I’m continuing my series of going through photos of previous months of my life. This time, let’s take a walk down memory lane with July photos of years past. I was able to go all the way back to July 2010 (but then couldn’t find anything for July 2011, so I had to skip that year). Let’s recap!
July 2010
Sweet little Dutchy boy. I love this photo of us! I was 22 and Dutch was 7. Such a cute little goober. This was obviously taken at one of our game nights. We were playing Mad Gab, which is always a supremely funny game. Have you ever played it?
July 2012
Ooh, check out that old-school Instagram border! Remember when all our photos had to have a specific border? Ha! I believe my mom and I took this photo on her birthday right before going into a restaurant.
July 2013
Gah, I look so young here! I was firmly in my bang era and loving it. I was 25 here but I feel like I look way younger. A month after I took this photo, I would quit my job as a marketing assistant at a very small company (10 people total!) and join the company I still work at today. I was likely going through the interview process at this time and still remember one of the bosses taking a look at my employment history and making noises about how it looks like I never stayed in one place for very long. Joke’s on him!
July 2014
I am pretty sure I took this picture after my mom and her boyfriend (now husband!) came home from a week-long cruise. We were living together at the time and I missed her a lot while she was gone. This was our reunion shot, and it felt so good to have her home again.
July 2015
My mom and my stepdad got married in July 2015! Helping to plan my mom’s very low-key wedding was such a highlight of my life. We had a friend officiate, found a quiet area of downtown St. Petersburg to have the ceremony, and then took up the back area of an Outback Steakhouse for the reception. This was the last big event my grandma went to (she would pass away three months later). She was battling cancer and had just had a chemo appointment before the wedding. But she rallied and hung out through the ceremony and reception, and even managed to eat most of her meal. It was a true testament of her strength; she wasn’t going to miss her daughter’s wedding for anything.
July 2016
Just another photo of me and my boy! He was 14 in this photo and not a single gray hair to be found. People were always shocked when I told them how old he was because he looked young and acted young. He was my bestest friend.
July 2017
More Dutch photos! He was so much fun to photograph. In July 2017, things were okay on the health front. Dutch was starting to slow down a lot and there were more appointments at the vet’s office. He was on medication to help him calm down at night because he got very restless and wouldn’t settle down easily. But he was energetic during his walks and eating fine, so it was not something too concerning yet. I spent a lot more time at home because he needed more supervision and frequent walks.
July 2018
In July 2018, our book club took a fun weekend trip to Anna Maria Island, which is about an hour south of us. We worked together to make it also a surprise bachelorette weekend for Bri who was getting married in November. Bri is a classic enneagram 2 who will go all out for other people but hates having the attention on her, so it was fun to make sure she got some good, old-fashioned love showered on her during our weekend away.
July 2019
I have a fairly large extended family, but it’s rare for everyone to get together. Even in this photo, there are people missing but we got a good amount of us together for a 4th of July party on the beach and it was a lot of fun! It was our first big family gathering after Pops’ death in October 2018, and it was really nice for all of us to be together for something happy.
July 2020
For my mom’s pandemic birthday, we went to a nail salon to get pedicures and then went to an outdoor restaurant. Pandemic birthdays (especially during the height of things!) were so weird, weren’t they? And the pandemic in Florida was much different than other areas, of course. (Well, the pandemic itself was the same, but the way our state approached it was vastly different.) Salons were open for business in July, but this salon had a very strict policy about masking, hand washing, social distancing, etc., so I felt comfortable being there.
July 2021
There is a lot of emotion behind this simple photograph. This is where I got a text from Mikaela with a video of Olive ringing the bell after successfully finishing cancer treatment. (And she’s had clear scans ever since—after another clear scan this month, she’s graduated to yearly scans rather than every few months!) This is also where I went on a date with a woman, a relationship that I could feel had a lot of potential. It was my first queer relationship and I remember being so excited about where it was going but also a little insecure because we had been on a few dates at this point and neither of us had made any ~romantical~ moves toward each other. “Does she think she’s just hanging out with me as a friend? She does know we’re dating, right?!” I remember texting Mikaela. Being a baby queer in my thirties was a weird experience.
