BIG news!!!!!

If you haven't heard from me in the past couple of days, you might need to sit down for this one.... or maybe just rest your jaw on your hand so it doesn't drop too much. Two major pieces to this story, so sit tight as I share some pretty crazy/exciting news!!

On Friday, it was with mixed emotions that I resigned from my position at Progressive. I have spent the last 7.5 years with the company, 3 years in claims, 3 years in corporate training, and the last year and a half as an instructional designer. During my time as a trainer, I obtained my Masters in Adult Education/Training, learned a lot about project management, and found a real interest in instructional design. My time as a designer really made me realize that while I do love the entire process of instructional design, I am drawn to the analysis, planning and organizing side of training. It's just the way my brain works. I really couldn't be more thankful for my time at Progressive and for all of the opportunities I've been provided and the incredible people I've met along the way. I've met some amazing friends and colleagues that I know I'll stay in touch with for a very long time.


With that being said, I wouldn't have given my notice without some sort of plan in place. A few weeks ago, I saw a posting on someone's facebook page that Stella & Dot was hiring for corporate positions. Being the curious person I am, I looked on the website just to see what positions were open. When I saw the "Manager - Field Training" position, I thought, "this was written for me." I decided to go for it - I had nothing to lose. The more I kept thinking about it, the more I really wanted it. The position involves doing some analysis with the existing training and determining the most effective ways to develop and deliver the material to the 10,000+ stylists out there, with developing some measurement strategies around what's working and what can be improved. Totally up my alley!!!!!! Besides the position, I just LOVE everything about Stella & Dot - the jewerly is a given, but the business model, the CEO and her innovative ways for changing the direct sales business to make sense for women today, and the fact that this company is still super small, but is growing extremely fast are all so appealing. 

I interviewed over the phone and in person and knew instantly when I met everyone in the home office that it couldn't be a more perfect fit. I was offered the position early last week, and by the end of the week, accepted. I couldn't be more excited about joining Stella & Dot as an employee and not just as a stylist repping their jewelry... now I get to do both!! And while I know I'll be working my tail off in a very fast-paced, always changing environment, I couldn't be more thrilled for this opportunity. So I'm going from wearing my PJ's to work every day (at home) to actually getting ready and going to an office again!

This brings me to the second part of the news....

Remember this post just a week ago?? It was all about how we're finally settled into our new home, loving the neighborhood, our house, and being close to our family. Well, that's still true....

.....but only for a few more weeks.

We're moving to San Francisco!! 

Stefan and I knew this position was based in San Fransciso when I applied and while we are very happy being back home and did have a terrible moving experience to get up here, we also realize that life is all about opportunities. There's never a good time for anything. When opportunities like this come up, you just have to go for it - and that's what I did.

Now.... who's ready to plan a trip to SF to visit?!?!

new digs...

So, we're finally settled in our new place. At least, settled as much as we want to be at this point. Thankfully our new place has a basement with LOTS of storage, and while there are still plenty of boxes down there, at least it's "hiding" from our every day living space. We love our house-- it's in a great north end neighborhood, just a few blocks from Metropolitan Market and the Proctor District. The neighborhood is also very dog-friendly.... Brooklyn and Bentley like to say hi (bark) at every dog (and person) that walks by our house. They LOVE looking out the windows all day long.

My office for working from home is perfect. My white desk is perfect against the gray walls, and one of these days when I get some spare time, I'm going to add a splash of yellow here and there to spruce it up a bit. I'm loving gray, white and yellow these days (thank you, Pinterest). I really want to refinish a bench and put this really gorgeous fabric on it that I bought.... but I've yet to find a bench that will work... just add it to my "to do" list.

The house has become a home and we're loving it!

Here are a few pics:

Reason for the Season...

This time of year we all get so busy with the holidays,that certain things happen and it really makes us sit back and reflect, and think about the real meaning of the season. I had one of those moments last weekend when my mother-in-law came over and told us about something she did a few weeks ago.

She was heading to the grocery store and saw a lady on the side of the road near the store with a sign that said "laid off, two kids at home, need help"... We all see those people with their signs, and it's hard because you never know who actually needs help and who's doing it to pay for their drug/alcohol addiction. Something about this woman drew my mother-in-law's attention, and after she parked her car, she walked over to her and just started having a conversation. If you've met my mother-in-law, you know that she's got a very strong personality and with her thick french accent, you may not understand what she's saying some of the time.

