3 more letters to the name!

Well, folks. 

I have officially completed my masters degree! 

MSW (Masters of Social Work, for those of you who are wondering :) ) has been added to the name and I can finally breatheeeee. 

and chill. lots of chilling shall now commence -- I am currently watching the movie how to be single and cuddling with smoosha, so I think I'm pretty good at it (and yes, I'm officially admitting to the crazy cat lady lifestyle for the next 2 weeks. It's a good one). 

So what's next you ask? 

I say goodbye to Fort Collins this week and sobbbbb. and THEN I leave for Malawi in 13 days and get to see SHANNON in 15! I. can't. wait. to see that woman. and from there, EUROPE! 

Adulting can come eventually, right? right.

Follow along on Instagram and/or Snapchat, if you wish (@hklaugh for both)!

Thank you all for the love and support so many of you have given me this past year. Couldn't have done it so "smoothly" without you! true, true story there. thankyouthankyou.

Here's some pictures from the day and from all the weekend celebrations!

 ^^^ our 4th & 5th grade teacher! So grateful to still have a great relationship with her!

to someone that I used to know.

I drove by our old home the other day. 

The cute little white house with red trim on Cherry Street. The one I'm kind of shocked is still there...being built in 1900 and all. 

I wasn't alone, I don't think I could have done it alone. I avoid that street everyday, even though it would make my drive to work significantly faster...so I had to bring someone with me. 

It felt good to go back there, even for just a few minutes. 

He was holding my hand as we drove up to it. 

I said, "there it is! my favorite little house." 

I showed him where you built the fire pit and I told him how we used to have the best talks with our friends out there during the summer. I wondered if those friends are now your friends today, I haven't seen them. 

I showed him where we attempted to grow our first garden, but only got one little baby cucumber out of it - which we let go bad anyways - OOPS. My green thumb has gotten much better now, I have 10 happy plants just in my room alone! Vegetable garden will come next, I can only dream of that for now ;)

I showed him the window I accidentally shattered when I locked myself out because of that pesky lock we both hated so much. I told him the story of how I was standing inside with blood dripping everywhere when you got home and how all we could do was laugh and enjoy what happened to be our last new years eve together, and try not focus on how the hell we were going to fix it for the next few nights so we wouldn't totally freeze.

I showed him where my bike got stolen and told him yours did too, pointed out each window, including smoosha's favorite - where she used to sit and wait for us to come home everyday. We walked the old paths you and I used to go on walks together and went to the park where you tried to teach me how to play tennis. So many stories came back to me and I told him each one. 

It was weird to remember you.

It was weird to be telling someone about you, showing someone new our memories, reminiscing on you and us and that place, that life we had together. 

It feels like a completely different life than the one I'm so happily living now. 

I'm a month away from having a master's degree, I've successfully lived with all kinds of roommates for over a year now, I've gotten to know and love myself in a completely different way than ever before. I've had more little heart breaks and relationships, I've said goodbye to good friends, I've planned a trip of a life time, I've pierced new holes in my face and even dyed my hair purple. I've developed strong feelings for another human being and gotten closer to them than I ever allowed myself to get to you...all things I used to think I could never do without you. Then again I did used to believe I would literally turn into dust if we were to part, so I'm glad that piece wasn't true. 

But I'm still here. I'm still so okay. 

And dammit, that feels good.

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for being a part of my story. 

lots and lots of pictures from the road trip to the E A S T

Hello and happy March! I've been taking it easy over here lately because I think all the stress has officially caught up to me and I'm thinking maybe this time my head might actually explode, so I suppose it's time to slow it down. That being said, I finally am giving myself the opportunity to post pictures from the road trip Gabi and I took almost 2 months ago!

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We packed up her car with all of her necessities and a maybe-not-so-happy hedgehog to take on the 34 hour road trip to the East Coast! For a move we all hope is somewhat temporary ;) Even many weeks later I'm still kiiiind of in denial that she's not 7 minutes away from me...but we'll get there. in theory. :) Considering a good chunk of our time was spent in the car, we were able to cram in a lot of sight seeing and adventuring - and that, my friends, is my kind of trip. 

^^ onward! we met at 8 am at a Taco Bell (if you know us well at all, that's quite fitting...) and started our trek! We didn't hit any bad weather, but we did have to rearrange the car a few times because those car racks in the above pictures lasted for about 2 hours. Still grateful for Gabi's dad encouraging her to not cram her car just because there was room and that no one was behind us when they made their dramatic exit, phew! 

 ^^ sight seeing day one! Once we got to New Hampshire we spent the first day wandering around Gabi's new area. We felt like we needed some beach time even though it was freezing -- worth it. Nubble Lighthouse and Wiggly Bridge! 

 ^^ Sight seeing day two! We drove an hour south to walk around Boston! We ended up taking a tour of the Boston Tea Party museum, threw some tea boxes overboard, walked around the city - fully embracing the tourist look - we had a beer at the cheers bar and then ended up on the Harvard campus in Cambridge! We only walked around Harvard Yard since that's all time would allow for, but boy oh boy, was it beauuuuutiful!

^^ this is right outside of Gabi's house... and I'm talking you walk out the door and cross the street and bam OCEAN. So naturally we had to play on the rocks for a bit with a selfie stick and the camera I brought. And us being the Colorado girls we are, not so used to oceans you could say, we did end up forgetting about that whole "high-tide-thing" and almost lost all of our cameras and phones to the water. Thankfully getting soaked ourselves by running back to shore is a much easier 'oops' to fix than losing all of our devices ;)

 ^^ CANADA! We spent 24 hours in Montreal, Canada and it might have been the highlight of the week for all 3 of us. We stayed in an adorable and cozy airbnb for the night. Our host was a nice man from France who recommended great things to fill our hours with. We took the metro to Old Montreal to see the city, ate at a pizzeria where we shared a bottle of wine and got to cut the pizza with scissors (we were surprisingly stoked about this...is this a thing that we've just missed out on for all these years?!), I fell in love with a floral wall because HELLOOOO that wall is beautiful...we ate at Tim Hortons and embarrassed ourselves terribly for being so American, tried poutine for the first (and last) time, practiced the very little french we knew (merci, 6 years of French...meh!), and went dancing at a gay club where each floor had different music playing - we had all of the fun. Quality 24 hours for. sure. I'm already excited to go back.  

and last but not least, the stunning view from Gabi and Evan's new living room window. She's one lucky girl moving from one beautiful state to another! 

Thank you Gabi and Evan for starting my year off with such a wonderful trip! I miss you both everyday! <3 

And thank YOU, as always, for swinging by :)