Hello

As the world turned upside down this year and we were all forced into seclusion within our own homes it gave me time to reflect on the things that truly matter to me.

My family, oh how I have been so, so grateful for this extra time with them. My husband now works from home full time, my 7 year old daughter is now home with the rest of us instead of spending hours away at school, her and my 3 year old son have built the most beautiful bond since being home together and I am going to savor every second of it! Is it always rainbows and sunshine around here? Ummm… no! But we are together and that is what is important, the memories made, the love shared, the bonds strengthened, those are the important things.

The importance of keeping my family healthy, especially now, and figuring out the best ways to do that has suddenly been forced to the top of the list and this has been the year that I made our wellness a priority. I have become very intentional about the things we are doing and the products we use to promote our health, both physically and mentally, because this year has given our sanity a run for it’s money and we need to be aware of our own mental health as much as we are of our physical health.

Which brings me to an important lesson I’ve learned in the last 6 months or so, how to say “no”. Sounds so easy, right? Not so much for me, but I’ve learned that in order to make time for the things and people I love, I need to preserve my time, protect it and not frivolously throw “yeses” out there because I’m worried about letting someone else down. Since being promoted to head homeschool teacher in our house, I’m needing to protect my time even more.

I’ve been forced to slow down and make conscious choices about what I do with my time, I’ve notice a theme developing, I’m choosing to spend my time on the things I really love. I’ve re-kindled my love of cooking, I was in a rut for so long, but in the many hours at home, my kids and I have spent countless hours in the kitchen. Being creative has always been a big part of my life, but was put on the back burner when I was constantly running to and fro for pick up and drop offs and errands for this, that or other things. And now I get to be creative with my kids, Brynlee will sit down and craft for hours and her creations continually blow me away by how talented she is. Reading, it has been far too long since I took the time to read something other than a toy manual and I had forgotten how much I missed it! Even homeschooling has been a fun new adventure for me, I love learning (or I guess re-learning) right along with Brynlee and as an added bonus, its been so fun when I’m able to relate something outside of school to what we learned that week or day. In those times, I am so grateful that we not only have the opportunity, but made the choice to homeschool this year. We absolutely love our school and hope she can return next year, but with all the uncertainty, this is what is best for us in this season.

And as we enter this new season of life, closed off from the interaction we’re so accustomed to, I found I’ve enjoyed sharing more about out lives, the adjustments we’ve made and the things we’re doing to survive this with our sanity. And after the encouragement of many, many friends and family, I’ve decided to start this blog as a creative outlet and to have a landing page to share the things I love. I hope you’ll be able to find something useful here too, thanks for stopping by!

xo, Cassidi