New Book!!!

Many stories for you this week! Tales from our class reunion, the surprise date Ryan planned for me, and the whole subject of this blog post, too!!

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Well, my friends, I have some fun news to share with you today!

It's true!! I have a new writing project just out, and I've been looking forward to sharing it with you!

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Let me give you a bit of a background.

This is not the book I wrote last fall. That one is still seeking its publishing home. Actually, I wrote the content of this book about ten years ago. God and I went on a little journey together, and after it concluded, I felt God pressing me to write about it.

So I did. I wrote it and then I tucked it away on my bookshelf, where it has remained, all safe and secure in a binder, for the last ten years.

I'm glad I wrote about it back then. I'm glad I wrote while the events and lessons were fresh in my mind, because if I hadn't done it then, I wouldn't have been able to accurately remember everything all these many years later.

But words do no good on a shelf. And as absolutely FRIGHTENING as it is to share them right out loud with people I may not know or be able to see, that is what I'm called to do as a writer, so with trembling hands and an equally trembling soul, I offer you this piece of my story.

The reason I chose to take the words out of their bookshelf hiding now is because this fall, I'm speaking at some women's retreats, and my topic is Be Still. In the writing of the material, I felt that I wanted to offer more to these women. More than four sessions that whirl by in a weekend. I wanted to show them how I learned the be still lesson. I wanted to give them words they could hold in their hands and take home with them if they felt they still needed a friend in the journey after the weekend concluded.

This book isn't a how-to. It's a how-I-did. It's a story and a study all in one. It's a story of my weeks of praying in the prayer chapel. It's the study of passages God brought to me to teach me in that season. It offers Scripture passages for you to read on your own {if you want} and even journaling lines if you want to make notes.

The details surrounding my need to be still might not match the details that cause you to spiritually flail. That's okay! No matter what it is that causes rustling in your soul, I think you'll find the heart of my journey similar in ways to the heart of yours.

To share words of a heart-journey is both exciting and terrifying. I have freaked out on more than one occasion, knowing this previously private part of my life was about to be on a published page. I've begged the Lord for His mercy and protection over this story. That somehow, as you read, you would see the true desire of my heart, which is for you to find the same kind of intimacy with Him that I did.

Dear friends, I would love for you to to read Be Still: Learning to Know He is God if you'd like. It is available on Amazon {and if you're local to me, I have copies as well}. You do not have to be a woman or attending the retreats I'm doing to enjoy the book. It was meant to be a companion to those weekends, but it also stands alone.

If you do read it and want to share something the Lord stirs in you, you're welcome to use #bestillbook. But this journey is not even remotely about sharing and hashtags. This journey is about letting the Lord work in you. That is what I have prayed over these pages. That He would remove anything of the details of my story that might get in the way and that He would work somehow in you. If that happens, pulling the manuscript out of a binder and sharing it is all worth it.

Very shortly, I will share with you about the day I got the book for the first time and all the fun I've been having already. But for today, I very humbly offer you this new book of mine. Thanks for sharing the journey with me!

45th Monthiversary

Happy Labor Day! Ryan's working today, so it's not much of a 3 day weekend in Shafferland, but I still like Labor Day, because it signals a whole new seasonal start. Not just the signal to put away the white pants and shoes {for anyone who chooses to observe that rule} but the signal to welcome the fall decor and all things pumpkin.

I'm actually not a huge PSL fan, but I appreciate pumpkin and am excited to start using it in cooking again. I had planned to make something this weekend but alas, our store was sold out of store brand pumpkin, and I was not paying TWO EXTRA DOLLARS for a name on a label. Nope.

But before Labor Day. there was a monthiversary! 45 months!

We were blessed with a gorgeous day, and when Ryan got home from work, we went out for a tiny celebration. We had a big, out-of-town date planned for the next day, but we wanted to pay tribute to our monthiversary on the actual day.

Though this is NOT on the clean eating route, I really wanted Burger King, because I had not had it IN FOREVER, so that's where we went. And we experienced our meal to the hilt:

Ryan had to finish mine...it was too much. But I had been waiting all day for Starbucks, so even though he was full, we made a stop at the remaining Starbucks in town before going home.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record on the second day of every month, I must say again that I am grateful for this season of our life. I'm grateful for house projects that are done, for a husband that so kindly indulges my need to celebrate, and for the fun we get to have even in simple things, like burgers and coffee.

I remember three years ago, on our September monthiversary, when we had just come home from our cruise to find that our water heater was broken, and Ryan spent the whole day crawling around under the house, repairing broken pipes, and working on the water heater. This was definitely a preferable day, and I don't take it for granted.

