Stranded: Books

Hi! It’s been crazy around here. We’ve been packing boxes and running errands and all sorts of things these past two weeks so my blogging as been sporadic. I’m hoping to get back on track soon…hang with me!!!

Today I’m participating in Shay and Erika‘s stranded link-up and we’re talking books.

What 3 books would I take off my bookshelf if I was stranded on an island?? Ugh, this is hard. I don’t know if I would want to read or if I would be too pre-occupied and anxious to read. You know what i’m saying?!

The first book that I would try to make sure that I had was some sort of guide for surviving on a deserted island. You know, ’cause i’m all practical and stuff 😉

I’d get this book so I could figure out WHAT THE HECK TO DO. It looks helpful and probably would be a good read as a just in case. In this guide you’re suppose to figure out how to signal for help, get drinkable water, and catch food. I’ll need all the help I can get!

If I was stranded on an island I would want a funny book, you know to entertain me and also keep me sane.

So i’d pick Bossypants by Tina Fey because…
-SO MANY OF YOU recommended it and really loved the book
-I haven’t read it before, which I’d love because I don’t read books more than once
-It’s also an autobiography which is my favorite!
-It was rated on buzz feed’s most funny books

Win, win!

And the third thing I would take with me is a series. You know, have a long drawn out series to read to keep me occupied while I am waiting on someone to come rescue me. That’s a good idea, right?!

I’m normally not into all the mystical creatures and made up stuff with vampires and witches, but Morgan LOVED the Twilight series along with just about everyone else. I’ve seen the movies (and liked them) but I haven’t read the books. Do you suggest I take this series or would I have a better series to read while I’m stranded??

YAY FOR READING!!! Except I probably wouldn’t be this happy and I wouldn’t have a school book with me. Haha!

So what do you think? Would you keep it practical or would you just take your favorites? I’m really hoping I would never be in that situation!

Ps…to see my reads for 2016 click here! And in case you’re looking for other great options, check out a link-up I host on the first Wednesday of every month (don’t worry it doesn’t interfere with this one) called Bookworm Wednesday!!!

Books in May

I’m a huge fan of reading. There are few things in life that are better than laying on the couch with a good book, a beverage of choice, and nothing to do.

I always take a book with me when i’m traveling, whether it’s to Boston, my grandpa’s farm, or a family road trip.

And definitely to school. Even to read in my classes.

This month with finals taking a week, being with my friends for an entire week, and going to Boston for a weekend I really didn’t spend too much time reading. I’m hoping that when the sun starts shining soon (fingers crossed considering we were having tornados yesterday) that i’ll be able to take a book out to my backyard with me to lay out in the sun. Have I mentioned how much I love summer???!

I started The Best Yes because of all the recommendations for the book. Now that i’ve finally finished it i’m not really sure I actually liked it. It was okay, but it just seemed to take me a while to get through. I think I had such high expectations for it because of how many times I saw others talking about how it was such a good book. She does a lot to relate to the mom readers and while that’s good, i’m just not in that stage of life right now so maybe at that time I can pull this one out and re-read it. There’s a lot of correlation with scripture from the Bible which I really liked.

Unglued was a book that I heard of with The Best Yes. I’m actually still reading it with just a couple pages left to finish. I can probably finish it up tonight, but I liked this one better than The Best Yes. This book was more about handling yourself in conversations and situations when you kind of just want to punch the other person square in the face. I really related to this one because I know I have a very short temper. It just teaches us different ways to handle situations we might be in that we just want to explode.

The book also pictured above, Let’s All Be Brave, is going to be my next read. Being brave in tough situations is something I really want to work on. This can look different to all of us, so I think that I can really use things from this book in different parts of my life.

I was watching our sermon Monday night from this past weekend and our pastor recommended this book. So, the next time i’m needing to purchase a book…boundaries is it!

I told ya it was not going to be a very long list today. I’ve been a book slacker. Have you read boundaries? Is it as good as my pastor was making it seem?

Show and Tell: Organization Tips and Tricks!

Today’s Show and Tell is all about our personal organization and tips. And if you know me you know this is SO up my alley. In fact, everything that I wanted to include was in my photo gallery already because i’ve posted about organization. I love. being. organized.

