Other

I have a lot of thoughts in my head right now but just not enough time to get them all down on paper. But I’m heading to Houston tomorrow and I’m hoping that some quiet time in a hotel room will give me a little bit of time to actually write paragraphs and such. I’m also hoping it will afford me the opportunity to order a cheese plate and a glass of wine from room service while I watch something on Bravo on TV.

And in case you’re in the area, I’m speaking at the women’s spring luncheon at St. Martin’s Episcopal Church in Houston on Wednesday, the 26th and will be in College Station on Friday, the 28th to speak at the Aggie Women’s Legacy Luncheon at the Annenberg Presidential Conference Center.

Here’s a quick list of things you might like and/or might make you laugh and/or might just be informational.

1. She Reads Truth Bible

I got this She Reads Truth Bible in the mail about two weeks ago and it’s quickly become one of my favorite things. It’s the Christian Standard Version of the Bible and includes built-in devotionals, reading plans, cultural context and even an opening few pages on how to read and study the Bible. A friend told me a few weeks ago that she felt like she needed a “Bible For Dummies” and this is kind of that but wrapped in a beautiful, smart package.

It seems to be backordered a lot of places, but you might be able to find one in your local LifeWay store or just order on Amazon and know that in a few weeks your future self will thank your past self for being heads up and placing an order.

2. At Home in the World by Tsh Oxenreider

I am such a homebody. There just isn’t anywhere I’d rather be than in my own house and even on the best vacations, I find myself ready to come home. Which is why I love the idea that home and family can really be found in different ways. Tsh is a beautiful writer and this would make a great summer read.

From the inside flap:

What would you say if your spouse suggested selling the house, putting the furniture in storage, and taking your three kids under age ten on a nine-month trip around the world? Tsh Oxenreider said, “Thank you for bringing it up first.”

From releasing paper lanterns in Thailand to experiencing the community of strangers in Zimbabwe, Tsh invites readers to join her on a trek around the globe without the cost of a ticket; to discover the people, places, and stories worth knowing about; to belong in the familiar and yet feel at home outside of it; and to find the balance between wanderlust and rootedness. “Travel has taught me the blessing of ordinariness, of rootedness and stability,” she writes. “It can be found anywhere on the globe.”

3. gap sleeveless drapey scoop-neck dress

I ordered this dress from Gap last week and now it’s on sale for just $24. It’s super soft, totally lightweight and also comes in gray, black or navy. It’s a great dress for summer.

4. febreze laundry odor eliminator

I bought this at HEB last week out of desperation because Piper and Mabel think our outdoor furniture is for them and so they are always on it. This is fine until we are actually having people over and want it to smell like not dog. However, it was hard to get the dog smell out.

This Febreze laundry odor eliminator works like a charm. You just add it in with your normal detergent and it has made even the stinkiest things smell fresh. When you have a husband who owns a landscape business and a daughter who plays soccer, that is known as a miracle in a bottle.

5. dior addict long-wearing tattoo color tint

I haven’t bought this yet because I’m not sure what color to get, but I am excited about the promise of it. I love a long-wearing lip color and this one is allegedly not drying and stays on a long time.

6. 13 Reasons Why…Your Life Matters

I’ve been hearing about the Netflix show 13 Reasons Why and was glad to see that my friend Sissy Goff, the Director of Child and Adolescent Counseling at Daystar Counseling Ministries in Nashville, is writing about it for both kids and parents.

7. It’s Not Okay To Just Start Talking to People You Don’t Know

Sophie’s friend, Daphne, linked to this on Facebook and it cracked me up. You know what they say, there’s always some truth in comedy.

8. 19 Best Children’s Book Quotes

I loved reading all of these and it included some of my personal favorites.

9. B&N Teen Blog

Caroline is a reading machine and sometimes she can’t find a new book. This teen blog at B&N has been a great resource and has helped her find some things that she may not have found otherwise. Not all of them are necessarily for everyone, but it’s definitely got some great suggestions.

And the B&N Reads Blog is a great place to look when I need something new to read. I plan to read all the books this summer because my spring reading has been lackluster at best.

10. caffeinated tee

And now I’m going to bed because there’s a reason I keep looking at this Caffeinated tee from Milk & Honey and thinking I need it.

Have a great day.

Well, I feel terrible because Monday was apparently National Haiku Poetry Day and I didn’t even get Mabel a cake to celebrate. And don’t think she didn’t notice. I found this in her notebook just a little while ago.

It hurts when your mom
Fails to foster your talents
Haiku is my life

Guilt. The gift that keeps giving. I’ve already marked it on my calendar for next year.

We had a fun but busy Easter weekend around here which I’m sure is part of why it slipped my mind that Monday was National Haiku Poetry Day. It’s almost as bad as that time I forgot when it was National Eat A Carrot Day.

Caroline didn’t have school on Friday so we spent the early part of the day running errands and then had invited her soccer team over to go shopping and then eat dinner at our house later that afternoon. It’s safe to say that it was not quiet anywhere within a five mile radius of our house on Friday night.

The girls had a great time and managed to not only eat a record amount of hamburgers but also clean out a plate of brownies and cookies in a shockingly small time frame. Filling them up with burgers and cookies must have worked because they managed to beat the number one team in their division 4-1 the next day. And since this is how sports superstitions are born, guess who’s hosting a team dinner again this weekend?

We had the aforementioned soccer game on Saturday and went out to lunch with the team afterwards before coming home and doing absolutely nothing the rest of the day until we decided it was time to dye Easter eggs later that night.

Dyeing eggs with a teenager is definitely a lot calmer than dyeing eggs with a toddler. I only stressed out about getting dye on my new white cabinets 40% of the time instead of a full 100%.

