This is going to be a super short post as I wrap up our brief series on travel (see the other posts here and here), but as Barry and I have been traveling more, I’ve learned a few things here or there that I just want to share. I realize these are super simple things that a lot of y’all might already do. But you know me, if I’ve got a tip, I’m sharing it! These air travel tips save us a little bit of time, money, and stress – and also keep us healthy! [Read more…]

I talk a lot about the importance of taking a travel re-entry day over on Instagram. And y’all seem to really love and appreciate the idea! So, I decided it was high time there was a blog post about it too.

I don’t know about y’all, but the first day back from a trip, I am a complete and total zombie. It’s almost impossible for me to get anything done. I try to stay on task but it’s not always easy. And I try not get frustrated with myself and my kids. That’s usually easier said than done.

But then I realized… maybe I just need to cut myself some slack.

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One of our main family goals for 2018 was to travel more. And I’m just going to keep it real y’all, we don’t just mean traveling with our kids. Our children are 9, 6, 4, and 2. Nobody wants an extended car trip with those ages. Plus, I can’t imagine paying for 6 tickets for the flights! Today, we talk travel tips and answer some questions you asked on social media. [Read more…]

For a long time, I told myself I didn’t need friends – I’m a loner. Women are just annoying and catty, and all they do is talk about each other behind their backs. Who needs or wants that?! But in the past few years, I have made some of the best friendships. And when I started sharing about my new friendships, it was amazing how many of y’all reached out to me asking how to find real, genuine relationships with women that won’t bring you down! So today, I’m sharing some of my thoughts and tips with y’all on how to make friends. [Read more…]

I know a lot of times I talk to you guys about how we try to live our lives free of harsh chemicals. And I also share all about how we try to use products that are safer on the toxicity scale. It’s been about a lengthy process, slowly ridding our home of things that were unsafe and replacing them with better – which is a  natural fit with our essential oil lifestyle. But it has taken so long because we did it slowly on purpose.

We used a method called transfer buying.

When I found out that most of the stuff we were using was NOT safe according to the EWG skin deep database, I was shocked! But I didn’t go out all at once and replace my entire medicine cabinet or all of my cleaning products in one giant shopping trip. No way – that’d be both expensive and also wasteful, because of all the products I already had on hand.  But the way that I could make this a lasting change that could stick long term was by replacing the products we use bit by bit. I would replace things whenever I ran out with a better, less toxic alternative. Slowly but surely, we have adapted to a house that is almost entirely lined up with our essential oil lifestyle. [Read more…]

I have been buying thrift shop clothes for several years. I started with Thred Up and I really, really liked it. Then they made some changes and I didn’t like it as much.

I am not saying they don’t have some nice clothes; I have some I really like!  In the case of Thred Up, their customer service was no longer good. Their correspondence was really bad and when I did get a hold of them, they were not very nice. So I switched from Thred Up to Swap.com. Both are used clothing outlets, but Swap is my favorite place to buy thrifted styles. But in the last few months, I started to go to more events where I needed to dress business casual. That’s when I tried Stitch Fix. [Read more…]

There are three things I do every single day – even when it’s absolutely insane.  I called these my homemaking anchor tasks. These are things I do so that whenever it’s crazy, I don’t feel overwhelmed and I don’t feel like I’m behind. And once things slow down, I’m able to pick back up the pieces and continue on with life.

These three homemaking “anchor tasks” are certainly not rocket science. Some of you might even think it’s a waste of a post to write about this. But I feel like its worth sharing because on busy days, these tasks keep me afloat, y’all.

In no particular order, here are my homemaking anchor tasks:

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