One habit that has improved my life the most 🙏🏽

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Daily writing prompt
What’s one habit that has improved your life the most?
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One habit that has improved my life the most is 🗣 DAILY PRAYER! 🙏🏽

It has been one year since I returned to the Lord and returned to faithfully practicing my faith, and I am SO grateful for God’s great love and mercy.

I am lost without Jesus and my daily prayer! 🙏🏽 Prayer helps me stay connected with God and keep Him center of my life.

Photo I took at the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Detroit.

I start each morning by first lighting my prayer candle, dipping my finger in Holy Water (we have a bottle of Holy Water gifted to us from our church), and signing the cross. Then, I begin to say my morning prayers in my kitchen.

Why my kitchen? 😅

Well, we live in a small house, and I am usually the first one to wake up before my husband and the children. So, I say my prayers in the kitchen first thing in the morning!

I always say the kitchen is the heart of our home. 💜😊

Photo I took at the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Detroit.

I also keep a prayer card that lists specific topics to pray about each day of the week (i.e. Mondays praying for the week ahead, Tuesdays praying for the sick, etc.).

And I keep a prayer list to pray for any personal needs or the needs and requests of others.

So, when I tell people I will add them to my prayer list and pray for them, I truly mean it!

My pastor once told me prayer is the most powerful thing we can do. 💯🙏🏽 It is one of the best pieces of advice he has given me.

I strongly believe in the power of prayer. No matter if I am feeling happy, frustrated, stressed, or sad I pray to the Lord. No matter where you are in your faith journey or if you are feeling unsure, prayer can help you connect to God.

“Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful.” — James 5:16

💜 XO

P.S.—if you would like me to pray for you, please let me know! Peace be with you. ✌🏾💜🙏🏽

📸 Feature image of St. Bonaventure Chapel in Detroit, Mich. when I visited the Blessed Solanus Casey Spiritual Center this past spring.

How was your weekend?

A weekend of museum visits, Mass in the city, and a family picnic.

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Flight of the bumblebee 🐝

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I never thought I’d be so happy to see a bumblebee buzzing beside me, but I suppose that’s where I’m at now in my gardening journey! 🐝😆

About a week ago, it occurred to me I hadn’t seen any bees in the garden, even though I have plenty of pollinator flowers.

This morning, I was again thinking about the bees because I have a lot of flowers on the cucumbers now.

I started worrying what if the fruit and veggie plants don’t get pollinated (I know we can manually do this, but I’ve been waiting for nature to take its course 😉).

And then later this evening, Zaya (5) came running through the front door into the kitchen.

She excitedly yelled, “Mommy! Mommy! I saw a bumblebee! There’s a bumblebee on a white flower in the garden!”

So, everyone rushed out to the garden, and the six of us (me, Travis + 4 children) huddled together to watch this little, fuzzy bumblebee wiggle its tiny behind from flower to flower. 🐝😄

💜 XO

Happy Friday

Three things to reflect on in honor of September 11th.

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Church hop ⛪️

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We went to a different parish for the 11:30 a.m. Mass today. (That’s where I took these rainy Sunday pictures, by the way—in the peaceful parish garden. 😌🌧🌻)

It’s the third church we visited within these last seven days.

We like to do what Travis and I call “church hop.” That means visit different parishes throughout the week.

(Okay, this next part might sound a bit confusing. 😄)

During the work week (Mon. – Fri.), our family attends the 7 p.m. daily Mass two to three times a week, and each evening Mass we attend is at a different parish.

Then, on the weekend, we attend either the Saturday Vigil Mass or a Sunday morning/afternoon Mass at a nearby local parish.

For the daily evening Mass, it is generally offered only once a week at select parishes. Not every Catholic Church offers an evening Mass.

The evening Mass may be at 6 p.m. or 7 p.m., just depends on that particular parish’s Mass schedule.

Whereas, early morning daily Masses are offered pretty much at all parishes (there are a few exceptions, of course) four to five days out of the work week.