She began to talk to the woman, found out she was laid off from Walmart, has two kids, and was so embarrassed to be standing with a sign in front of the grocery store but was doing whatever she could for her children. She said that she was near Safeway earlier and they told her she couldn't be in front of their store, so she went to another store where they didn't seem to mind. My mother-in-law finally asked her, "so what exactly do you need help with?" The lady replied, "I really just need to be able to feed my kids. With my rent and utilities, I have very little money left over to pay for food." My mother-in-law said, "well, I'm not going to give you any money, but let's go inside and get you some groceries." They both went inside, my mother-in-law had a cart, and told the lady to get one for herself and they walked through the store. Some of the conversations went like this:

MIL: "Do your children like fruit?"
Lady: "Yes, but it's too expensive."
MIL: "That's not what I asked, do they like fruit?"
Lady: "Oh, yes. They do."
(MIL puts some fruit in the lady's cart)

MIL: "Do you eat meat?"
Lady: "Sometimes, when we can."
MIL: "Well, what kind of meat do you like?"
Lady: "Chicken, pork, whatever is the least expensive."
MIL: "Is there any kind of meat you would like to have but haven't had in a while?"
Lady: "A turkey would be very nice, because it would last a long time, but they're always so expensive, we can never afford it"
MIL: "Let's get a turkey and we'll have the butcher cut it in half so you can freeze one half of it"

They continued to go through the store, getting all sorts of food. Peanut butter, bread, vegetables, pasta, and even a couple boxes of cake mix for the kids. The lady continued to thank my MIL as she kept putting things in her cart. By the time they got to the cash register, the lady's cart was full. My MIL paid for the food, and the woman was so grateful. As they were walking outside, my MIL asked her, "how are you getting all of this home?" The lady said, "well, I have some extra money so I'm going to take the bus, normally I would walk, but I think it would be easier to take the bus with all of these groceries." My mother-in-law couldn't fathom the idea of this lady carrying all of the groceries on a bus so she asked her, "well where do you live?" The lady ended up living in an apartment that was on my MIL's way home, so she said "I'll just take you home, that will be much easier." Although, I'm sure my MIL would've driven across town to get this lady home.

When they got to her house, the lady continued to thank her for the groceries and for being so nice to her. The lady told her children my MIL bought all of the groceries, and the children gave her a big hug and thanked her. One of the kids said "thank you so much, now I won't go to bed hungry tonight." The woman was so grateful, the kids were grateful, and my mother in law left with a full heart.

When my MIL got home, she couldn't stop crying. She felt so good about being able to do something like this for a family in need, but felt so sad at the same time that there are so many other families out there who won't have food on the table for Christmas, and who have kids that go to bed hungry at night. It's unfortunate that it takes something like this to make you sit back and reflect, but it really put things into perspective for me, and I have a whole new appreciation, not only for my MIL, but for my family in general this time of the year.

Happy Halloween!!!

I've never really been a huge fan of Halloween.... not that I'm against it or anything, it's just never really been a holiday that excites me. Maybe it has something to do with one little Halloween in 1987.

I was in Kindergarten at Beartooth Elementary in Billings, Montana. We were a couple months into the school year obviously, and Halloween fell on a week day. When I was little, I wanted to be a clown and a cheerleader when I grew up. So for this Halloween, I was a clown. My mom got me ready for school that day, and I had the wig, the makeup, one of my dad's old button down shirts, suspenders.... and for some reason, I wasn't just any clown, I was a FAT clown (hence the need to wear my dad's shirt). I had a pillow stuffed under my shirt so I would look fat. I'm sure my parents thought I looked so cute going to school that day. I got to school and wouldn't you know.... I was the ONLY kid dressed up in a costume. Apparently my parents were the only ones that didn't get the memo that we weren't supposed to dress up at school. Awesome.

I wish I had a picture of that costume.

Needless to say, although very traumatic for a shy kid like myself, I got over it and still had fun on Halloween dressing up through the years, and I still love answering the door and seeing all the cute kids in their costumes. Maybe I'm exhausted from moving and ran out of time, but we decided to skip the costumes this Halloween. And after seeing my friend Brittany's costume this year, I don't feel like anything could top hers anyway. I'm just so impressed....

