anniversary – Rosie Culture

4 Year Blogiversary

Happy blogiversary to me – I’m celebrating 4 years of Rosie Culture! (Well the real day is somewhere between October 20 and 30th but idk). I’m going to give you a brief background history even though I know a lot of you have heard it all before.

I started this blog as a school project for my New Media concentration and it was all about relationships and initially called Hookup Culture. I was a couple months out of a break up and I was with my ex for four years. It was a really nasty break up that left me with a lot of questions that never really got answered. I was thrown head first into single college life and was just trying to navigate it. Now I’m just trying to navigate in a relationship post grad life and I’ve pretty much learned that no matter what stage of life you’re in, there will always be more questions than answers.

On my first blogiversary post I stated that I had 163 followers on WordPress, over 300 likes on Facebook, and 400 followers on Twitter. Now I have almost 3,000 followers on WordPress, over 600 likes on Facebook, and over 1,000 followers on Twitter. Oh yeah and everyone’s become obsessed with this little thing called Instagram that I’ve put A LOT of time in to grow to almost 7,000 followers.

Thank you to everyone and anyone who has read my blog whether this is your first time and you’re like what the heck is this girl talking about, or if you’ve been here all four years (have you? if you have you need to comment here), or if you’ve been here just a few months! This community has gotten me through a lot and I’ve learned a lot about myself along the way, it’s weird to read back and see how much I’ve grown. I’m going to give you 10 fun facts about me in honor of this blogiversary and I hope that you will comment with a fun fact about yourself 🙂

My real name is Roisin, if you’re from Europe you probably don’t think this is weird but in America it’s pretty weird.
I have a pet leopard gecko named Lucy and a doggo named Kaya.
I lived in both Pennsylvania and Georgia when I was around 4 years old and under, but I’ve basically lived in New Jersey my whole entire life.
I’m a Delta Phi Epsilon Alumna.
I love to dye my hair. My hair has been purple, blue, pink, brown, red, blonde, black, and green! I’m a natural brunette but honestly don’t know what my natural hair color looks like.
I like iced coffee or I like lukewarm coffee. Never hot coffee!
I really like cheesy YA novels, especially if they include vampires.
My favorite colors are pink and black – they’ve always been included on my blog even as my themes change.
I love piercings, I have 6 right now but at my peak I had about 9.
I have a hard time listening to new music, I’m an emo kid at heart and my whole Itunes library is just pop punk from the 2000’s.

Thank you all again for joining me on this journey, leave a fun fact about you below 🙂

Relationships

What It Really Means To Love Someone

I will first start out by saying, everyone loves differently. So I can’t speak for everyone, but I can try to speak generically.

Loving someone doesn’t mean saying “I love you” every morning, evening, and night. It doesn’t mean spending all your free time together and thinking about them every minute of the day. It doesn’t mean falling asleep in each other’s arms or getting them the most extravagant gift for your anniversary.

If some of those things apply to you, that’s all nice and good.

But loving someone means not being that grossed out by all their gross habits. It means thanking them for going the extra mile for you when you’re tired after a long day at work. It means thinking of them a few times a day and being able to go a few days without them, but being so happy when they finally come home. It’s about sacrificing time in your day to pick up the groceries so they don’t have to or walking the dog in the morning so they can sleep a little longer.

Loving someone is about constant care, work, effort, and appreciation. It’s not about getting the perfect photo for Instagram and explaining to everyone why you both love each other SO much. While everyone loves each other differently, loving someone rarely means the things you can see from the outside. It’s everything inside that goes unnoticed by everyone except you two.

man in black long sleeved shirt and woman in black dress — Photo by Jasmine Wallace Carter on Pexels.com

Relationships

What I’ve Learned After 2 Years Of Being In A Relationship

Our two year anniversary of dating is next week! For a reflection of what I learned after one year, click here.

I learned a lot about myself when I was single, I’ve never been one to jump from serious relationship to serious relationship. I think self exploration can be done in a relationship, it’s just harder. The first year of our relationship involved a lot of learning curves for me, I had been single and independent for a long time and was badly burned after my last relationship. As we approach our two year anniversary, I was given more time for self exploration and growth. Here’s what I learned after two years of being in a relationship.

It’s okay to be afraid of big steps. We moved in together, we got a dog, I freaked out. But that’s okay.
Nothing has changed, communication is HUGE. If you are freaking out, you need to tell your partner. They should understand, they should be the one who is able to help you.
Make time for your friends. There are just some things your boyfriend will never understand. It’s important to have at least one other person to confide in.
Things will easily start to get boring in the relationship. The simple thing to do most nights is to plop on the couch and watch Netflix. Put in the effort, switch things up, don’t let it get mundane.
It’s normal to have relationship doubts. Some people just have a harder time settling than other people. If you know yourself, you should know when your doubts are valid or not.
Alone time is still very important.
The longer you’re with someone, the more you think about the future. And the more the future becomes about “us” and not “me”.
No one is as perfect as they look on social media. We bicker – a lot. It’s healthy.
At the end of the day, love isn’t Romeo and Juliet and dying for someone. It’s choosing to be with the person who you like spending time with – every day with – who you don’t actually hate ever.
Take everything at your own pace. It may seem like you NEED to follow the steps of getting engaged, moving in together, getting married, and having kids. But just because that’s the normal plan doesn’t mean it’s your plan.

