Finish This: Week Thirty

Joining {a day late} the awesome link-up hosted by Jen at The Arizona Russums, Nicole at Three 31, Becky at The Java Mama, and Lisa at Coastlined.

I like wearing pajamas around the house. If I'm going to be at home for more than an hour, even if I'm going out again later, I will put on pajamas.
For going out into the land of the living, I like wearing bright colors. I love wearing black with one strong pop of color. Totes fab.

My most memorable style was a Minnie Mouse dress I wore every. single. day. when I was ages 4 and 5. It was hot pink {foreshadowing much?} and had rows of Minnie all over. My mom still has this dress somewhere.

I dress to impress by straightening my hair. Hair makes or breaks the good outfit day, doesn't it? Usually, straightening the hair means it's gonna be a good outfit day.

The best style tip I ever received comes from "What Not To Wear" and my dad says this all the time: "Don't wear jeans unless they make your butt look good." Thank you, Clinton and Dad.

Three wardrobe staples in my closet are a pair of jeans that fit me length-wise, a black shirt {currently loving this one from Target}, and a fabulous scarf. Done.

Three words that describe my style: comfortable, bright, fun.

Thanks for joining! See you next week, home-skillets!

7 Quick Takes: Spiders, Sisters, and Craftiness

Linking up with Jen's friend Carolyn for this edition of 7QT - yay, new friends!

1. Biggest and most exciting news first: I finished my Doctor Who scarf yesterday!!!! Woot! A more complete blog post on that is coming soon, don't you worry. This fangirl cannot limit her excitement to one little Take; a full post is definitely required. I mean, I crocheted the full scarf... I owe it to the scarf to write a full post about it. Here, I've already 'grammed it :) And here's a Flashback Friday to when two of my friends and I wrapped the first half around ourselves.

2. Speaking of crafty things, tomorrow night is officially Craft Night. A few friends and I are getting together to make Moscow Mules, do crafty things, talk, laugh, and perhaps watch a movie {if we can remember the three we said we would remember for such a time as this}. My craft is putting ribbons on cookie holders for a friend's wedding - wish me luck. It's going to be a blast, and it has been the happy thought getting me through this week.

3. My happy thought for next week is a person! My good friend Laurie {from the Frozen Tundra} is coming out for a business meetings our fathers have, and she is spending the week at my house! I will try and remember to take some pictures of us together - promise!

4. Alright, deep dark confession time: I don't get Twitter. Conceptually I understand it involves short notes and links and following and tweeting and retweets and favorites and hashtags... but I don't love it or use it frequently. Am I missing a crucial piece of knowledge that makes Twitter cooler than fro yo? Am I doing it wrong? Twitter Jedis, teach me your ways, for I am only a baby Twitter-bird.

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5. I get to hang out with my sister Jayna today! She came down for my dad's birthday dinner yesterday, and today we are going to coffee before she has to go back to work. I love spending time with my sister!

6. Just this week, I've killed three spiders. THREE! This. Week.
I don't care if the weather goes from 90* to 20* - spiders need to stay out of my house! Anybody have some good recipes for spider repellent? I'm frantically searching Pinterest as I type, because y'all know me and spiders do not get along.
The plus side of this story is that 2 of the 3 spiders were encountered before I left for work, so I couldn't just yell for Samara to come kill them. So I killed them. And then I killed them again, just for good measure. This picture sums up my life pretty well this week:

7. To end with a Funny Friday, here is Yzma as a Disney Princess:

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Happy Friday, friends! Enjoy your weekend :)

Finish This: Week Twenty-nine

Joining our lovely hostesses once again for Finish This! Check out Nicole at Three 31, Jen at The Arizona Russums, Becky at The Java Mama, and Lisa at Coastlined for prompts and the link-up.

I add spice to my life by listening to audio books in the car. Driving places when I don't have specific directions. Painting my toes bright colors. Playing chicken with my snooze button. Cleaning my kitchen after 11pm...actually, make that doing anything after 11pm.

