Blog-tember Challenge | Day One

Happy Tuesday! Today is the first day of the 2015 Blog-tember Challenge, a month-long link-up hosted by Bailey at Brave Love Blog! Bailey has been a blogging friend of mine for a while now. She fills her online space with such joy, creativity, and encouragement – it’s hard not to get inspired by what she shares! 🙂

The Blog-tember Challenge is one where you’re welcome to come and go…and to follow along with whichever days of prompts you’d like! Bailey’s goal is that we all get writing together and that we learn about each other along the way! I’ll be joining in on some days of this challenge, starting with today – Day One. 🙂

Today’s prompt is: Introduce yourself however you like! I don’t have a lengthy “about me” section on this blog anymore, so today’s prompt is a fun opportunity to answer some questions and point you toward where you can now learn more about me (and my husband). 🙂

I’m Hannah. I’m kind of an extroverted introvert and a meet-a-friend-for-a-slow-morning-of-coffee gal. My husband and I live in rural Minnesota, where I am a Title I teacher and he is a history teacher. On a typical afternoon, you’ll find me dreaming about a chai latte, listening to the acoustic-y goodness of Gregory Alan Isakov on the record player, and snapping pictures of food, landscapes…whatever I can find!

Here are the answers to a few questions you may have:

Did you grow up in a rural setting? Do you live on a farm now?

No, I grew up in the suburbs of the Twin Cities in Minnesota. Bjorn and I met at college and we planned to live in rural Minnesota when we got married. It’s a bit difficult to pick up and move the family’s farm fields, he always says.  Luckily, we both LOVE Minnesota! The rural life has always appealed to me, from gawking at the wide endless skies to snapping photos of country sunsets to the fact that I always wanted a red pickup truck! (Check!) The latest adventure: I’ve recently started taking horseback riding lessons!

We do not live on a farm currently. The farm pictures you see are most often taken at my in-laws’ farm place, where we frequently spend time hanging out or feeding the animals. We live in a rental home in a nearby tiny town surrounded by acres and acres of fields in every direction.  Bjorn and I do plan on living on our own farm place in the future. It’s the type of life we look forward to settling into, and the type of childhood we wholeheartedly want for our children.

How do you manage your blog while working a full-time job?

With intention!  Working 40+ hours a week at a job not related to blogging means that I do not check my blog or do blog-related things (of course!) throughout the day. I rely heavily on programs that allow me to schedule posts and shout-outs in advance. I also utilize my time as best I can in the evenings and on weekends to write, photograph for, and schedule my posts!

When did you get married?

Bjorn and I met in college at Bethel University and got engaged at the end of our senior year. We then had a 10-month engagement and got married in March 2014. We were crazy enough to plan and get married during our first year of teaching! I lived alone in our current rental home for 7 months as we planned the wedding and as I worked on making it a peaceful space we would both love living in. It was a pretty stressful season of life but it was totally worth it. 🙂

More of our love story.
My wedding planning tips series.

Psst – I stole these Q+A’s from our recently updated FAQ page! For a larger sampling of our FAQs, including why this blog is named “Just Bee,” just click on the FAQ tab at the top of the page!

Thanks for reading along, friends! And as a reminder, you can get in on the 2015 Blog-tember Challenge here – although I would also love to hear about YOU if you want to introduce yourself below! 🙂