Side note: Several of you have asked for a post about the kitchen remodel and I promise it’s on my list and I’ll do it soon. I’ve just been waiting for a few final things to get finished first.

On Sunday morning we got moving early to go set everything up at Community Worship. We were serving communion plus having an egg hunt for the kids afterwards so there were a lot of moving parts to get together. We also ended up being short on our childcare staff so I spent Easter Sunday morning with the kids and doing my best to keep the little girls from getting marker on their pretty smocked Easter dresses. I succeeded moderately at this.

After church, Mimi and Bops came over for an Easter brunch. I’d made a sausage, egg, and hash brown casserole the day before in a shocking change of pace from my traditional breakfast casserole and we all agreed we liked the hash browns in place of the bread better, especially since I always make a french toast casserole,too. I mean I’m not one to ever feel you can have too much bread, but I also believe that a potato is always a solid bread substitute.

We did manage to take a few pictures after church on Easter. Of course we didn’t get a picture of all three of us together because we were all so ready to be back in our pjs.

And Caroline was also happy to see that the Easter Bunny still shows up for teenagers.

Although the Easter Bunny wasn’t smart enough to hide that basket anywhere better than on top of the washing machine in the laundry room where it was actually discovered on Saturday night. Sometimes the Easter Bunny is as dumb as that tooth fairy who used to always forget to pick up teeth.

Hope you all had a great Easter.

And a lovely National Haiku Poetry Day.

Also, your taxes are due today.

Mabel wrote a haiku about it:

Today is the worst
I don’t even make money
What is income tax?

I have been meaning to write a blog post all week and then every night I sit on my couch and something happens. It’s called Netflix and lethargy.

Of course it’s only Tuesday night at this point so I guess it’s only two nights that I meant to write something and ended up paving the road to good intentions with Schitt’s Creek and a glass of wine. I think I’ve just needed some downtime because this is the first week I haven’t traveled in a while.

Speaking of travel, I mentioned that I went to New York last week. It was basically an advance trip to meet with various people about my new book that comes out in October. I flew into the city last Tuesday night and had meetings all day on Wednesday. And when I say all day, I mean I left my hotel room at nine that morning and got home a little before midnight. When they say New York is the city that never sleeps, they apparently mean it literally.

But it was such a fun day. The weather was a perfect sixty degrees without a cloud in the sky and we even had time to stop in the Anthropologie in Rockefeller Plaza which is the best of all the Anthropologies. And, in what was maybe my favorite part of the day, we got to visit the main Harper-Collins offices in the financial district.

That is a terrible picture but the offices are amazing and they have all these walls with quotes painted on them. This year marks the two hundred year anniversary of Harper-Collins publishing and this nerdy bookworm found the offices completely awe-inspiring. To think of all the authors they have published and all the amazing words that represents was completely amazing.

I fell into bed a little after midnight on Wednesday night which was especially unfortunate when you consider that my car to the airport arrived at the hotel at 5:00 a.m. which was really 4:00 a.m. to my central time zone brain. But I was relieved that I booked the early flight when we were boarding the plane at 7:00 a.m. and the flight attendant announced that the weather was getting increasingly worse and if we didn’t leave the gate in ten minutes we wouldn’t be leaving that day. I have never had to resist the urge more to yell “GET YOUR CARRY-ON AND GET ON THE PLANE, PEOPLE!”

I landed back in San Antonio about 1:45 that afternoon after a layover in Dallas and then took a quick power nap before P and I headed to Caroline’s track meet that evening. She was supposed to run three events but strained a leg muscle during her first event and ended up not running the last two events. I was sad for her, but not sad to get back home at 9:00 p.m. instead of 11:00. I had no idea track meets last so long. It’s like a thing no one tells you as a parent. I guess because then nobody would run track and Usain Bolt would have never happened because his parents would have said, “Nah, those track meets last for like seven hours.”

I don’t remember anything that happened Friday because I was so tired. I have a vague memory of working the popcorn booth at Caroline’s school’s spring carnival and hating myself for being optimistic enough two weeks earlier to think I wouldn’t be too tired to work a popcorn booth at a junior high carnival.

Saturday morning was glorious because I was able to sleep in. Caroline had soccer at 3:00 but that allowed for plenty of time to stay in pajamas and drink coffee and just be leisurely. And then we headed to her soccer game.

Her legs are officially longer than mine even though she is still three inches shorter than me. I don’t know what this means except that she needs new jeans. Her leg was still bothering her from the track meet but she played a great game and we didn’t realize she was playing in pain until the game was over. It also may explain why we looked over when we got home and she was stretching on the rug one minute and then dead asleep the next.

Bless her heart.

On Sunday we had church and then I took yet another nap. And now I’m just trying to get caught up on real life because I realized that maybe I should get our taxes together since they’re due in a week and perhaps going to the grocery store is a good move since we were down to two bags of chips, a granola bar, and a questionable bunch of grapes.

I also managed to melt a straw from one of our water bottles on the heating element of the dishwasher last night and make the whole house smell like a chemical factory. It brought back terrible flashbacks to one Easter when I was little and the Easter bunny had hidden a plastic egg full of jelly beans on top of the lightbulb of a table lamp and then forgotten about it. You may not know what melting plastic and jelly beans smells like but people in hell do.

But to make up for the melted straw debacle and the lack of groceries in our refrigerator and the fact that P has been doing most of the cooking, I made this one pan balsamic chicken and veggies for dinner tonight. The only problem was I forgot that I really don’t like chicken or veggies. There are some things that even balsamic vinegar can’t fix. But it was healthy and we ate it and then I cleansed my palate with one of the Easter sugar cookies that my mother-in-law had brought by earlier in the day.

In summary, I am winning at real life right now.

And I will not cook chicken again for a long time.