July 2022
The beginning of July 2022 was such a difficult time for me. I started my One Line a Day journal in 2022 and reading over the entries from July took me right back to that period. On July 1st, I took a Covid test and tested negative for Covid, which was great because I had been testing positive for a few weeks at that point. But then I found out that my mom got Covid, then my brother, and then my stepdad, and I am pretty sure I was patient zero there. (I followed the CDC guidelines at the time, but I definitely should have continued isolating until I was testing negative.) I felt terrible and my mom had a really tough go of it, which of course, led to my own panic attacks. I even had a dream one night during this period where I was Facetiming my mom and she answered from the back of an ambulance! Stupid subconscious. Anyway, it was hard and I felt like the worst person, but everyone recovered.
July 2023
A much better July! My mom and I took a weekend trip to Charleston for her birthday, which was a ton of fun. We went to a fancy steakhouse for her birthday dinner, walked all around Charleston, and spent way too much money at their outdoor market. It was a good time!
July 2024
Last weekend was my cousin Rachel’s baby shower! Her baby boy is due in September, and we’re all so excited! She found out she was pregnant mere weeks after her father died of cancer. She was deep in the depths of her grief and it was almost like it was a sign from above. It felt special and also omniscient. With death comes new life, and all that.
If you had to show a photo from a July in your life, what year would you choose and what would picture would you show us?
I love this concept of looking back in a monthly manner.
And you do look so you in the early images … which is no surprise of course.
Mhm I think July 2005 where I took the first image with a guy who turned out to become my husband. I would have to include those. Every other July I need to think more on.
That’s a lovely memory to look back on! That’s what I love about this photo series – it makes me really contemplate my life in an entirely different way.
Oh sweet Dutchy! We walk by a Daschund (?) on our family walks and I always think of Dutch!
When I think of Julys past, 2 stand out. 1st I think of July 2011 when I moved from my suburban condo to a condo in downtown Minneapolis along the river. That spring I had gone to Paris and was so depressed to come back to my suburban lifestyle. I wanted to move to Paris but that was not realistic at all, so I thought about how I could make my life more like my time in Paris and moving downtown was the way to do that.
The other July that I think of is 9 years ago when I started at my current job. Like you, I had bounced around a bit (psych experiment job, then to a different job, then to another job where I intended to stay for awhile but then they made me move to Charlotte so I changed jobs again to move back to Mpls, and then I moved over to my current job). Luckily they could look past my resume. I think they barely looked at my resume. I don’t even remember applying for the job, actually. My retired colleague/mentor totally got me the job.
I remember the July when you got your current job! I was so excited for you, and what a great decision that was!
I don’t think I ever realized that you wanted to move to Paris! Are you thinking of doing some sort of extended trip at some point in your life (maybe after you and Phil retire/boys are grown?)
The desire to move to Paris was definitely more of a pipe dream. I knew it would never happen but it motivated me to make changes to make my life in Minneapolis more similar to the time I spent in Paris which mostly meant living in an area where I could have more of a pedestrian lifestyle!
I would love to spend 1-2 months in Paris when we are retired and the boys are in college and beyond. I met several couples when I was in paris who were doing that and it sounded so amazing!
Ahem, I just remembered that I found out I was pregnant with Paul in early July of 2017 so add that to the list of significant life events! And here I was thinking not much happened during the month of July!
It’s actually amazing how much happens during different months of our lives when we sit down and really think about it!
This was such a fun way to walk down memory lane. I really enjoyed this post, Stephany, and I realized, that I think I’ve been reading your blog almost all the way back to 2010. How cool. I loved seeing photos of Dutch… I sometimes forget that you were a dog mama before you were a cat mama 😉
I think I’d pick a photo from July 2019 when Jon did his first 5k walk with me. I was so proud he agreed to finally do this with me 🙂
LOVE these posts! Your eyes – what color are they? They look green or hazel in that one pic with your mom. And I love how these posts show how much you love those you love – obviously, your mom, but also so many other important people (furry and otherwise!) in your life. <3
My eyes look different based on what I’m wearing, but they’re green!