Home Sanctuary

DadGUM! Time to Turn in Points for July!

Why does July go soooo much faster than, say, January?  I'm perplexed.

I hope you Company Girls have had a fun month with the Small Things!  I tell you, they have kept me SANE through this crazy summer.  And today is the day to add up your points for the month and turn them in for your chance to win some great prizes! 

Let's take a little look-see at what the Most Points Winner will receive: (You can read the full description here, but this is the short version)

This is a whole system, people! Perfect for getting back into shape and working on those "trouble" spots.  You will love this.

Now, the Random Drawing Winner will receive this book by Joann Heim, a copy of which is by my bed.  With a new school year just around the corner, this is a good time to reflect on the joy in simplicity before you get sucked into every committee and sport offered your family.

Today's Small Thing involves two steps, but don't let that intimidate you!

1.  Email your point total to me, OR email a simple "enter me in the random drawing" note if you just can't be bothered with the math.  Or if this was just one of those months that you weren't able to participate much.  Truly....we understand, we've been there.

2.  Leave a comment, sharing either your favorite Small Thing activity this month, or a Small Thing related theme.  It is really fun to see how these little, teeny tiny tasks can have a HUGE impact on your home.  Even if it's just in how you pay attention to small things in your day....it all counts.

That's IT!!  You can have through Sunday night (12 midnight CST) to do this.  But if you can do it today, I urge you to do so because the weekend might just come and go....and then you might forget and be mad at yourself later.  I'd hate to see that happen.

POINTS: 30 for doing BOTH things, good toward July's points!

Don't forget to join in for Company Girl Coffee...see the next post.

Company Girl Coffee 7.31

This week, I'm on a mad mission to create the Perfect Robin's Egg Blue paint finish.  Something similar to the color in my blog header, but a little softer.

It is blue? Green? Teal?  Blue-Green?  In Europe, you see it in vivid hues, while in cottages here it can be subtle or striking.  I've got it on my brain and I can't shake it!  I MUST FIND IT!

After a half-dozen paint samples, I do believe I've found the RIGHT color to start with....and I will share the step-by-step process with you next week! This would be a great time to subscribe to my blog feed by clicking on that "rss" button over there in the right hand column so you won't miss out.  I wish-wish-wish I didn't have to work today so I could just PLAY WITH PAINT!

Robin's Egg Blue Paint. you gorgeous color of love

So what are the mad missions at your house?  I hope you'll link up below and share your life through a blog post.  If you are not a blogger, PLEASE do leave a comment so we can get to know you that way.  Did you know that at least half of the Company Girls are non-bloggers?  They are are quiet bunch, but I'll bet if we nudge them a bit, they might come out of their shells :).

Have a great weekend everyone!

Get Clocked

Special thanks to Zoanna of Penchant for Pens, for coming up with Today's Small Thing!  Zoanna is one of those people that you can hear the smile in her voice when she writes.  I just. really. like that in people.  She has a great way with words, and although I've noticed that she is taking a step back from blogging for a week or two, I always appreciate her posts.

You simply MUST cue the music for Today's Small Thing to get you in the mood for this timely task!

I've already told you girls that living by sundial would be a more accurate way of telling time at our house, due to the inaccurate nature of every single clock in our house. We basically just guesstimate approximate times by subtracting minutes from the "fast" clocks, adding minutes to the "slow" clocks, dividing the average by the square root of 5 and then just grabbing our cell phones to find out the "real" time.  It's complicated and exhausting.

Today's Small Thing is to do something with clocks.  You could:

• Synchronize the clocks in your house.
• Clean a clock! Dust the pretty one on the mantel or hallway, or the digital ones by the bed.
• Rock around a clock: clean AROUND the clock...get rid of the clutter around it.
• Make time fly: Change a clock battery.
• Erase the minutes: Clean the goop around the stove clock.  (Oh, sorry, maybe it's just MY stove clock that has goop on it.)
• Time to rest: straighten up the jewelry box where your watch spends the night.
• Finally take the watch to be repaired, you know, the one that's been sitting for 2 years in a drawer.

