Dear Small Town, You know how some teenage girls dream of big cities and moving far, far away? I don't ever remember doing that. I'm sure I had visions for how my life would turn out that might not exactly mirror what I see today, but I never lamented my smaller than average circle. I dreamed of wide open spaces, red barns and family. Dear Pop & Granmom, Your house was one of my most favorite places to spend time as a child. The vast number of sand buckets, filled with strawberries, that we toted up the front porch steps were too many to count. I remember lazy days on the screened porch, too tall sycamore trees and rope swings. Some of my favorite stories still revolve around fishing in the pond and hearing Pop call the cows. Dear Marley, You did good. First time ...
A Halloween Recap
If you've been reading here for any amount of time, you might remember that we usually head to our church's annual Trunk or Treat to celebrate Halloween. Last year we partnered with another local church to celebrate, but this year we didn't host anything at all. There is a part of me that is so sad when established traditions screech to a halt, but this year we were able to squeeze our week with so many other fun things that we didn't have time to be sad. First up was "Tappy Halloween" at our dance studio. The competition teams don't participate, so I didn't get to watch Ella dance, but we did get to observe the little girls and have a special snack after class. Sophie was a mermaid for Halloween this year. We bought her costume over the summer at the beach and she has been so excited to ...
Letters
Dear October, Where the heck did you go? I feel like I blinked and you were gone. While we did Halloween night up right, there were so many things that we missed. We never made it to the pumpkin patch this year and we didn't carve or paint any jack-o-lanterns. Fortunately, I don't think my girls even realized the error of our ways. Dear Scrooges, I know that everyone is entitled to their own opinion about Christmas and when it's appropriate to begin decorating or singing along with the radio or whatever. I welcome Christmas music whenever the radio stations want to start playing it. Thanksgiving is fine, but so is Halloween. I do kind of hate seeing decorated trees in the stores in early October, but there is a tiny part of me that understands. When I looked at our calendar for November ...
Happy Halloween!
Happy Halloween from these three darlings to yours! We have lots of fun planned for today -- it's book character day at school, we're "Trunk or Treating" at a local church and then headed to a Halloween party with some great friends. We're hoping your day is as spook-tacular as ours! ...
Letters
Dear Sophie, My new favorite thing is to watch you color, or to hear you explain your drawings, or even to thumb through them after you leave a stack near my bed. Ella has always liked coloring books and writing stories, but I don't think anybody loves copy paper as much as you do. I can almost always find you with a crayon box stuffed under your arm and you love to ask us to spell things or to write things down for you to trace and copy. You have such a vivid imagination when you tell us the stories behind your drawings and the color and composition is always so beautiful! I am so hopeful that this isn't a passing phase. Let's plan to keep making beautiful things together. Deal? ...
Last Minute Halloween Treats | Easy Spider Oreos
Affiliate links appear in the following post. Although shopping the embedded links won’t cost you any additional dollars, it might mean that I earn a small commission on any purchases made. Your support of this blog is always appreciated! As usual, I waited until the last minute to start thinking about what to make for the girls' friends at dance for their Halloween party tomorrow night. Sophie's first request was bat shaped cookies and I thought I had her convinced to just buy the Little Debbie brownies shaped like bats, but when Gran send us {this} super cute suggestion. It looked simple enough, but I decided to try using Double-Stuf Oreos since we can't bring peanut butter and I figured it would be easier than spreading each individual one. It turns out, this was one of the easiest ...
Church Words
Can we talk about church? I'm not sure what I can and can't say without ruffling feathers or feeling overly emotional, but it's really been on my heart to share what we're going through. I'm struggling to stay invested in fellowship while at the same time desperately missing that "family" like crazy. It's unbelievably hard when your head and your heart are in such completely different places. No denomination is perfect. I know that Baptists have a bad reputation and are generally thought of as "bible thumpers" or unnecessarily conservative. I also know it is altogether possible to be fully invested in the doctrine and at war with the current climate. There is such a dichotomy between those who thrive on tradition and an entire generation of young people who are craving revolution. I grew ...
Smoke & S’Mores
I know I've said this before, but I love my parents' house. They love to entertain us and both have such a knack for making this place feel like home, even when I haven't lived there in almost half my life. In the fall, the sun sets at just the right moment in their backyard. You can just see the cotton field through the trees and if you're quiet, you can just hear the coyotes howling from afar. The Texaco sign on the barn is all lit up and the entire place smells like a campfire. We eat hot dogs and doritos and drink gallons of sweet tea. We do our homework around the fire and complain a little because mom forgot to bring us warm pajamas. We chase this little guy and keep him from falling headfirst into the fire. We play kickball until it's too dark to find in the woods and ...