Gabi | Senior Pictures

Last weekend, I had the chance to hang out with my brother's sweet girlfriend, Gabi.   I met up with Gabi and her mom on a cloudy Friday afternoon to snap those infamous senior portraits.  

Gabi has been in our family for over two years now.  She has a quiet demeanor.  She speaks no foul of anyone or anything and could honestly be a Greek goddess with her olive skin and dark brown hair.  Shes absolutely gorgeous from the inside out.  

Gabi's quietness has been something I've had to get used to.  I'm a talker.  I'm loud.  I'm honest.  So is my sister.  Between the two of us, there is no such thing as quiet.  So when my brother brought home this sweet, tender soul.. we didn't know how to handle it.   Honestly. 
 

 

However, what I have come to realize is that her gentle and quiet spirit is refreshing.  It encourages me to sit back, shut up and just listen.  It encourages me to get out of the spot light and let others tarry there.

I can't help but think of this scripture when I think of Gabi.

"Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes.  Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight."  1 Peter 3:3-4

A gentle and quiet spirit is of great worth in my creator's eyes.  Therefore, it should be something we notice and adore about our sweet Gabi.  I'm not saying I am going to quit my life goal of making her a chatty Kathy like the rest of my family!  But it is her spirit, that quiet, tender, careful, delicate demeanor, in itself that makes Gabi the absolute beauty she is. 

Congrats, Gabi!  We are so thankful for you and are so excited to see you take Raleigh by storm!
 

Bunion Be Gone

In the past 10 days I have taken more pictures of my foot than I have in my entire life collectively.  I had a bunion surgically removed a little over a week ago.  Glamorous, I know!  I have really wide feet anyway, but the bunion on my right foot made it even more wide --  and let's be honest, it was pretty ugly.  It wasn't as bad as anything I saw on Google images.. but regardless ugly.  Even though it was ugly, that is not the reason I had it taken off.  It was physically restraining.  In any active activity, that baby would throb and cause a good amount of pain.  It started with high school basketball.  Before every game my coach would cut out two doughnut shaped pieces of styrofoam and tape them to both of my bunions (yes, one on each foot.. my left doesn't hurt near as much) before he would tape my ankles.  

Okay, wow.  I am telling you the history of my bunion agony!  Let's just skip to last week!  Bunion, gone.  Pain, ever so present.  I was waited on hand and foot by my husband and my mother pretty much all of last week.  It was incredible to have those two people love on me so well.   Colby was unbelievable.  He brought my coffee to bed, he would literally carry me to the bathroom in the middle of the night when walking on it was too painful, he would massage it at a moment's notice.  He was wonderful.  My mom worked from my dining room the next two days.  Bringing me anything I needed and cooked us supper (well breakfast & lunch too) every day and stocked my pantry, fridge (& freezer with homemade baked ziti and chicken casserole to fix the following week so I didn't have to go to the grocery store!)  World's Best Mama Award. 
















 

 

The day my mom couldn't be here, my precious mother-in-law came down to see me and relieve me of my cabin fever.  She got me out of the house and rolled the windows down.  It was fabulous.  My sisters-in-laws were also so incredible at loving me.  They brought me magazines, goodies, care packages and a beautiful spaghetti supper! 

 

 

 Ya'll this is like the most minor surgery EVER!  And I had all these people loving on me like it was something super serious.  Golly, I am so blessed.  I am officially full weight bearing and I get my bandages taken off and my post-op boot changed next week.  Recovery is going great and I am so thankful for the continued support!

HAPPY HEALING!

Our Snow Day | Video

Earlier this week I spent hours cleaning off thousands and thousands of pictures off my computer.  In the process I came across a video that I made for Colby for Valentine's Day a couple of years ago.  It was a silly video with a several pictures and a lot of slow-motion video clips from years past.  Colby and I watched it on Wednesday of this week and we were reminded how much we love that video.  So I suggested that we make a video for our "snow day" the following day!  He agreed and I prayed specifically the next morning that Colby would show me grace as I kept a camera in his face for the rest of the day.  I AM NOT GOOD AT MAKING THESE, but it seemed like a fun project/challenge that documented our day in a different way than just still frames.  

