Warning: Affiliate links appear in the following post. Although shopping the embedded links won’t cost you any additional dollars, it might mean that I download a few extra audio books this month. Your support of my reading habit is always appreciated! It is no secret that I love to read, but I've been terrible about logging my books into Goodreads or keeping track of how many or which books I've been reading. It also doesn't help that I've read a few sketchy freebies that I'm not sure I would even disclose. I've decided to take a more deliberate approach this year, both to reading and to sharing, so I'll be writing a monthly post categorizing everything single thing I read this year. I love that I'll be able to keep up with exactly how many books I log, I'll be sharing my thoughts on ...
Holiday Hop | Valentine’s Day Printables
While we don't always celebrate big in February, I do love making sweet little crafts with my ladies so that they can share fun treats with their friends at school and dance. I thought I'd share a few of our favorite past printables so your little bitties can be ready for their class parties next month! First up are our Lollipop Tutu Valentines. Since my oldest daughter dances competitively, we always have twenty girls in need of a dance-themed treat. We tried our hand at crepe paper tutus last year and they might be my favorite DIY to date! You can choose your favorite lollipop and leave them wrapped or put them in cello bags if yours is as cute as this one. Aren't they tutu sweet?! It seems that suckers are our favorite sweet treat, because these Ring Pop Valentines are a favorite, ...
January’s Interview
I fully intended on giving you a real post yesterday, but we were home together in our pajamas, crafting and cleaning and finally packing away Christmas. I cooked three meals and folded all the laundry and finally met with our real estate agent to get this house on the market. In short, the blog didn't cross my mind until late afternoon. So how about a random Tuesday post instead?< A friend of mine shared these questions last week with answers from her three boys and they were so funny that I couldn't resist sharing them with you. I didn't have a recent picture of the girls that I haven't already shared recently, so I thought I'd pull one from the archives. This was from the Fall of 2011 and part of our Christmas card shoot. When I flipped through the album last night, this one got ...
Navigating Inspiration
One of the things I've been blessed by the most in this faith art community is the encouragement, inspiration, and beautiful friendships that I've found because of a few images shared on the internet. This community was so much smaller when I stumbled across Bible Journaling last year and as it continues to grow, so many other things follow suit. Yes, there are more friends and more worship and because of that, there is more inspiration. There is also more criticism, plagiarism, and unnecessary vitriol. I don't know what it is about joining women together in a common place that encourages hateful words, but where two or more are gathered... Last night, I happened to read a conversation about whether it was okay to directly copy work that other people were sharing. Unfortunately, I was ...
Currently in January
It's mid January and that means there isn't much going on around here. After a photo heavy few months, we're just resting and recharging our batteries over Netflix and soup. I though since I don't have some big event to share with you each day, that I'd update you on what we're doing currently. READING: I have bought stacks of books this month and I'm making it a goal for 2016 to read every day. I'm planning to share a post at the end of each month with what I've read and what I thought. So far this month, I finished up What Alice Forgot and I'm currently listening to After You and getting ready to read It Starts With Food. LISTENING: You guys know I love music and we're always adding new things to our playlists. I watched a documentary about Kurt Cobain over the holidays, so I've been ...
A Little More Christmas
We are so fortunate for extended families who live close by AND we celebrate with them the day before and after Christmas, so we aren't fighting to get everywhere in a single day. We love doing Christmas breakfast three days in a row and seeing all of our favorite people. On Christmas Eve, it's off to Nana's we go. We had Chic-fil-A chicken minis, cinnamon rolls, sausage balls and mimosas. Ummm, it was delicious and the mamas may have laughed way too much. These girlies love each other so much and posed for pictures all morning long. This was Sophie's, "hey, why don't you take a picture of me?!" face. These mermaid tails were pretty much my pride and joy. I found the pattern over at Modern Vintage Designs and my mom was so sweet to spend four hours helping me whip them up. Since ...
A Letter to Christmas
Dear Christmas, You are so, so sweet. Every year you come racing in and leave us in a cloud of excitement and twinkle lights and expectation. Every year we anticipate your arrival like little kids and are left sad and lonely when you make your way out. So many times this year I engaged strangers in conversation about Christmas and I left every conversation feeling like they weren't ready for you yet. There was a sense of dread about the impending holiday season and I can't even imagine what that must be like. We waited for you with bated breath. I will miss this view: our cozy (read: tiny) living room filled to the brim with fresh evergreen and glowing lights, every inch of floor and furniture piled high with Christmas gifts, family movies on heavy rotation and endless plates piled high ...
Commune
commune verb Share one's intimate thoughts or feelings with (someone or something), especially when the exchange is on a spiritual level. "The purpose of praying is to commune with God." synonyms: communicate, speak, talk, converse, interface. Feel in close spiritual contact with. "He spent an hour communing with nature on the bank of a stream" synonyms: empathize with, identify with, have a rapport with, feel at one with. Take Holy Communion. I drafted this post so many times before publishing. I'm not sure why I felt like it was so hard to get my words in order, but even though the word "commune" has been tumbling around my head and my heart for months, I couldn't quite wrap my head around how to explain it to you. I have such a desire to be connected to people and ...