And I was also excited about the day to come, which I will tell you about tomorrow, when we went on a date that was a total surprise for me...Ryan planned the whole thing!

The Shafferland Shuffle

* Last Sunday morning, we drove my sister, Lori, to the airport, so she could fly back home after Mom's party. I was so glad she had been able to come for the party, but I wasn't ready for her to go home so soon!! We stopped for a breakfast date on the way home and then...we got to keep Miss Phoebe!!! She came over for the afternoon and evening, and we had a grand time, going for walks, visiting Grandpa, and taking naps. We love Phoebe!!

* Monday signaled the return to normalcy for us. Ryan captured this gorgeous sunrise on the way to work, and I got busy cleaning up after all the party. Decorations and supplies had to be put away...and there were also many veggies to eat, since Mom brought that ginormous veggie tray to her own party! LOL! Salads all week long! I guess there were too many salads, because Ryan sent me a picture of the "big bowl of snacks" at work. I mean, seriously! Have you ever seen a bowl this big???

* Tuesday was a big day...because Ryan's grandpa got out of the rehab hospital! :) We were happy to see how much he had improved!! And other than that, the day was just filled with regular things, like sitting in the carpool line with my coffee and going for power walks with Ryan. {This is a new thing for us, and I'm obsessed with beating our previous time. On this day, we beat it by FOUR MINUTES!!}

* Got a special treat on Wednesday: Ryan ended up with the afternoon off work, unexpectedly!!! We took a long nap, went for a coffee run, and caught up on all our DVR shows that we were STILL behind on from the Olympics. Ryan and Braeya got into a little bit of a remote war. I'm not sure who won.

* Thursday was a pretty low key day. Oh how I have longed for low key days! Hung out at home with Braeya, who was extra needy of drinks from the sink that day {eyeroll}, laid in the hammock to read my novel, and watched Ryan eat M and Ms from a bowl. Because that's how we do things around here.

* Friday was our 45th monthiversary, and it was nearly a perfect day!! We got a pretty exciting surprise in the mail, which I will tell you about soon, and we enjoyed a fun date out on the town that evening. Went to Burger King, which is NOT on the clean eating list, but we were celebrating and that happens to be one of my favorites. And we went to our remaining Starbucks, too. :) Thankful for 45 months together with Ryan!

* Yesterday was SUCH a fun day. Ryan planned a surprise date for me, and until we were on our way, I had no idea what it was! We went to Indianapolis and did a scavenger hunt of the downtown area. I can't wait to tell you all about it. Great date idea!! It was a treat to have him all to myself for a whole day after all of the busyness of the last month!

The Saturday Six

One.

So this happened last week. I have to say that of all the places in the whole wide world that I ever imagined to see my name, the Wall Street Journal was never one of them. {Mostly because I have always associated it with numbers, and you know how well I get along with those!} So anyway. This was pretty cool!

Two.

Ryan actually found this article, but I agree with it so much that I couldn't help but share. I do not take it for granted that I'm able to run hard after my dreams right now because Ryan is shouldering the entire financial load on his own. This is such a gift, and I appreciate it. When people find out we don't have kids, they think it's kind of strange that I don't work outside the home, but we're learning that this works best for us. We need this to thrive. And I'm grateful to him that we can do it. {By the way, the photo has NOTHING to do with the article, but I just love pictures of Ryan!}

Three.

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I love Jennifer Rothschild, and I love lessons learned by the water...so I loved this post. Love the reminder that even in the bigness of an ocean...in the bigness of all this world is...God sees us and loves us.

Four.

Two or three years ago, I saw these wooden letters on the Dayspring website, and they were on sale. I felt they so perfectly captured the life God has given us that I wanted to own them. I purchased them, but in our Marion house, we didn't have a good spot to put them, so they sat in the trunk of my car until we moved. Ryan hung them up in our hallway, and I have had multiple people comment on how much they love them. I figured they had long since cycled out of the inventory at Dayspring, but I happened to notice this week that they are part of the Labor Day sale! Twenty bucks - on sale from fifty!! They're wooden letters, but they are not very thick or heavy, so that's good for your wall. I love their strong presence and what they represent. I would give them two thumbs up...and they would make a great gift, if you're buying ahead for Christmas! 

Five.