Yesterday was a dream, ya'll.  We got up and read Bibles and books.  Colby did some work from home, while I lit candles, turned on Pandora and did some wifely duties.  Then we played in the snow and saw our nephews and fixed perfect winter lunches.  We built an Olympic snowman and built fires and indulged in fresh pumpkin bread and coffee.  Seriously, it was a dream.

So while Colby continued to stoke the fire, I threw this baby together last night...

Click to watch our snow day HERE.

PS.  Colby & I celebrated Valentine's Day last night considering we thought he was going on a hunting trip this weekend (which got postponed.. go figure!).  Colby bought us Country Mega Tickets for the rest of this year's celebrations and holidays (not including anniversary!)  -- #tightbudgetprobs #myhusbandisunbelievable. 

Valentine's Day is suppose to be about romance and telling people not just that you love them but WHY you love them.  So we ate supper in front of the fire place, put a little Boyz II Men Pandora on and we wrote on index cards that I made.  Each card had a different line on it.. for example, "I love it when you...", "I feel loved when you...", "You look best in...", ETC.  We both wrote on our set of cards and then exchanged.  SUPER CHEAP & effective I'd say.   Simple, nothing crazy.  Yes, we should say these things more often.  But sometimes a written note about what your husband loves about you or what you do for him is a super tangible reminder of why you should keep doing those things... BECAUSE HE LOVES IT.  I wrote the date on the back of the index cards and I hope that this is a tradition we continue to do for Valentine's Days to come!

Happy Valentine's Day!  Now go tell someone WHY you love them!!

August & Madison | Engagement

It is amazing what you can gather from just spending a hour with someone.  I met up with Madison & August one evening in Mount Airy to snap a couple of engagement pictures.  Even though I have known Madison for quite sometime, I had never met August before, but I can already see the dynamics of their sweet relationship.  August is a gentle but strong leader.  August adores Madison, from her mind-of-its-own hair to her wrinkled nose to her genuine love for people and for him.. you can just tell it in his eyes and his constant smile.  Madison is a loving, supportive free-spirit.  When Madison hugs, she hugs with every fiber of her being, soul & heart.  She loves people.

I smiled the whole way home after our time together at White Sulfur Springs.  Jesus is doing something crazy good in them and it is so easily reflected in these pictures!

Here's a sneak peek for the future Short's!

Happy engagement season, August & Madison!

Bread & Wine

I have always appreciated that my mom creates home-cooked meals for our family.  Every now and again she would stop in on her way home to grab a pizza or some seafood, but for the most part everything is picked from a garden or produce stand, sauteed in some type of old school pan sauce and marinaded in a tried and true recipe.   Our family always jokes about how she can never leave the kitchen without flour, oil or grease splatters all over her clothes.  But what I am realizing more and more.. is that that is a translation of the gospel.  Stirring, kneading, creating something beautiful in the mess around us.  Fulfilling a need.  Feeding our hunger.

For my birthday this year, my sister-in-law got me a cookbook.  She wrote me a note saying that a review of this book "screamed" my name.  A review that ultimately said cooking a love song, an ode to the people you love.  That in cooking there is healing power in food that was prepared with love and joy and creativity.  I love that Sidney acknowledged that.  Because that is what I want. Not for people to acknowledge the things I like, but to know that I believe there is power in your knives and wooden spoons.  Probably something I picked up from watching my mama manhandle the kitchen for my 20 plus years of life.

I just finished an unbelievable book called Bread & Wine.  A book that I plan on giving as housewarming or newlywed gifts from here on out.   It is a book that is heart warming from page one.  The kind of book that you read when candles are lit and you are curled up in a knit throw.  It's the kind of book that truly inspires you to get in the kitchen and invite people into your messy homes.  To nourish their stomachs as well as their hearts.  To share your life with the people you love with nothing but a table between you.

