Journal Prompts for People Who Don’t Journal

April 19, 2020Leave a comment

10 things I’ve learned in quarantine so far:

How to perfect the top knot
I don’t really like sheet masks
Tostito’s chips are my quarantine snack of choice
Cut your buttermilk biscuits bigger otherwise you’ll end up with tiny baby biscuits (still good just sorta small!)
Meditation is actually cool if you do it often enough
Way more people have instant coffee on hand than I thought (@ everyone making whipped coffee right now & I’m jealous)
Boxed wine > bottles of wine
My apartment gets really nice morning sun
Anthropologie candles are the best candles & last FOREVER (this one is my fave)
Journaling actually keeps you sane. For real.

Number 10 isn’t really really a surprise to me–I’ve been a writer as long as I can remember. I have at least twelve volumes of childhood diaries, a handful of journals of poetry (High school Kasia was a poet–fun fact!), this blog (duh), and no less than 5 current journals that all have different purposes depending on what I’m writing. Writing is the #1 way I process emotions (my therapist can verify) and I 10/10 recommend it to anyone, ESPECIALLY during this weird/crazy time.

But I get that not everyone is a natural writer & staring at a blank page to be filled with your deepest emotions~ can be daunting. So I put together some of my favorite journal prompts (that are not cheesy or LAME) for non-journalers who may want to become one. Remember–no one’s going to see your journal except you so feel free to let it all out.

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Coffee Shop Copy Cats

April 7, 2020April 7, 20204 Comments

I’m not gunna lie–I’ve been craving Starbucks (specifically a iced caramel macchiato–my special occasions drink) for a solid two weeks now. Probably more so because I know I can’t just go out & get one. Oh the joys of quarantine.

However, just because we’re stuck in our homes without access to coffee shops does not mean we need to suffer from the lack of quality caffeinated drinks (although, some of your local coffee shops may be open & you should totally support them if can/want to!) As part of my job, I run a student Instagram account (seriously) & I recently posted how to make their favorite campus coffee shop drinks (heyyy @holygrounds) at home to “bring a little campus to them” in this weird/sad time. Got me thinking–I should share this former barista knowledge with a larger audience because who doesn’t love a great cup of coffee?

So below I have recipes/instructions for: cold brew, steamed frothy milk (to top your coffee/espresso and BAM you have a latte), chai tea latte (hot or chilled) & iced matcha latte. The photos at the bottom are little recipe cards to download/pin to Pinterest if you want to save them for later. Enjoy!

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How to Stay Sane in Quarantine

April 1, 2020April 1, 20208 Comments

Hey. I’m back. I know, it’s seems like forever since I’ve written. To be honest, it was so long, I forgot my WordPress password. I almost didn’t renew my Ampersandblog.net domain (& did at the very, very last minute). It’s not like I intentionally stopped blogging for any particular reason–it sort of naturally happened. I wasn’t feeling super inspired by anything & was doing a lot of writing (offline ;)). And I didn’t want to force it you know? Blogging has been a hobby and I didn’t want to feel stressed out by it.

But we’re here now! Amidst all the things going on the world, I’ve been drawn to comforting, easy, familiar things (as we probably all have), and I felt like I wanted to blog again. So thanks for bearing with me, for those of you who asked if I still blog, for reading anything I write at all. We’ll see if this becomes a regular thing!

We’re all in quarantine, doing the social distancing~ thing so figured I’d share some tips that have helped me stay (somewhat) sane during the past two weeks. By no means an expert (& always looking for new tips!) but hope this helps even a little bit!