I am bursting with excitement to share with you… *happy dance* *high fives* *group hug* Chris and I are so so stoked. We’re having a baby! We’re going to be parents! It’s WILD and AWESOME. It’s been hard soo to keep it a secret and I’ve been dying to share the news. I told myself I wanted to have my new blog up and running before sharing so that I could just enjoy writing about pregnancy and babies without worrying about the redesign any more. I’m so glad it’s here! I'm four months along; our baby is due in mid-April... Read more →

I am so so SO excited to welcome you to the new RISING*SHINING!! I hope you like it! Designing a new blog was lots of work but I learned so much and this new site feels more me. Moving over my archives (and every single comment!) was a labor of love to be sure; and it was so interesting to read through my old posts. I was surprised to see posts from a year ago and thought, "Wow! That was only a year ago?" For some reason it seemed like much longer ago. I think it might be that having... Read more →

Chris and I love to make smoothies in the morning. Sometimes we do a protein smoothie with banana, almond milk, peanut butter and protein powder. Other times it's fruit juice, a handful of greens and frozen fruit like mango and pineapple. Lately my favorite combo has been orange juice with frozen mango and frozen pineapple. We try to always keep a couple bags of frozen fruit in the freezer for smoothies and when bananas start getting too brown we put them in a ziplock bag and freeze them for smoothies. A friend of mine showed me the genius idea of... Read more →

Last weekend Erica and I got our fall craft on. We're both nuts for the fall and winter seasons and enjoying them to their fullest...but it can be hard in Arizona, the land of perpetual sun and warmth. So to make the best of things we headed to Starbucks for pumpkin spice lattes (Erica got a fancy iced chai + pumpkin spice syrup, she says it's the best!) and to the craft store. If fall doesn't come to the desert, you must bring the fall yourself. We crafted all afternoon at Erica's, amidst her lovely fall decorations, and of course... Read more →

I hereby publicly declare that I will finish my Christmas shopping early this year. I love, love the holiday season. But inevitably I have last minute shopping and wrapping every year and it stresses me out. Plus all the spending at once (presents, wrapping, shipping) can be stressful. The most frustrating part: there's absolutely no reason for it. There's no reason why presents can't be bought over October and November (or earlier even), wrapped and packed in November and be ready to be shipped or given by early December. My plan is to pick a day in November to be... Read more →

As part of my "embrace the summer" outlook I ordered a Summer Minibook from Elise to capture summer memories. I've never been a scrapbooker and have had no interest...until I found Elise's blog. I love that her designs are modern and simple. I've kept a journal for years and used to tuck movie stubs and other small memorabilia in the pages (although never considered it scrapbooking) so I thought a minibook wouldn't be too much of a leap for me. I kept things very simple for this first minibook but I did buy a few supplies. 1 Color Box stamp... Read more →

In September I enjoyed a great (quick) trip to Austin for my cousin's wedding immediately followed by our awesome trip to Hawaii. It was the perfect farewell to summer...and now I'm pretty eager for fall weather to arrive. At least Trader Joe's has pumpkin flavored everything on the end of every aisle. Trader Joe's always knows what season it is even if the weather doesn't. I've also made some good progress on migrating my blog to Typepad. I know I've been talking about this f-o-r-e-v-e-r but I promise it's close, maybe as close as three weeks - ? This weekend... Read more →