It’s Tuesday! Which means I’m one day late with a Mash-Up post. But seeing as I was totally consumed with all the incredible conversations and life change that was going on at Creative @ Heart this past weekend, I’m ok with it. As the Emily Ley quote goes, “I will hold myself to a standard of grace, not perfection!” Trust that there will be a much longer post coming this week to enumerate on exactly why it was such an amazing experience, but for now, let’s get on to the Mash-Uping! (Thanks to The Herrintons for this photo!)

Actually, I’m actually not really sure what to write. Because last week was totally insane, and much of my thought process was devoted to one of two things: either A) “EFF. I need to practice my talk, but I can’t right now because I don’t have the time, but if I don’t practice then I’m going to mess up and I’ll probably just end up self-imploding in front of the entire group!” or B) “What the heck am I going to wear?? Maybe if my outfit is cute enough, it can distract from the hot mess my presentation might end up turning into…”

So we’ll just dive into the lessons learned/events that transpired, shall we?

• Things I do not recommend: waiting until 20 minutes before you need to leave to pack for a highly-anticipated weekend. This results in high levels of stress for everyone involved, especially when you’re already stressed over the aforementioned two things on my mind.
• Things you can do to distract yourself from the stress of it all: log onto B&H’s website and order $200 worth of film for your upcoming Europe adventure.
• Don’t ever go to a conference for creatives, one specifically geared toward women, with any sort of notion of “eating well.” I mean, you’ll eat WELL, but as for watching your sugar content? Yeah, no. I ate TWO mini pies over the course of the conference. Yes, they were single serve, but there’s no excuse. Except for the fact that they were delicious.
• I regret none of it.
• There was black & white washi tape in the swag bags!!! If you don’t know why this is relevant enough to deserve a bullet point on MMU, see this photo. It’ll all make sense.
• My grandparents are the best. They came to hear my talk yesterday, and when I accidentally cussed in front of 100+ women I respect and love, my Pawpaw stood up and pointed at me, like “I see you, Abby! I heard what just came out of your mouth!” And it was awesome.

Ok, so this kind of ended up being all about Creative anyways… sorry about that. But now it’s time for link love! Remember last week how I said I wanted to start sharing posts from around the web that I think y’all might like? Well, I only have one this week because I honestly didn’t read much last week due to everything going on, but here ya go:

• This post from my dear friend Natalie Franke. Go read it, and share the crap out of it because it’s one of the best things I’ve ever read.

Aaand happy Tuesday, my friends! It’s WARM outside today!