Helping Families to Connect and Thrive

Mermaid Days!

06.17.20

We are cautiously emerging from our social distancing cave and starting to see some loved ones. Our hearts relish the togetherness, but we are taking things slowly to ensure that we are still being as responsible as we can. This past week we enjoyed some time on the coast with cousin Waverly and her family. When Wavy comes to visit, she is ALL ABOUT craft time! So, I did a little search for a beachy project the girls could make. It didn’t take me long to discover this adorable egg carton mermaid tutorial by Arielle of Art Camp. I’m telling you, if you want to fall down the most glorious rabbit hole of art projects, you MUST check out her site and Instagram account. WOW!!! Her ideas are so fresh and creative!

Whenever we find projects online we try and incorporate a few little twists of our own. In this case we added glitter hair, fins, and “booby shells” (as the girls call them!) and a sequin pearl hair accessory. We also used the activity as an opportunity to talk with the girls about appreciating different skin colors— the takeaway being that it is important to recognize we all have different skin colors, and no one color is better than the others. I told the girls they could choose any skin color for their mermaids. Isla wanted her mermaid to have darker skin and Waverly chose to try and match her own skin color by blending paints (such a cool learning opportunity, by the way!).

We also chose to connect all our pieces by threading a pipe cleaner through the egg cartons, attach it to the tail fin on one end, hot glue it to the back of the mermaid body on the other, and twisting the leftover piece into a little hook.

Our little mermaids loved this craft, and they enjoyed some time on the beach splashing in the waves and giving Cole his own merman tail!

Sunshine, wave jumping, and hot tamale breaks with Nana!

Cole is not nearly as enthusiastic about playing in the surf as Isla and Waverly. He spent most of his time rolling around in the sand, and made a few brave dashes down to the waterline.

10 Favorite Gifts

06.12.20

Between Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, and an abundance of family birthdays, May and June are our busiest months for giving gifts! I know I have talked about it before, but I absolutely LOVE meaningful gift giving! I often find myself dreaming up ideas of things to make or find that my loved ones will genuinely appreciate and enjoy. Today I thought I’d share 10 of my favorite thoughtful gifts (in no particular order) in case you’re looking for a little inspiration for your own giving.

Custom Jewelry
These custom necklaces are among my most treasured items— not because of their aesthetics (which I also love!) but because of the sentiment behind each of them.

Isaac wrote our kiddos’ names in his handwriting.

Isla designed individual snowflakes for some of the important women in her life last Christmas.

We immortalized Isla’s most spoken phrase from the year and Cole’s adorable “mommy love monster” scribble in these adorable Mother’s Day necklaces.

I cannot recommend Caitlyn Minimalist enough for these custom jewelry projects, by the way! They were so helpful, kind, and they have gorgeous craftsmanship!

“I Love You” Art
I am a total sucker for repeating gifts, especially the “I love you” art that Isla and Isaac make me every Mother’s Day. When Isla was one she used to say, “I yuh you.” It totally melted my heart and Isaac knew that, so for Mother’s Day he and Isla collaborated on a piece of art featuring “I yuh you.” Since then, every Mother’s Day they work together to create a piece of art that features how she most frequently tells me that she loves me. Talk about sentimental!

We always seek opportunities to give gifts that honor time together and/or shared interests. The next three gifts highlight a few of our favorites…

Gruncle’s Raspberries Sign
Isla and Gruncle have picked raspberries together every summer since she was two. We were so excited to create this sign for his garden featuring Isla’s handwriting. All the details can be found HERE.

Isaac’s Birthday Video
Friends and family from around the world and every stage of Isaac’s life came together to help me create a video of birthday greetings. I compiled all of the individual video messages into one big slideshow using iMovie. This will forever be on of the most treasured gifts we have!

Nana’s Garden Book
Isla and her Nana Jan love spending time gardening together. One Christmas, Isla created a book for her Nana. She wrote all about their time together in the garden, the things they planted, what she enjoyed most about gardening, her own recipes, and listed the fruits and vegetables she hoped to plant next year. She also created all the illustrations and they are SO darling!

To go with the book, Isla made a bookmark out of the leaves and flowers she and Nana had pressed together that summer. She was strategic in selecting each item for the bookmark; Nana’s favorite green hydrangeas, strawberry leaves from the plant Isla had given her, a flower from their pea plant, and Isla’s favorite mint leaves. These were all items that would remind Nana of their time together.

