30 is the new 20

Today is my 30th birthday!

Everyone's been saying about how this is a big one, talking about the last few days of my 20s and that got me thinking on the past and how I really spent the last decade of my life.

The start of my 20s was in Maryland.  I was spending time getting a business degree from community college and working as a manager for a video game store.   Working with my friends, going out eat on the weekends and generally playing lots of games and making stuff.  I was still at home and it was a pretty care-free time to be hanging out in Annapolis.  I was close enough to DC and Baltimore to go to rock shows.  Living on 4 hours of sleep a night between the shows and my video games was no big deal.

A couple of years later I started The Pink Samurai.  The blog and my Etsy shop where I just kind made whatever I wanted and wrote about silly stuff (seriously...do not go through these archives haha!).  Growing up surrounded by a family of artists, entrepreneurs and community leaders it was kind of inevitable that I started my own business.  And after having spaces on Angel Fire (please tell me you remember Angel Fire pages!), Live Journal, Xanga and MySpace, a real blog was the next step.

After working as a bank teller for a little while and getting steady business on Etsy selling pin-back buttons at the time, I decided to finish up my four year degree.  I ended up going to a school on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.  The campus was half an hour from the beach, which was a big selling point haha!  Despite being well into my 20s, I had still been living at home, a more common occurrence even now, and this was the first time I'd be moving out on my own.

I loved my classes and graduated with honors, an award and was obsessed with graphic design.  This was when I really started following tons of blogs and evolving my personal style.  I just wanted to be plugged in with the design scene all the time.  Constantly looking for inspiration, I was designing buttons, prints, bags, just anything I could get my hands on.  I was lucky enough to a design job pretty soon after school and met this cool dude who quickly turned into my bff.  I was in awe of Andy's talent and I don't think he knew how much of an influence he was (and still is) on the evolution of my drawing style.

Without going into too much detail, I had been in a relationship for about 9 years, a majority of my 20s, that didn't end well.  But out of that difficulty came the best thing to ever happen to me.  I learned a lot about myself during that time.  What I wanted from life, how I wanted to spend my time and most importantly, how I wanted to be treated.  I found the most perfect person on the planet for me and married him up!

The last three years of my 20s were incredible.  Full of love and fun and growth and kittens!  I've been traveling, making new stuff and really building a future with my husband.  I couldn't ask for anything more.

• • • • •

It's really amazing how much your life can change in just ten years.  Life has a funny way of throwing you for a loop.  I think it's good to be open-minded and really embrace those changes and use them to evolve.  So bring on the 30s!  I'm so stoked for this new chapter!