Morning daily Mass times range from 7 a.m. to 9:30 a.m.. Also, each daily Mass, mornkng or evwning, is about 30 minutes long.

We’re just not able to go to a daily Mass in the morning right now. Travis has to be at work by 6 a.m., and we only have one working vehicle at the moment.

But boy, are we thankful we found a few evening Mass options at several local parishes during the work week! 😊🙏🏽

After today’s morning Mass, we went to say hello to the priest, and he said, “Don’t I know you?!” 🤔😆

We explained he probably remembered us from a different church we visited a couple of weeks ago when he was the celebrant at that Mass.

“Oh, yes!” he exclaimed remembering where he had last seen us. 😅

We do have a “home church” that we make the best effort to attend on the weekend a few times in the month.

However, Travis works a lot (six days a week), and life gets pretty busy with the kids, so having the flexibility to also attend a Saturday Vigil (at 4 p.m., 4:30 p.m. or 5 p.m.) or a Sunday Mass time (at 11 a.m., 11:30 a.m., 12 p.m., or even 5:30 p.m.!) that fits our schedule works best for us.

As you can see, living in a metropolitan means we have A LOT of options! 😂 And that’s another great blessing for us. 🙏🏽

This is just the stage of life we’re in right now, ya know. 😄 #busybigfamilylife

Honestly, I wish we would have thought to do this (church hop) when the kids were babies and toddlers instead of always being late to church. Haha 😂🫣

💜 XO

Happy Friday!

Four fun things for Friday, including a new art exhibit I’m excited to see.

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Happy 4th of July! 🇺🇸

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Happy 4th of July! ❤️🤍💙

It’s a chill Independence Day holiday for us. We are enjoying a family cookout 🌭🍗 , and later on, we will light a bunch of sparklers (the kids’ favorite!) and watch the fireworks in our neighborhood.

Photo of me from July 2019. 😅

Travis is grilling chicken and hot dogs, and I cooked homemade macaroni and cheese and corn on the cob.

I didn’t feel up to cooking a lot of food this holiday because it has been so hot this past week. 🥵

Hope you have a fun and safe holiday!

💜 XO

📸 Feature image of Zhen when she was 4 years old. 🥰❤️🤍💙

A morning at the farm store 👩🏽‍🌾

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Going to the local farm store has become one of our favorite things to do this summer.

We’ve been going biweekly to look at the flowers (and sometimes buy flowers 🌸😆), get fresh baked goods, and checkout any new products.

The kids love it because I always buy them lollipops. 🍭😅

In May, I bought some of our fruit and vegetable starts at the farm store.

I must say, I am very pleased with the plants we got because they have been growing so well in our little gardens. 😍🌱

On this particular day, we bought a dozen cinnamon sugar donuts 🍩 (for only $8!), deli meat and sub rolls for lunch 🥪, lollipops for the kids 🍭, a hanging flower basket for the front porch 💐, and fresh parsley for the swallowtail caterpillar we’re “raising” 🐛.

Zaya (5) picking out lollipops at the farm store. 🥰🍭

A few weeks ago, we found a butterfly egg on our garden parsley. Since then, we have been caring for the swallowtail caterpillar.

But I’ll share more on that story in a different post. 😉🐛🦋

Fresh parsley for Cali the caterpillar 🌿🐛
Cali loves the parsley! 🥰🐛🌿

I was good, and I only bought three plants this time 😆🪴: flowers for the porch, onion starts, and more parsley for the caterpillar (because I didn’t want it to eat all of the small parsley plants I had in my grow bag).

💜 XO

Tattoo collector

American traditional tattoos—I love the classic, vintage imagery and bold colors and lines.

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A little garden harvest 🌶🫛

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Just a little garden harvest of banana peppers, green beans, and basil (to season tonight’s lasagna dinner).

The kids helped me water the front garden (because of this excessive heat 🥵), and they noticed a few beans and peppers looked ready to harvest.

