Saturday, December 22, 2012

Let It Snowwwww, Snowwww, Snowwww !!!

This is what it looks like today, outside our kitchen window...

Did I ever mention we live in Maine?

Which means, it's just not right.  :(


However, I could/should be sweeping this...


But I'm still here in my p.j.'s smelling the beautiful aroma of this...


And I feel pretty accomplished having already put together this... (washed one bathroom, put in a load of laundry, and I'm sure I've done something else in between.)

I'm sure of it.  :)


Since she is getting ready for work, (17going on 25 year old), and Blue Eyes is out doing the shooting thing with our boys... (which ALWAYS makes my mothers heart smile)


And even though there are only 3 of these left...


I think I'm going to start another pot of this...




My peeps think they made this blend especially for me.

Funny, only to them.

Wait, did you just chuckle?  :)

It happens to be my favorite.  Go figure

  :)



I will stay beside these, and in front of this, and enjoy listening to Christmas music in an empty house while I can...


Because it won't be long before our house is filled with peeps galore, and the quiet is gone.

But, I'm good with it.  Really.

And on another note, if you or one of your loved ones is hanging on to an annoying cough, go to the health food store and by this.  It is amazing, and I can't tell you enough how much it helped 17, going on 25 year old get rid of a cough that just wasn't going anywhere.

(that's her in the background taking her daily dose. She said it tastes awful, but is so worth it.)


And on the last Saturday before Christmas, I leave you, in the quietness of my house with this...


Hugs From My Grateful Heart

Saturday, December 8, 2012

Rosewood Wreath

Just found this great, easy, and so doable rosewood wreath at Under the Table and Dreaming by, Stephanie Lynn.




The instructions look easy enough, just a little time consuming...

Click onto her link here. Looks like a great rainy day project in the quiet of my house with hot tea and an old Christmas movie... Hugs From My Heart

Thursday, December 6, 2012

Sad Desk Salad

I recently read the book, Sad Desk Salad, written by Jessica Grose.  The book was offered to bloggers as a read with the understanding that we would "review" it when we finished.


The Blogger, Mandy, of The Well Read Wife, (try saying that five times fast), who is a well read wife, sent me a copy last week.  

At first I wasn't sure what the envelope had in it, or who it was from, but squealed like a pig with joy when I realized she took the time to send me a copy, and I could participate.



I'm in!


At least for this book.  ;)

I'm not a writer, or a professional reviewer, and I'm pretty sure there is a "right way" to review a book.  I'm going to review it my way, since that's all I know, and hope for the best.

The book is about a young, popular, mean blog writer named Alex, who spends 12 hours a day in her stinky muu-muu, going from her unmade bed, to her old food stained couch, not even having time to brush her teeth. 

But she does have time to grab a good cup of coffee.  

(Yeah, I like her)

Even though she has a loving, hard working, professional live in boyfriend, she has no time for him or to even shower for that matter.  The book follows a week in her life and how our world is changing so much now that everything and our mail, is online.

She finds herself in a place of feeling stressed, disconnected, and in a moral dilemma, after she has published a video that could potentially ruin a young girls life.  She is also feeling pressured with a threat of being in the same place she has recently put this girl in, by an anonymous blogger who claims to have "dirt" on her, during her college years,  if she doesn't take the video down, pronto.


I finished the book last night realizing how much the world I was brought up in has changed, and how much it is really, the same... just more intense.

I guess what I mean is that it hit me that when we were younger, being brought up to do the right thing, and make the right choices, we had a normal amount of awareness/pressure to do just that.  

The right thing.

We didn't have the reality people now face, that our bad choices can, and probably will be recorded, and broadcast for the world to see.  We only had to worry if Uncle Dave or the neighbor, would get wind of it, and maybe tell our parents, who would then ground us.  End of story.

That is the difference.

The unfortunate thing is, young people are still young people.  And until they are 25, the frontal lobe of their brain is not fully developed.  That, is the reason and logic portion.  

That part is the same.

So I wonder if the reality of their bad choices having the potential of being recorded and broadcast for the whole world to see, (not just your neighbors to hear about it at the corner store), is a good pressure or  not.

Probably not.