Organizing just makes me feel so much more put together when I feel like i’m going all sorts of directions. This is probably my guilty pleasure. I’ve been known to spend a couple $100 on organization stuff. I don’t know, maybe that’s just gossip. Maybe that’s true. Sooooooo today i’ve listed organizational tips from different parts of my life.

Home Office

 

I have my work office and my home office. In my home office ( a credenza turned desk), I usually keep all my personal paperwork (paystubs, medical records, receipts, etc). I usually put all my papers into these folders right away because I hate when there are random papers laying around on my desk. I labeled these folders with different colors; usually I can remember the colors associated with each: To do-green, to file-pink, to read-yellow and there are more of these, don’t you worry!. If you were a teacher you could put: To grade. Another good idea for bills is: To pay. You know, that type of thing.

Closet

Before:

I recently re-organized my closet. Check it out right here and see what I did. I love this jewelry box, my Uncle made it for me, however I couldn’t see all of my pieces of jewelry. One day I went to The Container Store and got this bracelet three-tier organizer and I really like it. I can see everything I have. The only difficulty is if I want something from the middle, but those are usually the pieces I don’t wear as often.

After:

Before:

When I was using our guest room closet and when I was in my dorm room I used this bucket to hold all my shoes. Again, I couldn’t see anything and it was irritating when I was in a hurry or couldn’t find the match to a shoe I was looking for. So at Bed Bath and Beyond one day I snatched this shoe organizer and it’s awesome. I can see everything and it’s all organized!

After:

Attic

 

We are right now in the process of re-organizing our attic and getting rid of things we don’t need. It’s crazy right now, but usually we have everything in sections (Dad’s stuff, Christmas, Kids’ stuff, Mom’s fabric, etc) We label all of our boxes, so we know what’s in everything instead of it being a guessing game. The picture above right is what we put all of our wrapping paper in to keep it together. Wrapping paper thrown everywhere = unwrapped disaster.

Spiritual Life

 

Organization in your spiritual life is super important. These three things above left usually go everywhere together when they are with me, i’m thinking they should probably be glued together. Except, at Church I usually leave my Jesus Calling at home. I think setting aside specific time in your spiritual life is key. I love to highlight all over my Bible, I use those sticky tabs to mark certain sections or verses I want to memorize. And now i’m going to begin using this Daily Devotional printable from Emily Ley’s sight during my Quiet Times. Maybe this will help you too?

Pantry

 

We organized our pantry this past fall. All of our extras went on the top shelf of our pantry and everything is now organized into labeled buckets within the pantry. Yes!!!! It’s an organized girl’s heaven.

Physical Life

 

I’ve probably said it once before and I’m sure i’ll say it again, but working out is the. best. thing. you can do for yourself. It really is. Check out my running post here to see what I mean. I stay organized in my physical life and keep healthy by that LuLuLemon bag in the picture right above here. I keep a spare everything in that bag and all I have to do is pick it up and go work out. It’s a lifesaver!

I hope you got some ideas today. I’m sure there will be way more where this came from 😉 Stay organized, people! It really does change things!

PS. If you’re having a bad day, just think…you could be me sitting in classes for 12 hours. Hmmm, suddenly that traffic isn’t so bad, huh?

Colors of Life: Crafting & Creativity

Today I decided it was probably time to do a Colors of Life post. So, we’re talking about crafting! It’s kind of weird that this would be a color of my life, but hopefully you’ll see why.

I’m going to be real here and say I actually hated crafting when I was younger. Anything creative I was out. In fact, when we had school projects I would usually wait until the day before in order to start them. It was dumb, but I hated any kind of creative thing. Art was my least favorite specials in elementary school. I’d rather have gone to the library! Haha

I started having to craft when I joined a sorority, because the stereotype is true, sorority girls CRAFT!! Look, I know i’m not going to be the next Picasso or something of that sort, so with that being said let’s make this a no judgment zone? Cool? Cool!

When I got my big in the sorority she gave me crafts, and so when I got my little I made her a bunch of crafts, it’s just what you do! Below are just two crafts that I made for her. I was pretty proud of these, so I decided that maybe I do enjoy being creative and crafting after all.