"When you eat, I want you to think of God, of the holiness of hands that feed us, of the provision we are given every time we eat.  When you eat bread and drink wine, I want you to think about the body and the blood every time, not just when the bread and wine show up in church, but when they show up anywhere - on a picnic table, or a hardwood floor or a beach."  - Shauna Niequist

 Last week, I decided to make baked spaghetti for supper.  It was about 5 o'clock and I knew Colby would be headed home soon, so I started making my mama's famous spaghetti sauce  that takes both time to cook and practice to perfect.  Then my wheels started really turning.  What if Colby came home to Italy?  While I was stirring sauce and boiling noodles, I tossed a salad and threw a baguette into the oven to get nice and crusty.  I laid out an absurd amount of candles in the dining room so we could have a candle-lit dinner.  I set the table and poured tall glasses of water and small glasses of wine.  I drew a menu to sit on our plates and laid out a small bowl of blackberries for us to munch on until supper was ready.  I found an Italian Pandora Station, Bluetoothed it out the Bose speaker and cranked it up.  But Colby came home like 30 minutes earlier than I had expected.  I locked the back door, so he couldn't get in and ran frantically around the house to find a box of matches to light all those candles.  Then the timer was going off, telling me it was time to lay a hefty layer of cheese on the top of the spaghetti and I had planned on changing into a dress.  Instead, as Colby was walking in the door, half of the candles were lit,  I was burning my hands getting the spaghetti out of the oven and I was wearing a wrinkled flannel shirt, skinny jeans and cowboy boots.

In Bread & Wine, Shauna (aka my new BFF) says it perfectly... "I'm not talking about cooking as performance or entertaining as complicated choreography of competition and showing off.  I'm talking about feeding someone with honesty and intimacy and love.  About making your home a place where people are fiercely protected, even if its just a few hours, from the crush and cruelty of the day."

Colby couldn't care less what I was wearing or that every thing wasn't perfectly in place by the time he walked through the door.  He appreciated the fact that I was being creative in how I was loving him.  He praised me for my efforts for the rest of the night and kept saying sweet things like, "Man, Italy was great.  We should go again next week."

And then Shauna says it perfectly again, "What people are craving isn't perfection.  People aren't longing to be impressed; they're longing to feel like they're home.  If you create a space full of love and character and creativity and soul, they'll take off their shoes and curl up with gratitude and rest, no matter how small, no matter how undone, no matter how old."

I believe feeding and being fed is life-giving.  Both physically and metaphorically.  After reading Bread & Wine, I have the greatest desire to invite more people to my table.  To create conversation between mouthfuls of bread.  I'm not talking about super fancy dinner parties (which I hope to conquer one day, but today is not that day).. but just inviting our college roommates to catch up over for some take out Chinese or pizza.  Or inviting our siblings over and all of us taking part in the menu.  One on sides, one on the grill, one setting the table.  Or inviting our parents over for dessert and coffee and board games.  Or inviting new friends, that you know nothing about and learning their middle names over salads and steaks.   Ultimately, inviting people into our homes, into our lives.  Showing their place around our table and exchanging the hard and good and sour and delightful things in each of our lives.  To feed and be fed.

(PS.  This is a blueberry crisp.  A recipe that Shauna so graciously reveals in her book.  It is delicious!!)

Naked Tree

The first Christmas is exciting.  You get to start fresh and buy all of your Christmas decorations.  The first Christmas is terrible.  You have to start fresh and buy all of your Christmas decorations.  Since we are incredibly limited on dollar bills for pretty decorations we had to to find ways to steer around our budget.  We bought some matte white ornaments and a couple of gold ones thinking it would suffice.  My parents came over one night to eat supper with us right after we had just decorated our Christmas tree.  The very next night they came Christmas caroling (literally!) and bearing gifts.. aka tinsel and more ornaments.  My mom is very much against a "naked" tree and she felt bad for us. 

 

(my favorite ornament my parent's gave us)

 

Oh ya know.. just classic pity gifts.  Don't bother me!  I got more ornaments!  Even still, my tree looked seriously naked.  So Colby and I decided to make some more ornaments to save on money.  We bought clear glass balls for like $3 a pack and filled them with twine and red ribbon.  We also spray painted some coffee beans with gold glitter and put them in a glass ball ornament - that's one of my favorites!  

 

We also cut down some wood and sliced them into 3 to 5 inch diameter coins.  We next got Colby's wood-burning kit and started burning them in several designs.  We did the outline of North Carolina, the state flag, words of the Christmas season like joy and hope, and bunch of other things.  We loved them.  We made smaller wood coin ornaments that we combine with keys to the multiple houses we had lived in since being married.  The ornaments were hung by strings of twine and dipped in polyurethane to keep them from warping.  

