I know it’s not called The Friday Five.

But maybe it should be.

This week has been one where I have been the taxi driver – even with daily carpooling to theatre camp, it’s felt like an awful lot of to and fro, which is what a portion of parenting is, of course, but it is still not my favorite portion.

 

 

funny

 

It’s funny how ridiculous my children act about our cat.  That we’ve had for over a year.  She’s so shamefully well-loved.  Adored.  Treated as if she is some sort of demi god.

It is not at all unusual to find these sorts of photos on my phone taken by my children.

 

 

fashionable

 

Boots and bags.  That’s what I love.  Boot and bags and earrings.  But that’s all.  I mean, mostly.

I also love leather – leather boots and leather bags.  And earrings.  That sort of leather.

 

 

I saw a beautiful tote bag in a local outdoor store here and I had to know more about it.  Turns out the designer of the bag is a local resident and I figured that would make a great story.  It was loads of fun to have his interview this week.  It felt like going home – he works out of a building on an abandoned dairy farm that was once used by Clemson.  It felt dairy barn-ish right away, before I even knew the story.  Anyway, he was an entertaining and kind guy and his work is just really very cool.

 

 

I’m calling it a birthday present.

Because that’s what grown ups get to do.

I’m legitimately infatuated with this bag.

 

 

It is a miracle bag.  The perfect size.  The perfect length.  It has pockets inside made of sail from boats in Charleston.  One pocket is perfect for your water bottle – or, as he said – your wine bottle.  But since I’m not prone to toting Chardonnay (wait, is that a wine?) I’m going to declare it my water bottle pocket.

I adore the bag.  More than I should love an inanimate object, but I feel things strongly, what can I say?  I have all this love to pour out, right? It has to go somewhere.  Hello beautiful bag, the object of my current affection.

It looks good among the boxed ruins of my home – right?

 

 

He also makes wallets – and flip flops.  (Which I watched him make right there during the interview – a specially ordered pair for a client.)  And bigger bags.  I want it all.  All. Of. It.  Well, I’ve got to give the flip flops some thought as I have never in my life owned any legitimate flip flops.  I mean, I have on occasion owned a $1 pair of Old Navy flops but I’ve never really worn them.  But I’m definitely wanting to add the bigger bag and the wallet to my collection of friends.  (What, your inanimate objects of affection are not your friends?  I don’t have a problem.  What are you talking about?)

 

 

Maybe I even named the bag.  And by me, I actually mean that Mosely named the bag.

I came home, toting my prize and grinning and Mosely asked, “Hey, do you like this bag more than Sean Penn?”  (Uh.  This story is only making me look more odd.  Eh.  It’s too late.)

 

 

I couldn’t tell her yet because I don’t know.  They are both great bags for different reasons but I might be more obsessed with one more than the other currently.

Anyway, then Mosely said, “Well, if you name this one too you should name it Walter Mitty.”

To which I laughed, gave her a high five and said, “Done.  Meet Walter Mitty.”

 

 

Isn’t that larger size gorgeous too?  (You can see them all for yourself at his website – Cooks.)

 

flavorful

 

That Trader Joe’s hazelnut date thing.

 

 

Yep.

I saw it on the shelf during this week’s grocery go round and it looked like a batch of some treat I have made before eons ago.  (Five years ago, actually.  According to this blog post.)

I still make them off and on but they’re kind of a pain to make, I forget to buy dates, sometimes dates are hard to find and anyway – this is incredibly convenient, both to purchase and to store and to transport.  The homemade ones do not go into your bag well.  Especially not your Walter Mitty bag.  Too risky.

But these travel easily.  I’ll bet they’ll fit right beside my water bottle.

Anyway.  I think they’re delicious.

 

faithful

 

Every summer our church takes a pause from the routine of studying out a book of the Bible verse by verse.  Instead, a specific topic or theme is chosen and we dive into that biblically for five weeks.

This year the sermon series has been on racism.

Each week I sit in a row beside London, Mosely and Bergen.  This series has created deep conversations and thought provoking questions.  Some blind spots in my thinking have been revealed to me and I feel that I have been educated, challenged, convicted and encouraged in so many ways through the series.

Often we’ve driven home from church asking a lot more questions than we had at the beginning of the summer – about inherent prejudices and subtle thought patterns and ignorance of what other cultures experience.

Last week’s sermon was especially provisional for our family as it felt as if there were questions answered in several directions for us, particularly in the idea of intentionality and how to help the issues instead of ignoring the issues.

We can do better.  We really need to do better.

 

Unity

 

feels

 

People are SO kind.  That annoying hatch issue on my car?  A friend told me to stop by, that her husband was pretty handy at figuring out car problems.

Sure enough, his skill and his suggested amazon purchase and in a couple of days that pesky back hatch will probably be opening just fine – all for the cost of $23 and a couple of really nice humans who went out of their way to take my problems on their own shoulders.

You guys.  Let’s be THOSE sort of humans.

Helpers.  Noticers.  Humans who do good things for the people around them.

 

 

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