just a quickie

Today I released my music video.  I'm basically peeing my pants I am so happy and excited.

Another thing that makes me very excited is this beautiful poster made by the man that I love.

Thats all I wanted to say :)

the video

I am an administrator.  That is what I am paid to do.  I have been a legal secretary for about nine years but just this year got a sweet promotion to this flash new role.  My job is actually interesting at times and definitely quite demanding.  But being the creative that I am, my job is also often quite unfulfilling.  The hours between 9 – 5 are a breeding ground of daydreams for me.

This might seem a bit silly, but a couple of years ago I started this thing where each year I give myself a new motto to base my life around.  My first year’s motto was ‘I’m gonna live my life regardless’ and honestly, it really helped (not to mention it inspired one of my most favourite songs I have ever written).  Last year’s motto was ‘Fuck Dreaming: Make Plans’.  A tad crude, but the blunt aggressive nature of it was what I needed to inspire myself.  So since the beginning of last year I have approached my dreams in that way.  That’s how I transformed my dream of making an EP into a reality as well as all the other musical ventures I have been involved in over the last year and a bit.  However, sometimes no matter how hard you try certain dreams just seem impossible.  Making a video clip was one of those dreams for me.

Since I can remember, all I have wanted to do was make music, perform and be on film.  

Actually before I was obsessed with making music, I was all about the acting.  My little 10 year old self spent most nights lying in bed rehearsing her Oscar Award Winning Speech, or imagining how her interview on Oprah would play out.  I was going to be a great movie actress.  Even though my dreams for feature film making have been put to one side (for now), I have spent many day dreaming hours on the topic of music videos and the making of them.

The problem was, while it was well and good me saying I was gonna start making plans as opposed to just dreaming, how does one make plans to make a video clip with no money and utterly no clue.  That was the question.  I’ve spent years dreaming about it and never felt like I had any way to proceed in this regard.  However, during a good day dreaming sesh at work I began racking my brains for any possible film connections that I had.  I came up with three.  Turns out three connections and the audacity to send a cheeky email was all I needed.  It also turns out that unpaid work for an unknown artist can sometimes be an enticing offer.  I don’t know what gods were shining on me that day, but my heart and smile continued to grow as various emails were exchanged and a date was set down for me to meet with this potential director. 

I remember my first meeting with her so well.  I was impossibly afraid.  I had decided the best thing for me to do was google this so-called director and find out who she was.  Once I did find out I was clueless as to why she would be entertaining the idea of making this video for me.  Her name is Ruth Korver.  She has quite a beautiful array of work under her belt acting in various roles (ie director, producer etc).  The most notable would be that she co-produced the feature film ‘How to meet girls from a distance’ (if you don’t know what I am talking about, well you should check out this trailer).  So yeah, I was a tad intimidated.  But all of my nerves and anxiety dissipated within a minute of meeting her.  I left that meeting so excited because I couldn’t believe my luck.  I had managed to meet a talented director who loved my music and was herself excited to make a clip with me.  It was impossible to believe what had just taken place.

Somehow, over the following months, a lovely lady crew was pieced together by Ruth (so very Beyonce of us!).  So all up we had a director, a director of photography, a set designer, a costume designer, makeup artist and lighting coordinator.  Oh and I got to be called ‘the talent’.  I was quite ok with that.

Everything about the whole process of making this video I was drooling over – ‘Why yes I would love to drink wine and brainstorm with you’.  ‘Costume fitting you say?’  ‘Of course I don’t mind doing some pinning to our pinterest mood board’.  ‘You want to do a makeup and hair test? OK!’ -   I LOVED.IT.ALL.  Like to the point where just now I considered hashtagging that statement.  I thrived on the environment of creativity, the environment of collaboration.

Still now, when I think about it all, I panic that it was all just a dream.  It’s all just too good to be true.  I got to spend hours brainstorming with Ruth and creating this interesting world for the clip to inhabit.  The costume designer Bonne folded approximately a million doilies to hand make me a one-of-a-kind whimsical and daydreamy dress.  Larissa, the set designer, created a room I wanted to live in forever.  Daniela lit my face and the space so beautifully that it looks like I am glowing.  Ness the DOP captured beautiful angles and perspectives and gave the clip such warmth and Fiona gave me my dream hair-do and makeup.   I mean.  Just tooooo good.

But it was real.  It is real.  And its realness is very soon going to be presenting itself to you.  In just a few days all should be revealed.  So keep your eyes peeled people for my dream is about to be served to you on a platter.  And I refuse to pretend I aint excited. 

