Love in Every Language
I am in total LOVE with the "Love in Every Language" collection from Capsul Jewelry. This necklace has quickly become a staple in my everyday jewelry collection. I like that it is simple and understated so you can wear it with pretty much anything or layer it with other necklaces. The collection consists of necklaces in three tones (silver, gold, and rose gold) with the word "love" available in several languages.This collection is really special and I think these necklaces would be a lovely gift for yourself or someone you love.It also reminds me of one of my favorite quotes and it's become a physical reminder for me to,
"Do small things with great love." St. Teresa of Calcutta
The necklaces themselves are well made, and feel sturdy on my neck, but are not heavy or constricting. They are finely crafted, "3D-printed, cast, plated, and hand-finished using only the highest quality and non-toxic materials and processes."I was also pleasantly surprised to see they also provide a service where they create jewelry from a copy of handwriting. I've been wanting to create a necklace from an old card from my grandmother. I think that will be the next piece of jewelry I purchase.
The Kitchen Is Closed + I stretch those poetic muscles...
The kitchen is where little fires are put out, and big ones can happen. It's where our lives get lived. Where little bits of our mothers get absorbed into ourselves when we're too busy to notice.
The other night, I said something my mother always said when I was growing up. "The kitchen is closed!" It was out of my mouth before I realized I was saying it. The kitchen is always such a big part of a home. It's where you gather around to share a meal. In the eleventh grade, you'll sit with your mom on the linoleum, share a pint of ice cream, and talk about a boy who broke your heart. It's where your little sister will choke on a Jolly Rancher one Halloween evening, giving you the chance to test out the Heimlich Maneuver you learned the summer before. It's where a single mom, totally exhausted and overworked, will dance with her children to Fleetwood Mac. It's where, after wiping down the counters and putting the dishes away, at 10 p.m. on a Wednesday evening, she'll turn off the lights and declare to everyone within earshot, "The kitchen is closed!" Which we all understood meant, "Don't mess it up!" It's where she'll rush out one morning, a patient on her mind, and it's where a fire will catch.
Little fires are put out in the kitchen, and big ones can happen. It's where our lives get lived. Where little bits of our mothers get absorbed into ourselves when we're too busy to notice. I'm not concerned I'm turning into my mother. That's not what this is about. She is in me as much as I ever was in her. We don't turn into our mothers after all, but we often take parts of them and make them our own.
My kitchen is always a mess these days. I'll wash up, and not five minutes later, one of the boys will have filled the sink with cups and missing spoons. As much as these little messes annoy me, it's where evidence of our living can be found. Like the messes, we make with flour and chocolate chips when we celebrate our wins or console our losses. Our daughter often brings her blocks into the kitchen and pours them onto the floor. She'll play at her father's feet as he cooks dinner, building towers to the clouds for her unicorns to climb down. His favorite podcast about aliens, space, or Big Foot will play as the sun fades, and I sip a glass of my favorite wine.
Over dinner, we'll discuss the highs and lows of our day. Sometimes, dinner rolls into a meltdown over math homework. It's where the kids will put the groceries or silverware away in all the wrong places. I'll search for a wooden spoon purchased in Greece and wonder how the sugar got in with the Tupperware. On a busy morning when we're all just a little bit grumpy, I'll discover someone (usually me) forgot to run the dishwasher, and we'll eat our toast on paper plates. My husband and I will sit at the kitchen table and discuss our future, break the news to our kids their dad is deploying, or tell them we'll be moving in the middle of the school year.
The kitchen is the first room we'll unpack in a new home and the last one we'll clean before we move out. In the kitchen, we'll shake our heads at our teenagers and laugh at a joke. It's where dreams are told and plans are made. It's where we'll wonder if we're doing this parenting thing all wrong and realize we survived our mothers' kitchens, and our kids will too.
In years to come, we'll see where they've made the bits of our kitchen their own. It is where I'll think about writing, and ideas will emerge over sudsy water. I'll run to write these words, remembering when I used to write poetry so much more often than the random haikus that have shown up here.
In the kitchen, I decided I wanted to begin exercising my poetic muscles again. And so here I am. Though I fear my muscles have atrophied, I'm flexing them here just the same because this is a reflection of a kitchen, and it is mine.