Here's what she looks like on a regular day:

And here she is, as Lil Wayne:

Now THIS is awesome.

Happy Halloween, everyone!!!!

MITP!

 (That stands for "Moving Is The Pits!")

What an adventure this has been!!! Holy moly..... I feel like the last couple weeks have been such a whirlwind, I can't even keep track of the days anymore! All I know is the last Monday in September the movers arrived in Arizona... When they showed up 2 hours late, I knew things were only going downhill. When the truck arrived, Stefan texted me and said "um, I don't know if this truck is big enough for all of our stuff." The movers assured him everything would surely fit and they started wrapping all of the big stuff, bringing the boxes outside and getting everything inventoried for the truck. Around 7pm the main guy told Stefan that our original quote was "off" and based on the amount of stuff we had, our estimate was going to be DOUBLE than we were originally told. The guy said he could offer us a flat rate which would be on the "low end" OR we could follow them to a weigh station when they were done and just pay the price per pound that we were quoted, which would most likely be more than the flat rate. Three hours later at 10pm, they realized not all of our stuff would fit on the truck. "I told you so" was an understatement. So now they had most of our stuff on their truck (the rest in our garage that they would pick up in the morning), and they wanted more money. We felt stuck! We took the flat rate because honestly, I didn't want to follow them to a weigh station 40 minutes away after such a long day. I think that's their tactic: show up late, purposely bring too small of a truck to make you think you have more stuff than they originally quoted you, then stay extra late so you're too tired to follow them to the weigh station for an accurate quote. SO frustrating. Either way, they had our stuff, had our money, and they were on their way to Washington.

We left a few days later.... our sleeping arrangements in the meantime consisted of this:

Thursday morning, we got up super early and drove to Vegas with all of the animals! Drugged up the kitties, and we were off!

(The drugs are totally humane.... just make them a little sleepy, and made Oliver a little cross-eyed is all).

We dropped all the animals off at PetSmart for boarding in Las Vegas while we spent the weekend relaxing with family! My parents, brother Bob, sister-in-law Allison, brother Mark, sister-in-law Sandra, sister Debbie and brother-in-law Chett all were there and we had a blast (as usual)! Stefan and I also attended my friend Heather's wedding that weekend and it was SO beautiful! Heather and I were in the same sorority in college and she's been such a great friend over the years! Unfortunately, I didn't bring my camera that night but I know other people got some pictures. She was a gorgeous bride and I'm so excited her and her husband are in the process of moving to WA too!!!

After our Vegas weekend, we continued our roadtrip, stopping in Utah to stay with my brother and his family for the night. My nieces Katie and Heather made dinner when we got there (DELICIOUS enchiladas!!!) and we got all the animals ready for their next adventure in the car! We left bright and early (well it wasn't bright, it was still dark out) the next morning, and drove for 15 hours before we finally arrived in Washington! If we did it all over again (which we're not), we would probably split that up into two days... Stefan had to stop at one point because he was too tired and we both slept in the car for a couple hours! We were so excited when we finally got to our new house!

When we arrived, my parents were there and my dad was painting. He went the day before and got a couple rooms done and was just finishing the downstairs when we got there. This was our first time actually seeing the house, and we absolutely love it!! It's in such a perfect neighborhood and the house is super cute. It's a little smaller than our Arizona house, so not all of our stuff fits, but it's got cute old charm and there's plenty of storage in the basement for all of our stuff that won't fit!

The next few days we (well, mostly my dad) spent finishing up the painting before the movers arrived.



Brooklyn even tried to help....

I don't know if I'm ready to vent quite just yet about the movers. I'll just say they were the shadiest moving company I think I have ever dealt with. Never returning calls, promising us a discount, then retracting the discount because I mentioned the words "Better Business Bureau" during a conversation, changing the names of their supervisors, making up random employees names that they say I spoke to (and when I call back they say they've never heard of someone by that name), delaying our delivery time, movers not showing up until 5PM when they were supposed to arrive at 9AM...... and then our broken stuff..... oh, do we have a list of broken stuff. I know they're material things and it shouldn't matter.... and honestly, I am just glad our stuff is here, broken or not, because I was starting to doubt our stuff would ever show up after the conversations we were having with the company. Cuts in our couch, broken glass, broken mirror, several broken bowls, glasses..... the list goes on and on. It's more irritating than anything. Thank goodness I bought extra moving insurance from an outside company.

