This and That
Hi!
I hope you had a lovely Christmas holiday if Christmas is your thing.
We're still celebrating Christmas around here, and I enjoy every second of my Christmas home.
However, I'm looking forward to the new year and chose this paired-down paper planner I found at Target. Winter skin got you down? I've added these two new products to my skincare routine. I am enjoying them and feel compelled to share these two products. The first is Aveeno's Calm And Restore Oat Serum. The other product is from L'oreal's Revitalift line. It's the Hyaluronic Acid Serum - *Quick tip - rub this on your lips and follow with your lip balm for lips that aren't dry or cracked. It all helps heal cracked and chapped winter lips.Help keep the air moist in your home with a humidifier. I'm using this one bedside, and it works great. It is reasonably priced and also doesn't look horrible on my bedside table.I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I read very little this year. My goal is to get back to my old reading habits. If you, like me, wish to boost your reading routine, here is an excellent list to get you started.I love a good furniture transformation and testing out new paints while I do it. I recently discovered this paint on Pinterest. I'm itching to try it.Is one of your new year's goals to stop procrastinating? Mine too! Check out this article for some helpful/apparent tips.I am currently giving Joan Didion's book of essays a re-read. She passed away recently, and I wanted to give her words a fresh read with my more aged perspective. If you're looking for a book to add to your TBR list - Add, Slouching Towards Bethlehem, you won't regret it. My favorite sweatshirt. I want all the colors. Speaking of color, I want to wear this sweater-like every day. It's so bright and cheerful, and I am in love.Santa gifted my daughter this Teepee tent, and she loves it.
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.
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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Epiphany - Chalk House Blessing
Happy Epiphany! One of my goals for the new year was to grow spiritually. The other was to share more of how my family celbrates the liturgical calendar and how my husband and I help teach our children about our faith. If you don't know we're a Catholic family and today marks the twelveth day of Christmas and the arrival of the Maggi to the smallest and frailest of kings, Jesus. To mark this day, my kids received a few small gifts, to celebrate the arrival of Three Kings. We also blessed our home, which traditionally Catholics call an Epiphany - Chalk House Blessing.Yesterday we attended the vigil mass after a fun visit to a local park to spend some time with farm animals. I was hoping it would give my kids a sense of what it may have been like in the manger with a newborn and... cows. Not sure I succeeded, in that regard... I'll share pictures from our fun afternoon later in the week.We also blessed our home for the year with the following on the lintel of our front door 20 + C + M + B + 19This isn't algebra, it's a centuries-old Catholic tradition of blessing one's home. You don't see it too often here in the States, but in Europe, we saw it a lot. If you're a Catholic (heck even if you're not) I invite you to bless your home. It's a beautiful and simple way to invite Jesus into your home and ask him to bless your family and all who enter into it for the year.The numbers represent the year we're in 2019. The plus signs represent the Cross, and the letters: C, M, B, are to represent the traditional names of the Three Wise Men or Three Kings, Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar. They also abbreviate the Latin words Christus mansionem benedicat, “May Christ bless the house.”Catholic's traditionally use chalk blessed at the vigil Mass, but if you don't have it, you can say a simple prayer over it. It need not be overly complicated, simplicity is probably best. This chalk blessing and prayer are what we used.
I'd also like to take this opportunity to thank you for visiitng my home on the Internet. I pray you will be blessed with an abundance of love and joy, this year and always.xo
Blessed Because I am His. My Catholic Retreat Experience
This weekend I had the chance to simply be. Be with amazing women who each are beautiful and uniquely the Lord's. I was on a retreat with women from my Church. The theme of the retreat was, “Blessed Because I am His.” It was a beautiful weekend filled with love and sisterhood, each of us bearing witness to how Christ works uniquely in each of us through the many gifts he bestowed on us. We focused on how each and every soul including our own, is His; because we are made in his likeness by Him for Him. I feel blessed because I am His. My Catholic retreat experience was in a word... wonderful.
God wants us to share these gifts. His gifts aren't meant to be kept hidden within us, we are meant to share them.
Having a weekend spent focusing on our gifts was wonderful. It was exactly what I needed because I needed so much to hear it. I generally don't have a hard time sharing my gifts with the world... Except as it pertains to my creative writing.
I have such a hard time sharing this aspect of myself, it can become crippling to my writing. Weird I know, considering the medium through which I am sharing this story. However, the two for me, are entirely separate and unrelated. I need to remember they aren't. They both come from God and He wants me to share my gift for story with you.
We are sanctified with his Grace. I am His, and He lives in all of us.
Having the opportunity to sit and focus my attention on this simple fact was so fulfilling. I left this weekend feeling as though my soul got a bolt of Grace and now I'm ready to take on whatever life sends my way, (including this new story I began outlining last week.) That's the amazing thing about stepping away from our imperfect mundane lives to reflect. One can return to her flawed life and realize how perfect it really is.
During the course of the weekend, we were treated to three lectures.