Sad Desk Salad was a good read.  I felt like I knew Alex, and was really concerned for her well being. I kept saying to the book, 

 "just take a shower and brush your teeth, you'll feel better sweetie!!!"

It was worth the few days it took to read it because it got me to thinking about this world of internet we live in, and all it is.  

How things have changed so much from when I was a young girl...

and how much they have stayed the same.

Thank you Mandy for taking the time to send me a copy of this book, and allowing me to participate. 

Hugs From My Heart

Saturday, November 17, 2012

"It can be scary to find out that you’ve been wrong about something. But we can’t be afraid to change our minds. To accept that things are different. That they’ll never be the same. For better, or for worse. We have to be willing to give up what we believed. The more we are willing to accept what is, and not what we thought, we’ll find ourselves exactly where we belong.” Meredith Grey

So working on this.

 I'll get there.

 Hugs From My Heart

Monday, October 8, 2012

I Haven't Posted On My Blog For Over A Month!!!

It has been over a month since I've posted on my blog.


For those of us who have blogs, (really, who doesn't now a days), our blogs take on a life of their own it seems.

My blog did anyway.  It was really a good friend.  "Someone" who listened without judgement.

My blog has helped me through a lot of times in my life.


These photos are special to me.  They were taken a couple of years ago now... maybe even three.

Actually... maybe even longer!

Around this time of year.  They are special to me because, this is when I realized I love photography!

It was my favorite time of year, fall, and I was spending it with two of my favorite people.

The one in the photo above, my dear friend, has moved.

From Maine to Texas.

I know right?!

Don't worry, she feels the very same way.  ;)

It sucks.

No two ways about it.


But these photos remind me of where I've been, and how things change.

People you love, move.

You get better and better at what you love to do.  For me, that is photography.

Even though my friend has moved, she is still with me.

We will always be friends.

Close friends.

Even though my photography skills have improved these past few years, my eye, and heart, are still drawn to the same subjects.

Both realizations are a comfort to me.

She is still her.

I am still me.

God, is still in control.

I am one grateful girl.


Hugs From My Heart

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Julia Child Remixed | Keep On Cooking | PBS Digital Studios



Watching Julie & Julia again tonight.



So love that movie.

Love Nora Ephron.

If you have lived under a rock and not seen this movie...

FIND IT AND WATCH IT SOON!!!

You'll be glad you did.

Hugs From My Heart

Monday, August 20, 2012

Unembellished Thought...


Today was a full day-

but I suppose it is about time I take the time to come clean, dear friends. The past three weeks have been some of the most perplexing and generally confusing days this girl right here has walked through in her life up to this point.
For the first time since attending Liberty University (a Christian college), I began working full time in a truly secular environment. As one of the masses of kids who was churched since birth attending Liberty, I had really little to no clue or personal experience with ‘people of the world.’ Because of this, I found it very easy to be drawn up into an ‘us (Christians) and them (the world)’ type of mentality when dealing with people outside of the Liberty bubble, and even those within the Liberty bubble. I assumed that people who did not know the Lord would most certainly judge me for my faith in Him, in the same way I judged those whom I perceived did not desire to have a relationship with my God.
In the past three weeks, time and time again I have found myself absolutely thunderstruck at the amount of grace, acceptance, and really just genuineness shown by my unbelieving coworkers toward me. There has been such a striking difference between the attitudes I expected and the ones I have seen for myself. I have found myself convicted time and time again by the amount of love and tenderness shown forth by those who do not know my Savior. If they have no reason to be this way, how much greater should my love be for others than it is- seeing as I have the true, steadfast love of God indwelling me through His Spirit?
It is time we as Christians take a very long, hard look at the One we claim to have inside us, and ask ourselves how we can continue for even a moment to live with ourselves as we hide the Love we claim to know underneath a pile of religious makeup. This false veneer of perfection is only clogging our pores and creating blemishes on the face of Christ that is visible to the world. It’s time to be genuine, because it is a genuine spirit that confesses its own brokenness without Christ that will allow us to relate to the brokenness of this world. 