A little garden harvest in the morning 🌶🫛
Harvesting green beans 🫛
Harvesting banana peppers 🌶

All week the temps have been in the high 90s. 🥵 We’ve had to deep water the gardens—the front garden in the morning and the back garden in the evening.

I based the watering schedules on when each garden gets full sun. It’s been working pretty well for the plants, too!

More banana peppers growing! 😍

I noticed my energy has been low all week because of this excessive heat.

I focus on working in the garden early in the morning and later in the evening when it’s not too bad out.

I’m ready for it to rain so I can get a break from watering the garden and the temps will hopefully go down. 😆

💜 XO

Tough day 😏, so let’s enjoy some flowers 💐

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Daily writing prompt
What’s the best way to deal with negative thoughts?
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This question of the day is very timely, as I am having a tough day on this Wednesday. 😏

Our minivan needs some costly repairs, and it’s our only vehicle. So, it immediately triggered my anxiety.

Negative thoughts and questions started swarming through my head, and I felt a little defeated, at first.

What about this…? What about that…? How will we…? How much will it cost…? Trying to hurriedly come up with solutions, and so on.

Beautiful Cosmos flower 🌸

Pause and just breathe

But instead of letting it get me down, I took a few slow deep breaths and quietly sat in the kitchen for a moment. 😌

The kitchen is the heart of our home, so it just made the most sense to pause here. 💜

I decided to stick with my morning routine: light the prayer candle, morning prayers, get the tea kettle on, tidy the kitchen, start breakfast for the kids.

And then I spent the rest of the morning in my garden. My happy place. 😊🌼

Potato flower in the garden! 😍🥔🌸 We will be harvesting potatoes very soon! This made me SO happy. 😊

It doesn’t make the problems go away. We will still have to get the minivan fixed. I know that.

But I also trust in God; He is my hope. 🙏🏽

A timely message of encouragement

Yesterday, we went to the Tuesday evening Mass. Fr. Jim’s homily focused on having hope and trusting in Jesus even when life throws us some curve balls.

I’m thankful for his very timely message. It turned out I would need it this Wednesday morning. 💜🙏🏽

Our spider flowes are doing their best in this heat. 🥵🌸

And tending to the vegetable plants and admiring our flower blooms was the joy and peace I needed to help me take a break from the stress of auto repair issues. 🥰🌸💜🙏🏽

💜 XO

The old journal

A visit to an art thrift store leads to a journal discovery.

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Purr my last email 😹

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We do something a little different from the traditional chores allowance. Instead, we give the kids a reading allowance. 📚🤑

Think 90s Book It!, but instead of a free personal pan pizza from Pizza Hut 🍕📚 (which I miss BTW! 🥹 #90sKid), they earn a little money when they fill up their reading logs.

And my kids LOVE doing this! 😁

I always take them to the stores where it’s easy to find fun things for under $10.

Places like Walmart, Five Below, Target, and Dollar Tree where a kid gets excited over novelty products, inexpensive art supplies, plushies, puzzles, slime, posters and unique gadgets. 🤩

You know the kind of stuff when you’re out grocery shopping and your kid picks up some random fuzzy pen that costs six bucks and asks if you can get it.

But you’re like, “Absolutely not! That fuzzy pen is $6! 😲 We’re here to just get some milk and bread, dude.” 😂😏

I found this fun sign when we went to Five Below. Lol 😹

But with their own money they can get any fuzzy pen or quirky doodad they want! 😆😉

Yeah, those are the kind of stores I take the kids to on their allowance payday. 🤩😂

Plus, it’s a great way to teach the kids living math! 💯

They learn price comparison, estimating, paying tax, counting money to pay for purchases at stores, how to save their money…and bonus…social skills—how to interact with the cashiers and staff!

💜 XO

The cucumbers have flowers 🥒🌼

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Our cucumbers have flowers now! 😍🥒🌼 I noticed the bright, yellow flowers this past Saturday.

Travis and I were geeking out about it. Lol! 😂This is the first time we have grown cucumbers, so we are very excited!