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Bacon is the best way to start a Saturday morning brunch. Finish zumba, come home with a chai latte, and make bacon with the bestie. Perfection!

The perfect meal is when the whole family is home and it's something Mom has made. Lasagna or enchiladas are family favorites.

My favorite food to grill is burgers, because meat! Hot dogs should be roasted on a stick over a beach fire, and burgers should be grilled.

I beat the heat by embracing it! Seattle rarely gets hot the way the rest of the country would define hot, so I put on sunscreen and relish the sun. Walking to the waterfront is one of my favorite sunshine activities.

Thanks for joining! See you next week for another round :)

Life Update

Golly, "life update" sounds so serious and intense, and while that applies to some things, we're not gonna be alllll seriousness. It's a mixed bag up in he-ah, folks.

Since it's Tuesday, let's start with a Doula Adventures update. Bradley class was last night, and it was pretty fantastic. A couple from the last class came in with their 3-month-old and told us their birth story, which is basically my favorite thing since crunchy peanut butter. Then the class focused on stages of labor, which was great because I just read that part of Natural Hospital Birth by Cynthia Gabriel. I love it when different sources talk about the same topic.

Speaking of books, I started listening to Rose Under Fire by Elizabeth Wein. She also wrote Code Name Verity which quickly became one of my favorites. I'm waiting for this one to grab me like the first one did, but we're only on the second disc. I'm sure it's going to get intense here very soon.

Still speaking about books, Jen Hatmaker just released a new one. Interrupted is the prequel of sorts to 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess, which I loved, as you might remember from Christmas. Well, Jen gave away 350 copies of her book to bloggers who would agree to review it before August 15th. Guess who got a copy?! This blogger! Guess who will be reading a review very soon?! You will!! Brace for impact, because Jen never fails to pack a wallop in her 200 pages.

Exiting the library now and continuing with the update...

My friend Laurie is coming next week! Actually, a lot of people are coming in town for a conference with my dad, but Laurie is the only one who is going to stay with me. I'm so excited to see her, but my house needs some serious cleaning before I let her in the door. Some weeks are easier than others to stay on top of the housework, and the past few weeks have been of the not-easy kind. Sometimes you just have to go to bed before 8pm #trueconfession

Victoria and I had a phone date last week, talking of all things doula certification and blogging. {Side note: isn't it awesome when you're real-life friends with someone in the blogging world? I'm a fan.} We talked about why and how doulas should be certified, her experience with a friend filling the doula-role, and then we talked about blogging. So much fun!

I started watching "Pushing Daisies" and am already anticipating withdrawals. The first season is great and I watched it in a couple weeks, and now I'm 3 episodes into the second season and am dragging it out as long as I can because this is the end. Isn't that always how it goes? You blow through the first season in excitement and over-eagerness, and then by the last season you don't want it to end. Well, it especially sucks when the entire show is only 2 seasons long.

When you start the first season and realize how wonderful the show is:

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When you start the second season and realize that the end is near:

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Bee tee dubs, can we pause for one moment and just appreciate the gorgeousness of Lee Pace? Hot dang. That was a good moment. Thank you for participating. 

Well, I don't know if anything can follow up Mr. Pace...nope, nothing comes to mind. Have a wonderful Tuesday, friends!

Finish This: Week Twenty-eight

Linking up with these marvelous ladies: Nicole at Three 31, Jen at The Arizona Russums, Becky at The Java Mama, and Lisa at Coastlined.

The only thing standing between me and doula certification is $400. Right now I think I can afford it, but I want to wait a little bit longer just to make sure all the medical bills are covered for good and for sure. Thank the Lord for babysitting jobs on the weekends!

I don't have to be perfect to be used by God as a Client Advocate. When clients come into Care Net and I fumble my words or forget to pray with them, God can still use me. When I don't know what to say to a client facing a crisis situation, God can still use me.

I would improve Goodreads by adding a feature for re-reading books. I would love to be able to easily keep track of how many times I've read a certain book, because some {like my summer recommendations} books need to be read more than once! Oh, Goodreads, why don't you understand?

