When life gives you lemons…

… you make lemonade. The past few weeks have been tough. Work is crazy busy and I spend all my time prepping and teaching classes with no time to do anything else. After 3 weeks I was so strung out that I had to call in sick. I was so tired, got headaches all the time, felt dizzy and just completely out of it. By now I know that until fall break I’ll have to soldier on as my schedule cannot be changed. Bummer, and I hope I will manage. I hate being negative though and when life is hectic I like giving myself positive prospects to look forward to. Hence the title. Here’s what’s good, despite all of the bad.

source: weheartit.com

1.) Conference in Alaska

So the day I called in sick, I found out my graduation thesis has been accepted for a conference in Alaska next year. I found out 2 days before my graduation and I love how all my hard work is going to get a follow up. All I have to do is arrange things at work.

2.) Another graduation party

Today is my second graduation party. My friends and family live too far apart so I always get to do things double for birthdays and thus also for my graduation. Today will not be super busy though as I didn’t invite too many people. I don’t like massive parties where you have no chance to talk to people.

3.) Concerts

I love going to live shows and so I have quite a few coming up in the next few months. I already saw Braids a few weeks ago. The other shows I’ll be going to are: Cloud Control, Savages, Johnny Flynn & The Songbird Festival. The latter is a 2 day festival and I have tickets for both days. The artists I hope to see most are Sam Amidon, James Vincent McMorrow and Marcus Foster.

4.) London

One thing I didn’t do this year is travel. Alright, I went on a study trip via work, but that doesn’t really count. With my parents’ gift for my graduation (a check to book a trip to wherever I fancied) I booked a 4 day trip to London. I will be leaving in little over 3 weeks and I am so excited. London is my favorite city in the world (after New York of course) and I can’t wait to be in the city of red double-decker buses and Big Ben again.

5.) New haircut

The best thing to do when you’re down and out is do things that make you feel better about yourself. My hair had been bugging me for weeks, so this Thursday I paid my hairdresser a visit. And this is the result:

I am so happy with it. The only problem is that if I want to make it look like this ever again I will seriously have to up my blow drying or straightening skills…

6.) Be nice to myself

Last but not least, I’ve decided to be super nice to myself. If I’m tired, I’m tired and will simply do nothing. This means that I have been skipping gym sessions left and right, have simple go to meals for dinner and go home straight after my last classes. And being nice to myself also means that I get to buy nice things for myself. Such as these Desert Boots by Clarks:

I had been wanting a pair of sturdy but nice looking boots for fall/ winter. I have plenty but most of them have a heel or don’t really go with dresses and skirts as they are too chunky. Since I’ve been wearing plenty of dresses and skirts these past few months (hello, style change!) and I saw these when I was shopping a few months ago, I knew these would be perfect. The color is called Wolf and it’s a light taupe brown color, which makes them very versatile.

What do you do to find that silver lining?