I have been blessed with a few cherished new friendships this year… and as somebody who is introverted by nature, and has always had a really hard time making new friends – that’s not by any means a common statement to come from me.
I have always just had a small core group of life long friends; Friends I have had since I was a kid; Friends I grew up with and have seen me through thick and thin; friends who know and love me for all my flaws and weirdness; Friends I wouldn’t trade for anything in the world…
Those friendships were always so comfortable for me; and honestly all I ever needed. I cherish the people I surround myself with because they are good people.
That said; I have definitely closed myself off from many new friendships for many years because of my struggles with social anxiety, because it can get very real sometimes. For a long time I avoided any kind of unfamiliar social situation where there would be new people, for fear of how I would be perceived by them. I clam up when you first meet me. I sit; I watch; I listen; And this can make people uncomfortable.
As a teenager I was given one too many side-ways glances for my odd behaviour at parties, so eventually I just stopped going. I preferred being at home alone over a crowd of people any day. My friends always invited me, but I preferred to spend my time with them on a more one on one level. So that’s what I did.
But this year I decided I was going to push myself out of my comfort zone in as many ways as I possibly could – and working on my social anxiety was one of my top priorities.
So I started off slowly; I started by simply accepting invitations to events from my close friends and I started letting them introduce me to new people; People who as it turned out to be not nearly as scary as I had thought they were going to be; People who I got along with, and actually began to form close friendships with.
One of those people was Nikolina; A beautiful person inside and out, who I am so grateful to have met, and who I get to call my friend.
She is so incredibly talented, hardworking, beautiful, kind, genuine and generous. I admire her for so many reasons; one of them being her creativity. She is an absolutely amazing knitter.
I hav become obsessed with each and every one of her pieces, and I know you will too. If you love a good toque, you need to check out her online shop here!
She was sweet enough to knit me my very own pot holders (featured below) and I am obsessed with them! They are basically me in pot holder form. I love them so, sooo much! Thanks Nik xxx
I recently had the pleasure of helping her out photographing her beautiful knitts.
We had such a fun day running around like a couple of goofs, pretending to be toque models, when really we are both awkward as heck in front of a camera. (This is our wanderlust walk… I mean, did we nail that or what?) hehehehehe
But the result was totally worth all the awkward behind the scene camera moments, because we captured her knitts in all their beauty.
Below are a few of the shots that I just had to share, because I am so proud of her amazing work.
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