At the end of February I attended a denominational women’s leadership conference. The conference was held in Atlanta and the attendees were all in positions of leadership in their local church. Five women from our church flew down together and had a BLAST for three days. Well, 2.5 days really. The last five hours together we were all so exhausted it was hard to form sentences! Amy Wilkerson, Linda McKindley, Sherry Drury, Me, Jean Bronson

I’ve grown up in the Presbyterian Church of America. My daddy is a pastor, my mom is my mom, and my husband now works at the denominational seminary. I knew a couple people there but it was funny to be back in the part of the country where I am known by my parents. Jane Patete is the denominational director of Women’s Ministries and a friend of moms. This picture’s just for you, mom!

We went through seminary with a couple of the gals who were there. Debbie and her husband are working with youth in Florida now but they used to live down the street in one of the apartments in our complex. We only got minutes together but it was fun to see photos of the kids and hear how they are doing.

Lani came to seminary with her six kids! and was such an encouragement and mentor during school. She mentored us gals by living her life – not just in special meetings and one-on-one sit downs. Lani’s husband is pastoring in Illinois and watching her with the group of women from her church, well, it looks like Lani is still loving women toward Jesus! So fun to see her and get a couple hugs.

The weekend was good. The main speaker was a professor from the Seminary and he did a WONDERFUL job. The workshops and breakout times by regions were good. Many of the churches represented were small and things were geared toward them. In the future it would be great to see more options for churches with 300+ members. We’ll see.

On Saturday my sister and brother-in-law picked me up and we had lunch together.
They had gone to a Hawks/Mavericks game the night before and I got a play-by-play over seafood at Spundivits. We had a ball. It is always super fun to be with family. The time went quickly and they dropped me at the airport so they could go to Ikea before heading home.

My mom is convinced that she is bothering me when she gives input. It’s hilarious. After decades of input into my life, I finally WANT her to give it and she apologizes every time she does. She uses phrases like, “I don’t know what I am talking about, but. . .” and “I’m just going to throw this out and you can ignore it if you want” (wouldn’t THAT have been fun to hear in 10th grade?).

Thing is, I hear every word of what she says and MOST of it takes root and gets put to good use. It may take several weeks, but that’s just the life I am called to. Stuff takes time.

So, mom was here the first week of February and we cleaned out the files. I am almost done shredding the stuff that was embarrassing (phone bills from four years ago – – WHAT??) and have managed to keep new paperwork under control. As you know, we also cleaned out the cooking utensil drawer and it is still looking good.

One of the unplanned projects was the cabinet over my oven. My pans are there on one side and baking “stuff” was on the other. And 30+ plastic bags. Yep. I would just stuff them up there after a Walgreens trip and pull one down when Little pooped. Mom said, “I am just going to throw this out there and do with it what you want, but Becky I’m sorry – you should get one of those fabric bag holders and get those bags out of your cabinets. You are wasting space. Now I may not know what I am talking about, but you could hang one of those fabric hangers right over there. You could even sew one probably.”

Now, honestly this wasn’t a new idea for me, and I did want to sew one. The real maturity came in my realizing that I wasn’t going to sew one and it was worth it to go to etsy.com and buy one that someone else sewed. So, two weeks after my mom left I bought, received, and hung this:

It now hangs over on my white pantry cabinet and looks adorable. The color matches the blue hutch perfectly and the utensils look cute with my other utensil wall art. I love stuffing plastic bags in and Little’s poop is even not as vile since I get to pull a plastic bag out of my new hanger ditty.

Mom, you DID know what you were talking about and I did something with it. No need to apologize – plastic bags in the cabinet is ridiculous and a waste of space. Thanks for being brave, risking rejection (eye roll) and putting this idea out there. I LOVE MY BAGS BAG AND MY CABINET SPACE!!!

When I think of Easter, I think of a sweet smocked dress, white tights, and new white shoes. This is after I think of the Savior’s resurrection, of course. This post is about the dress – don’t judge me.

As a displaced southern girl, I find it increasingly harder to find smocking sweetness in my Midwestern homeland. Today I did what any self-respecting and resourceful girl would do. . . I turned to EBay! And look what I found:

Of course it is from a home in Tennessee and the description says it was only worn a couple times. Well, I know two little girls that will have turns wearing it! Little is almost as excited as me. Now to find or make a big matching bow!!!