The love for baking is a magical thing. This recipe is one of my favorites. Today, I am particularly bored, so I decided to bake cookies of course.. especially because I have a few people to thank. What thank you is better than cookies? None.  Today's batches are Nutella Crinkle Cookies and they to die for! Just in case you need photo evidence..

Check out "Playing with Flour" for more delicious treats like these!

This looks too perfect on a rainy day like today.

The Ordinary Summer

So, this summer I was dreading coming home. Absolutely dreading it. Now I am looking through my pictures from the past three months, and I'm thinking about how much I needed my family, my normalcy, to rejuvenate for this upcoming school year. I have wanted to post for a long time, but I didn't know what to write about because a.) I have been working at the optometry office everyday for the past three months, and let's face it, that's only exciting to me; b.) I have been taking a physics class, again only exciting to me; and c.) I was hanging with my friends or my family during any free times I had.

Then I thought about it. That stuff is the normal ordinary stuff I initially wanted to blog about, even if it isn't the most entertaining.

So here it- my summer. My closest friend from high school and I joined a bible study with my church, I climbed up to a building's rooftop for the first time which was probably semi-illegal, watched a civil war reenactment at Connor Prairie,  I did a detox cleanse thing to better my body, I worked both in school and at my internship, I wired my own lamp (which blew up less than 24 hours after I plugged it in at my new apartment), did my typical other crafts to make my room the way I wanted it, and just let myself grow as much as possible in the process.  That's what this time in life is for right? To be twenty-one and confused... or maybe curious about where life is headed is a better description. Yeah. I like curious better than confused to describe where I am at.

Here's what all the sudden made me realize why this summer was so important. I moved into my new apartment with my three other roommates and was thrown all kind of big-girl-world type problems that we had to fix... and to be honest, I really wasn't sure if I was ready for this grown-up life to start happening (or patient enough either). I always pictured myself as an adult and wanted that control over all of my decisions, problem solving, and wanted to learn how to do real life. Now that it's here and happening, I am kind of shocked by it. This past summer allowed me to feel more like a "kid" at least one more time, which I am a lot more grateful for than I was when the summer started. I filled my time by crafting, cooking (trying to anyway), playing games with my siblings, celebrating birthdays, eating lots of ice cream, taking mini vacations to DC (what?!), watching lots of baseball, visiting my grandparents and reliving my childhood… that is what summers are for and that is what I found it to be once again. I got to be the intern. The baby. A student. At school I obviously am a student too, but I have to be much more serious about it. I also have to worry about bills, books, and budgets when I am here. Don't get my wrong, I love being at school. It's that grown-up feeling I have coming back here that I am having trouble dealing with. It's fun for me to look at back on these pictures, even though I should have taken more, and feel more bliss than freedom. They may not be anything fancy or crazy, but they expose the life I made during my three months at home. My Ordinary Summer.