The summer at the end of the tunnel

It’s been a pretty weird winter for me.  I have felt a distinct absence of words (although I anticipate my boyfriend will disagree with me on that).  But putting mindless chatter aside where I concede my words are plentiful, I have struggled with a surprising absence of language during this season; an inability to articulate.  Perhaps feeling there is little value or meaning in my words, that is, if I could find any to say.

This word-famine I seem to be experiencing has affected me in so many ways.  New musical ideas struggling to be formed, blogs have barely been written, lyrics left naked without consonants or vowels, wordless feelings that have not been penned and crafted into melodies. Just a sort of barrenness. 

I am full of feeling. That is for sure.  I have a lot of tastes on my tongue and experiences on my skin that I wish to write about.  In fact, the strongest feeling of them all, one which is entirely new to me, is this timeless classic called love, or, being in love [I know. Totes gross].  The happiness and the excitement and this new wholeness stemming from that feeling is dancing around inside me, waiting to bust out into song.  But the ability to describe with integrity the breadth of love I have for this being or simply what even love is to me, seems entirely impossible.  I don’t know what to write or what to say.  Lost in a sea of just, well, feeling.  Then cause I’m a bit cray cray I spiral into darkness thinking if I am unable to depict the commonest of experiences, how can I seek to then express all that lies beyond the most obvious of topics and bring the depth and reality to my music as I desire. Don’t worry, I‘m rolling my eyes at myself.

So yeah, winter has been unkind to me.  Work pressures, fickle health, light deprivation, not to mention the endless attention-demanding navigation of high-heeled shoes over wonky slippery Wellington pavements.  Winter is just so fricken hard.  However, perhaps there was one thing I can attribute the word-famine to; a heartbreakingly bad review.  

So this was posted some time ago, and I haven’t shared it publically yet till now.  I’m not really sure why now I feel like showing it.  Perhaps it’s my finale.  My way of letting it go.  I know you are supposed to have thick skin if you are wanting to work in an industry like this but I guess you only get that thick skin by learning how to live through these things.  This was not only my first bad review but it was my first review.  So, that sucked.

So while it has been hard to pull myself out of the recesses of that swift kick to the gut, I seem to be getting there.  The truth is I love music and I love the music that I make.  I love my band and I love performing.  I love performing even if there is only one person in the crowd who appreciates it.  I just love it.  Like, it is the time I feel most myself and the most connected with the world.  So I guess all in all, first layer of thick skin acquired.

And while I still feel surrounded by the tunnel I have been trudging along inside for the last few months, I am starting to see some sunlight through the cracks and cannot wait for the summer at the end.  This year will see a few more fabulous gigs yet, with some new material AND a beautiful new video clip for my song All a Flutter.  So plenty to be looking forward to. 


And Plenty of words yet. 

falling, yes I am falling

So admission time. I have never been a fan of the Beatles. Just hold on a minute ok, perhaps I should re-phrase! I have never known enough of or about the Beatles to even know whether or not I like them, and admittedly, I have never been that curious. I mean, sure, I know the classics like All you need is Love and I wanna hold your hand, however the association those songs have with the Beatles for me is slim. All you need is love reminds me of Christmas due to my favourite seasonal movie, Love Actually, and well, I wanna hold your hand always makes me think of Kurt from Glee. But what can I say, recently I have been lending my ear towards them and I am suddenly understanding their renown.

I am not going to pretend that I have started listening to them out of a pious desire to educate myself musically.  No.  Over the course of this year I have fallen for a boy who is pretty much obsessed with them and like in most relationships you can’t help but absorb some parts/likes/tastes of your significant other.   While I have shown him the beauty of earl grey tea he has shown me the beauty of the Beatles.  Clearly both of mutual benefit right?

While the classics like I mentioned above are actually magical and breathtaking, I mean All you need is love is actually just a fantastic heart warming affirming song but also, I have found they have this plethora of songs and lyrics and melodies and sounds that I utterly appreciate.  Yeah I know this is not news to a lot of you, but just bear with my slow realisation.

I mean, ok, this slow realisation and my sudden enjoyment for this band whom I have always ignored has perhaps only been ignited due to my ardent interest in a particular boy (perhaps entirely because the moment I knew I loved him was during a viewing of Across the Universe) BUT a slow realisation is better than none hey? 