Speaking of the pressed flower bookmark, she also made one for her Great Grandma DJ because we used the flower press DJ had made for me as a child!

Cheryl’s Disneyland Book
Photo books are pretty much the peak of nostalgic gifts, am I right?! My sister in law, Cheryl, and I took our girls on a wonderful surprise Disneyland trip. I compiled all our photos and created a Blurb book for Cheryl so that she and Wavy could easily relive our magical experience!

Daffodil Cards for Nana Sandy
We wanted Nana Sandy’s quarantine birthday to feel sunny and joyful! Knowing her love for the color yellow and cheerful springtime blooms, we set to work on a family art project and made her daffodil cards. Each person chose their own preferred mediums and methods. Cole and Isla created with ink pen and watercolor, Isaac made a pencil sketch, and I constructed a collage from sheets of paper I had painted with acrylics. It was so much fun to use the same source of inspiration to create our own separate projects.

Daddo, You Rock: Customizing Pinterest Finds
Pinterest is an amazing resource, and there are endless possibilities for customizing ideas you find! I saw some “Dad, you rock!” gift ideas a few years back and they were the perfect jumping off point for a Father’s Day gift. Isla and I put together this framed photo for Isaac using the rocks she had collected on our beach walks— always looking for ways to weave in personal connection! I happened to take a photo of their feet together when they were climbing earlier that week (sometimes the stars just align in your favor!) and had Isla write the phrase, “Daddo, you rock!” on the picture with a white gel pen.

70 Things
For my Mom’s 70th birthday we made her a jar of 70 Things: A collection of meaningful memories, lessons learned, and qualities we admire about her. Our hope was to help her recognize how much good she has contributed to the world through her thoughtfulness, creativity, hard work, selflessness, determination, integrity, patience, love, and humor.

Holiday Art
I mentioned earlier that I love repeating gifts— items that your loved ones look forward to receiving year after year. Holiday-themed gifts are a perfect repeating gift option! A few of our favorites are Christmas footprint crafts and abstract Easter egg paintings. They make for such festive decor and are so fun to see year after year!

Mom’s 70th Birthday

06.11.20

On Monday my mom turned 70!!! Much like Isaac’s recent milestone birthday, we had a much smaller, quieter quarantine celebration than we had originally planned. It was a lovely day, filled with intention, quality time, and flowers!

The kids and I had such a great time making decorations in my mom’s favorite colors.

I found the tutorial for these fabulous watercolor paper plate flowers here. We added glitter and used pinking shears on a few to give them our own flair.

We painted large sheets of paper with acrylic paint to make the paper chains. To achieve the stripy textured look on some, we pressed sheets of blank white paper onto the papers with wet paint, patted down firmly, and then peeled them apart. Once the paint had dried, I cut the paper into strips and started gluing!

The kids designed the sweetest cards for their Nana! Cole made her a “Coley flower and a Nana flower” with glitter. He was so proud to do all the drawing, gluing and glittering himself. Isla spent several days creating the most precious illustration of Nana and herself working together in the garden. Every detail was included, right down to Nana’s toenail polish!

Isaac drew our card and I hand cut the birthday sign. Mojanana is the nickname Mom uses with us, as it includes all the names we call her (Mom-Jan-Nana).

The birthday girl requested a favorite dinner from her childhood and ice cream sundaes for dessert. YUM!

After dinner was present time! The four of us worked together to create a gift that would honor Mom and her milestone birthday. Our hope was to help her recognize how much good she has contributed to the world through her thoughtfulness, creativity, hard work, selflessness, determination, integrity, patience, love, and humor. We made her a jar of 70 Things: A collection of meaningful memories, lessons learned, and qualities we admire about her. We all sat around the table together as Mom read through each item, laughing and reminiscing. It was a perfect way to wrap up our celebration!

Happy, happy birthday, Mom! Cheers to many more happy years! We love you!!!

