About & Contact Info.

Hi! My name is Mary.

I’ve been fired. I’ve lost friendships. I’ve gotten dumped. Some life transitions have been hard for me; such as becoming an adult and financially taking care of myself! Learning how to date took me till I was thirty to start!

I’ve messed up at transitions through life enough that I want to learn how to transition well. Learning how to transition well lead me to starting this blog:

In 2013, after my first boyfriend dumped me, I decided to plunge in and just start the blog I had been thinking about for a couple months. I had extra time in my life right then, and writing has always helped me process life, so I started.

As I threw around blog names, I realized I wanted to write about life transitions and have a tree theme (because trees are lovely, and they symbolize hope and growth). One day these ideas came together into: “Trees of Transition.”

Over the last five years, I’ve had “life transitions” in the back of my mind usually as I posted something, but it’s been more on a “journal of my life” type of blog. Now I’m focusing my vision for what I share with you to fall under this mission statement:

The reason for Trees of Transition cards and blog is to bring comfort to people going through life transitions by sharing encouraging stories, photos, and recipes.

My re-focused vision for this blog is:

-To provide comfort and encouragement to people going through life transitions.

-Focus on the transitions of singleness, marriage, and motherhood.

-Share my own experiences and thoughts on these topics as well as ideas from relevant books.

-Share beautiful photography that gives a lift to the mind and the spirit.

-Share handmade photography cards that I make to celebrate life’s transitions.

-Pass on comfort food recipes that have helped me through the loss of loved ones, the birth of a son, and changes in relationships and jobs. Food just helps transitions go easier!

Check out this tab: Articles on Different Transitions on the top of my blog for my favorite posts from the last few years on dating, singleness, job loss, engagement, marriage, motherhood, and more.

You may be wondering, “Are you still a misadjusted single adult who gets fired?”

I’m so happy to tell you, “No!”—thanks to love. As I learned let people love me when I was scared, as I believed that I was worthy of love because of the truth that I am God’s child, and as I gave more love away, I changed; I keep on transitioning into a more loving, adjusted, sensitive person who is married and who has a little boy. I’ve changed for the better because of unconditional love from God as shown through people.

One of the tipping points of when I started transitioning out of fear was eleven years ago when I went to visit my brother, Aaron, and my sister-in-law, Erin. Through our talks, this topic of love came up, and Erin looked at me and said, “You can come in here wearing fishnets and a mini-skirt, smoking a joint, and I will love you no matter what!” My eyes brimmed with tears as that truth washed into my heart. I had never heard that from my family before—I had thought love was conditional on how I acted, but Erin helped me learn that it doesn’t need to be. I believed her. This was one of the points where I grew in confidence. With that anchor of love, I started learning how to live as an adult, take care of myself, and let others into my heart.

The experience with Erin was just after I took seven years to finish my BA degree (not because I failed any classes—I just wanted to graduate debt-free and I didn’t have any pressure to get out into the workforce). A few years after that I took a huge leap and moved into Chicago to take a teaching job that I thought I would be at for years, but after three months I was fired, which was so hard. As I learned to give love away, I got hurt more, but there was more love there to heal too! It wasn’t until I was thirty before I started dating, and that relationship ended after six months. It hurt, but I got up again and kept on dating, so that when the right guy came around, I knew how to do it! (See: Our Engagement Story: The “Train Guy” Asked Me to Marry Him! )

I needed people to love me where I was at during all these messy times of transitions. God, my family, and friends loved me and helped me learn how to love and transition well. I extend the invitation to you: I want to help you learn how to transition through life in an even better way than you already are! Please learn from my mistakes, and let’s grow together. Please come to this blog to be loved right where you are at so that you can go gain courage to go be you and then go out and bless the world.

Peace!

~Mary Hope

P.S. Does this make sense? Please let me know if “Trees of Transition” is more understandable now. Thanks!

If you desire to ask more questions about something I wrote, contact me.

If you want to use a photo or piece of writing elsewhere, please ask permission first by writing me at
treesoftransitiondesigns@gmail.com.

Thank you!