Dear 2008 Hollyce

Dear 20 Year Old Hollyce,

Oh little Hollyce – you are so young but have such an adventure ahead of you! You just turned 20 (2008) and are 1 year out of high school. You are wrapping up your freshman year of college at Baylor University in Waco, TX. You aren’t sure what the future holds or what lessons are ahead of you – so let me give you some of the highlights of your next 10 years.

You aren’t going back to Baylor this fall. God is calling you to be closer to home for reasons you can’t know yet – but I’m telling you to trust His plan. You will move straight into the Kappa Kappa Gamma house at Mizzou with 80 of your new best friends.

As a 20-year-old, you will…

• Learn how the Big 12 tailgates (which is something you will NOT be good at)
• Wear a fancy, blue gown and be presented to society as a woman at the Veil Propet Ball (which is really just the chance to party and wear a fancy dress)
• Count down the months until you are 21 (because I guess that’s something that is important to you at this age)
• Travel to NYC with the Mizzou Magazine Club (yes, you will spend a year as a journalism major) and spend one of your favorite days ever all by yourself touring the city
• One of your Facebook statuses will read: “i cannot believe lauren is actually leaving the hills. sad” Apparently, you care about this 😉
• Your family will tug at your heartstrings and show you why you are transferring to be closer to home

21 is next! You will…

• Celebrate turning 21 in style – including fighting with a bouncer for not letting your underage friends into a bar on your birthday. (facepalm)
• Lose Grandma Helen – your favorite human being on the planet. This loss will shake you to your core but also launch you into service work with Hospice.
• Travel to Las Vegas and Los Angeles in the same summer – you lucky girl!
• Serve in your first official leadership position at your sorority – the Pat Song will be your jam!
• Live in Barcelona, Spain for a semester! You will travel the world including London, Glasgow, Paris, Rome, Venice, Mykonos, Santorini, and Capri.
• Take your dog Louie to Spain with you, live with a strange family who ultimately kicks you out, try to sneak the dog into your school dorm and then get in trouble. Why did I think this was a good idea to take him with me?!

I don’t know about you, but you’re feeling 22 (the song hasn’t come out yet – but you’ll know what I mean when it does). You will….

• Nanny for the most darling girl and spend the summer in the pool teaching her to swim
• Run the football field at the homecoming game after the Tigers won
• Be completely obsessed with the Target Lady commercials – you will post about this a lot on Facebook
• Panic that you don’t know what you are going to do with your life after you graduate. You will interview with Teach for America and get a job offer
• Decide to follow your heart and throw yourself into tremendous student debt to move to Chicago and go to pastry school
• Graduate from Mizzou with honors. Yes, YOU – you will be in the Honors College.

At 23, you start adulting! You will….

• Sell your car, find an apartment in Chicago, and move there with friends
• Attend The French Pastry School, create the most beautiful desserts, meet the sweetest (no pun intended) people and complete that program with honors as well
• Wake up to be at work by 5am. Just a heads up – one morning, someone will steal your bike. But you are also the goober who didn’t have a bike lock!
• Fall in love with baking pies! You will even win a pie contest
• Sing the song “Friday” by Rebecca Black almost every single Friday
• Work the hardest you have ever worked – long days spent at Lovely Bakeshop and working as a waitress on the weekends. You will work 6-7 days weekly at 70+ hours all for the love of sugar and butter!

Then you turn 24. You will….

• Have carpal tunnel surgery
• Discover that you are a really good recruiter and get hired to help companies find great employees
• Celebrate your first Christmas away from your family. This will be a day that changes the direction your life will go in the next 6 months.
• Celebrate St. Patrick’s Day by riding around in a limo and going on a dinner cruise at Navy Pier with 2 of your best friends from college
• Meet your future husband and crush on him big time!
• See your baby sister graduated high school and get ready for college

At 25, you are halfway through your twenties. You will…

• Start dating your husband and fall madly in love. You will know this right away and it will scare you.
• See Justin Timberlake in concert
• Be the Maid of Honor at your best friend’s wedding
• Move out to the suburbs. Peace out city life.
• Learn about the tremendous growth that comes through pain, struggle, and adversity
• Watch Frozen one thousand times
• Teach the kiddos how to make the best chocolate chip cookies

25 was a huge growth year…but 26 gets better. You will…

• Play pool games nonstop – Marco Polo, Colors, Sharks and Minnows
• See Shaq in person
• Pick up golf and really love it – you do have the best coach (cough David cough)
• Move into a townhome and get a new car – Ford Explorer Sport baby
• get ENGAGED and then propose to T&E
• adopt Chewie

And now you are 27. You will….

• Take the kiddos to St. Louis for the first time
• Say goodbye to the house you grew up in – love you Wiltshire
• Get married at Disney World to your best friend and two favorite little ones
• Take David to the ER twice in a month – once for an insane amount of bee stings and the other for 10 stitches to his ankle
• Purchase your first house
• Say goodbye to sweet Momsie
• Catch baby fever

Then there is you at 28 years old. You will….

• Play 54 holes of golf in 24 hours with your favorite guy at Geneva National
• Take your first camping trip as a family
• Get pregnant and be sicker than you ever imagined possible
• Cut down your very own Christmas tree
• Give birth!!
• Receive a Down syndrome diagnosis for your new baby
• Grieve, accept, and then embrace your new journey as a special needs mom

Now it’s the last year of your twenties. You are 29 and you will….

• Find your village with FIT4MOM
• Begin to advocate like a mother
• Take Hudson on 16 flights
• Return back to work after baby and then leave to stay home 6 months later
• Watch T&E become the BEST big brother and sister that you could have hoped for Hudson
• Attend your first PGA golf tournament
• Balance a new “normal” with staying home with the baby, taking care of the house, working 2 part-time jobs and running your blog

Most importantly young Hollyce, you will become you – the true you. Not what other people want you to be or what you believe is expected of you – it’s hard to kick that people pleaser habit. You will learn some very hard lessons and go through some unexpectedly challenging times. But there is so much joy to come! These are just highlights.

My advice to you 20-year-old Hollyce…

Let God’s light and love shine through you. Be present. Believe in magic. Embrace life. Forgive quickly. Love deeply. Keep perspective. Sing every day. Always be silly. And every now and then, try to bake something – it makes you happy.

Love,

Almost 30-Year-Old Hollyce