We loved them, seriously.  One more sentimental ornament I created this past Christmas was this one:

At our wedding, we had buttons on our cake.  I had kept them in a ziploc bag, moving them from room to room, trying to find their place in our home.  I had given up hope of finding that place and decided to toss them.  But I literally couldn't throw them in the trashcan.  It was like a force field had engulfed the trash can.  So I, impulsively, laced some baker's twine through the button holes and threw them on the tree, thinking at least it will get them out of that ziploc bag and out of my way for now.  And I actually loved how they turned out. 

We still have more ornaments to buy for next year.. so our tree will retire from nakedness.  But we will worry about that in December!

So as you can see, Colby and I are pretty good at taking what we have and making it somewhat decorative.  We were in my in-law's basement one evening during the Christmas holiday when I caught of glimpse of Colby's first deer he killed when he was 11.  I got completely fixated on it and we took it home.  We threw some old, red ornaments on the antlers with some fishing line.  And we threw a scarf around its neck.  Viola! A homemade reindeer.. a stylish one at that!

 I wanted to find a way to be very intentional this Christmas.  So I made it a goal, a vow rather, to write a personal note with each gift I wrapped.  Some explained why we bought the gift we did, some explained what we most loved about them, some were simple truths.  I want this tradition to NEVER stop.  I loved reflecting on the people we love and letting them know why.

 

I bought a gorgeous print from my sisters' new typography company, Leelyn & Co.  It is one of my favorite Christmas songs and this particular lyric completely sums up the season for me.  

And I had to throw my little gold-leaf reindeer in the blog because he is just too dang cute for me not to mention him.  

Regardless of our best efforts to not go over budget.. we did.  Only because of lights.  Christmas lights are going all LED this year, which I love and hate.  I hate that it doesn't give off that classic amber glow when lit.  But I know that this is good for safety reasons and the environment.

I do believe that the phrase a day late (or month) and a dollar short fits oh so perfectly into this post.

The gospel according to John & Will

So I have been wanting to blog about several things as of late.  Like the perks of unemployment... and also the pits.  Like my makeshift Christmas decorations.  Like the book I am currently reading and have vowed to give as gifts from here on out.  Like life as of late.

But this weekend, John and Will came to spend a night with us.  So I'm gonna blog about that today.

 

I am always surprised about how the gospel in revealed to me when those boys are around.  I don't know why I am always surprised.  Their mother is woman of unbelievable faith and every lesson, punishment, conversation that she has with her boys is drenched in scripture.  When we said our bedtime prayers on Friday night, Will, the 8 year old, prayed so specifically - something I am trying to be more aware of in my own life.  John pulled out my chair for me, while thanking me for fixing him supper, at the dining room table a couple hours prior that that.  And that respectful gesture was the gospel revealed to a 23 year old from a 12 year old.

 On Saturday morning, Colby and I took the boys to a park near our new home.  It was freezing cold but the boys ate it up.  Colby and I love the outdoors but these boys like looove the outdoors.  They freaked out when they saw a little island of cedar knots and they could honestly look at a waterfall for hours.

We wandered off beaten paths and crossed bridges.  I snapped pictures, they skipped rocks.  It was incredible.  Yes, it was cold, but we were outdoors, in the heart of the world that man cannot compete with.  This is all God.  Trees and creeks and moss and dirt.  Cold winds and cracking tree limbs.  Cedar knots and smooth rocks.  I mean this is it.  This is the stuff we are suppose to be in awe of.  God is way cooler than Van Gough.  Are you kidding me?  He MADE TREES.  And lots of them.  The whistling of wind and the crunching of leaves under your feet is nature's music.  Mozart, who?  

I have no doubt that their sanctuary is the woods.  Not a building with a cross on it.  The woods.  Where simplicity, sanctification and restoration for the heart resides.  I bet their alters are fallen trees.  And communion cups are those that John whittled out of acaia wood.  I bet you that they are baptized by waterfalls and their joy comes from the warmth of the sun.  I believe that whole-heartily.

And I also believe that is the gospel according to John and Will.