Apparently allllll four of my friends just decided to have fall birthdays. There were 3 in October, 1 in November. The first one I made was for Emily (the second one) you’ll be able to meet her soon! When I did my interview for her I got her favorite Bible verse from one of the questions…and turned it into a craft that matched her room.

Crafting takes a lot of thought and a lot of planning….of which I was not prepared for. With Emily’s craft I started here and did not like it ONE BIT! I ended up with the final product (pictures above) and then I got excited about it.

My favorite part about crafting is when whoever I give my gift to gets excited about it also and sends me a picture right away. Emily hung her craft up and the picture on the bottom I also gave her because it was yellow and grey, my favorite colors and her favorite colors! It’s meant to be.

Then I made Maddie’s craft (you’ll meet her soon too).

I also like that crafting forces you to problem solve in a way. I originally planned on making this craft for Maddie, but I didn’t love it and her room had grey and not black in it. So I took them off!

It then turned to this

and the finished product of this one.

She didn’t send me a picture, but I hope it matches her room perfectly!

Reeana was the third October birthday. I’m telling y’all, my friends wear me out here! 😉

I got the idea below on Pinterest and decided to turn it into her background. It sat background finished like that for a couple weeks because I couldn’t decide what I wanted to write on it, and she showed me her favorite verse (also on her MMP) and it was so long.

However I fit it on there, and she later said I didn’t have to do the whole verse and I felt like an idiot afterwards, but it’s all about learning.

And it turned out like this! I sent her a picture and she said she loved it after my perfectionist self sent her 5 pictures of me “fixing it” hahah she’s a good friend for just saying she likes it!

And my FAVORITE recent craft is this one I made for myself, go figure right? My FAVORITE pattern is leopard, my FAVORITE color is yellow, and my FAVORITE fabric is burlap (the sides are burlap) and this is my blog’s Bible verse. I just love, love this!

We’ve already talked about how I always have to be busy. It was just the way I was made, I guess. Crafting has become an easy outlet for me to relax. Sometimes when i’m having a weird day i’ll pull out some canvases and start drawing. I NEVER thought i’d be one of those people.

Making these crafts is a thoughtful way to gift for people. I’d prefer a cheap, thoughtful gift over an expensive, last minute gift any day, I think that’s also why these crafts became my friends’ birthday gifts. Because they’re personalized for each of them.

Now I consider crafting to be anything of the creative sort that you make, do you remember these blankets from my whiny edition weekend recap? We made these after they saw mine and they’re precious! Cute and personal gift, too!

I can’t take credit for this one below, because my mom made this. But this is just another example of how to let your creativity shine!

And I can’t forget about my favorite kind of craft ~scrapbooking~

If you’ve been reading around her a while you already know that I enjoy scrapbooking.

 Why do I love crafting?

1. It gives me something to do.
2. It (usually) looks good and costs less.
3. It’s a good way to let my creativity flow.
4. You can create so many things.
5. It helps me to use my right-brain a little more and relax from all my hard organization.
6. If you work with kids-babysit, nanny, teach, etc. this is a fun thing to do with them.

SO, as you can see i’m working on my creativity a little bit. Are you a crafter? Creative? Or super meticulous, left-brained, and organized like me?

Color of Life: White (crafting starts with a blank/white/clean slate)
Maybe I do have a little bit of creativity stored up in there. Find your hobbies. You can always learn new things about yourself. Don’t be afraid to try something new.

Why I love running, and you can too!

I realize I might be preaching to the choir here. A small choir. A small choir that will probably fall asleep on me. But hang with me, i’ve got some good stuff!

My hobby of running has come about recently and running and I have come a long way through the years. I used to strongly dislike it. Scratch that, I loathed running. I’m serious, in middle school Tuesdays were deemed “mile days” and if I was “sick” on any day of the week it was Tuesday. Then, I ran track in 7th grade because all my friends were (go figure) and I didn’t like the competitiveness of running (having people counting on me in relays and coaches/runners/spectators yelling at me to move faster during the sprints.) To the yelling people: my short little legs can only carry me so fast!!!! So track and I were done after that. I was okay in soccer with the running thing, because I loved soccer so I didn’t really care about running if I was playing. Same with volleyball, we had to run sprints inside the gym, and on occasion we ran on the track. But it was something I loved to do, so I did. After volleyball season senior year was over, I said a big fat SEE-YA to running and we parted ways.