One discussion was on the topic of the Holy Spirit given by a Sisters from a local parish, the topic focused on the Gifts of the Holy Spirit and how we use these gifts as daughters of the Holy Spirit. I never once thought of myself as being a daughter of the Holy Spirit, but after this discussion, I am confounded as to why I hadn't. I'm going to add it to my catechist toolbox, even though it is SO obvious. Every time I go to Mass, during the Liturgy of the Eucharist the priest prays the Eucharistic prayer and basically tells us this fact...
Have mercy on us all, we pray, that with the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, with the blessed Apostles, and all the Saints who have pleased you throughout the ages, we may merit to be co-heirs to eternal life...
I suppose I always related the "co-heir" to being a sister of Christ but considering the Trinity... Yep. I totally get it now. Which is why I love being Catholic. There is always something new to discover and learn about my faith.
The other two discussions were given by Brigid Hogan. She writes for the Blessed Is She website. I was so impressed by her spirit and her lecture. She said something in one of her lectures which really resonated with me. She referred to saints as "following her around". I loved this, and have certainly had some saints following me around lately, one who I had begun to think on in particular. Just in case your curious they are: Joan of Arc, Therese of Lisieux, and St. Francis De SalesI'm going to speak more on them later in the week.
I had the chance to get to know Bridgid a little bit over the course of the weekend. She is a beautiful soul, and I was so inspired by her passion for her students. She's teaches reading and literature at a school in D.C. where many of her students are immigrants and who've not had the most consistent education. I asked if she could use some new books and she said, "Always". She had me at "reading and literature" but mix in the whole immigration and underserved kids and I'm on a mission to get her kids some new books! Bonus, I get to use some of those
What happens at Retreat...
We celebrated Mass twice on Saturday and Sunday, and both homilies were moving. The first focused more on the Psalms. It much reminded me of Psalm 100.
Shout joyfully to the LORD, all the earth.
Serve the LORD with gladness;
Come before Him with joyful singing.Know that the LORD Himself is God;
It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves;
We are His people and the sheep of His pasture.Enter His gates with thanksgiving
And His courts with praise.
Give thanks to Him, bless His name.For the LORD is good;
His lovingkindness is everlasting
And His faithfulness to all generations.
During our Sunday Mass, one of our priests from our home parish came to celebrate with us. He is one of those elderly priests who crack a lot of jokes, but in doing so always manages to impart some wisdom... He is quite the character and I always enjoy his homilies.
This time, he told us of a man from one of his parishes he was assigned to in his youth, who when as a new priest to this parish, was confronted by a cantankerous man who demanded he "get rid" of all the people whom he considered unsavory and unworthy of their charity. Of course, this would never happen, instead, Father chose to work on helping the man see these "freeloaders" for the people they were...
In the end, the man began volunteering (though he still grumbled a lot) at the soup kitchen. Over time, this man's character and attitude changed so much that a representative from each of the groups he found distasteful on the Father's first encounter with this gentleman, served as a pallbearer to his wife, at her funeral. Isn't the God wonderful how He works in all of us? God is good!
We said the Rosary a few times. What did you expect? It is a Catholic retreat after all. Would it truly be a retreat without praying the Rosary..? (This catholic mom says "No".) We also had Adoration. Adoration isn't something I really learned about as a child. I don't know why. Either my parents never took us, or our parish really didn't hold it. I'm thinking it's probably the former rather than the later, but either way, as an adult, going to Adoration is something I look forward to. If you're unfamiliar with Adoration, check out this post from Life Teen: A Beginner's Guide to Adoration.
The retreat was held at the Roslyn Retreat Center in Richmond, Virginia. It is a beautiful property. I awoke our first morning there and felt as though I'd awoken in a Jane Austen novel. If I didn't have to attend Mass, I'm pretty sure I would've gotten lost among the fog and hills.
In the evening we relaxed
Boho Themed Baptism
Ellena was baptized on a lovely Sunday morning, on the feast day of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist, at our little military chapel. The day blossomed into a perfect warm summer day, full of sunshine and blue skies. After we came home for a boho themed baptism luncheon.
Ellena was baptized into the Catholic Church on a lovely Sunday morning, on the feast day of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist, at our little military chapel. The day blossomed into a perfect warm summer day, full of sunshine and blue skies. After we came home for a boho themed baptism luncheon.
Scroll down to the bottom of this post, for links and things...
After her baptism, we came home for a lovely and simple bohemian themed lunch. You know I love a theme, so I decorated our dining area with dream catchers I made using doilies and ribbon.
All the ladies wore flower crowns I made and after lunch, we dined on a delicious homemade (from scratch) vanilla bean cake "naked" cake I made. I'm so not a baker, but I do try.
The cake recipe I used can be found here: Vanilla Naked Cake. Do add the fresh raspberries... it's sooo good. I decorated the cake with fresh roses and peonies.Directions on how to make a flower crown can be found here, or you can always buy a flower crown. This is a cake stand similar to my rustic live edge serving platter I really like these dream catchers. Had I seen these prior to making my own, I totally would've bought these instead. This one has gold dipped feathers just like the ones I made. These come in a four pack! Seriously! I could've saved some cash! I purchased this rustic cake topper from the Etsy shop, Seaside Sass. These glitter ones are cool too and they come in a bunch of different colors!
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