HomeLife
How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. - Annie Dillard
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And the winner is …….
We’ve got a little business to take care of today! It was fun to interview Rachael at Twinflower Heights and to GIVE AWAY a fun gigantic height ruler! So – let’s do that now. You know – the giveaway part. After a super complicated procedure where my youngest son wrote down all the names on paper and then he cut the pieces of paper and then he drew them from a cup . . . . . . . The winner is ———- Vicki Hart! Congrats winner! Send an email to me at SoEveryDay@gmail.com and we will connect and I will hand over this cool ruler and then you…
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A Little Black Friday Giveaway
Thanksgiving was lovely. Simple and well spent. Full of far too much food, games of Monopoly that lasted just sightly longer than they should with victory just out of reach for me. Our table was loaded with friends and family and sweet potato pie and grateful hearts. I’m not really into whatever comes after Thanksgiving day unless it involves pie for breakfast and one turkey sandwich on white bread with mustard only. You can count me out of trips to the mall or to Target or to any store at all actually. I might occasionally partake of an online Black Friday deal here or there if it lands in…
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The Instant Pot: A Review
Months ago – was it this summer? – someone shared an Amazon deal on their Facebook page about this little creation called The Instant Pot. I had never heard of it. The comments were aglow with praise for this magical pot. I chimed in with a few questions about why this deal should be scooped up and why – in amazing two days prime shipping time – the Instant Pot should be sitting on my counter changing my life too. I was on the fence when my phone alerted me that a text had arrived. I was on Facebook. My neighbor was texting me from her house…
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Aquarelle: A Timberdoodle Review
Watercolor is one of those artistic endeavors that both intimidates and frustrates me. The intimidation part stems from the fact that I find blending colors and controlling the amount of water vs. the amount of color difficult. That color wheel graphic just doesn’t live icy mind as vividly as it does in an artist’s mind. The frustrating part comes from the mess watercolor can cause. The drippy paintbrushes on the kitchen table. The soggy paper that sticks to the table if I forget to put something else down first. Some place to dry the art for a few days. You know, all those details. But – lest…
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spinning plates ….
Imagine a monkey standing on one leg. Imagine he is spinning six plates on his left hand. Imagine he is also eating his dinner. Furthermore, someone is pelting him with water balloons. Additionally, he is reading a novel out loud to a room full of other monkeys. All while standing on hot coals with his bare monkey feet. Is that monkey you just imagined in your mind wearing my face? Because that’s how I’m seeing myself this past week. (Or – maybe past two weeks, more accurately.) There’s a lot going down and going around and going on and going up and going all around. Some of it is…
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Five Finds Friday (fried eggs, pricey skirts and funny kids)
FUNNY While lying in bed this week, my youngest son and I started a discussion about the quantity of hair upon his seven year old legs. “I have tons,” he said. To which I agreed. And then he said, “Sometimes I lick it. It’s salty.” FASHIONABLE During legging season, I like to wear them. Like, you know, every day. And I’m not here to start a debate on whether leggings are pants because, well, the answer is in the title. Leggings. We call them leggings and not pants. But hey, to each her own, and as long as you are not my daughter still…
Keep Reading . . .
The Right Word.
45.
Five Finds Friday (meatballs, Scrabble, really odd names for kids)
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A Grove Giveaway – those incredible smells!
I feel like I JUST finished a fabulous Grove Collaborative giveaway and it’s already time for another one! (That’s the kind of time flying that feels acceptable to me – from one giveaway to another!) This is another really fantastic (and delicious smelling) giveaway. These soaps also make wonderful Christmas gifts or hostess gifts. It’s just nice to have great smelling soaps for the bazillion of hand washings you do when you are raising kids. And, sometimes, it feels like a simple little luxury to have terrific smelling soap at you kitchen sink. It’s basically like a mom’s perfume. (Well, okay – that’s probably not true for…
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Jump In: A Workbook for Reluctant & Eager Writers – A Timberdoodle Review
My favorite way to teach good writing to junior high students is through good reading. I love to incorporate narration from the novels the kids are reading and to have them grow accustomed to reading well written words, which, in turn, hopefully leads them to writing well written words of their own. But sometimes it’s also really helpful to have a little guide – a handbook, if you will. I was excited to add Jump In: A Workbook for Reluctant and Eager Writers from Timberdoodle into my curriculum this year because sometimes I can forget what expectations are appropriate to have for my junior high writers. This workbook is…
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Draw Your Own Conclusions: the hot water heater in my kitchen
There is an ugly hot water heater that sits in the corner of my kitchen. You can’t move it. It’s giant and I can’t rearrange it to find a spot in another corner or hidden from view. It has to be there. Five years – maybe six – we’ve lived here. In those years I have draped ten or more different colored coverings over it during various seasons — yellow checked, gingham, plaid. Whatever. The table cloths get dirty. They look gross. I try to clean them. But they always look weird. Like they are covering up something shameful and they seem out of place. Last week I took the…
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Lost and Found : one decade down
It always happens in the shower. That’s when I find myself revisiting memories and thinking about things I didn’t even know I was thinking about. Ten years ago. A decade. Ten years ago my life looked very different. For that matter, my shower looked different too! For one – we had two of them. (What a gift, people – TWO showers.) My marriage was in a good place. My mother was alive. The view out my front window was Virginia mountain and field and river’s edge. I didn’t know any children by the names of Otto Fox or Piper Finn. I wasn’t teaching school and I was tripping over…
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Five Finds Friday (stopping to smell the roses)
Well this week was a long one – eh? FUNNY I don’t know you guys. Lots of funny things happened this week at our house. Lots of non-funny things happened too. We laugh a lot here. We read poems to make us laugh – Shel Silverstein is still a favorite. We have a billion and two inside jokes that crack us up. Lately we’ve been going old-school with Mad Libs and those silly stories have us rolling. But I don’t have anything real or solid for you today. I’m tired this week. A lot of moving parts to this week’s schedule have me sleepy and in…
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divorce diaries. entry 5.
I’ve almost forgotten what the routine Used To Be. Almost forgotten what it was like to grocery shop with a partner. The Divide and The Conquer. I’ve kind of grown accustomed to being The Only One. Some days it almost feels as if there never was a Before. (Some days.) Some days I just groove and strut along and forget I was not always in charge of every meal and all the yays and all the nays. And then some days it feels as if I am living with a severed limb. The ghost pains. The crushing weight of No One With Whom To Confer. Should this be allowed?…
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the post where I compare myself to a toad (kind of)
Outside of our dining room window sits a dilapidated old bird house. It’s kind of awesome and it’s kind of broken. (You guys, my whole house is a metaphor for my whole life – wouldn’t you know it?) Yesterday, while we were eating brunch (which we only officially do on Sundays and, by the way, I made sausage and gravy over homemade biscuits for the first time (I think) in my southern life) and we looked at the bird house and there was a frog toad peering over the high perch. Today, I kinda felt like that frog. If that frog could drive a giant bus of…