Aside from the movers, we're in our house, it's all painted, and it's starting to feel like a home. We LOVE walking up the street to Metropolitan Market with the dogs, and being back in North Tacoma and so close to our families. We've still got some unpacking and organizing to do, but since Stefan and I are both very OCD about making sure our house is neat and clean, give us a week or two and we'll be ready for visitors!!

Trading the desert for the soggy PNW

Well, after four wonderful years in Arizona, we've decided to make our way back up to the northwest! We've had so much fun the past four years, learning so much about ourselves, our relationship, and what we want in life, that we decided it's time to move back "home."

I'm so fortunate to work for a company that allows me to work from home, and with that, allows me the flexibility to really work from anywhere. Stefan has been wanting to get back into juvenile probation and with his contacts up in Washington, he has a much better chance of doing something he loves up there. Since we've been down here, the juvenile court/Maricopa County has been on a hiring freeze with no real timeframe for when they'll start hiring again. With Stefan not working right now, we figured there was no better time to head back up to Washington.

The decision seemed sort of quick, but we've been talking about it for a while now. We knew that Arizona was somewhat temporary, and ultimately we wanted to be back in Washington. After our trip home a couple weeks ago for Stefan's dad's retirement party, we realized that nothing was really keeping us in Arizona and Washington was our home.

As soon as we got back to Arizona, I talked to my boss, looked at some houses online, my parents went and looked at them for us, taking lots of pictures, and we made it official once I got the final okay from my work. Our moving truck gets here on September 26th and we'll be in Washington the first part of October!

While we're really excited to be closer to our families, we're still sad to leave our friends and life in Arizona. We've met some amazing people over the last four years, and it's going to be really tough to say goodbye to everyone. I'm not thinking of it as a "goodbye" anyway, because I know we'll be back to visit, I'll be back for work, and I'm pretty sure we're going to want to escape the rain at some point. After several weeks of 100+ temperatures, I'm really liking the idea of rain right now though!

A few things we're going to miss about Arizona:

• Our friends in AZ - We never thought we'd be able to find "new" friends like the ones we had back home, but I can honestly say we've truly met some amazing people down here that we'll miss dearly (and that better come visit us)!
• Our house - No need for a pool in Washington, but we really did love the home we made for ourselves here

• My work - I love the people I work with in Arizona and am so thankful I got to work with each and every one of them!
• Hikes - I used to think the desert was ugly because it's so brown and lacks greenery and water, but we've gone on several hikes in Arizona and the scenery is absolutely gorgeous. Different from evergreens, but beautiful in its own way.

• Grimaldis & Oreganos - The two best pizza places........ ever.
• Eating outside 9 months out of the year
• Spring Training
• Monsoons
• Doggie Daycare - We were so lucky to have such wonderful people take care of our pups the last few years, they treated Brooklyn & Bentley like their own dogs and we'll miss all of them so much!
• Flower - Our cleaning lady
• Sedona

• My Arizona Stella & Dot girls
• Our favorite bartenders at The Keg, Drew & Megan
• Lizards! I love seeing them run all over the back wall in our backyard
• New Years Eve with Alli & Bronson at Ruth's Chris
• Being able to drive to Vegas for the weekend
• The sunrises and sunsets

A couple things I won't miss:

• The bugs - I'd gladly trade in the large "crunchy" bugs in AZ for slimey slugs of the PNW any day!
• The summer
• Houses that all look the same
• The Arizona Cardinals
• The newscasters
• Sheriff Joe 
• Gross hard tap water!!

It's been such a wonderful experience and we're so grateful for the time we were able to live here. We're going to miss our friends so much, but know we'll be back to visit very soon!

Dear Hetty,

Dear Sweet Hetty,

I've always believed that "everything happens for a reason," but I sure as hell don't understand this one. It was just a couple months ago that we were planning our trip to San Francisco. After chatting over facebook and text, we were both so excited to attend our very first "Hoopla" -- Stella & Dot's annual convention. We had never met, but Tandy, our Stella & Dot upline, set us up. THIS, I know, happened for a reason.

