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I've had a moment of clarity this Christmas season that I hesitantly want to share with you all.   I spent all the years longing for the perfect presents, the trending name brand, the coolest toys, the things everyone else would get, but also the best unique gift.   Lately, I realize I've shifted.  When people ask me for Christmas ideas, I struggle. Not because I don't want things, but because deep down, I long for more, and I'm not sure how to put it on a list.   I genuinely love to spend significant time planning and dreaming up...

Several years ago, the principal at my kiddos school asked me to paint inspirational words in the school bathrooms. Being extra, I said, "what if I also paint a million murals?" At some point, during the months I spent hanging out in elementary school bathrooms painting, I started to feel the Lord's nudge: What if there's another school that needs your art… I felt a tug towards schools in lower socioeconomic areas, drawn to invest where there aren't a lot of stay-at-home moms with Pinterest boards or white-collar workers with flexible schedules. What if we just talked about those kinds...

It won't shock anyone who knows us that we don't plan ahead so much.  We love to go with the flow and cram adventures into the empty spaces.  The downside to living like this is that often, the planners have already snagged the good spots and we get what's left.  Also, with our lifestyle, we squeeze the life out of every minute, so there isn't a lot of margin when things go wrong….    That's how we found ourselves rolling up to the last available campsite after dark.  Imagine our joy to find not one, but TWO blinding street lights...

When one of my most loyal customers, Amy requested a new painting, I decided this project was the perfect opportunity to collaborate with an up-and-coming artist.    It's safe to assume I do ordinary things in “unique” ways.  Let me introduce you to dream clouds.  It is basically goal setting, but instead of making a list, I draw empty clouds on a few of the pages in my journal, and as I come up with dreams for my life, business, family, I write them in the clouds.  I have found that creating dream clouds is much more fun than lists,...

Over a month ago, a storm blew through and knocked down our neighbor's fence. We knew he liked to hold on to things, but once the fence fell, our view drastically changed. My oasis of privacy crumbled, and suddenly I have a bird's eye view behind the scenes of someone else's life: and it's a mess. Despite living here for almost twenty years and knowing better, perky Amanda still thinks: Now that we know, how can we help?  While he and my husband worked together, tearing apart the old fence, he rejected my offer to haul the rotten wood to...