The Kitchen
On Saturday mornings the kitchen is always open. You make the eggs, I pour the coffee. "Use the small mug." you say "You never finish." I plant a kiss on your cheek, you love me despite my discarded, half-drunk, big mugs of coffee. On Saturday nights at half-past ten, after we've wiped down the counters, and put away the dinner dishes, I'll holler at the kids, "The kitchen is closed!" Just like my mom used to do. We'll go to bed, snuggled in between is a daughter turned-furnace. The floorboards in the hall creek two sons are on a recon mission for a lucky charm. One grabs the bowls, the other pours the milk. We don't say a word drowsy smiles on our faces. You take my hand in yours because in a house like ours the kitchen is where the love gets poured.
Out For a Walk in Colonial Williamsburg
One of my family's favorite things to do on a nice weekend, is go to Colonial Williamsburg, for a nice long walk. On days like this, we don't buy tickets to any of the museums. We simply go to walk, people watch, stop at the sweet shop, Barnes & Noble, and just enjoy the day.
We recently did this when a cousin of my husband came for a weekend stay. We had a lovely afternoon. Of course, there is much more to do on your visit to Colonial Williamsburg.
There are several museums you can visit, stuff for couples, families, and history enthusiasts from learning about gardening in the 18th Century and fashion of the period.
Foodies can come and enjoy scrumptious traditional meals of the time as well as learning about both the Native American and African American experience.
Of course there is also stuff to learn about our military history and even some of the British royal history for those who are royal-watchers. The Colonial Williamsburg website, has several itinerary suggestions to help you plan your visit.
We often extend our walk through some of the campus at William & Mary, it is so pretty with mature magnolia trees, green carpets of grass, and historic buildings.
Little Lovely Things - Book Feature
Today I'm here to share this lovely little book called, Little Lovely Things This novel is a quick, at times edge-of-your-seat read. If you're looking for something to read this summer that isn't your typical romance or mystery this is the book for you.Summary:A mother's chance decision leads to a twist of fate that is every parent's worst nightmareIt is the wrong time to get sick. Speeding down the highway on the way to work, her two little girls sleeping in the back seat, medical resident Claire Rawlings doesn't have time for the nausea overtaking her. But as the world tilts sideways, she pulls into a gas station, runs to the bathroom, and passes out. When she wakes up minutes later, her car—and her daughters—are gone.The police have no leads, and the weight of guilt presses down on Claire as each hour passes with no trace of her girls. All she has to hold on to are her strained marriage, a potentially unreliable witness who emerges days later, and the desperate but unquenchable belief that her daughters are out there somewhere.As hopeful and uplifting as it is devastating, Little Lovely Things is the story of a family shattered by unthinkable tragedy, and the unexpected intersection of heartbreak and hope.
I received an ARC to facilitate this review.
The Hugo Spritz - Recipe
I remember the first time I ever savored a Hugo Spritz. It was on a warm summer afternoon while at a lavender festival in Venzone, Italy. I had run into a friend at a local bar. Saw she was drinking something which clearly involved mint and lime. Mojitos are my absolute favorite cocktail so I had to ask. She replied, "This? This is a Hugo Spritz." Thus my new love was born. I asked the bartender how I could make one at home and he shared the
Hugo Spritz Recipe.
It's simple and delicious and contains a combination of elderflower syrup or liqueur and Prosecco.In Italy the phrase "bar" most often refers to a place you can get an espresso, usually consumed quickly, standing at the bar, or quick meal and a glass of wine, it's not like the bars here in the States. Kids are often seen enjoying gelato or sandwich while their parents enjoy a spritz, as did I on this special day when I sipped my first Hugo Spritz, and then my second. It was pretty hot as I recall. Making this the perfect simple recipe for a refreshing drink you can savor all summer long.
Alas, I am no longer in Italy and though I miss it every single day, there are still ways to bring Italy home to America. One of those ways is the wonderful aperitifs... Like this lovely and very pretty Hugo Spritz.
Authentic Italian Hugo Spritz Recipe
Ingredients:
1 ozSt. Germain or other Elderflower Liqueur (or syrup).