I hadn't had a roommate in years. I'll be honest, I was actually pretty nervous to have a roommate, especially one that I had never met before. I checked into the hotel before you, got up to the room, unpacked my things, and made sure I was as tidy as could be. I unpacked everything--- made sure everything was perfect. I gave you the bed closest to the bathroom, because that's the bed I would've wanted. I made sure my things were tucked away behind my bed so you wouldn't think I was a complete slob. I went across the hall to Tandy, Christine and Zandra's room and remember telling Tandy how I was a little nervous meeting you, almost like it was like meeting my roommate in college for the first time! I went back to our room and a few minutes later heard your little knock on the door.

We embraced in a hug like we were friends who hadn't seen eachother in years. So cliche, I'll admit, but I knew I liked you the second I met you. We both got ready quickly for the fashion show, and we helped eachother pick out our jewelry--- you had on the sofia pearl bib and paired it with an older white brooch that I had never seen in person before. In fact, I don't even know the name of it. You had a cute linen dress from Banana Republic that you were going to wear to the fashion show.... but we (you) were running late and you had to still check in downstairs and get your "swag bag." You ironed your dress and the hotel iron leaked water all over it. While you went downstairs to check in, I used my hairdryer to dry your dress. We walked down to the fashion show and so many other stylists just loved your necklace/brooch combination. After the fashion show, we viewed the new fall collection together. We loved the same pieces. We weren't sure about some of the pieces. We had the same taste.

After that, we were both starving and tried to find a place to grab some food down in Union Square... We saw Tandy and Christine on the street (along with about 20 other gals in S&D jewelry). You wanted to find a place to eat outside because the weather was so beautiful. You being from Alaska thought 75 degrees was "nice out".... I (with my Arizona blood), thought it was a little chilly. We walked down towards the mall, another S&D stylist asked us to take her picture with her mom, and then she asked if we wanted our picture together.

After we realized there weren't many outdoor places to grab food, we started walking back towards the hotel, smelled pizza, looked at each other and I immediately knew I had found a girl after my own heart. You had a slice of pepperoni and I had a slice of cheese pizza. We chatted over our pizza and beer--- you told me about life in Alaska, your two sweet daughters, Ella and Adelaide, and your husband. I remember telling you I loved the name Ella and that if I ever had a daughter I told you my favorite name for a girl (that I rarely share with ANYONE), and that we would call her Ella for short. I thought the name Adelaide was so beautiful, too. Addie, for short. Somehow it came up that you and your husband had a little plane. I remember being so impressed that you and your husband owned a plane. I texted Stefan later in the day and told him, "I don't know how I got so lucky with my roommate, she is absolutely perfect-- and guess what, her and her husband have a plane! How cool is that?!"

We then agreed that it would be a good idea to find a liquor store so we could have a few drinks in our room. (Again, we were meant to be). I found a liquor store using the GPS on my phone, and we headed to Eddie's Liquor Store. You told me how you loved beer, and you found one of your favorite beers at Eddie's... one that you loved in college, brewed in Colorado. We also got some champagne and peach nectar (we thought it would be fun to have mimosas in the morning), and you were so excited about all of the fresh fruit at the tiny liquor/convenience store that you couldn't find regularly in Alaska. We headed back to our hotel with our brown paper bags and got ready for the Gem Fatales Team Dinner at the Parc 55 hotel.

We met up with some Arizona stylists in the lobby at the Parc, and found a bunch of other stylists down at the bar grabbing drinks before dinner started. The line was long, and we were assured the line was just as long upstairs where our dinner was being held. We were one of the last ones to be served at the downstairs bar, and figured there would be plenty of seats at the dinner upstairs. Instead of getting "a drink" we thought it would be a better idea to share a pitcher (yes, PITCHER) of white sangria. We each had a glass full of sangria in hand, and I carried the pitcher up to the dinner. The room was packed. There were no seats together. For a second, I thought it would be a better idea to leave and share our sangria in the bar downstairs than be separated in the room of 400+ stylists. We started walking up towards the front of the room with a few other girls, when this woman came up to us and said "we have room for two at our table".... In almost a desperate tone, I said "We're two! We're sharing this pitcher of sangria, we need to be together!" As we walked towards the front of the room, I thought "oh no, why is this lady taking us to the table with the giant RESERVED sign?!" We sat down and I whispered to Hetty, "This is Tysh Mefferd's table. She's sitting right across from us." You had no clue that was Tysh at first. I felt a little awkward, but it was pretty funny at the same time. Two girls who started with S&D less than a year ago were sitting at a table with veterans. Jessica came to our table, Blythe, and even Maya Brenner (who I told you was my celebrity girl crush). Even though we felt completely out of place at that dinner table, I wouldn't have wanted to be there with anyone else.

