The Big White Farmhouse

intentional living, little by little

{around here} Week 31/52: Week of 8.1.16

A collection of our ordinary days, recorded every week.



Around here, I have been:


watching the kids have a mega water balloon fight with friends at the park.  We bought two packs of these and they worked relatively well, but it always goes way too fast!  


finishing The Cuckoo’s Calling – finally!  At the recommendation of a friend, I started Struck by Lightning.  Whew – deep read, but an important reminder to keep your eyes on the One who matters most.  I’m also reading A Spoonful of Sugar: A Nanny’s Story from the library.


purchasing a flower girl dress for Sophia and a few (hopefully successful!) choices for me.  My brother is getting married this fall and I’ll be a hefty 30 weeks along, so my options are pretty limited.  I ordered three dresses from ASOS and am praying at least one of them works!


drinking ice cold lemonade from Chickfila, my favorite on a hot day.


eating way too many pieces of licorice.  Mark (bless him) came to my rescue when I mentioned a craving and I’ve been sneaking a few at a time when the kids are distracted.  Did you see this post from Bunmi Laditan on Facebook this week?  Um…guilty.  I don’t want to share!   


finding my groove as I work on Big White Farmhouse this week:
+ I started tracking my hours which surprisingly kept me on course and helped me avoid Facebook scrolling rabbit trails.  Monday-Thursday totals: 3hrs 45min, most likely rounding out to 5hrs by the end of the weekend.  
+ Being more active on Instagram is a lot of fun and I’m discovering so many wonderful, talented ladies.  I also connected with a talented sign maker and am so excited to carry her work in our shop!
+ I photographed and entered a bunch of new vintage products to the site with even more to come!

100 Little Things: Round Three



It’s that time of year again!  100 Little Things, round three – here we go!  

What I’ve learned from Round Two: 
1. I ended up completing 45 out of the 100 items on the list.  Not even half, but more than I managed the first year, so improvement!
2. I need to keep the little things simple.  In Round Two, I had many multi-part goals and those ended up taking much more time than I had expected.
3. 100 Little Things is the perfect pick-me-up when I’m feeling uninspired and in a rut.  There’s no pressure to complete it all, but it’s definitely a starting point for creativity in different areas of my life.  I see it being a yearly tradition for years to come.

My hopes for the third round:
1. Document with photographs this time!  
2. Start a new monthly recap series on this blog to keep me motivated. 



100 LITTLE THINGS: ROUND THRE

1. Read 35
books
2. Read An
Omnivore’s Dilemma
3. Read
Kirstin Davenstradder
4. Read The
Birth Order Book
5. Leave a
positive, thoughtful comment on 50 blog posts
6. Blog at
least twice a week regularly
7. Host a “My
Favorite Things” giveaway on my birthday
8. Rearrange
books in the bookcases by theme/genre
9. Financially
support a family raising money for an adoption
10. Send
someone flowers, just because
11. Send five
baby gifts (for the first baby or the fifth!)
12.  Send 15 cards, just because
13.  Make 5 birthday boxes for the food pantry
14.  Send a care
package to a college student
15.  Thank our garbage men
16.  Thank our mailman
17.  Meet someone
new
18.  Make a rosary
19.  Pray 5 novenas
20.  Learn about a new saint
21.  Read an
encyclical
22.  Complete a
Bible study
23.  Replace all light switch covers to one design
24.  Add another house plant
25.  Find a dresser to refurbish for the new baby
26.  Install new
kitchen lighting
27.  Repaint the kitchen table
28.  Make roman
shades for my office
29.  Finish my office desk project
30.  Redo the
back patio
31.  Clean the microfiber couch
32.  Grow tomatoes
33.  Grow cucumbers
34.  Grow spinach
35.  Buy containers for flowers on the front porch
36.  Add bamboo
shades to the kitchen and living room
37.  Have the carpets
professionally cleaned
38.  Power wash the back porch
39.  Buy a hummingbird feeder
40.  Cook through the “30
Recipes You Should Know By Age 30” list
41.  Sign up for a small farm’s CSA program
42.  Make 10 different pies
43.  Make popsicles
44.  Go strawberry picking
45.  Go apple picking
46.  Make no churn ice cream
47.  Bake 5 new hot breakfasts
48.  Do a green smoothie challenge
49.  Make homemade jam
50.  Bake
doughnuts from scratch
51.  Try a new
vegetable
52.  Watch 15
documentaries
53.  Participate in Screen-Free Week
54.  Make a dent on the movies on Common Sense
Media’s “50 Movies Every Kid Should See before age 12” (at least 50%)
55.  Create six memory boxes for the kids
56.  Make silhouettes of the kids
57.  Make 20 freezer meals before the baby comes
58.  Refresh memory on infant CPR
59.  Lose the baby weight
60.  Complete a 30-day walking streak (at least 1
mile a day)
61.  Run a 5k
62.  Run a half marathon
63.  Complete all three levels of T25
64.  Double Big
White Farmhouse’s sales from 2015 to 2016
65.  Try a new marketing technique for Big White
Farmhouse
66.  Purchase vintage at a big fair
67.  Hold a Big White Farmhouse pop-up shop
68.  Grow BWF’s Instagram followers to 400+
69.  Finish a 12-day gift wrap idea series for BWF
70.  Complete a 30-day no spending challenge
71.  Pay off car debt
72.  Pay off remaining student loan debt
73.  Schedule an eye exam
74.  Buy new glasses
75.  Clean my
wedding ring
76.  Take a bath
77.  Finish our home first aid kit
78.  Finish our emergency preparedness kit
79. Find a skin
routine that works and stick with it
80.  Make a quilt
81.  Sew a throw pillow with pom-poms for Sophie’s
bed
82.  Hang something on the wall to display Sophie’s
peg dolls
83.  Complete an embroidery project
84.  Buy new pajamas
85.  Create a postpartum wardrobe that makes me
feel confident and not frumpy
86.  Find new summer sandals
87.  Find a new winter coat
88.  Send out birth announcements
89.  Write three love letters to Mark
90.  Make salt dough ornaments
91.  Potty train TJ
92.  Explore a new city
93.  Try 5 new local restaurants
94.  Make a weaving
95.  DIY a felt leaf wreath
96.  Learn calligraphy
97.  Buy 2 new board games to play as a family
98.  Make DIY Geodes with the kids
99.  Take the
kids to see a movie in theaters
100. Paint something on a canvas