Their songs, while seemingly simple, are quite complex and often things they do remind me of musicians and music that I idolise today.  For example, I was listening to a song the other night (unfortunately I have NO idea which song it was), but at the end it had this random calamity of noise and it actually completely reminded me of Sufjan Steven’s ‘All Delighted People’.  Now Sufjan is one of my favs, like I loooove that man, and it was surprising to me that I could find familiarity between the Beatles and him.  Now clearly Sufjan and the Beatles are not similar artists, but I could certainly find aspects of their musicality that I love that seemed to remind me of the other.

I think perhaps it surprised me because, lacking in knowledge as I am, I’ve never seen the Beatles as particularly edgy and I think I like music that is slightly edgy; interesting and different.  I know musically they were supposedly “innovative” but to me they’ve always seemed like a regular pop band, like a 60’s version of the Backstreet Boys.  While their music alone can defeat that belief, I have to say after my recent viewing of the Beatles movie A Hard Day’s Night my boy band pop persona idea has irrevocably changed.  The movie is so Fucking weird, they are out there as shit.  Pardon my language!  I can’t fathom a massive popular band releasing a movie remotely similar in nature.  I can’t imagine something like that could succeed.  It is impressive that they could.

I honestly have no idea how all of this is relevant to anything, or why I feel the need to share this.  Perhaps I feel I must confess my sins of ignorance or perhaps I am just excited about this discovery.  Maybe it is nothing more than something to share on a Tuesday afternoon.    

Now seeing as I’m still a total Beatles newb and have a lot to learn and listen to I am wondering if you all could let me know your absolute FAVOURITE Beatles number.  So far, my two most favourite of their songs (that I have listened to) are “I’ve Just seen a face” and “Good Night”.  If you don’t know those ones you should definitely listen to them.  You should listen to Good Night right before sleep, it is the PERFECT lullaby.  Yeah.  There ain’t nothing wrong with being 29 and wanting a lullaby.  

priorities

Whatever I am doing lately, I feel like I should be doing something else.  Everything feels important.  I find myself unable to actually give specific weightings to my priorities ‘cause I want everything all the time at the same time.  Everything.  I want to be able to travel and buy clothes and go to concerts and be able to clear my debts.  I want to eat healthy and learn how to cook, be able to socialise every night of the week and also give myself space to write music and be creative.  I want to sleep in and lounge around the house all weekend with my boyfriend and also get up early and see and experience the world.  How the crapballs does anyone have time for everything.  I want it all and I want it all now and I can’t figure out what the fuck is most important to me.

Living in this state is the worst because it makes it really hard to enjoy the great things that you are actually experiencing.  I feel like I am perpetually living in fear of running out of time, this fear causes anxiety and anxiety causes depression and to cope with depression I sleep, which leads me straight back to the fear of running out of time cause I keep sleeping instead of doing things.  Talk about a vicious cycle.  I also sleep because I am afraid of being shit at everything I want to do although I will probably only admit that to your face after a few drinks or if you are part of the rare few who get to experience the sleeping-pill-drugged-up-Rhiain (she is quite entertaining and far too revealing so I have been told). 

Another downside to this inability to prioritise and the fear it induces is that you never think you are achieving anything either.  Mainly because you are always thinking far too far ahead to look at what it is you are actually doing.  So l decided to think about what it is that I have actually done this year and the list is pretty good. 

I almost died in January, gots me a good bout of septicaemia, which is pretty much a great way to start the year – especially because it coincided with the beginnings of a flourishing romance.  Luckily I didn’t die, and the romance has lingered.  I then also got to play at my first music festival which was an incredible experience.  So I guess one can say it was a busy January.  February was the first anniversary month for a couple of tragic things that occurred in my family last year, so that was a tough wee time, not to mention my dad was in a motorcycle crash that was pretty serious to say the least, but it also was the first valentine’s day ever that I haven’t been alone, and was in fact given one of the sweetest and most romantic gifts I have ever been given.  It was also a month where long-time friends and I got to retreat to the beach for some much needed bonding time as well as a month where I got to witness the union of two close friends and officially be welcomed as god-mum for their beautiful daughter.  March I had a paid gig to play and brunches to go to but mostly I think I spent it going on various dates with the bf and slowly becoming acquainted with his family and friends.  I also spent a crap load of time slacking off at work by shooting people with my dart gun and jumping out of bins to scare them.  This was in preparation of also having to farewell two workmates, the two who encouraged my playfulness (I in fact have had only one excuse to shoot my gun since they left).   In April I managed to source and play another paid gig, go to Melbourne for a friend’s wedding, tour a brewery and be promoted into a flash new role at work while also beginning a creative venture with the boyfriend in the form of an online zine called Venn (first issue in the making).  This brings us on to May which we are only half way through, but I have already endured the dreaded visit to the parentals to introduce them to the boyfriend, managed to keep my five month old goddaughter alive whilst being her sole carer for a few hours, and witnessed my older sister graduate her well-earned degree.