You might have some ideas of your own ticking right about now, so I'll let you wind up and take a minute to think about what you might like to do!

POINTS: 60 for getting clocked today!  Big Points in honor of the minute hand.

Psalm 90:12 Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

Free Company Girl Points!

{POSTING LATE TODAY....SORRY!  PLEASE FEEL FREE TO PICK ANY ONE DAY TO DO THIS ACTIVITY IN THE NEXT COUPLE OF DAYS.}

How about some FREE points today?  Right off the top of the morning, you get to have 50 points (that's 5 of these cute coupons!)  Yippee!  WOO HOO! Hurray!

But wait, there's a catch.

The free points are part of a game we're going to play today and I hope you'll join in with me.

The foundation of any home sanctuary is an atmosphere of peace.  But peace evaporates when there are attitudes of discontent and grumbling...two of the most common pitfalls in family life. 

Children are very adept at finding the glass half empty and it can really wear you down when nothing seems to meet their level of satisfaction. 

They're natural connoisseurs of excellent service and perfect appointments of things like drinking out of the red cup, not the blue cup, having their cereal bowls filled to the exact height and eating sandwiches that are cut into triangles, not squares.  Of course, that takes years to work out some of those demanding behaviors (because they ARE unacceptable, after all), but I've noticed a real trickle-down effect that starts with my own attitudes.

I find myself grumbling and complaining about things throughout my day.  Sometimes it is done inwardly, but often it spills out of my mouth and into my home.  I don't really mean anything by it, and sometimes it's just part of a conversation, but it starts to affect the atmosphere around here and I can see it reflected in my children.  It takes a conscious effort to speak positive things and leave the negative complaints alone.  I have to adjust my own attitudes first.  And then consistently help my children see the glass half full.

Today's Small Thing is to start the day with 5 coupons for 10 points each.  Print off this Download Points coupons5 if you want to make it a "real" game.  For each verbal complaint or negative comment you make, deduct 10 points (1 coupon).  The challenge is to try and hang on to all your points!  Sometimes just being aware of what comes out of my mouth is enough to help me speak positively throughout the day.

POINTS: 50!  Keep 'em all if you can!

Just for fun: try this game with your kids.  Print off 5 coupons per child and see how long they can hang on to them.  If you have Company Boys, here's one just for them:

Download Point coupon boy

On the Chopping Block

If you are a new Company Girl, you might just get the idea that we hardly do any work around here.

And you'd be right.

I leave the heavy lifting to the FlyLady, while focusing on the activities that can make life seem just a little bit sweeter.  Sometimes organizing does the trick, sometimes it's doing something fun with your family, and sometimes it's just paying attention to the small things that get overlooked.

Today, it's fighting the germs on your cutting boards.

Yeah, yeah.  We all know we're SUPPOSED to clean our cutting boards thoroughly enough to do surgery on them, but do we actually do it? 

I am ashamed.

Cutting boards, especially the plastic ones, are germ catchers.  You should have one for veggies and another one for meat so that you don't spread those germs, but sometimes I forget which is which at my house. Plastic ones can be put into the dishwasher and that should be enough to kill the germs, but it's still a good idea to scrub them under hot, sudsy water first.

There are several things that will kill cutting board bacteria.  The first is that Wonder Agent, vinegar, which can be wiped on full strength.  The smell will remind you of Easter (dyeing eggs) but that's ok, it's for a good cause.  You can also use 3% hydrogen peroxide, diluted with water, or a bleach solution (1 tsp. to 1 quart of water).  

Here's a great link that will tell you everything you ever wanted to know about cutting boards:

Cutting Boards, Chopping Blocks and Butcher Blocks

POINTS: 40 for sanitizing your cutting boards and chopping blocks

Now you can EAT WITH CONFIDENCE!