{learn goals} Some Goals for August



Things to Look Forward To
– big glasses of ice cold lemonade
– water balloon fights
– dinners on the grill and fresh garden veggies
– belly laughs
– the start of a brand new school year


Things to Work On
– crossing off items on our school supply lists
– writing new content for Big White Farmhouse’s neglected blog
– the beginnings of a project about gratitude
– selling unneeded items on Craigslist
– finding a maternity dress to wear for a fall wedding (at 30 weeks!)


Things to Think About
– a new tradition to start on the last day of summer break
– a documentary to watch
– a marketing technique for BWF to try
– a novena to pray
– a pie to bake


{via}

{around here} Week 30/52: Week of 7.25.16


 A collection of our ordinary days, recorded every week.


Around here, I have been:


 trying not to complain about this unbearable heat wave, but woo!  SO HOT!    

 reaching 20 weeks – halfway there already!  I had an ultrasound on Monday and it was surreal as always: he was curled up in a ball, with his sweet arm over his face and his ankles crossed.  He’s measuring right on target and everything looks perfect.  On my end, I’m hoping my slightly elevated blood pressure just means I’m getting old and live a crazy, somewhat stressful life…and not a bigger problem.  (Which, by the way, doesn’t get better when you try to self-diagnose yourself in the middle of the night and read the horror stories…not that I would know…ahem.)    

reading The Cuckoo’s Calling, which is surprisingly taking me longer to finish than I expected.  Good so far, but not awesome.  I don’t know.


hoping my overactive brain doesn’t drive me crazy!  Lately, my thoughts have been swirling with ideas, plans, to-do lists and dreams: Big White Farmhouse, home projects, cold-weather wardrobes and school supplies, fall birthdays, holidays and even a wedding.  Saving money, spending money, rental property management, grocery lists, menu plans, tiny baby clothes, pregnancy weight gain and doctor’s appointments.  Thank goodness pure exhaustion is enough to lull me to sleep at night – there’s no turning this craziness off! 

 getting back on track after too many nights of fast food with lots of healthy dinners. The menu this week:

w: grilled chicken and summer blast salad
th: one pan roasted chicken and veggies
sa: chicken with summer vegetable tian


trying out Honey and really liking it.  It finds the best coupon codes for you – gotta love anything that will help me save some money!  I used it this week with a Vistaprint order (saved me 25%!).  Also like that it helps find the best deal on Amazon.

 putting in the time for Big White Farmhouse and hoping to see the results.  This week was all about beefing up our “Vintage Finds” section and I hit the jackpot!  A lot of great everyday pieces and even a few that would be perfect for the fall and Christmas.  I was able to add a few items (like the cheese cloche with the teak base above) to the site and will hopefully photograph the rest this weekend.  

receiving this month’s box from Young Living: this time, I ordered Lime, Purification, and the Thieves Household Cleaner.
+ Purification was a reorder – we like to diffuse this one when there are funky smells in the kitchen.  We’ve also put a few drops in sneakers and on a cotton ball for the car.  
+ It’s my first time trying the Thieves Household Cleaner.  I love that it’s very concentrated and you only need one capful per big spray bottle!  I’ve heard raving reviews so anxious to see how it works for us.
+ Lime is also a new try.  Love citrus scents!

planning some fun activities to do with the kids before school starts at the end of August.  This summer has flown!  We’ve started jotting down ideas on our chalkboard wall: water balloon fight, s’mores dip, DIY geodes and a trip to a really cool playground near us.  

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P.S. Big White Farmhouse is having our biggest sale of the summer!  20% off sitewide with the coupon code SUMMERSALE20.  Promotion ends Saturday night, 11:59 EST.  I’d love to help you find the perfect gift or maybe something special just for you!

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