So…maybe I haven’t been doing nothing after all.

I guess I need to chill out a little bit.  After writing this list I can see that life has been lived and really that is my main priority.   I just want to be happy and live life.

Perhaps I just have to remind myself of that.  Often.

roadys, festys, lol'ing and the joy of abbreviating

I’m on to my tenth day in a row of sunshine.  TENTH PEOPLE!  This, being summer, may not seem like a bizarre and special find to you. But it is.  It is rare.  I feel like I’ve won lotto and slash or found out I have superpowers, it’s that exciting for me.  Obviously I’m not exaggerating at all.  See this is the longest streak of sunlight I have had since I can remember sunlight.  Ok that’s a lie.  But definitely true when I think of my summers here in the capital.  I think January is finally showing off and I like it.  Hopefully February will feel competitive and try and outdo him. 

Not only have I had a 10 day run of sun, but just a kind of general awesomeness as well.  And I use awesomeness not lightly.  Ok let’s be honest, I use it all the time.  Willy nilly some might say. BUT I mean it.  I have had a great couple of weeks.

Perhaps it’s because January didn’t start so well for me, as in I was unwell.  As in hospitalised.  As in sick.  So a lot of January for me was just feeling like I was dying, lying in bed, watching Downton Abbey and missing the sunlight.  In fact, when I finally was well enough and started back at work it was the 17^th already. And I was like, oh hells no! That be the date? Sheet.  The year had well and truly begun without me. 

Starting back at work was a painful excursion.  In fact, I still feel like I’m ‘play working’ a little.  As in, I’m just here, hanging with my peeps, typing some stuff, but really I’m still on holiday, like, I only have to do this for a day right?  But no.  Its real.  I guess that feeling of play working was only heightened by the fact that after two days back we had a public holiday and then I had to only work three days before I was off on holiday again.  It’s always weird taking annual leave after you’ve just taken so much time off even though you booked it ages ago.  But there was no way I wasn’t going away.  Why you ask? Oh yeah, cause I be playing my first music festival. Oh hells yeah I did.  And yep, I will say it unashamedly, it was Parachute Music Festival.  Or as a friend calls it, the chute. 

I didn’t have too many expectations from the weekend actually, just that it was a great opportunity to play for people who wouldn’t normally hear my music, and hopefully more than that it would be a fun time away with the strangers aka my band.  And indeed it was.  Like so fun.  I’d forgotten how much I love road trips and sleeping in dorm rooms with five other people.  In fact I think I probably had the most fun with the sharing room scenario.  I have issues sleeping so its delightful for me to have people around to annoy and talk to while waiting for sleep to come (plus I take sleeping medication so I get super loopy at night).  I think the person who least enjoyed it was Matt Potts aka the log (seriously, he’s a log, like once he’s in bed he’s just there and still and doesn’t move.  It’s pretty hilarious).  But like all roadies we had our hilarious moments and our lulls and that’s what I enjoy; how the journey develops.  The hilarity and the seriousness.  The silence and the noise.  The nicknames.  The new perspective of people.  The zone of comfy-ness with each other you don’t tend to find in day to day life.  I mean we all loved loved playing at Parachute, it was a blast, but possibly my fav part of the weekend was just the hanging out part.

It was strange being a the chute, strange but fun.  I hadn’t been since I was 17, so as scary as this sounds it has been over (just) a decade since I was last there.  Yes I am that old.  I think most of us were in the same boat actually.  But it was cool.  There were still a lot of the old time bands that I remember from back in the day, but there was also quite a surge of rad under the radar bands from Australia or the US and even here in little New Zealand.  In fact, a gorgeous band called Paper Cranes stole two of our members, the tater-tots (Andy & Nina) for an evening and had them play their set with them.  It was stunning.  The last song in their set, All My Life, is such a lush deliciousness and the tater-tots guest starred on their EP (which can be found here: http://lovepapercranes.bandcamp.com/album/oh-love) so I’m thankful they were able to play it with them live, cause the cello and mandolin sound freaking sweet.  I love having band friendships.  It’s the best.  And Paper Cranes were certainly a highlight from the chute venture.