Isaiah 51:1 - July's Verse (a little late)

I've been stuck in Isaiah 51 for weeks.  I haven't wanted to use the verse God had put on my heart for this month because I couldn't make a "pretty" picture out of it.  The artist in me balked until last night, when Michael Hyatt tweeted a joke while I was wrestling with it: "a man says to his wife, 'meet me at the gravel pit, I'm a little bolder there.'"

cricket. cricket.

OK, Lord.  Even I know when a dry joke is your way of pushing me toward obedience.  You don't have to hit me over the head with a....well, boulder.

 

I so desperately wanted to focus on the flowers and gardens in the following verses.  You know how I feel about the petals and blooms and God's redemptive thread that I can't get enough of.  But instead of pretty gardens, we are going to spend some time in the quarry today.

And I do love the metaphor God uses here. Rocks. Stones. Quarries.  Words like "hewn."

See, rocks take eons of time to form: layers and layers of sediment and mineral deposits.....compressed and forged into mighty stone. The heat of the earth's core melds the elements into solid rock.  Rock that can be quarried for special purposes.

Are you in God's quarry?

I can imagine some of you "granite people" thinking God has forgotten all about you, all buried and pressured by the weight of the world.  Hey, what's the point of being the handsomest and strongest rock around if you never get your day in the sun?

But life in the quarry means that eventually the Master stone cutter will find you and start his work. 

He inspects.

He measures.

He admires your color and strength.

He envisions where you will be most useful and utterly glorifying to Him.  He contemplates your quality and sees the areas that need work.

And then He begins to chisel.

First with the heavy tools to separate you from the rest of the rock around you. It's noisy and messy and dirty. It's kinda painful, really.  But he needs you to be fully and completely His to work with, so he chips you away from what has held you back.  Finally, you are free.

The Master strokes his chin and feels His way around your rough edges.  He knows the location you're going to eventually be placed like the back of His hand.  He knows he needs a very special stone that is both strong and beautiful.  He brings out the finer tools to form and refine you. You will be a work of art by the time He is done.

"But Lord, I'm anxious to get to the place where I'll REALLY be used, like building your church!" you might be chafing under the grinding tool.  What can possibly take so long in this dreadful pit?

Ah, but you must be patient! Don't forget that the stones used for Solomon's temple were perfected in the quarry so they could be fitted into place without hammer or chisel in the house of the Lord! (I Kings 6:7)  All the flying chips of rock and dust were left in the gravel pit so that only polished stones would be brought up out of that hole.  The veins of imperfections and weaknesses had been removed so that what was left was the incredible craftsmanship of the Master.

It isn't very glamorous down there in that quarry. 

And yet.

When we submit to the selection process, the measuring, the chipping, the chiseling, the fine grinding and polishing, we will emerge ready to be placed into God's building program.  We are living stones, fitted together with Jesus as our cornerstone.

Life in the quarry isn't easy, but it's part of how God builds His kingdom.  He is looking for those stones that have been beautifully marbled with life experience, sparkling with iridescent joy, and infused with the kind of faith that is borne in difficulties and pressures. He is skillfully smoothing and polishing each one of us for His purpose and glory.

Today's Small Thing is to take Isaiah 51:1 and print it off, post it up, or use it as desktop decor.  Meditate on the process the Master is using in your life and know that He is preparing you as only He can. 

POINTS: 50 for posting up Isaiah 51:1

Download Isaiah51

Get Real Gone

Turn up the volume on the playlist and get ready to get Real Gone for today's Small Thing!

As small business owners operating on a shoestring, we've had several years pass us by without getting a vacation.  It's just one of the many perks of owning our own company.

But even though we don't get two weeks on a sunny beach somewhere, it's important for us to disconnect from the daily stresses of life every now and then.  There's a mental and emotional (not to mention physical) toll that is taken when we never stop down to relax.  I'm really feeling it this week.

