This week’s learned, links, and thankfulness…

The scene above has been happening a lot this week, as well as a lot of watching on the iPad. We’ve had a heatwave, so we haven’t wanted to venture outside, and then with the crew working on installing our floors, we can’t leave the house. Once all this house stuff is done, we are definitely going out for more adventures.

Loved watching Valley Uprising on Netflix. The whole concept of free solo climbing is mind boggling. I’d say that is definitely insane. One day, on the new heavens and the new earth, I’d love to try. 🙂

Thankful for such a fun dinner with the neighbors. It only took us 9 years of living next to each to finally all have dinner together. I want to get to know my neighbors more!

I don’t think Ben would go for it, but I really love this pink bathroom.

I’m all heart eyes for this denim romper and this striped jumpsuit. I also want to sew one for myself.

If we “Love God Most, We Will Love Others Best.” YES!

It’s been my prayer this week that I would meditate and be in awe of God’s holiness. This verse has stood out to me… Isaiah 5:16 “But the Lord of hosts is exalted in justice, and the Holy God shows himself holy in righteousness.” Amen. Amen. Amen. I’m thankful for Holy God.

Have a great weekend friends! We still have a couple more days of construction here and then I get to clean all the dust. Then, stairs go in later this week. I’m so excited, though my savings account probably isn’t.

We left on a Saturday for our #bratchersixmidwestfix road trip. We were supposed to leave Friday, but Ben was sick all week and still wasn’t feeling well. He wasn’t 100% on Saturday, but he was a trooper and off we went. The first day we got as far as Grand Junction, Colorado. We went through Nevada, Arizona, Utah, and finally (late that night)… Colorado.

We didn’t know how far we would make it each day, so we booked our hotel while on the road. Ben does all the online booking because I get headaches if I read for long periods in the car. For most of the trip, we turned to the HotelTonight app (use RBRATCHER2 to get $25 off and I get a discount next time I use it too, so everyone wins!) or Hotwire to find our hotel.

The girls did so well on the road. We brought some of our school books with us, so we did homeschooling while we traveled. In addition, as we entered each state, we would color it on a US map and one of the big girls would read out basic information on those states from one of the books we brought along.

After staying in Colorado our first night, and going through the rest of Colorado and Nebraska, we ended up in Altoona, Iowa for our second night. Ben does most of the driving during the day, we usually switch in the late afternoon, and I get us to our destination for the evening. I love road trips and sitting in the car for hours. I really enjoy looking out at the landscape and seeing it change from place to place. This world is so vast and so beautiful; makes me in awe of God and how amazing He is. Besides admiring the view, I love having dance parties in the car. I go crazy dancing (when I’m not driving). Ben laughs at how much I get into it (it’s pretty much my arms flailing everywhere).

Those first two nights were kind of rough since Ben wasn’t 100% yet, so a cough was keeping him up at night, which was keeping me up at night. Praise the Lord we had enough energy to be alert and drive on through. The girls were so excited to keep coloring through the states. After two full days of driving, and crossing the Mississippi River, we were almost at our first main destination… Chicago. We all felt a burst of exhilaration knowing we were almost there.

Ben and I had planned to do a road trip with the kids in May, but we weren’t exactly sure of our destination. Initially, we were thinking it would be to Yellowstone, but most of the lodging was already booked. We had discussed going to Chicago for our anniversary in July (we both have never been), and then I told him, “Why don’t we take our family road trip to Chicago?!” He loved this idea, so that’s what we aimed for. We didn’t anticipate him getting ill prior to us leaving, but we were flexible and rolled with the punches. We hadn’t made any reservations yet, so we figured we could visit somewhere else in California if that didn’t work out, but thank Jesus it did!

More posts coming soon about the rest of our #bratchersixmidwestfix. Check out that hashtag on Instagram to see some other photos from our road trip (follow me @cakiesblog!).

Mollie Makes is a lifestyle magazine for those who enjoy living creatively. They bring the latest crafting trends in easy-to-follow how-tos, encouraging you to adapt and share your own crafty spin on things. They celebrate creative industries and give up-and-coming designers their first platform.