This is a tumblr site, I stumbled upon today.  
I thought I should share it with you.  
The young ladies name is Kristen. 
A proper introduction: my name is Kristen. I am a Christ following, autumn adoring, puddle or leaf pile jumping, secret keeping, used book perusing, chai tea and coffee drinking, paint dabbling, shower and car top of my lungs singing, accidental coffee-shop and grocery store checkout line eavesdropping, smell of rain loving, correct grammar wielding, language and word appreciating, once shamelessly people-pleasing but now recovering, rather introverted and exhaustively introspective, twenty-one year-old girl that strives to represent myself and my thoughts both honestly and somewhat eloquently as I grow closer to the One who is forming me into the person He originally created me to be. If you have any questions, please do ask.~ 
If she were my daughter, I would be very proud of her.
Link,  to her tumbr, here.

Hugs From My Heart

A Little Wisdom For Your Monday...



Thanks Eleanor.

I've always believed that we teach people, how to treat us.

Hugs From My Heart

Sunday, August 19, 2012

On Nora Ephron...


Nora Ephron was a woman I could have really liked.

Yup... I think we could have been friends.

Hugs From My Heart

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Just A Few Of My Favorite Kitchens















Hugs From My Heart

Tuesday Morning Breakfast



This, is my breakfast today.

Not because I am trying to be all healthy and eat an enormously huge slice of watermelon.

Only because Blue Eyes ate the rest of the already cut up and in a container waiting for lazy me to eat it other half, last night.  (did I mention HE had cut it up. I couldn't be bothered)

I still can't be bothered to cut this side up into nice bite size pieces so I'll just dig right in!

(my sisters are so laughing at me right now.  Can you tell I'm the youngest.  So lazy!!!)

Our youngest, (17 going on 25), Kate, is going on her second week in Cali with her friends and "sister" Elizabeth, having the time of their lives.


That's her, on the way left... with Lauren, Sam, (her best friend), and Elizabeth.

With Katie gone, I haven't bothered to buy food for the house...


 And with one more week of her having Hot Fun In The Summertime...

Why would I?!!!

Blue Eyes and I are so enjoying this preview of   "empty nest" more then we thought.

We stayed in bed the other day until 11:15!!!

When we finally got up, and I looked at the alarm clock I thought we had lost power during the night.

That would be a negative.  We just slept in.  Way in for us.

:)

Hugs From My Heart

Monday, July 23, 2012

Rush Home Road... Lori Lansens



This book is so good...

"Sharla Cody is only five, but has already lived a troubled life- only to find herself dumped on an elderly neighbor's doorstep when her mother takes off for the summer. Although Sharla is not the angelic child Addy Shadd had pictured when she agreed to look after her, the two soon forge a deep bond. To Addy's surprise, Sharla's presence brings back memories of her own childhood in Rusholme, a town settled by fugitive slaves in the mid-1800s. She reminisces about her family, her first love, and the painful experience that drove her away from home. Brilliantly structured-and achingly lyrical, this is a story about the redeeming power of love and memory, and about two unlikely people who transform each other's lives forever."

Hope you are enjoying your summer.


Hugs From My Heart

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Sunday, July 1, 2012

And For The Rodeo Girl In You...

My good friend is with her husband in New Mexico for the summer.



These are some of the amazing photos she shoots, while doing what they enjoy, attending local rodeos.


If these don't make your inner, YEEEEEHAAA! out, girlfriend, nothing will.  :)







These photos just make me want to get on some cowgirl boots and hat, eat a little dirt, and see a rodeo!


She says..." We went to the Taos rodeo last weekend. 
There were cowboys from NM, Arizona, Colorado, TX, and Oklahoma. 
These guys are for real!!!  


(me, being from Maine, she knew I'd be like, What?)


Can't wait to go to another on July 4th. 
It's the biggest one in the state, held at night, sure to be exciting!" 
_____________________________


Well make sure you take photos girlfriend! 


I can't wait to see more! 


 Hugs From My Heart

Saturday, June 30, 2012

Kristin Hannah on her book, Winter Garden

"Sometimes when you open the door to your mothers past, you find your own future."


I am on the last chapter of a book I found hard to get into at first.

I think we've all read those before.

But now that I'm on the last few pages, I am not looking forward to it ending.

I have learned a lot.

Historically.

So much I could connect to as a wife, mom, daughter.

This book moved me.

"How could any woman know her own story until she knew her mother's"

I am now convinced, I need to know more of my own mothers story.




Hugs From My Heart