The Intentional Life

So, I mentioned in a previous post how our house has no closets. Sorry, I must retract that and rephrase. When we moved into this house it had no closets (besides the ones in the bedrooms). There was no place for towels in the bathroom, extra sheets for beds, board games, and all those various things you put in closets. But, when 75% of our house was destroyed by water and everything was down to the studs, we had the contractor build a closet into a small spot that was not functional before. Hence, our small closet for some of those various things. Several of the shelves hold board games and those things have a tendency to get cluttered up pretty quick. So, I emptied out all the shelves, determined what games were actually played (keep) and what was just taking up space (donate), and put the closet back in order. It wasn't a horrendously difficult job, but once done, I found the kids playing with more board games. Amazing how a little organization can make things easy

We stayed in more hotels in April than I think we have in the entire last year. It felt a little odd to do that much traveling, but some great memories were made along the way. April 2017 was definitely one for the memory books. The biggest memory maker of all in the month: Paul running the Boston Marathon. If you followed along on Facebook or Instagram, some of these pictures will look familiar. I tried my best to post a daily update to help catalogue the trip.  As a birthday gift to me, my sister-in-law took me out to see Beauty in the Beast in the theater. I go to the movies about once every 5 years, and going as just the two of us to see my favorite Princess story was icing on the cake.  We may have been dancing in our seats and sitting with wide grins on our faces.....the whole time.  Thanks to my job, we got a two day paid trip to a State Park lodge. Swimming, hiking, swimming, reading, and swimming were all part of the agenda. The weather wasn't the grea

 Well, somewhere in the midst of life I neglected to post my March Lookback. Not that any of you care too much whether they get posted or not, but I'm pretty good at putting unnecessary obligations upon myself, so it needs to get done. Plus, it was fun to look back at March and remember. It wasn't that long ago but things can quickly be forgotten. I'm so glad I take pictures to jog my memory. March had a gentle roll to it. There were things on the calendar, but there were empty spots, too. Praise and Worship Night, Field Trips, a conference where I learned how to better gear by Business toward Missions (spoke to my heart!), a 3AM wake-up call from the Tornado Siren, Boston Training, an early birthday celebration, and the start of Spring Break.  The Time Change meant the sun came through the windows at an hour when I was still home and able to see it.  I was thrilled to see that after spending a whole winter in the darkness of our garage, the fig

OK. I admit. I am losing a bit of steam. I would love to have more time to devote to this purging thing, but time keeps marching on and I'm finding I don't have those large chunks of time that I need to tackle a space. I'm sure most people reading this paragraph can relate. So, I'm going a bit smaller. Like WAY smaller. I took care of a dresser. I love our house for the open living, kitchen, dining area it has. What I'm sort of bummed about is that there are really no closets (besides the bedrooms). I say sort of, because, really, it's a blessing in disguise. No closets = no spots to hide everything. But, that also means I have no spots to hide everything.... Enter, the Dresser.  This dresser has become the spot where things go to hide, and it was time to clean out. I was so intent on cleaning it out that I didn't take pictures (that's why there are more pictures of the flowers on top of the dresser than the dresser itself!), bu

Catching up, this was actually last week. Posting this today is a bit ironic as it feels like it has rained daily since these pictures were taken. Which makes me thankful I worked outside when I did. Generally Saturdays are when we clean the house but this day was too gorgeous to stay inside so we tackled all of the flower beds and the front porch. I feel like I have a decent eye for laying out my home in a way that is pleasing to the eye and makes me feel calm and comfortable. However, it ends at the front door. I am really at a loss when it comes to making the outside of our house looking anything but, well, drab. It may be because things that are needed to make it look better cost way more than what I've got to put into it. As you can see, our concrete porch only covers about 2/3 of the actual porch area. Our stone drive is in dire need of resurfacing.  And I don't have a clue what to do with plants to make them look like they were naturally planted, but org