Category Archives: Life

Happy Day After St. Patrick’s Day!  Hope you all had an awesome holiday, and hopefully you’re not feeling the after effects of last night too hard today.  Daniel and I had a low key St. Paddy’s, which included a homemade meal of corned beef, cabbage, and mashed potatoes.  Plus a couple of pints of Guinness (of course), mint green cupcakes, and a few Irish movies!  It was nice not dealing with the typical crowded bars, and since I didn’t have too wild a night, I was able to put up a new Etsy listing today!

My newest knitted creation is this super cute knit Bowtie Headband!  It is 100% handmade, super soft and warm, and looks great with a top knot.  It’s my new favorite winter accessory to wear for the last bit of the season.  Check it out!

This is another original design by moi, and you can get it at my Etsy Shop: MicheleVenleeDesigns!  You can also find other fun items there too!

As always, if you love it, please share it!  And be sure to come back soon, because I’ll be sharing the FREE pattern for this Knit Bowtie Headband in the spring!

Hi everyone, I’m super excited to share my latest listing on Etsy – the knitted Beard Hat!

If you love what you see, please share with your friends!  Hope you all have a Happy Monday!

Hey all, sorry for the lack of posts again!  I’ve been fighting another flu!  Ugh!

While I’ve been struggling to write new blog posts, I have managed to create something I’m really excited about… my Etsy shop!

So if you love this headband, but don’t know how to knit or don’t have the time, be sure to check out my shop MicheleVenleeDesigns!  I’ll hopefully be adding more colors and new items very soon!

And if you like what you see, please share with your friends!  Thanks for reading, and I’ll hopefully be adding lots of new blog posts soon!

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas from Portland!

I haven’t had this blog very long, but I’ve already been so blown away by the response!  It’s made me so happy to see the likes, shares, and repins!  It feels so rewarding to share things that people genuinely seem to be looking for.  I find myself loving the writing process each and every time I write a new post,  and I hope I can continue to provide useful, relatable articles through the New Year!

Thank you to anyone who has taken the time to read this lil ‘ol blog – it means the world to me!  I hope you all have a wonderful and safe Christmas and New Year’s Eve!

This is the Part 2 of my post Lil Bit More Skills.  This was a little hard to write, as it’s very personal and delves into to some not-so-great feelings.  But I felt it was important to share, since I know many of us feel similar things at some point in life.  Often simply being able to relate to someone going through the same thing can instantly make you feel a little bit better, and I hope this post has the power to do so.

3.  Get Back to Me

It sounds a bit cliche, but after living in Los Angeles for 4 1/2 years, I feel like I’ve lost myself and a huge chunk of my self esteem.  I’ve known what I’ve wanted to do since I was 13 years old (be an actor), not only did I know, but I passionately pursued this career with an unwavering determination.  Which, lucky for me, proved to be fruitful and continued to be so throughout college.  Without thinking I was the best and had no room for improvement, I still had confidence and believed in my abilities.  Without thinking I was gorgeous, I knew I was attractive.  I did not feel inadequate.

I’m not sure when it happened exactly, but LA changed all of that.  It was not only the lack of performing, but the complete lack of auditions that made me question my abilities and my choices.  It was not fitting into a particular beauty mold that suddenly had me criticizing everything about myself.  I had never felt bad about myself when I saw celebrities in movies or magazines, but when you are completely immersed into so much of that superficial nonsense, it’s hard not to feel bad about yourself.  It’s hard not to lose yourself.

Well, there’s only so much of that you can take, and I needed a break from it.  I happily moved to Portland for that break, and I plan to use this transitional time for new beginnings.  While I’m working on the self improvement and skills mentioned in Part 1 of this post, I will also be working on health, beauty, and fitness.  For extra confidence boosts, I will be trying out various makeup and hair tutorials, diy treatments, fitness plans, and basically anything I find on the oh-so-addictive Pinterest.  They may be wrought with trial and error in the beginning, but hopefully you’ll stick around to see me master new techniques!