It's a shame that we think that we have to wait for a formal vacation to have some fun.  Maybe it's because it's hard to turn our back on responsibilities without leaving home, or because we were raised with midwestern values that place a high merit on guilt.  But taking a stand for relaxation, especially on a Friday, is something we sure could use.  How about you??

Today's Small Thing is to get Real Gone in some way....and I'm going to give you the whole weekend to accomplish this task!  That doesn't mean that you have to be "GONE" all weekend, it means that you have to find a small way to step away from the "Have-To's" and do a "Want-To."

I want you to disconnect from stress by choosing an activity that allows you to "BE" in the moment.  You can be "gone" without really being gone, if you know what I mean.

You may have a busy weekend ahead of you, but I hope you'll take some time to play with your kids, or eat an ice cream cone or watch a movie on the couch.  And when you do, make a conscious effort to lay your worries down, let the stress go, and allow yourself to enjoy the moment.

All the cleaning and organizing and beautifying of your little sanctuary is to allow yourself to enjoy your home.  But don't make the mistake of thinking that you can't enjoy yourself because you haven't "finished" your work.  The work will always be there, but moments of pleasure with people you love should be seized and relished.

POINTS: 40 for getting Real Gone in some small way this weekend

BONUS: 10 for sharing what you're doing....leave a comment, and/or blog about it, and/or tell a friend!

I'm going to have some "girlfriend" time with my daughters!  Don't forget to scroll down for some coffee time...I'm still having trouble with Mr. Linky and I'm terribly frustrated.  Go ahead and leave a comment with your links!

Company Girl Coffee 7.24

Blasted internet connection!  I crawled out of bed super early to get today's post done (I usually do it the night before, but stayed up to late yakking with the kids), only to find that the internet was down.  Rats.

But let's not be daunted by a late start!  Link up below for a virtual cup of coffee with friends.  It's a great way to keep up with each other and make NEW friends.  Just share what is going on in your life, something about one of the Small Things, or whatever is on your mind!

Here is what I'll be working on this weekend:

Two more children's chairs and a rocking chair to go with this set.  So cute!!  (I must do what I can to make the world a more delightful place...)

And I am OBSCENELY excited about being by myself for the next couple of weeks, while everyone else is at some type of camp or event.  WHAT??? Time alone???  Be still my beating heart.

Link up, Ladies! Today's Small Thing is coming in a few minutes.

update:  OK WHY IS MR LINKY NOT WORKING STILL????  {troubleshooting}

**Thanks Christin for the tip to try McLinky!

My Internet Has Been Down :(

Internet has been down all morning, but is finally up...will get the coffee links up asap!!

One of These Things Just Doesn't Belong

Check out my mantle and tell me if you see something that doesn't seem to belong to the decor: (note, look very carefully)

Note the symmetry, the excellent use of color and lighting, the attention to detail.

But the plastic air freshener simply does not belong in the stunning visual vignette.

I've made many decorating concessions in this old barn house, and this may be one of the worst offenders.  But as you know, in our endless quest to fight the Eau de Old House smell, sometimes you've got to give a little.

Recently, I've noticed a great many other decorating concessions (mostly due to laziness) that really ruin the otherwise acceptable style mojo going on around here.  I'll spare you the photos of my son's socks by the couch, the flashlight on top of the bureau, the dog dish by the door, the folded washcloths on the arm of the chair from my last laundry folding session.  (However, I DID remove my swimsuit from the towel bar and the aftershave from the kitchen counter, so I've already made progress.)

What items are out of place at your house?  Do you have things that have wandered into rooms they don't belong in?  Do you have lovely vignettes that are marred by the loose Barbies and plastic pound puppies that were left there long ago?

Today's Small Thing is to find things that don't belong and remove them to where they DO belong!  If you have a bunch of out-of-place things in every room, why not just focus on your main living area?  Don't stress out about this...just look around and create some visual order.  It feels great!

POINTS: 30 for one room

BONUS POINTS: 20 for working in one additional room.

PS I LOVE today's song by Kathryn Scott, "I Belong."  Hit "Play" to hear it!