Holiday Gift Guide: Themed Collections for the hard to buy for- #FOLLOWITFINDIT

November 22, 2013

{these Collections have been curated as a part of my collaboration with eBay} I’ve gathered some truly unique, hilarious and just plain FUN gift ideas all in one spot for you, friends. Collections on eBay make it easy for you to look up specific categories of items and keep them all in one place, while also getting them at the great eBay prices we all love!   Everyone knows someone who can’t put their smart phone down for fear of missing a tweet or comment on Facebook. I found some hilarious gifts for just that person and called that collection: hashtag holidays: gifts for the social media addicted. I add things as I find them, and I’m having so much fun searching and refreshing the collections. Feel free to follow along. Here are just a few of the great gift ideas I came up with:   Gifts for the Social Media Enthusiast   […]

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smoke and olive oil

November 21, 2013

I felt myself going numb, shutting down, the thing I do with too much stress. I was driving the kids to school, and Miles had started a kitchen fire and we all smelled so much like a kitchen fire. Thank God nothing horrible happened, somehow he stayed calm and threw water on the fire. I was upstairs. What if, what if, what if…. I turned the radio up because it was U2 and also, I just didn’t want anyone to talk and talk and talk. I just couldn’t. Sometimes I feel like I’m being so dramatic. Like I can see myself in the song after the U2 song, like I’m in the video, with the sad and romantic lyrics and I’m so affected, seeking, philosophizing, Staring at the bottom of your glass Hoping one day you’ll make a dream last But dreams come slow and they go so fast I think that was […]

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Just Write {111}

November 19, 2013

Elsie was emptying all the cards and pictures from my Bible on the floor, away from the places I’ve tucked them, marking pages or time. Miles was on the bed with the rainbow loom next to Asher who was listening to me read. Ryan is out of town. I was trying not to lose my patience over chaos and how we’re always behind at bedtime but it felt like deep breaths were expensive. After we did so many things, the four of us, and they were all finally quiet with sleep, I sat stunned by the exhaustion and numb. There was more work to be done, lunches to get ready, dishes, laundry, writing deadlines… Then I put this note on Facebook – I wish there were some sort of motherhood gang sign, or a common phrase we whispered to each other as we walk by–in the store or on the street, at the […]

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a bedtime routine story

November 14, 2013

{This post is about our bedtime routine and there’s a good chance it could help you with yours. It is a sponsored post in partnership with Smart Electric and the words are all mine.} The doctor brings it up, it’s in all the parenting books, and your friends ask when you’re having trouble getting your kids to go to sleep: Do you have a consistent bedtime routine?  “They” all bring it up, because a consistent and predictable routine works. (True, so much of what “they” say is just opinion, but this routine thing totally has proven results.) Our kiddos need signals that become ingrained in their little noggins., so this is one bit of advice we’ve actually stuck with over here at our house. Our boys have never known anything other than “same bat time, same bat channel” bedtime routines, and then Elsie came along and BOY OH BOY does she ever need […]

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