We’re growing eight pickle cucumber plants. I plan on making dill pickles with our cucumber harvest, so I’m also growing dill in the same grow bags.

The cucumber plants are also showing signs they’re ready to start climbing. Thin tendrils have emerged and started curling around the trellis. 🥹🌿

I think it’s just amazing how the plants know to reach out and wrap itself around nearby objects. They’re like little hands searching for something to embrace. 😄😍

Over the weekend, Travis installed a simple homemade trellis behind the cucumbers. He just used nails and twine. Super easy!

We also ended up transplanting a few of the plants into separate grow bags so they don’t crowd each other and have enough root space to grow.

I can’t wait to see the cucumbers start growing! Shouldn’t be too much longer now. 😊🥒🌼

💜 XO

P.S.—here’s my midsummer seed order and a few new blooms in the garden.

Brunch, Garden, Mass, and H-Mart

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The day started with a cozy brunch at home. I’ve mentioned before on Fridays we have Pizza Friday.

I always order my pizza from a local Italian market. They always use fresh ingredients and cook the pizza using a wood-burning oven. It’s the best fresh pizza I’ve ever had! 😋

You get an 11″ pizza with unlimited toppings for just $12! Great deal! I always order the meat lovers pizza with artichoke as an extra topping.

For brunch on the weekends, I like to have my favorite tea with a slice of my leftover pizza with a fried egg and honey drizzle on top. I put on my jazz playlist and just enjoy the vibes.

Last Saturday, I introduced my pizza brunch recreation to Travis and he was amazed at how delicious the leftover pizza tasted with fried egg.

“Yo! This is REALLY good!” he exclaimed. “How did you come up with this?” 😲🍕

A little work in the garden

We did a little work in the garden. I planted another sugar baby watermelon start, and Zaya (5) wanted to plant a cosmos flower seed in her little baby pot. 🥹🌸

This makes two sugar baby watermelon starts we are growing in the garden.

Zhen (13) chose the mini watermelon to grow because she LOVES watermelon. 🍉

I’m a little nervous about having enough space for the watermelon to vine, but I’ve been researching ways to grow vertically, so I think we can make it work! 🤞🏾😁

It looks like he’s smiling at me. 😄🐸

Mr. Toad back again

And while I was tending to the patio garden, my little toad friend was hopping behind me. 😄🐸 It’s so cute because I often see this toad pop out when I am working in the garden.

It seems he was on his way to the garden section of our peppers and tomatoes. Lol 😅 That was perfect because some bugs have been hanging around the plants. 🪲

Mass and a quick stop at H-Mart

Later in the afternoon, we went to the Saturday vigil Mass.

Since Travis works six days a week, we have found going to Saturday Mass is a little easier on him. That way he can sleep in and fully rest on Sundays.

After Mass, we stopped by H-Mart to get lo mein noodles and a few other ingredients. I had a craving for homemade chicken lo mein and I wanted to cook it for dinner.

These Canton Style Egg Noodles are so easy to cook and the texture is perfect for my homemade stir-fry. 😋🍜
I also saw these lo mein egg noodles. I’ve never cooked them before, so I thought I’d give it a try. 🍜

The kids LOVE H-Mart! 😍 Every time we go, they always want to get ramyun and snacks. This time, they found K-Pop Demon Hunters snacks, so of course, we had to get it! 😂🫶🏾

What we bought at H-Mart…

I love H-Mart because they sell so many varieties of noodles, rice, kimchi, and other unique foods that you can’t find at American supermarkets.

The kids wanted to check out the toy section (obviously lol), and they wanted us to buy something.

I told them to save up their allowance money so we can come back and they can buy the toy they really want to get. 🤓💡

Before leaving H-Mart, we played a game of Toy House—the claw machine game.

We didn’t win anything (does anyone ever win these games? 😏 lol), but it was still fun trying. 😊

💜 XO

6-7 chicken nuggets

The new addition to the “6-7” trend—chicken nuggets! 😂🐔

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