Then, good ol’ college came along. And yeah, freshman 15. Whatever. We don’t talk about it. I knew I had to start doing some sort of exercise. We had a rec center, but the group exercise classes cost extra so I said no…i’m not a money tree. Trying to get broke college students to pay extra for an exercise class?? Did they get anyone to go?? So I had to start running on the treadmill, ’cause it was free. I like free. BUT I DISLIKED TREADMILL RUNNING SO MUCH! I hated that I stayed in the same place and didn’t feel like I got anywhere and people were next to me and they smelled and I could hear them breathing and it just stunk. Literally and metaphorically. Plus I didn’t lose weight like I was thinking I should have, so I said sayonara treadmill. I tried the elliptical and the stair stepper but it hurt my knees (I have osgood-schlatter for all you docs out there).

I then tried doing some work-outs that I found on Pinterest and I got way too bored with them so I stopped. As for a gym membership, like I said…broke college student…it’s not gonna happen. My dad ran marathons, triathlons, etc. but had to stop a couple years ago. I always saw him running so I began to run, but I only ran one mile at a time. That’s all they taught us in school with our “mile tuesdays” so I thought that’s what I had to do. And I disliked that too. I was exhausted and it was unpleasant and I didn’t look forward to it, so I decided it was on to something else. Thus, my interval running was born.

I love running because….

1. It’s a different kind of “in-shape”. I’ve heard it before and now i’ll repeat it but there is a complete difference in being in shape and being in running shape.
2. It’s refreshing after a lousy day. They say exercise release endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Happy people just don’t shoot their husbands. (Legally Blonde reference…I really hope you caught on)
3. I feel great when i’m exhausted and sweaty. This is totally weird, I know. But it gets your pores to open up, and releases those toxins out of your body. Plus at night you fall asleep so fast cause you’re tired.
4. It’s helped my intestinal health. We’ve already talked about my issue with constipation on my health post. But i’ve noticed that running, well working out for that matter, has increased my gastrointestinal function.
5. It’s free. I don’t have to buy the sidewalk I run on or the air I can breathe? I like that.
6. I love fresh air, it’s good for the lungs. It’s good for the heart. It’s good.
7. You get effects even when you’re not doing it. Running revs your metabolism, so even when you’re at rest your metabolism has still increased from your normal.
8. It tones your entire body. After you do it for a while, you start seeing results. The more often you run, the faster the results.
9. If nothing else, it gets me to drink tonnnnnns of water, and that’s awesome. We need water.
10. It’s AMAZING for you mentally. Running is such a mental thing. If you can push through that last 30 seconds of your interval, you can push yourself to just about most things. And it just gets your mind off whatever is bothering you. See below.

I don’t know, this just gets me pumped up for some reason!!!
ps. this applies to you males too.

My running tips for you:

1. Listen to your body, most importantly. Some days you’ll feel strong like you could run twelve marathons (I haven’t hit that yet), and some days it will feel tough to even get your feet going. On those days don’t push yourself too hard.
2. Change things up. Some days I run intervals of “walk5-run5-walk5-run5-walk5, etc”. Some days walk5-run6-5-6-5-6,etc. “. Sometimes “walk2-run5-walk2-run4-2-3-2-2-1, etc.”. It’s good for the body to change it up so your muscles don’t get in too much of a routine. Plus, I like getting a little “rest” time in between my running time.
3. Get some sort of a watch that will keep time. I keep my iPhone or iPod in that running band (THIS is mine for $6!!) so I don’t want to be looking over at it while i’m trying to run. I use my dad’s super old watch because he can’t use it anymore. I know plenty of people that use the Garmin and love it.
4. Get good shoes. Y’all, I wore Nike Frees allll of high school and the beginning of college for running because they were cool. Ow, did my feet ever hurt. Even at the Nike store the salesperson said those shoes aren’t for working out, they’re for looks. Now, I’m an Asics girl, so you’ll always see me in my favorite shoes. The pair I have is the ASICS Women’s GEL-Noosa Tri 9 Running Shoe and I promise, promise, promise they are worth the money and you will not regret buying them. (Sorry for the sweaty pics, just trying to keep it real haha)
5. Find a playlist. If nothing else it will help distract your mind from the “oh my gosh, I hate this” thoughts. I usually pick either really upbeat songs or songs that take me back to a memory and then i’ll start thinking about that, and what I was wearing, and who I was with, and oh yeah….I just went .5 of a mile.
6. Find a running buddy if you want. I usually go alone because I don’t like people listening to be breathe really heavily haha, but I have before. It gives you some social time, and you’re exercising. Win, win!
7. And lastly…stretch, stretch, stretch!