I’m honored to have our home featured in their most current issue (issue 67). In the article, I get chatty about our eclectic style and share all about how we make our house a home. You can pick up your copy at your local bookstore like Barnes & Noble or subscribe their magazine here. If you’re an online reader, download the iPad version here. Hope you all enjoy it!

The carpet is getting ripped out as I type. Hooray! It had a nice run for 8 years (almost 9), but now it’s time to move on. I’ve been sharing bits of the renovation over at snapchat (username: mycakies). I’m a total newbie, and I’m not sure how I feel about it. I think it’s good for quick snaps, but it’s also kind of weird. I do like how I can give quick tours (unfiltered), so I’m sharing some of our space over there. One of the things I’m most excited about is removing all those cabinets in the hallway. It’s supposed to be a desk area, but we don’t use it as such, and I would rather have more floor space than cabinets. We’ve been saving for this for 3 years, so I’m ecstatic that it’s finally happening. Once it’s all done, the decorating can commence.

Anyone else doing home updates this summer?

In my mind, it was gonna be a piece of cake to paint the stair railings, well, until I started. Prior starting, I researched what to do and other DIY blogs regarding it, but once I started, I panicked. I was brushing the first few spindles, and oh man, it was tough to get all the nooks and crannies smoothly. I considered just wiping of all the paint off and hire a professional, but then I turned to Pinterest. That’s when Pinterest came in to save the day. Whew!

First, I did all the traditional stuff when it comes to painting stair railings… I cleaned all the railings and lightly sanded them down. I used Benjamin Moore’s Aura paint, which is paint and primer, so I went straight to that when it came time to paint. The miracle worker that Pinterest gave me was to paint the spindles with a sock! I wore a plastic glove, put the sock over that, then dipped my sock covered hand in the paint, and rubbed all along the spindle to get paint in all the nooks and crannies. It worked a million times better than a paint brush and went so much faster too! This post taught me all about it, and if you get adventurous and want to paint your stair spindles too, I definitely suggest the sock route.

Supplies used: Fine sand paper, rag, plastic glove, sock, mini roller, frog tape, and paint (of course!).

For the base of the spindles, I used a small roller to get the paint spread out nice and smooth. It takes about a full day to get all of the spindles and base painted (I did two coats), and it looks so much better than before. I let it dry completely, and painted the second coat the next day. It was a white before, but it had more yellow in it, and this time we went with a much crisper white. The white on the stair railing is Benjamin Moore Chantilly Lace; it is what we will use for our trim too. I’m still debating if I want to put a polyurethane coat on it or just leave it as is. It didn’t have a polyurethane coat before, so I’m leaning towards doing without it. It’s quality paint in semi-gloss, so it should be pretty easy to keep clean. If you have any tips regarding this (I’m a total newbie), do share.

I will have another post to share of what I learned painting the upstairs and the white I chose for those walls.

You can see a bit of our stained carpet, but I’m happy that in about a week, the stains will be gone and we will have pretty wood floors in its place. I can’t wait to share all the after pictures!

This week’s learned, links, and thankfulness…

I learned that painting stair spindles is no easy task. I don’t think I ever want to do that again.

I’m back to my 5am wake-ups and quiet time. Praise the Lord Jesus! My soul has sorely been lacking food. I’ve felt a numbness to God and His word, and was choosing to binge watch and fill my soul and mind with useless things. My thought life was starting to feel the detrimental effects of that.

Soul has been so helpful around her. I’m thankful for this special time that allows her opportunities to stretch herself. She goes downstairs to sweep the kitchen without me telling her. I’ve been so encouraged how she steps up the big sister role when her big sisters aren’t here.

Loving the new striped dresses on Everlane. I want the red one.

I want to make s’mores krispy treats with the girls.

These yellow slides are so cheery.

Gorgeous pouf… please come magically appear in my house.

Read “Little Eyes are Watching in Worship.”

It’s been quieter in this space because I was sick and then renovations. I plan on starting to share posts of our long road trip this week, so stay tuned for that. I can’t wait until July when all major renovations should be done and I get to enjoy our new floors and just decorate. Hip, hip hooray!!!