Month: April 2013

Anyone who knows me, either personally or professionally, knows that I’m a Christ-follower, but I respectfully keep my thoughts on business and my thoughts on faith separate, as they are parts of the same whole.  This week, however, I’m not going to be able to separate those two parts as crisply as I usually do, and that’s OK. 

Yesterday in church, the pastor’s sermon challenged us to decide how we’re going to handle spiritual fruit this week.  Are we going to let life so overwhelm us that we bear no spiritual fruit, or are we going to bear spiritual fruit for the sake of making ourselves look impressive and big? 

Galatians 5:22-23 describes the fruits of the Spirit as love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.  So, I think about those and I think about how busy this week is as I prepare for my first show of the year, teaching my two girls, and the craziness that will be Friday and Saturday.  In the midst of all this, how am I going to manifest spiritual fruit even as I’m overwhelmed, stressed and tired?  That will be my question daily for my girls and myself, as well as our daily prayer:  “Lord, help us show love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control today” (because I’m only focusing on getting through today).

The beautiful thing about these fruits of the Spirit are, you don’t have to be a Christ-follower to embrace and embody them, so please don’t think these are just “Christian” ideals.  I have friends of different faiths (and no professed faith) who embody these character traits.

What qualities will you choose to exhibit this week?

I thought I’d found it – that most perfect specimen of man soap ever.  With its fresh, green, dreamy scent that the House of Creed designed especially for Cary Grant and which has graced the skin of Robert Redford, Richard Gere, Quincy Jones and Nicholas Cage, Green Irish Tweed (renamed Green Irish Fantasy in my line) has been my go-to fragrance for world-rockin’ masculinity.  But after a years-long love affair with Green Irish Tweed (marked by me sneaking into my soap room just to sniff bars of this soap for a while), another scent has turned my head and my nose in a different direction.

It’s…  The Perfect Man.  There are no words to describe this scent and do it justice.  It’s incredible, and both of my girls agree.  Even my three-year-old will take a deeply appreciative sniff and exhale on a sigh as her eyes glaze over in olfactory bliss.  This scent encompasses all the qualities of these men.  With a blend of earthy, citrus and spicy notes, The Perfect Man makes every man smell just about perfect.

What’s even better than that?  How about the fact that The Perfect Man can be all yours?  Now doesn’t that just sweeten the deal a bit?  Check him out here.

This time of year is a time to clean and freshen up the home, and I love doing it as much as everyone.  I have a whole slew of projects lined up, and we took the long Easter weekend to work together as a family to get things done.  We’re very excited about getting a new (to us) stand-up freezer, which necessitated my husband getting out in the garage and doing some major cleaning up and cleaning out.  How exciting that was!  I found some of my favorite stuffed animals, like this little fella.

Roadkill, the studly armadillo (complete with CZ stud in his ear)

I found the gorgeous orange, green and yellow floral silk scarf that my parents gave me for my birthday four years ago.  I had given it up for totally lost, thinking it’d been thrown away in our move almost 4 years ago.  I was saddened by the prospect, because it’s a beautiful scarf, and I’d wanted it to wear with this one white linen dress I have.

While Peter was kicking box-butt in the garage (more boxes emptied and crushed!!!  Woohoo!!!), I was in the dinette working on a long-anticipated project.  Our dinette is… utilitarian.  The vertical blinds are original to the house, I’d swear it, and a few of the slats are missing.  Eventually, those are coming down and a curtain and box valence are going up – hopefully before the Summer heat arrives.

Our dinette set was part of the package deal the hubster got with my cat and me.  I bought it in 1995, used, right before moving into my first apartment.  It’s a lovely square, solid ash table with pull-out leaves, and the top has a laminate inset.  The chairs are also solid ash, and they came with nice, neutral, light tan seat cushions that had started looking quite the worse for wear after 17 years of life, cats, people and young children.  I’d decided to recover those chairs in a stripe print to coordinate with the tropical flower/flip flop/cocktail material I’d chosen for my curtains.

This became a major family project.  Peter unscrewed the seats from the chairs.  He and our older daughter pulled the seemingly millions of staples out of the existing upholstery, and I measured, marked and cut out the new upholstery.  While I had the cushions off, I decided it would be a great opportunity to take some Murphy’s Oil Soap to the wood.  Oh my gosh!  Once the seventeen years of accumulated grime came off, the wood gleamed warmly and looked so pretty!  Then I saw the newly cleaned chairs next to the table.  Suffice it to say, I spent about an hour Saturday giving every inch of my table the same thorough cleaning.  On Sunday morning, I would just stop and admire how the morning sun came in through the back door, warming the clean, glowing wood, now completely clean.

The girls and I returned home from our Easter trip to my parents’ home today, and my newly refurbished and clean dinette set greeted us with its vibrant, cheery appearance.  And now…  The before and after pics!

One of the advantages to this new material is its stain-resistance

To say I’m pleased is an understatement.  I’ll be thrilled when this room is completely finished!