And when you do ;), take some weird sweaty selfies like mine, and tag me so I can cheer you on!!
Can’t wait to share more fitness posts with you.

Scrapbooking

I picked up my hobby of scrapbooking really early, when I was in 7th grade to be exact. If I remember correctly this was the first hobby I ever had, besides sports if that counts. My mom was tired of hearing me say all weekend “I’m bored, I don’t know what to do” so she would tell me “Get a hobby!” And so I did. I never was a creative kid…totally left-brain over here, so this is as close to creative as it got for me.

I really enjoy taking pictures because I think it’s always fun to look at them and say “Ewwww, that’s what I looked like” or “Jeez mom, that’s how you dressed me?!” or “Oh my gosh I remember, that was so fun!” Whichever reaction that I have to the picture, I always love the memory that it brings, even if it wasn’t the most fond memory I have. It is still a memory.

Scrapbooking is another reason I started to blog. Scrapbooking is more of my tangible blog.

I think the majority of time when people think of scrapbooking it’s usually something like…the book you flip through with glitter and ribbons hanging out of it. Well that is true, but not exactly. Here’s what my first scrapbook I made looks like…

Okay, this is the first page. See this is where you look back at the picture and say “Ewwww, that’s what I looked like?!”

These are a couple more pictures from that scrapbook. I made this one summer I was at my grandma’s. It was my vacation to Houston/Galveston/San Antonio with my cousin, Aunt, Uncle, and his grandson.

It’s also fun when people give you scrapbooks. These two I got when I graduated high school. My friend, Alyssa gave me this one of just SOME of our memories.

So cute. And to this one I can’t even say “Mom, that’s how you dressed me??” Cause I dressed myself then. 😉

This next scrapbook my family gave me when I graduated. Everyone including Aunts/Uncles, Great Aunts, Grandma’s friends, Grandpa, Cousins, etc. wrote me pages about their favorite memories and attached pictures. Here’s how some of them turned out:

It’s still fun two years later to go back and look at the pictures. And read what everyone had to say their favorite memories were. I forgot about some of them.

The pictures below are a scrapbook project I completed two summers ago. I nanny these kids and this was the first summer that we spent together. I took pictures of all the fun activities that we did, put it on a 16×20 page, and framed it. I gave it to each of them at the end of the summer. When I went back this year I saw that they still had them, so that was really sweet to see. And it was fun to see how much each of us has changed in that time!

This last scrapbook project I have for you is a page that I made for my big. Some of our friends put together a “Shotbook” for her 21st and had all of her friends make a page, so this is the one I made.

It’s not always glitter and ribbons. But it is memories! And a fun way to keep track of your memories! These were only some of my projects, but my favorite ones!

Friday Favorites

I wish I hadn’t been posting so late, we’ve been moving stuff around our house and getting back into the swing of things from being back from vacation. Today’s Friday Favorites with Andrea, Erika, and Narci are going to be my favorite things to do! Because, what are we without our hobbies?

1. Cooking

2. Working Out/Doing Yoga

3. Reading

4. Finding a good bargain

5. Scrapbooking

6. Like yesterday’s post said…gardening

7. Going on adventures!!

Come back Monday for my post about our vacation last week! Have a great weekend!!

Gardening

Gardening is the most recent hobby I have picked up. It all started when mom and I were running dads errands (of course) and we were getting something at Lowe’s for him. Mom decided to stop by the outdoor plant section. She loves her some Italian food and so we always either have basil growing outside or sitting somewhere in the kitchen. See…

This is outside the garage,,,of all places. Next to dads pot of grass. He’s weird, I know. But that’s another story for another time.

