HELLO FRIENDS
welcome
I’m Rebecca Dunn…Mama, Mommy, Mom, Mooooooooom…and sometimes even my Charlie girl calls me “Rebecca” when she really wants to get my attention. I’ve been wanting to “do a blog” for as long as I can remember. I’ve said “I’m working on a blog” more times than I want to admit, while never actually launching it. I’ve always been a writer at heart. My original vision for doing a blog was a space for wellness and natural living. I spent my late twenties and early thirties with that being my passion and biggest interest. I was also a prop and wardrobe stylist throughout this entire time and the blog was also going to be a space for me to exercise my love and need for creating beautiful pictures. But my heart could never really pull the plug- and as my life has gone, I have never been able to do anything unless my heart was completely in and completely in love. And now I know why…and I truly believe everything happens as it should…the thing I am really in love with, the thing my heart really feels the need to share, is being a mama.
That doesn’t mean everything on here will be directly related to motherhood. But it will come from me as the person I am today, which is defined as being a mom. So much of being a mom who is whole and fulfilled is about making sure that all aspects of my heart and soul are alive and well. I work hard to take care of my emotions, my mental well-being, my relationship with faith, my physical, moving body, my friendships, my relationships. All of that needs to exist for me to be in a space where I can love my little girls as hard and as wild as they deserve.
But all the life that had to happen for me to end up here? My story starts in the suburbs of Chicago. I grew up there. I met my husband there. I love Chicago. But I headed to Boulder, Colorado for my first two years of college after falling in love with the West during summers camping with my family. Colorado and Utah will always be two of my favorite places on the planet. But I moved to Nashville halfway through and transferred to a small liberal arts school called Belmont. Why did I do this, people always ask? My answer is always…“A boy, Blake.” But that is always followed up with, “But don’t worry, it was worth it! We got married.” And we did get married- 12 years into our story. We met in high school when we were 17 and have been together for the better part of 19 years now. We’ve been married for almost 7. He’s my person, my lobster. We live in a house that was built in 1920 that we have made our own for the past 6 years. We adore Nashville and have had so much fun watching our city come into its own the past 16 years. We have our two little loves Charlie and Tessa- who are 3 and 1-and our little pup, my best bud, Monkey.
In a past life -or at least that’s how it feels- I was a wardrobe and prop stylist. I worked hard for my career and I will always be so incredibly proud of it. I was signed with a major agency in Chicago and traveled all over working on photo shoots. Making things visually beautiful is in my soul. And that career served me well for a long time. But when I became pregnant with Charlie, I started to feel a shift. I felt like that industry no longer served me in a positive way and my heart was being led to focus on being a mama. I have never felt more confident and more myself since becoming a mom. It has also coincided with a spiritual growth that has given me so much peace and calm in life.
I’m sure you all have at least heard of the blog “Humans of New York.” Fun fact: I met Brandon, the photographer and creator, in Chicago a couple of weeks before he moved to New York to “start this project.” He said he was moving with nothing but his camera to do something he had always wanted to do. And now of course it’s a globally known blog and he has a bestselling New York Times book. So bloody amazing. Paired with his portraits of people is usually a paragraph of some profound story or moment from their life. Some little bit of wisdom they feel they can share. Often I’ll think, “What would be my bit of wisdom or story about my life that would be shared with my photo?”
And I think it would be this: “I am the poster child for your life happening when you are planning for something else. And that a seemingly small life can be so beautiful. In high school I dreamt of having a big-time fashion career in New York. That was going to be my life. It was going to be exciting. Life unfolded differently, as it does. But I can genuinely say that my life brings me incredible happiness. And I find so much joy in my everyday life. And that to me, is my biggest success. That to me equals a big life. Our house is full of dancing and laughter every single day. We adventure. We travel. We cry. We feel. We love so freaking hard. We live, man.”
There has always been a part of my heart that has been wild. A free spirit. I hung a little print in the girls’ playroom that says, “Stay Wild”. One of my favorite songs of all time is Tom Petty’s “Wildflowers”- “You belong among the wildflowers, you belong somewhere you feel free.” Motherhood is what makes me feel free. And I feel like I belong here. Flowers have always been an important part of my life- they’re one of life’s best things. Charlie, my 3 year old, and I find so much joy in finding all the pink flowers in life- during car rides, on walks, in books, wherever we go. And every time we yell out, “Look, pink flowers!” It’s a welcomed reminder every time that this mama life, here and now, is so beautiful.
I’m so looking forward to sharing this space with you…stay wild.