We finished our pitcher of sangria, and as we toasted our last glasses of the pitcher, I happened to glance over at Tandy at the table across from us, and as she caught us saying "cheers," I'm pretty sure she was thinking something along the lines of, "yep, those are my girls!"

We got our pictures with Jessica and Maya, and had such a fun night. We found Tandy and Christine down in the bar after dinner, and had a few more adult beverages to end the night.... 

For some reason, I took a picture of the four of us at the end of the night...

With my combination of beer, sangria, and vodka, I wasn't feeling so hot the next morning. Needless to say, we didn't end up having our mimosas that we thought was such a great idea the night before. We went to all of the same training sessions together, and even though the training is intended for us to network with other stylists, we stuck together. We still chatted with other stylists, but we were inseparable at the same time.

I got used to people being so shocked that you were from Alaska, that I almost started answering all of the "typical" questions for you. "You live about an hour from Sarah Palin, you're the only one here from Alaska and one of the very few active stylists in Alaska." You were famous. The reactions when you told people you were from Alaska were hilarious. It was almost like you were from a foreign country. I'm sure you get that a lot when you travel outside Alaska. You never got annoyed though. You loved everything about Alaska and were proud of your roots.

That second night, we had our dinner cruise. It was so much fun figuring out what jewelry we were going to wear to each event. I remember we were trying to figure out how to tie two La Coco Cupchain necklaces in a knot. You had one of mine and yours and neither of us could figure it out. I said "We'll have to find Kelly Bird. She'll show you on the bus ride over there." You ended up with only one, and it wasn't tied in a knot, but your outfit (and jewelry) was still perfect. We had so much fun on the cruise. We rode on the bus next to each other, bought each other glasses of wine (although I was trying to cut back after the night before), and took so many pictures on the water. We went upstairs and talked to the boat captain for a long time. He told us about his children, and how his two daughters grew apart after the years, and how their age difference probably contributed to that. You told him how you hoped your daughters would grow up to be best friends one day.

We didn't stay out late that next night-- we had way too much fun the night before! We took another "end of the night" picture, and you can clearly tell the difference between the night #1 and night #2 pictures.

We spent the entire weekend together. The final night was the gala with all of the stylists. Christine invited us both to her senior director table for the dinner. We had a blast that night with the other girls from our team.... we danced the night away and created great memories. Neither of us could believe the weekend was coming to a close.

Our last night....

The next morning we said our goodbyes. I was heading to visit my friend who lived on Russian Hill, and you were going to do a little shopping for your friend who needed you to pick up a gift for his wife. After your shopping, you met up with your friend on Russian Hill before your flight left back to Alaska. We soon figured out that both of our friends on Russian Hill lived two doors apart. Talk about a small world. We said our goodbyes at the hotel, and I told you to plan a trip with your family to Phoenix, and to plan it around a monthly Stella & Dot meeting so everyone could see you again. You were so excited about planning a trip to Phoenix. We didn't even have to say "let's keep in touch" before we went our separate ways - it was more like we knew there was no way we couldn't stay in touch.

When I came home from Hoopla, I was on this wonderful high. The weekend was so much fun and I wouldn't have traded it for the world. It was absolutely perfect (minus that one little hangover). You were the perfect roommate and the perfect "instant friend." Whenever anyone asked me about Hoopla, they got to hear about you.


Fast forward 3 weeks.

My nephew got married on July 30th in Sterling, Colorado. You told me you went to Colorado State University in Fort Collins. You had heard of Sterling. 99% of people have never heard of Sterling, Colorado. Another one of those weird similarities. On July 31st, my family and I went out to the North Sterling Reservoir for the day, to relax after a fun wedding weekend. When we got back to our hotel that night, I noticed I had 5 missed calls from Tandy, a text message that said "call me, I have something to tell you," another message from Tandy that said "call me as soon as you get this, no matter how late it is," and another message from Kelly Bird that said "call Tandy as soon as you can."

Tandy: Hello?
Julie: Hey Tandy, it's Julie.
Tandy: Hey Julie, I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but Hetty was killed in a plane crash with her husband and two girls yesterday.

