Getting to Know You

Since I recently made the jump from one blog to another, I thought I'd move a couple of my favorite and most recent posts here to this blog space!

JUST IN CASE YOU’RE NEW – A LITTLE HOW DO YOU DO!

I’m Natalie and this little corner of the internet is my blog – As The Story Unfolds. I started this blog in October of 2010. I’d just graduated from college and I’ve always liked to write, so I thought starting a blog would be a fun way to chronicle life as an “adult”.

It’s been seven years and I’m still plugging along! I was once a Mississippian and now I’m a Virginian. Life has taken twists and turns and at times my life is certainly not what I expected it to be when I started this blog seven years ago – and that can be both a positive and a negative. However; I’m so glad I have this space to document both the big moments and the small in life – because both the big moments and the small make up the story of life!

WHAT’S IN A NAME?

I suppose the name of my blog isn’t exactly “deep” – but I’m a firm believer that life is filled with lots of little moments that may not seem that significant but I find when you look back, those little moments mean more than you realized as they were unfolding. And certainly the big moments are just that – big moments – but I find that the real joy of life is finding the beauty in the small moments; not living from big moment to big moment.

I mention that my life is not always what I thought it would be – over the last twelve years, my life has certainly not played out in the way I’d have planned it in my head. I am thirty-two, I’m single, the only thing I “parent” is a seventeen pound puppy and I currently live in a basement apartment in my parent’s home. It’s not glamorous but it’s MY life and it’s also filled with so many wonderful things: I am also currently working at a job that makes me happy 9 days out of 10, I am surrounded my amazing friends and my wonderful family, I live outside a city I dearly love and because of my location, I can be in so many amazing places in mere hours!

In 2010 I graduated from the University of Southern Mississippi and began the great search for a job! I started working my first job at an insurance company in January of 2011, my Dad moved to Virginia in June of 2011, I bought my first home in July of 2011 and my Mom followed my Dad to Virginia in November of 2011 and I was on my own in Mississippi. Obviously the theme of 2011 was change!

I worked two jobs and scraped to make ends meet for the next two years – my job made me deeply unhappy and all of my close friends lived over an hour away…and my family lived thirteen hours away! 2012 and the first part of 2013 really stand out as “tough” years for me, to be sure. That’s certainly not to say that there weren’t happy times – but the less happy were more frequent.

In May of 2013 I was able to sell my house and just two weeks later, on June 13th I made the move from Mississippi to Virginia – one of the best decisions I’ve made in my thirty-two years of life. I was near (very near, ha-ha) to my family again, I made friends like I’d never have imagined and after about seven months of hunting, I found a job where I fit in perfectly and friends were even a part of that package!

I have been a “Virginian” for almost three years and while those three years have been filled with good and bad moments (after all, that’s life – right?), there is something about being surrounded by family, friends and the wonderful Shenandoah Valley that just makes my heart so happy.

I AM…

…saved by grace, a lover of all things related to family, an entertainment nerd – I love being transported to different worlds whether it be through the pages of a book, on the silver screen or even the TV screen, fiercely loyal to my friends, a self-proclaimed nerd that knows much more than any one person should about the worlds of Harry Potter, the Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones and the Marvel universe…just to name a few, a baseball fan and I wear my heart on my sleeve where my Nationals are concerned..a nervous flyer, an anxious driver and yet there is a deep desire in my heart to see the world – even if it means boarding hundreds of planes and taking a million different drives.

I can find happiness in so many places; I love to laugh but I can also be very serious. I find watching the snow fall to be magical and I can only guess that’s because I didn’t see much of it the first twenty-eight years of my life. I am happy hiking to a mountain waterfall and I can be just as happy watching the tide roll in on the beach. Christmas is my favorite holiday and even at thirty-two there is something so magical about the Christmas season and I hope I never lose that! There are days I dwell on the past too much and there are days that I wish I could fast forward my life – learning to live in the present is a lesson I’m still learning.

My little sister is my best friend and my Watson puppy is my most favorite “thing” that isn’t a human being. I love my people with all my heart, even if I’m not as showy about it as some. Deep down I still think I’d like to be a Disney Princess (Belle please) and even though I haven’t found my Prince Charming, I still believe in true love – perhaps he just got lost and is too stubborn to ask for directions? I believe there is good in the world, even if you have to look just a little bit harder to find it.

If this is your first time stopping by, I hope you’ll stick around and if you’ve been reading since the start, thanks for enjoying the journey with me. Here’s to celebrating more of life’s moments – both big and small!