3-4freshMint Leaves
1small slicelime (optional)
2 oz unflavored sparkling water
4-5ouncesprosecco*, chilled
ice
To prepare:
Fill a wine glass with ice. If you want to serve it as it is served in Italy only add two ice cubes, three at the most. If your guests ask you for more give them the side eye and huff, "No!".
Pour one ounce of St. Germain directly over the ice and then add a few mint leaves and a slice of lime.
Top off the glass with 4-5 ounces of chilled prosecco.
Stir briskly for a moment and enjoy pronto!
*For a non-alcoholic version, swap out the wine for ginger ale or lemon/lime soda and use Elderflower syrup.
Toddler Room Refresh - Whimsical Bohemian Toddler Girls Bedroom
I refreshed Ellena's baby girl whimsical nursery into a toddler big girl room including transitioning Ellena's crib to a toddler bed. The end result was what I'm calling a Whimsical Bohemian Toddler Girls Bedroom.
This infant to toddler room refresh didn't have the effect I was hoping it might as she's still not sleeping much in her own bed. She's been co-sleeping with my husband and I and that's where she sleeps best... as for my husband and me, we can't say the same, with the little feet in our face or her warm body cocooned against ours. Eventually she'll be on her own at night, but for now, we're enjoying all her littleness.The biggest thing I switched up was her bed. We have the Jenny Lind crib. I bought the toddler rail to transition her crib to a toddler bed.Then I added the canopy. I vaciliated between a sheer canopy and a solid fabric one and eventually opted for the solid. I also went with white instead of pink just in case I eventually decide to change out the pink for a different color like grey or lavendar.
As far as the added decorations, I took some of the dream catchers and flower crowns I had made for her bohemian themed baptism luncheon and incorporated them into her room's decor. I hung the dreamcatchers on the walls. Initially I was going to hang twinkle lights on her canopy - I still might add them in, but for now, I took one of the flower crowns I had made and added it to the front of her canopy and then hung a dream catcher from the openining.
We don't have a playroom in this house - it's military housing so space is at a miniumum for us, so all of her toys and books are downstairs in the living room. I did bring up a few of her toys and books to try to entice her to actually want to spend time in this room.
Not much has changed with respct to her dresser. I was using her dresser as a changing table, but now she mostly gets changed on my bed or on the floor. The mobile I made for her nursery, now hangs above the dresser. I did adorn her wall unicorm with a flower crown.All in all it was a pretty simple refresh and I'm so happy with this Whimsical Bohemian Toddler Girls Bedroom.
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How do I have a fifteen-year-old son? & How to make a box cake taste like you made it from scratch.
Where has the time gone? It's so true what the say when you're the parent of really young children and you think you'll never sleep again.The adage goes something like, "The days and nights are long, but the years are short." Never have true words been spoken when it comes to raising children. Some days are so, so, so very long. Others are wonderful days spent making beautiful messes and chasing purple dragons. I've been writing about my son on this (or some version of it) blog since he was two or three. Now, granted, as he got older, and I got busier raising my other kids, and writing elsewhere, I haven't been as consistent with my blogging as I had been when I first began way back in... what was it..? Two-thousand and six. Yet, here I am, reflecting on the fact that my sweet baby boy is a young man and asking myself, how do I have a fifteen-year-old son?He's growing into himself more and more and is becoming quite the human being. I'm so proud to be his mom and I'm so looking forward to watching him go out and live his life all the while being terrified of him growing up even more quickly and getting to that part where he's off on his own. Anyway, before I get a little too purple in my prose here, I'm just going to share some photos from his birthday. 
We had a simple birthday celebration, at home with just us. He requested a red velvet cake (his favorite) and so I made one for him from "scratch", really I doctored up a box cake mix and it is fabulous. Read on and I'll share my tips for making a box cake taste like homemade or you got it from the absolute best bakery. The decorations are from Target. I have one of those helium tanks you can buy at the store. It's the best thing ever! I can have helium balloons whenever I want some! Balloons are like bubbles, they mean instant happiness to me.
So many candles. His cake was so bright!
To doctor up your box cake to make it taste like it is homemade from scratch or from the bakery...Substitute the water for milk. The oil for melted butter. Add in a box of instant pudding mix (I recommend the Godiva or Ghiradelli kind), bake as normal. The end result will be a dense, super moist and rich cake.
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