Not possible.

"Oh my gosh, I can't believe it" were the words I kept saying over and over again. Tandy was obviously crying, and thinking back, I was just in complete shock and denial. I don't even think tears came out of my eyes because I was so shocked. I just didn't believe the words Tandy was saying. It didn't make sense. It couldn't be true. I JUST saw you a few weeks ago. You became an instant friend. We had so much in common. You were going to come to Phoenix. You were just so happy. You had everthing going for you. It just couldn't be true.

I layed in bed after I got off the phone with Tandy and googled the accident, read a couple articles, looked at your facebook page, looked at our pictures from Hoopla, and re-read the text messages from Tandy and Kelly. I went to sleep that night and woke up with black mascara all over my pillows. And when I say "went to sleep," I mean that I layed my head on my pillow and cried. I didn't really sleep. How could I? I continued to think about my conversation with Tandy, all of my conversations with you, and the disbelief I felt about the whole situation.

The next day, we went to breakfast with my family before heading to the airport. While we were sitting in the restaurant, the song "If I Die Young" by The Band Perry came over the speakers and it brought tears to my eyes. Over the last couple weeks, prior to your passing, I have been obsessed with this song. I love the melody, the way the words come together, and have played it on repeat on my ipod. In fact, on Saturday before my nephew's wedding, we were at my sister's bar setting up for the reception and I played it on the jukebox at the bar. Twice. I was at lunch the other day with some co-workers and it came on in the restaurant and again, brought tears to my eyes.

Getting on a plane and heading to Cleveland for work was extremely difficult. I was emotionally drained. I was on a plane. I was by myself and completely vulnerable. I was only left with thoughts. Thoughts of you. Thoughts of you and your sweet family on Saturday, enjoying your perfect afternoon, heading to your family's cabin on your plane. The plane that I was so impressed with. As much as I don't want to think about it, I can't help but think about the horror you and your family experienced that afternoon. I keep trying to get that out of my head, but looking at all of your pictures on facebook, especially the one of your husband checking the oil on your plane and your daughter Ella standing next to him, I just can't get it out of my head. You didn't deserve it. Why was this meant to happen to you and your precious family?

So many things have gone through my head lately, paired with so many different emotions. Why was I impressed with your plane? I feel guilty that I was impressed with such a material possession, something that you didn't think was a big deal at all. I shouldn't have thought it was a big deal either... and now I feel guilty that your plane ended up being the vehicle in which you spent your last moments. I have these breakdowns. Stefan mentioned a Honda "Pilot" the other day, and I just broke into tears. Little things. I know this will pass at some point, but it still makes me wonder why I'm taking it so hard.

I talked to Tandy a few nights ago for about an hour. We spent the entire time talking, laughing, sharing memories, and even shed some tears. I told her that I don't understand why, after just knowing you for a short amount of time, I'm having such a hard time coping with all of this. She told me it's okay to grieve, and it's our way of paying our respects to you. It shows how much of an impact you've had on our lives in such a short amount of time, and gives credit to the amazing person you were. She said, "You can grieve because you think that person is amazing." So true. I told Tandy how hard it is to move forward with my Stella & Dot business, knowing you're not able to move forward with your business, and building your team in Alaska like you were ready to do. She assured me that I need to take some time and just let myself take everything in and grieve like I need to. We also realized that you'd probably be pretty pissed at both of us if we gave up on our businesses because we were grieving your loss. I know you want us to move forward, and I can promise you we will, but I'm telling you, it's going to be difficult.

We have a team tomorrow in Phoenix, and Tandy asked me if I would be willing to share some stories about you. I told her I would be so happy to share your beautiful spirit with other women in our little S&D family. I'm so thankful to have met you and can't wait to tell others how amazing you were. I warned Tandy that I may start crying, so she'd have to crack a joke or tell a funny story so I didn't completely breakdown and lose it! I'll make sure that people can get to know you as a person for who you were, and not just for how you left us so suddenly.

I know that you were put in my life for a reason. Your infectious smile and positive energy will leave an everlasting impression in my mind. I cherish the weekend we spent together and it makes me smile thinking about all of the weird similarities we shared. While we were not best friends or relatives, you truly left a lasting memory in my life. I will be forever grateful for getting to know you, and can't wait to share another pizza and beer with you when I see you next...

I'll miss you, sweet Hetty.