Another one actually is this Auckland band called Great North.  Seriously, out of all the bands I saw at the chute, they were one of my favs.  I think they just have that something you know.  Awkward in-between song banter and all.  I seriously like them.

So the chute was ace.  But the ace-ness of life didn’t stop there.  Oh no no no. Think again my pretties.  I then ditched my band leaving them to drive the 7 or so hours back to Wellywood whilst and I bussed up to Auckland to see some friends and go to Laneway where I gorged myself on music glory and friend loving.  Yeah it was pretty sweet.  Two of my best friends as well as my sister all live in Auckland so it’s kind of a place for me with a lot of love.  My two friends I’ve known since I was well young (one since 10, the other 12) so their souls are a sort of home to me.  I get to spend far few minutes with them so I enjoyed more than anything staring into their beautiful faces and talking their mouths off.  Not to mention grooving our sticky beer laden feet off come the end of the night to Tame Impala.  My highlight of Laneway however was Bat for Lashes. Oh god she was amazing.  I was in awe. I may even be in love.  From the second she walked on stage she owned it.  Clothed in a metallic red wonder of a dress I was giddy and faint hearted from the first glimpse of her.  She was amazing.  She may have changed my life a little.  She hells as inspired me.  Other great sets of the day were Alt-J and Polica. 

Still with one day of holiday left and sunshine to spare I spent the next day catching up with people and just being generally happy.  Now whilst back in Wellington (and back at work which is entirely lame), the sunshine seems to be prolonging the happy feeling as evenings feel early and extended and therefore are being utilised and well spent and enjoyed.  Not to mention the weekend seemed to quickly approach which was good because my lovely friend and keyboardist/backing vocalist, Sarah Colman, (an amazing solo artist in her own right not to mention) held a house gig party last night which was the best of fun.  There was a diverse and interesting line up with solo artists, spoken word poets, and Rhiain and the Utter Strangers on the bill.  Perhaps inspired by my new love, Bat for Lashes, I actually feel like I owned the stage a little more than I usually do.  So that was fun.  But let’s be honest the highlight of the evening was at the end of the night when we tried to light a flying lantern.  You know, those massive paper lanterns that you light the bottom of and they fill up like a hot air balloon and float dreamily into the air.  Yes, well, this lantern lighting exercise became the most hilarious slash dangerous thing in the world.  Someone almost died and slash or we almost burnt down Petone.  If only I was kidding.  All was going well; the lantern was lit and we were just waiting for it to fill up enough to take off,  but we live in Wellington people.  Windy Wellington.  So it was a pretty rocky take off.  Sarah kept trying to grab it to straighten it up and I am surprised her hands are now not cinders.  Eventually she thought it was safe and let it go.  It wasn’t safe, it didn’t float up into the air just over and down towards a bunch of my friends sitting on the lawn.  My other friend, B-Ho, stepped in now, thankfully saving the onlookers and the grass from destruction and again we waited for the lantern to fill up a bit more so to achieve lift off.  And then once again we let it go, hoping to stare with magical feelings in our hearts as it floated away.  We didn’t.  Take two of too much wind and desperately trying to steady it and then trying to get it away from the grass and the shrubs so we didn’t burn everything down was more like how it went.  I had thought then we were going to give up on it.  Too many almost burns had occurred.  I thought we were dragging the fireball, I mean lantern, over to the concrete in order to stamp the shit out of it.  When all of a sudden it is back in the air and is actually floating up up and away, albeit at not a very steep climb.  A friend who was not paying attention literally, literally, almost got the fireball in his face.  He thankfully ducked last moment due to excessive yelling of his name by his lady and I tell you it missed him by millimetres.  But then, this tricky fireball lantern actually began its climb to greatness.  Soaring into the sky.  We all ooooooo’d and aahhhh’d and every now and then panicked when the wind picked up and it rocked around.  I am sure my words have not even begun to articulately describe how awesome and dangerous and fucking hilarious that was but honestly I am not sure I have laughed so hard in a while.

Anyway, I guess this is just an update on life, a “what’s new with me” sort of blog entry.  One which I’ve rambled on a bit for! Sorry.  I guess right now I just feel excited about things (even taking into account the rose tinted glow everything has due to the thrill of a budding romance), but yes, I feel quite excited about things.  Everything.  Life, friends, music, all of it.  Like I said, I may just be a bit gushy these days, but hells, if I’m feeling happy, and enjoying things, and excited about life why try and diminish that?  Sometimes I feel I don’t acknowledge the good as often, so here it is.  An acknowledgement.  So I don’t forget the goodness there is. Cause there is.  There is goodness.

so this is the new year...