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I told Ryan this week that it's officially been 3 years since we returned home from our Caribbean Cruise. I shouldn't have brought it up. It is like reminding a kid that his puppy died. Ryan LOVES cruises and has mourned the fact that we've not been on one since. Whoopsie! So perhaps because cruises were on the brain, I happened upon this post, which fascinated me entirely. This girl is a packer extraordinaire. Packed for a seven day cruise IN A CARRY-ON. I can't even pack for CHURCH in a carry-on. I realize she probably didn't mess with things like books and journals and tripods and such, but seriously - still!!! This is impressive.  

Six.

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I was a sixth grader the first time I picked up a book written by Janette Oke. I'd exhausted all the literary possibilities of young adult fiction {on the approved-by-the-parents list}, but my voracious appetite for reading remained. Mom encouraged me to try a grown-up book, and Love Comes Softly was my gateway to the fiction I now love and devour regularly. Janette Oke was a pioneer of Christian fiction, and her pioneer stories captured my heart. I read them all and still own the entire collection.

Her When Calls the Heart series, written back in the 80's and set in Canada has recently become the inspiration for the extremely popular TV series by the same name. I confess I have not watched the series, because I learned when Love Comes Softly became a movies series that it's hard on readers when beloved books translate to film. I loved the movie series, don't get me wrong, but it was hard to see so many details change. I eventually had to pretend the two were unrelated entirely.

So when I saw that a new book series existed, called Return to the Canadian West, co-written by Janette Oke and her daughter, Laurel Oke Logan, I was torn. I desperately wanted to read the books because I love Janette so, but at the same time, I saw the books were companion stories to the TV series and I just wasn't sure my little soul could handle it.

But I picked up Where Hope Prevails, the third book in this series, and was delightfully surprised to find it as easy to love as any Oke book I've ever read. I don't know how much authoring Janette did and how much Laurel did, but the spirit of the book is exactly what I remember of every single novel I ever read, and I adored the story.

I will say that while I hadn't read the first two books in this series {didn't know about them until now}, I wasn't lost in any way. I will go back and read the first two, though I now know some serious spoiler alerts about the way they'll end, based on the plot in this book.

This book is the story of Elizabeth Thatcher, a city born-and-bred teacher who has moved to the Canadian West to teach in a small mining town. As the book opens, Elizabeth is just returning to Coal Valley after spending a summer back east with her family. She is shocked to find that the town has erupted in growth and change in her relatively short time away, and while the townspeople have made decisions they're excited about, the changes are tough for Elizabeth to fit into when she returns.

Beth's not-quite-fiance Jarrick, is a Mountie, and while he loves his work, his assignments take him away far too often, leaving the two of them unsure of what their own future might hold. While she prays for guidance, Elizabeth immerses herself in teaching, spending time with her students and friends, and trying to catch up with the changes in the town.

I will absolutely be purchasing the first two books in this series so I can have the complete set, and while I have no idea how closely this holds to the TV show, I have to say, I loved the book.

* Thanks, Bethany House, for providing a copy of this book to me in exchange for an honest review. And thanks for taking a chance on Janette all those many years ago.* 

 

20 Years

The OTHER big event of our weekend, other than defying all my mother's wishes and throwing her a surprise party, was my twenty year reunion with my high school class.

A couple of observations. First of all, I do not feel like I have been out of high school for twenty years. I'm pretty sure when I was in high school, twenty years seemed so far away and that surely, once I reached that milestone, I would be nothing short of OLD. And if you're reading this right now and you're about 20 years old yourself, you're probably nodding in agreement.

But I feel great! Aside from the pesky white hairs I pay to cover, I don't feel old at all. I actually think I feel better now than I did when I was in high school. And I've decided that part of the reason I don't feel like I've been out of high school for twenty years is because I don't have kids growing up in front of my face to daily remind me that I'm getting old.

So there's that. A second observation, which I hinted at a couple of days ago when I spilled my guts about what I learned in August, is that twenty years offers some good, healthy perspective on high school. I don't know what it was like for you when you were in high school, but for me, it was this constant chase to fit in, which I never really did, except for with a few close-knit friends. {And thank God for them. They were and are such a gift.}I walked around the halls of our little school wondering why I couldn't fit into this group or that, because all those people seemed to have it all together and have it figured out.

I'm quite certain they had nothing together and had nothing figured out. It just looked that way. Twenty years later, a contingent of us came back together, just for fun. After all, reunions are not what they used to be, thanks to the advent of social media. You don't go back to find out what your friends look like, because you just hop online to see that. You probably know how many kids they have, what they do for a living, and more than you ever cared to know about their political views and eating habits.

