We're settling back into our routines after our weeklong travel to Austin and Dallas. I'm going about it rather slowly. Disconnecting from my full time job and all the responsibilities of my creative projects was really glorious and made me realize just how much I've piled on my plate. Overall they are good things, endeavors that energize and fuel me, and for the most part things I actively chose to have in my life, but it is a lot. I told Chris to help me enforce a rule of not taking on anything new until after the new year (at... Read more →

My boys are 3 years 4 months and 19 months old and this is what I want to remember: The near constant wrestling. They remind me of puppies. Dash's sweet, nurturing nature and spontaneously coming to cuddle or hug us and saying, "I love you." Cedric's big brown eyes and long dark lashes on his little face. Dash's love of books. Recently we had put him to bed and then he came out to get our bag of library books and went right back to his room. When we check on him before we go to bed we often find... Read more →

We still have a stretch of summer weather left to go and so I hope it's not too early to say this but I have been LOVING the summer. I'll never be one of those people who proclaims, "I just LOVE the heat," but I have changed my attitude this year and now actively look for things to enjoy instead of despise during the loooong, hot and dry summers. Or maybe acclimating to the desert heat just takes eight years! It's easy to let a negative aspect of something color your entire perception and then overlook all the good parts.... Read more →

We are still sitting squarely in summer and in fact sitting just at the middle but in August inklings of fall start to trickle in. Kids will be going back to school, college students return to the campus where I work, football pre-season gets going (which we don't follow but the sport always puts my in a fall mindset) and pumpkin spice latte promotions begin. This will also be the first August since we've lived here that Chris hasn't been returning to work - he's on sabbatical through December! Chris will still be working but it will be from home... Read more →