I think they call this hope

Things I am proud of that you may or may not know about me:

I love country music! I love listening to people sing about how much they love their country and their family. And I'm not saying country is immune to less savory subjects, but man! there are some really great country songs! Gimme some Collin Raye, John Michael Montgomery, Nitty Gritty, Brad Paisley, Rascal Flatts and Reba any day! I am proud of my choice in music.

I can bake bread! When we were first married, I would follow recipe after recipe and never have bread turn out. We even bought a bread maker machine and it still didn't always turn out. While I was researching the bread maker's website, people were talking about adjusting the recipe and how the bread should FEEL at different stages. You mean you can open it up during the cycle and check and adjust?! Ever since then, I have taught myself how it's supposed to go and I can do it! Homemade pizza dough, rolls, batter bread and dough bread. I am proud of how I bake bread.

I don't have to have a pattern to sew. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE patterns (and recipes) and there's a reason someone got paid money to tweak those things and make them work right. But I get a little natural high when I can change something in a pattern and still make it work. Mending and using tutorials from the internet are fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants type sewing and I like the challenge of that. I am proud of my mad sewing skills.

I love my cowgirl boots. I don't know if this is because of the copious amounts of country music I listen to or what, but I seriously want to wear my boots all the time. A huge contributing factor is that cowgirl jeans are the longest jeans I've ever worn and I can't get enough of those pools of denim at my ankles!  I am proud to wear my pink and brown boots with my extra long jeans and it's one outfit I feel truly awesome in.

I am articulate. I can express myself fairly well with words. I often pause (especially when in front of a crowd - eyeroll) because I want to use the exact word that I mean. I LOVE thesauruses! I love to click through and find the word I really mean, not the one that is close. I am proud of the way I speak and write.

Every so often, I feel the urge to do a post like this. (Like here and here, for example) I'm never really quite sure why. It's obviously for myself. I want to remember what I'm good at, so on days when it feels like the answer to that question is "nothing," I have something to prove my more downtrodden self wrong.

Because if I can replace even one negative thought with a positive one, I think they call that hope.