But we came together, pulling up in mini-vans instead of sports cars, giving rides to kids instead of siblings, and we spilled out into the same parking lot where we spilled out of buses years ago, and we had a tailgate party with the brick walls of our school serving as our backdrop. There was the appropriate awkwardness, as we all tried to figure out where to start with a group we may or may not have interacted with back in the day, all of us trying to remember that none of what mattered then, matters now.

It's relieving, really, to have that freedom. I remember even ten years ago, rushing to buy new clothes and prove myself to these people I shared thirteen years with, wanting to make a point that I had made something of myself. This time? Well, here I am about twenty minutes before leaving home. Still doing my hair. Still wearing my apron from baking more party cookies. And being stalked by a cat.

Perhaps I should have just gone with that hair.

Ryan wasn't in my class. He was in the class behind me. And our valedictorian's husband wasn't even a student at our school. But the two of them hung out in the grilling section while I mingled with my friends.

From the group I hung out with regularly, only one came to the reunion. Amber and I still get together on a semi-consistent basis to shop and drink coffee and hide from storms.

Most people hadn't changed a bit. Kristen and I are nearly birthday twins, and she's still delightful with an unmistakable laugh. We caught up on our respective jobs, and I appreciated her encouragement on the writing and speaking front. And then we did the "WHAT?!!?!?!!?" face to text to our friend Phats, who elected to sit this one out.

And I got to sit for a bit with Laura and her husband, and their son, who was very excited about his trip to Lucas Oil the next day to watch the Colts play.

Selfie with my date while waiting for group photos.

I'd held off on this post, hoping the official group photo...the one with spouses and kids...would be ready to go, but it hasn't popped up yet. So here's the shot of the classmates, which Ryan took from his perch over to the side. {Thought of it all on his own: what a good scrapbooking husband!!}

{Funny side note: ran into Ryan's brother yesterday when I was out getting lunch. He asked how the reunion went and I showed him this picture. He was guessing identities and as he worked his way through the front row, he said, "Who is that girl beside Kristen?" I said, "You mean the one kind of in the back? Amber." He said, "No, the one right beside her." I said, "ME!" He said, "No, the one right there in the white shorts." Ummmm STILL ME!!!!! I cracked up so hard!

The tailgate party was a bit shorter lived than we planned, thanks to a rain storm that popped up.

So Ryan and I headed to the other end of town to get coffee from the Hydration Station, and Amber joined us for a little bit.

The rest of the group met up again later that night at Buffalo Wild Wings, but we had hospital visits to make and parties to prep, so this was it for me. Twenty years marked and done for another five or ten.

I'm glad I went. I'm glad I had the chance to see friends and classmates, and I'm glad I had the chance to realize that twenty years of perspective is a blessing.

How to Host a Cookies and Canvas Party on a Budget

Can you handle one more party post?? I decided to do this post, because you do not even begin to know HOW MANY HOURS I spent researching putting together a cookies and canvas party, and I thought maybe it might be helpful to have all this information in one place for someone else.

{And in all fairness, when I say "researching," I mean "playing on Pinterest," which really isn't all that much of a sacrifice.}

As I told you earlier this week, we decided to have a Cookies and Canvas Party for our mom, to celebrate her 80th birthday. We wanted to do something fun and different, not just for her, but for her friends as well. Having said that, my sisters and I are not independently wealthy, so while we wanted to put on a NICE party, we also wanted to be mindful of a budget. I think, in the end, we pulled off a really nice party without spending a ton of money.

I learned a few things along the way, so today I offer to you what I learned about hosting a cookies and canvas party on a budget.

1. Keep all your ideas {and receipts!} in one spot. I created a {previously} secret Pinterest board to keep track of all the ideas I found for the party. I could let my sisters see/contribute to the board, and whenever I wanted to find something, from a recipe to a decorating idea, I knew exactly where to find my inspirations. {If you don't have Pinterest, and you like good, old-fashioned paper gathering, make a folder.} I also kept every single receipt for what we purchased so we could return whatever we didn't use and so I could present my spending to my sisters if they wanted to see it. Knowing where all those receipts were housed was very helpful when it came time to take back items. Here is a link to my Pinterest board if you'd like to delve more into the elements of the party - and see a few we didn't use.

2. Dollar stores are your friend. There are many versions of dollar stores, but for our paper products and decorations, I shopped almost exclusively at The Dollar Tree, where all items actually are one dollar each. I bought the paper plates, napkins, paper straws, balloons, streamers, plastic tablecloths, take-home bags for cookies, ALL of that kind of thing at the dollar store. I priced items out at an actual party store in town, and they were much more expensive there. I think the quality of dollar store products is just fine, and the price was unbeatable.

