacon salad hahahahahah!  I went to bed sooooo early again #selfcare and then Saturday morning I woke up….SO TINNNNY!!!!

I hated being sick, but I will take this silver lining. I spent this weekend taking it easy!  I finally ate a real meal!

I had not gone grocery shopping yet though!!!

I also had some me time…investing some time into spicing up my hair and makeup routine…something I love to do and that is long overdue! #poet

Now that I have this beautiful makeup space I just want to be practicing and trying new things all of the time.  I used to be MACsclusive, but lately I’ve been wanting change, so I ordered some things to try from Glossier and Fenty Beauty and I’m OBSESSED with all of it!  Also, I’ve been watching ALLLLLL of the tutorials online.  I was doing EVERYTHING wrong before!

On to the Self(ie) Care rant/portion of  your regularly scheduled post: Is it hard for anyone else in their 30’s and beyond to take a damn selfie?!  I feel like I can’t get the light right, I don’t know how to get my phone out of the pic and I always have one eye that won’t cooperate and my crooked smile!?  I mean where does my top lip even go????  When I look in the mirror as I’m taking the pic, I’m like girl, you look great and then I look at the pic and I’m like HOWWWWWWWWWW!?!? And before you say anything like, Sara, that picture is lovely….(thank you!) well it was the 700th one I took!!!!

 

So give your girl some tips on how to nail it sooner if you’ve got ideas! Here are more examples…the winners and all of my fun weekend hairstyles:

I’m newly obsessed with space buns!!!  So on brand for me, why haven’t I been wearing these every single day!?  Then two dutch braids, then dutch braids into a bun and then post braid beachy waves!!!  Loving all my options!

What it took to get there AKA The Losersss:

 

Where am I looking!?  Why do I have dead shark eyes?! Why is it so hard to get a pic of the back of your head!?  What is that face!?!? And honestly I delete the really bad ones!  I didn’t know this was going to end up a post focus, so I now regret that because the really bad ones were WAY WORSE and so funny! But here are some cringy ones:

 

The living deadest eyes…both of my eyes are failing me in pic 2 but my boobs showed up for the party…and I look like the biggest creep in the third one or like I’m farting! Ewwwww!!!! Ok back to reality…

I also spent Saturday with you guessed it…my mom!!!  We went to Sola’s pop up market

and almost fell down this little incline hahahahahaha!!!  We survived and found the cutest stuff! Don’t worry Joelle, I paid down my HVAC first!

Mom and I got matching earrings from Windblown Jewelry…cutest packaging ever and I got the kids some hilarious cards and bath bombs for Easter!  We leave for the beach in less than a week!!!!  Then we went grocery shopping because even I get tired of breakfast salads!!!  We decided to try Lidl and you guysssss!  It was great!

I got so much for $66!!! I even got some fresh flowers, which y’all know I live for!

I will for sure be back!  Mom left to go home and sew and I lumped around until Jenny came over!!!

Even with SnapChat I have a dead eye!!!!!!!!!!!!!  We had so much fun!  We had Guasaca for dinner, my new weekend ritual and we watched stand up comedy, tutorials, choreography videos, fantasized about new furniture, talked about meatballs….we did it all!  I got so much Jenny time and it was amazing!

Then Sunday morning I woke up, put gym clothes on and surprised my dad at the gym! Talk about self care!!!!!!!!!!

The look on his face when I walked in was priceless…I was the last person on earth he expected to see!  I gotta get to the gym more.  We had so much fun together and it felt great to work out…I have been wanting to do it, but not actually doing it for sometime now!  Then mom made the living best breakfast:

I mean is there anything better than your mom’s cooking!?  Then I got to see my boyfriend for a little while which was so nice and then I spent the rest of the day until this very moment cooking and doing laundry!  This week on the menu: Spaghetti squash chow mein, egg roll meatballs and chicken thighs in a mushroom sauce!!!

Self care is a new concept that I am really starting to grasp.  I have to make the time to cook for myself every week.  I need/want to work out.  I want to see my family and friends.  I love learning new things and exploring new places. Going to bed early is a gift.  Listening to what my body/mind/soul/spirit needs and obliging! And of course, learning to take a good selfie…it will happen one day right!?!  Until next time…I love you all so much.

Xoxo,

Two months ago vs yesterday…feeling so different!