Happy New Years!! (she says as she high fives herself and continues marathon-ing it through Downton Abbey season one).  Due to an unfortunate timing of a silly procedure, Miss Rhiain, aka me, is at home alone on New Year’s eve.  As I cannot be around people I am going to talk my mouth off to all you online folk about new years and resolutions and making years count.

Last year, just prior to the turn of 2012, one of my close friends invited me around for an afternoon of lavish kindness together with another close friend.  With food and wine we sat around and chatted until a home visiting beautician showed up and surprised us with delicious facial treatments.  It was divine.  After the facial we returned to my friend’s lounge where she had laid out blank canvases for each of us surrounded by stacks of magazines and other “scrapbooking” materials.  “We’re making dream boards” she said.  I know, the words scrapbooking and dream boards kind of make my skin crawl a little too, they’re just sort of naff words.  But in all honesty it has been one of the best things I have done leading into a new year.  Beats the crap out of any new year’s resolutions I have tried to make and inevitably never stuck to, or any other sort of evaluation mechanism I have tried to implement.

I always spend either side of the cusp of the year panicking basically.  Worried I have wasted it, and fretful over how to make the next one count and I know I am not alone in this sort of behaviour.  So like most I have spent years making lists and resolutions and instead of said lists and resolutions providing me with freedom and inspiration and resolve, I have more or less felt like I am just putting off the inevitable disappointment that I will be to myself, as I know I will fail.  Like I have a brick in my hand and I’m falling to the bottom of the ocean.  Yes, I am nothing if not dramatic.  So I know not how to express how magical it was to spend a crafty afternoon with two of my favourite ladies, finding pictures and pretty images and statements and words that created my dream year for 2012 in the form of a collage.  We spent quite a few hours cutting and pasting and thinking about what actually we wanted from the year to be and then we walked each other through our dreams.

The exciting thing now is that pretty much everything on my board has happened.  Well, that’s hard to say really, as a lot of the things are progressive in nature, so the end result should not have occurred yet anyway, but the bulk of things represented by the imagery on my board, well, it has at least begun.  I had some simple things on there, like growing my hair.  Who knew you had to look after your hair to grow it right?  I didn’t.  But now I do.  And I’ve grown the crap outta my hair this year. And I love it (I’ve wanted long hair ever since I went to Scandinavia where the guys are beautiful but the girls even better). The rest on the board, not so simple.  Like one of my goals was to let go of the idea that I am unmemorable.  I’ve had that belief for most of my life and it has only been compounded by the fact that I am constantly encountering people who cannot seem to remember my name, let alone my face.  But I’ve learnt that this says very little about me and more about them.  See, I am a name person.  98% of the time I will remember someone’s name and face, even if I have only met them once.  It’s just a thing I can do.  Others can’t.  So this year I let that belief go.  That was much harder than growing my hair.  But I can actually say I did it.  It was on my board, and it is now done. 

Probably the biggest chunk of my board dedicated to one thing was covered in music related imagery, and boy did I chase that this year.  It’s exciting to think that within one year I have recorded and released an EP, had my song played on national radio, and shot a music video together with a bunch of other very cool things.  Its totes cray cray.  Kind of unbelievable, for me anyway.   It been hard work, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy it.  I’m still just an unknown, just a girl pursuing a career in music, but hey, that’s hells as better than where I was a year ago.

Other things I’ve managed to do that were weaved into the imagery on my board is travel (Bali & Thailand), put myself out there in terms of boys and romance and whatnot and also wear togs without boardshorts (because let’s be honest ladies, it just looks better).  So yes, I think it has been a successful year and it is so nice to be able to look at the canvas that I plastered only but a year ago and see that I really did what I wanted. 

I don’t think I am going to return to resolutions.  Whilst I haven’t made another board this year (yet) I am going to figure out a way to creatively highlight my hopes for 2013.  I think the difference is, instead of resolving to go to the gym three times a week from now on, or something of the sort, I’ve decided it’s better to say saying something like, I will pursue health this year.  Give yourself room to grow into it I reckon, otherwise you always feel like too much of a failure to continue trying.  That’s what I’ve noticed anyways.

So yeah. This is the new year.  And I’m excited.

(this was my dream board for 2012)