3. Reuse color themes. If you like to host parties, {cookies and canvas themes aside}, I think it is really helpful to come up with 3-4 color schemes and always build from those so you can reuse decorations. For example, I've told Ryan that our party colors from now on are going to be red, hot pink, and turquoise. I'll just keep buying reusable decorations in those colors and recycle them as appropriate. I can accent with different colors as needed, but those will be the main ones. It keeps me from having way too much stored in our house to accommodate every color scheme under the sun, and it helps keep decorating costs down as parties go along.

4. Coupons, coupons, coupons. We elected to purchase our own art supplies for the canvas portion of the party {more on this in a moment}, so Ryan and I made more trips to Hobby Lobby than any two people should ever make in a month. We both have the Hobby Lobby app on our phones, and we would buy one supply at a time, each of us using our 40% off coupon from the app so we could maximize our funds. This saved us over $40.00 in art supplies. We also used RetailMeNot {another app/website} to get coupons for Jo-Ann Fabrics, where we purchased supplies we couldn't find at Hobby Lobby. And I used coupon codes from RetailMeNot to get a discount at Wal-Greens, where I printed off photos to use for signs for cookies.

5. Make whatever you can yourself. I designed my own invitations using an online template. I did pay to have them printed out {to save color ink in our printer...it was more cost-effective that way}, but I didn't have to buy the invitations. I also designed all my own signs for games and food, using the PicMonkey website. I also made all my own cookies, which had a cost element, because I did have to buy the ingredients, but it was still WAY cheaper than purchasing all those cookies from a store or bakery. {We served 8 kinds of cookies and had several dozen of each.}I looked up prices on a local bakery's website, and I actually spent about $20 more on supplies than I would have spent on 3 dozen cookies purchased from them. And we had over 24 dozen cookies. I also made Mom's cake and saved a bundle from what I would have paid to purchase a cake. It wasn't decorated with fancy frosting roses or any writing, but really, when you have 80 candles on a cake, who misses the writing?

6. Let the cookies serve multiple purposes. The main purpose of the cookies was for our guests to take home a favor from the party. Something to enjoy a bit later. But we also had the cookies out on display throughout the entire party and guests munched on them from the time they arrived until they left. Using the cookies as part of the menu and the favor meant that we didn't have to have another huge menu to feed guests the day of the party, AND we didn't have to mess with other party favors. {PS - they LOVED snacking on cookies throughout the party and they loved taking some home. I even had requests for recipes after the fact.}

7. Do the option that works best for your crowd for the canvas portion of the party. I know you can find painting tutorials online, so if you really want to go cost-effective, hook up a computer to a TV and let the online tutorial run the show! And I also know there are entire shops that will let you come to them for the party, and they'll do all the work. We fell into the middle between these categories. We could not afford to pay $25 or more per guest to take them to a canvas shop for a traditional party. And because none of us are artists, I didn't want to make people uncomfortable by showing a video and setting them loose with paints. So I hired a friend who teaches canvas parties to come to our house and walk us through the process, but she came for a reduced rate because we purchased all our own supplies. All she had to do was teach. This worked best for us, and everyone seemed to appreciate having her there to help, and we appreciated the lower cost!

8. Nothing wrong with paper plates! Rather than purchasing plastic paint palettes for 17 people, we put a disposable plate and cup at each station for paint and brush-washing. I found a tutorial on Pinterest to make my own easels from recycled boxes {which we snagged from the recycle bin at Ryan's work}, although Sarah said later it would have been possible to paint with just the canvas flat on the table. Still, the easels were nice to keep everything up in full view, and we didn't have to pay to rent or buy them!

9. Borrow, borrow, borrow - and shop your house. We held the party at our own home, so we could save money on venue rental. We held the games and eating portion of the party in our living room so people could sit comfortably, and we held the art portion in the garage, where spills could be easily cleaned up. We borrowed tables and chairs so we didn't incur rental fees, and I shopped my own house for containers to put the cookies in, and other party decorations. That saved a lot of money, too!

10. Support local business where you can! Though we did a lot of DIY to save money, we did spend where we needed to, and we tried to support our friends in the process. Sarah, who taught the canvas class, is a friend of mine, and we were happy to pay her fairly to spend the day with us. I loved knowing we could help her family financially while she helped ours make memories. The shirt we got for Mom to wear was inspired by Pinterest, but was crafted by a little shop in my sister's town. I'm glad to know we could help support her locally-owned shop!

In the end, the party was a hit, I loved the way everything looked, and it was worth every bit of DIY work to surprise Mom!

Linking up with Tamar today, too!