When I was in elementary and middle school, I was hardly ever sick. As a result, I rarely had to stay home from class. However, my sister was the opposite, and I was jealous (yup, I wanted to stay home so badly that I was willing to be sick for it!). So my mom gave me permission to take one “mental health day” per quarter. She’d call in sick for me, and I’d snuggle up on the couch in front of the TV with some cookies and forget about school for the day.
Once I started high school and college, I stopped taking days off—it was more stressful to miss all of the day’s lessons and homework assignments than to be in school! However, now I’m fortunate enough to be “working from home” for the next few weeks (or more—but let’s hope the job search turns up something soon!). As a result, I have the luxury of being able to take “self-care days” (as I prefer to call them) again.… Read More »

We all know that plastic is bad for the environment and for us. Different kinds of plastic take anywhere from hundreds to thousands of years to break down. Plastic that makes its way into the ocean kills millions of sea animals every year. It contains dozens of harmful chemicals that leach into the ground and our water supplies. And it’s extremely dirty energy-intensive to produce.
If you’re interested in reading other travel adventures on our cross-country road trip, here’s where you can find my recap of our visits to
When E got the call that he’d gotten his dream job last fall, we couldn’t have been more excited. E was employed, and we were California dreamin’! All the work that moving across the country would entail hadn’t occurred to us yet, and the reality didn’t actually sink in until we in the thick of planning our move in April: how do we find an apartment when we’re living 2,000 miles away? Do we need a renter’s insurance policy? Why is shipping SO expensive? We don’t even have that much stuff!
This is my third travel recap of our road trip across the country to move to California. We started out