Anyways back to Lowe’s, we were searching for basil and mom couldn’t find her sweet basil (no really that’s what it’s called), she didn’t want Italian basil or whatever other kinds of basil they had. Just regular sweet basil. So once she realized they didn’t have any more in stock she decided to look at the parsley, oregano, and all her other spices. Momma likes spices. As she was doing that I kind of thought to myself as I was passing the other kinds of vegetables how cool it would be to start my own “garden”. So, with moms credit card, I did just that!!! (See, there are perks of living at home.)

We bought cilantro, cucumber, edamame (dad’s favorite), oregano, tons of basil, spearmint, peppermint, chives, rosemary, and dill. You see we didn’t do the whole vegetable garden because my mom, the poor woman, she just can’t grow a weed if she wanted to. So she bought them and said I had to take care of it. I didn’t have any background info on gardening beforehand so I decided to start small. This is how it turned out…

My own personal mini garden, and I think it’s perfect. It’s fun, and sometimes hard because it’s easy to forget about it. My dad helps though because Saturday’s are his work-outside-days so he waters on the weekends. I enjoy gardening because it’s a lot of practice nurturing and being patient, both of which come in handy at times.

SO, 3 months later and this is where i’m at:

This is my favorite plant in my garden because it’s shown the most growth. You can see my little cherry tomatoes coming in!! Can’t wait to be eating them!

This is my least favorite plant to garden: My cilantro… it shot up the quickest….at first. I went outside the other day and saw that my poor cilantro was thrown in the trash.

As crazy as it sounds this is another thing I like about gardening, the failures! Life is full of failures and now i’ve learned that I can’t grow cilantro (i’m blaming on that ol’ TX heat) but a lesson learned is a lesson learned. I see gardening to be very therapeutic (when it’s not hot outside).

Read Any Good Books Lately?

As you might have read on my Hobbies homepage I have become a fan of reading. Weird for my age, actually. But it’s fun and I do enjoy it. I try to make it through one or two books a month with all of my other activities. But this summer I have made it through a lot more than that. It’s kind of my downtime thing, when i’m babysitting, waiting in a doctor’s office, before brother’s baseball games, etc. This summer started off with the Love Comes Softly series:

One of my absolute favorite series i’d have to say. Mainly because of the memories from watching the movies with my grandma, but also because of the story line. It’s the perfect “olden days” western time story. Click to get Love Comes Softly (Love Comes Softly Series, Book 1) for yourself!

And click to get the movie! Seriously, you won’t regret it. Plus, Katherine Heigl is in it. You can’t go wrong. I definitely recommend either reading the book or watching the first movie and then you will fall in love with this old love story.

I recently just finished the second book, Love’s Enduring Promise (Love Comes Softly Series #2).

It’s already kind of wrinkled because I look my copy with me everywhere. I can’t wait to finish the rest of the series. I’ve seen the movies so many times! Here’s Love’s Enduring Promise movie link.

In between the Love Comes Softly books I read the famous The Fault in Our Stars book. It’s a must read and must see in theaters. #1 everywhere.

Click here to get The Fault in Our Stars for yourself!

And of course, because Nicholas Sparks is wonderful, I had to throw in one of his books to my mix. I usually watch movies before I read the books (Yes, I am backwards) and that’s how I came across the book. If you don’t already have a copy of A Walk to Remember, get it!!!

Or the movie.
And the last bit of my summer reading, so far…goes to this book, 90 Minutes in Heaven: A True Story of Death and Life.

I happened to find this book for a fantastic sale, but I found it for you for about $8. So worth every penny. There’s a lot of skepticism with this book but I actually found it to be rather uplifting and informational.

This one and Heaven is for Real: A Little Boy’s Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back
should be on your summer reads. There are frequently bought together. Also, Heaven is For Real was in theaters. Yet again another book and movie combination for you. If you are ordering you get free shipping after spending $35, wahoo!

COMING UP THIS WEEK:

Monday: Read Any Good Books Lately?
Tuesday: Foodie Toosdy:Week One
Wednesday: What’s on my DVR?
Thursday: Shopping for the beach!!
Friday: Friday Favorites with (Momfessionals, A Little Bit of Everything blog, and Grace and Love blog)