Let me know how long you’ve been in a relationship for and your biggest piece of advice in the comments! 🙂

woman holding man s hand during day — Photo by Tan Danh on Pexels.com

The Hookup On...

The Hookup On: Holiday Shopping

I am not a good gift giver. When birthdays, holidays, and anniversaries roll around I all of a sudden forget about any interests the person I’m buying for has. I brainstorm ideas all year, then the date rolls around and I’m completely blank.

I never thought I would find an affordable personal shopper option until I learned about Occasion Station. With the free version, you can create a station for a loved one and fill it with all the special occasions you want to remember for that person. You’ll receive email reminders from the system when that date is approaching. For a little more money, you can activate one of the personal gift shoppers and they will complete the task of buying, wrapping and shipping the gift for you.

And how do I know that Occasion Station sends good gifts and really nails the personalization? Because they sent me two AMAZING gifts to prove to me and to share with all of you how awesome their services is. My personality boils down to two things – the sloth being my spirit animal as I am lazy and quite sleepy, and eating donuts as much as possible.

GUYS look at these gifts! When I opened the box I audibly said “oh my god” and danced around my room alone. I can’t wait to see what Occasion Station will choose for my holiday shopping. Since Christmas is just around the corner, I thought this was a great time to share with you all this easy option!

Are you a good gift giver? Let me know in the comments!

This is a sponsored post. All opinions are mine.

PostGrad

3 Year Blogiversary

Happy blogiversary to me – Rosie Culture turns 3!

I recently hit over 2,000 WordPress followers and did a Q&A on behalf of that, you can read it here. I would just like to take the opportunity to thank everyone again for engaging and welcoming me into the blogging community.

I started this blog as a school project and it was all about relationships and initially called Hookup Culture. When I started it, I was a pretty bitter college student who didn’t believe in love anymore after my four year relationship ended horribly. A lot has changed since then. But if you told me then that that silly little blog about one night stands would turn into a passion for blogging and becoming an influencer on social media, I would not have believed you.

The more it grew, the more I found a voice for this blog and the more I grew more comfortable with myself.

There are a few bloggers here that have been with me since the beginning, since I was writing about Tinder, bad dates, and not believing in relationships. Some have come and gone. Any new followers probably know me as a more hopeful, yet still troubled 20-something year old.

I’m happy to have the old and the new and for us to all grow together. Here’s to 3 years and many more! 🙂

xoxo

Rosie

Relationships

What I’ve Learned After 1 Year Of Being In A Relationship

So I had taken about three years off from committed relationships before diving into the one I’m in now. The last real committed relationship I was in lasted four years and this one has just hit the one year anniversary! 🙂

I learned a lot about myself in the time I spent casually dating and being single. It took me a long time to recover from my last break up, to find myself, and to open up to someone again. So here are the things I’ve learned in the one year I’ve been in a relationship:

No two people are the same – don’t compare your current boyfriend to your ex.
Being alone is still very important, you can’t spend all your time with your significant other without going nuts.
There will be doubts, you just have to know if they’re valid or not.
Communication will save your relationship. Be honest, always.
You’ll drift away from your friends. That’s a big part of being in the honeymoon stage and growing older in general.
No one is as happy as they make themselves seem on social media. Everyone fights, bickers, and gets annoyed at each other.
Always show appreciation. I am constantly surprised by how patient my boyfriend is with me and I never stop thanking him for it.
Be yourself from day one. I was weird when we went on our first date and I’m probably a little weirder now, but there were no surprises as the relationship went on.
Being in a relationship isn’t like being in a jail. I used to cringe at the thought of being tied down, but it’s really not bad when you find the right person.
Take everything at your own pace. People all around me are getting engaged and buying houses. But I’m a slowpoke when it comes to big steps and that’s okay!

Capture — Photo by: https://www.flickr.com/photos/149902454@N08/

Relationships

The Mid-Relationship Crisis

The mid-relationship crisis is a bit like a mid-life crisis. It’s the existential realization that maybe not everything is going according to plan or maybe everything is too perfect and you need to just screw it all up.

I’ve always said that around every 6 months, a couple will hit a tiny mid-relationship crisis. It doesn’t have to be something serious. Or it could lead to the end of the relationship.

Every time these crises come about, there are a few things that you need to remember.

One is how much you love the other person and how happy you normally are. If you aren’t in love or happy, your crisis might be just and it’s time to end that relationship.

Another thing to remember is sometimes life gets a little crazy. It may not be your relationship that’s causing you to have a crisis.

And lastly, you need to listen yourself above all others. But also let other people talk you off the ledge if you just can’t handle your mid-relationship crisis. Listening and remaining calm are always key.

These things happen, love is crazy and we panic. Your mid-relationship crisis won’t be an end all, be all unless it’s really meant to be over.