Speaking Up

06.01.20

Earlier this spring we noticed a starling had made a nest in our neighbor’s attic vents. One morning the neighbors covered the vent and Isla was very concerned about the welfare of the baby birds. As she observed the frantic mother bird, she became increasingly upset. There were a lot of tears. I felt her pain too. She begged me to contact our neighbors and ask them to open up the vent so the mom could get to her babies. I was so torn— I couldn’t bear the thought of the birds or Isla suffering, but I hated the thought of overstepping and insulting our neighbors, who have been nothing but loving and helpful to us. ⠀⠀
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I tried to explain my dilemma to Isla as tenderly as I could— people handle situations differently, the birds were causing destruction to their home, questioning our neighbors’ decisions might ruin our relationship with them. She turned to me, her face stained with tears, and sharply asked, “What’s more important, Mom?! Maybe upsetting our friends or the lives of those babies?” ⠀⠀
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Gut punch. She was absolutely right. My fear of facing potential discomfort was not only silencing my inner voice, it was silencing hers. I realized in that moment my actions were teaching her to ignore her heart, stuff her feelings down, and give up when challenged. I vowed right then and there I would never again attempt to silence her because of my own fears.⠀⠀
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Isaac, Isla and I drafted a message and sent it to our neighbors. Touched by Isla’s concern and courage, they agreed to unblock the opening, let the baby birds grow up and leave on their own before closing up the vents. They agreed to the continued damage, mess, and expense for the sake of those babies and for the sake of our girl, who was BRAVE ENOUGH TO SPEAK UP.⠀
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The birds stayed for another few weeks, and each happy chirp reminded us that our voices had made a difference. Our experience with the starlings is certainly not a direct parallel to the battle against racism and bigotry in our nation, but it was a valuable reminder to our family to always speak up for what we believe is right. I am so very grateful to our Isla for reminding us that we should never let fear or discomfort silence our voices.

Isaac’s 40th Birthday!

05.31.20

Isaac turned 40 on Wednesday, and his quarantine birthday was one we will always remember! I could not host the big party I had been dreaming up, and we had to postpone our trip to Europe— the gift that would have boosted Isaac’s “countries visited” count up to 40 (we love a good symbolic connection in this family!). Admittedly, this milestone did not look anything like we had planned, but it was better than anything I could have hoped for, and my heart is overflowing with gratitude to the hundreds of friends and family who came together to help me pull off a surprise that left Isaac feeling SO MUCH LOVE on his birthday!

Birthdays call for festive decor in our family, and the kids and I had so much fun making this beachy banner for Isaac! Isla and Cole painted sheets of paper in ocean hues and I just love how they turned out! To maintain consistency with our decor, we also used some of the leftover paintings for a spunky little 40 (complete with party hat) and Cole’s card for Isaac.

Isla took a little inspiration from my hand cut lettering to make her own sign for her Daddo!

Our morning started in the most glorious way possible for parents with small children— sleeping in! Thank you, Nana! We enjoyed a round of Beachy Marys, sweet potato hash with hollandaise, and the most incredible bacon (thanks to Isaac’s brother and the fine folks at Beaux Freres Winery) for brunch.

My mom gave Isaac a bunch of his favorite Costco-sized staples (there are few things this man loves more than natural peanut butter) and surprised him by paying a speeding ticket he didn’t know he had received earlier this spring. We all had a good laugh over her unique gift.

Of course the cats immediately found the empty gift boxes.

It didn’t take much longer for the kids to find them too!

After brunch we headed out into the sunshine for some play time on the beach. The weather was absolute perfection!

We couldn’t resist recreating a favorite photo from the kids from last year on Isaac’s birthday. Stop growing so fast, babies!

That afternoon the birthday boy went out and took a nap in the sunshine while I prepped our dinner— tacos, of course!

Isaac’s brother, Christopher, and his family put together a personalized collection of albums that represented each decade of Isaac’s life. To give the full record store effect they created mini store in a box– complete with incense and labeled album dividers. It was such an incredible and memory-filled gift!

After dinner and cake we made our way down to the beach to walk and watch the stunning sunset.

Once the kiddos were in bed, we popped some bubbly and I surprised Isaac with a slideshow of video messages from friends and family from around the world and every stage of his life. With this milestone birthday looking fairly different than we had imagined, it was my hope that this video would help Isaac feel deeply, deeply loved. All I can say is, mission accomplished!!! It is hard to find adequate words to express just how much it meant to both of us to have so many loved ones take the time to share such heartfelt, genuine, and often hilarious sentiments with Isaac– thank you, thank you, thank you, from the bottom of our hearts! This is a gift we will both cherish for the rest of our lives.

A number of people have asked to see the completed video, so we’ve included it below. With nearly 200 individual greetings, this slideshow quickly gained feature film length, so you might want to pour yourself a drink and pop a little popcorn before you hit the play button!