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Thanks for reading! If you want to participate, I'm sure you know the drill by now :) 

"The Fall"

"We all need a movie that wrecks us emotionally," says my friend via text message yesterday morning. She said this because Sunday night we sat down and watched "The Fall" together.

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I cried myself to sleep Sunday night.

Monday, I watched "The Fall" again. Six tissues were sacrificed on Tarsem's alter.

Words are pretty inadequate when it comes to describing this perfect film. I wish I could articulate all the emotions and thoughts that this film evokes, but I am still processing. "The Fall" is both sad and hopeful, painful and beautiful.

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The plot is fairly simple; the visuals are simply stunning. Roy {Lee Pace} is an injured stuntman in a hospital who makes friends with Alexandria {Catinca Untaru}, a little girl with a broken arm. They become friends, and he begins telling her an epic; he narrates, and she imagines, and the result is beautiful.

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That little outline reveals only a portion of "The Fall"'s depth. It is much more than a story-within-a-story.

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There are many amazing details about the making of this film that I could share with you, but that feels like a cheap sell. "The Fall" deserves more than fun facts and trivia; it deserves to be viewed for its own sake.

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"The Fall" is breathtakingly perfect. Telling you "just go watch it" is impossible...you can't just watch this movie. Plan for an evening to experience Tarsem's masterpiece with its magnificence and extravagance. You will love every second. 

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NAS: Summer Reading List

Wow, the Not Alone Series didn't keel over?! Nope, it just decided to take summer a bit slower! We've got July's post this week and then a few fantastic ladies are meeting in Georgia together! Just a little bit jealous up here, but since Seattle weather has been in the 90s all week, I will stay here and enjoy the heat without the humidity :)

Share your favorite book recommendations! Beach reads, deep novels, anything! Share share share!

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein
Fiction; published 2012; set in England, 1941
My favorite books tend to rotate, so for this book to come up twice {in case you missed it, it was one I shared with Laura when we interviewed each other} is significant. This book, you guys.... it's really, really well done. This was the first book in a while where I would have chosen reading over socializing...and I'm a 9.5 out of 10 on the {made-up} extrovert scale! It's so gripping. Just read it!
Language warning: this is a war-time story and there is some intense - albeit appropriately used - language.

7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess by Jen Hatmaker
Non-fiction; published 2012
I've mentioned this book a couple times last year {a QT here and a Christmas post here}. This book wrecked me, and I need to read it again because change comes slowly. Jen picked seven areas of her life from which she eliminated excess and practiced simplicity, and this book is both blog posts from during each month {she focused on one area for 30 days each} as well as her conclusions after the fact.

Baby Catcher: Chronicles of a Midwife by Peggy Vincent
Non-fiction; published in 2003
This was my first "baby" book that I read, and I think it may be my favorite for both a narrative and birth stories. Vincent weaves together both her journey as a midwife and wonderful birth stories of her clients, and the result is wonderful. If the subject matter is up your alley, this is a great and fun read!
Content warning: this is a book about birth, so guess what gets described in detail? Also, Vincent doesn't know Jesus and is in Berkeley in the 1970s, so that is something to keep in mind as you read.


Classic recommendations:
Emma by Jane Austen
Hello, I'm 25 years old and just read Emma for the first time a couple months ago. Read it. Push past how annoying Emma is. Pick yourself up from that swoon for Mr. Knightley. Read this classic {and check out this modern adaptation on You.Tube and Samara's review!} and let me know what you think!

Persuasion by Jane Austen
I think this is my favorite Austen novel. My friend Julie and I are re-reading it together right now, and I am reminded yet again how much I love it. Any one else a Persuasion fan?

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
This is another book that I should have read as a teenager but missed it. However, I thoroughly enjoyed reading it last winter and highly recommend it as either a first-time read or a re-read.

There you go, friends! Enjoy your reading, and let me know if any of these books make your best or worst lists. Thanks for hosting, Jen and Morgan!