Jen Russum

If you haven't figured it out yet, I am in love with God's Word. His Word is so powerful and has changed my heart in more ways than I can express to you. Even on days when I don't feel very eager to read Scripture {yes, those days do happen}, I never regret afterward that I took the time to read the Word of Life for at least a few minutes of my day. 

What about you? Do you read the Word? And when you do, are you growing as a disciple of Christ? I recently read this article that talks about why many Bible studies leave the heart thirsty for more...

My hope is in 2013, we can be women who flourish from reading the Word. It's my prayer that we would study the Bible with diligence covered in grace and watch with joy as God transforms us from the inside out. He has promised it. And His promises never fail.

Below is a list of some of my favorite Bible reading plans. I am copying the list I posted last year, but adding a few new ones to it that I've discovered during 2012.

If I could ask anything of you, sweet friends, it would be to pick a plan. Choose one. If not from this list, from somewhere else. Dive in to those life-giving waters of Scripture. Commit. Grow. His Word is our very life. His Word became flesh and dwelt among us...

Hello Arizona Russum readers! I'm Veronica and I blog over at Passion, Pink and Pearls where mostly I write about the daily blessings the Lord grants me, aka everyday life. I've always admired Jen's sweet writing, and I've felt so refreshed after many of her posts. I'm so honored to be a guest post for her today.

With the Christmas season upon us, Jen asked for some Christmas appropriate posts. What better Christmasy post than one about the tree? A quick history lesson for you, did you know long ago people decorated their trees with items you'd eat like fruit? It wasn't until the 18th century till the tree started to have lights, by candle. The earliest record of a tree is back the Renaissance area in Germany, where children would gather to snatch a sweet treat from the tree. There's a lot more interesting facts you can read about here.

Well this craft was originally brought to you by Hayseed Home Makin' blog, but I discovered it where else{?} but pinterest. I thought it was be a sweet, fairly simple and inexpensive way to dress up our first Christmas tree. Especially since we don't have many ornaments.



Mallory Jane, did a pretty good explanation of her process but I edited it a bit for our use.

Supplies:
-Christmas lights (2packages of 100 count it what we used), the green colored strand if you're going to use it for a tree.
- 2 yards of Tulle, any kind will work, I chose a white one with a bit of sparkle ( hope onto JoAnn's and snag a coupon before you hit the store to make it extra inexpensive).
-scissors, preferably sewing scissors to make your cuts smoother.

Definitely enlist help!

How To:
- Mallory cut big pieces because she used them as decor on their own...I cut smaller squares. I ended up with about 8cm squares (centimeters happened because I accidentally read the wrong side of the ruler when measuring and cutting...oops...it turned out great at this size though). I'd recommend maybe cutting a little bigger squares. Cut up a ton of squares but don't use all the fabric up.
- Grab someone to help ( I snagged my husband), snap on a Christmas movie (we chose Home Alone) and get to tying. We tied one by every light bulb.
-Once you get all the way through the strand put it on the tree!
-You'll likely have some squares left, we used those extras to fill in on the strand where the tree looks a little sparse.
-Finally, if you chose to leave enough out, use the last big of tulle to tie a big bow for the top of the tree. There's lots of tutorials on line for tulle bows, I kind of looked at a few and made up my own.


Pearls:
- Note: unless you're super anal about it, you won't have every square be perfectly square and all the same size...and that's okay.
-Mallory put some lace in with one of her tutorials. That would look pretty too, I imagine there's all kinds of variations you do on this.
-Have some fun...oh and take some better pictures than me! ;)

That's it! Not too hard really, and we love the final product! Since it's our first Christmas, we don't have many ornaments so this was a perfect solution to try and fill up our tree without having to hit up Walmart for tons of colored balls. Hope you enjoyed this simply DIY and click on over to my blog for some more Christmas DIY. Many thanks to Jen for letting me take over her sweet blog today and good luck on your packing!

Hi! I'm Ashley, the wife and mama behind the blog Pencilled Daydream.

Today I want to share one of my favorite Christmas traditions. Every year, like many families, we send out a Christmas card with a family photo. And one way I love to document our family is by saving those family pictures in a scrapbook. I love the idea of scrapbooking! There are so many cute ways to frame photos and so many adorable stickers that can go with any theme. But you should notice that I said I like the idea of scrapbooking, not actually doing it. I will confess I've never actually made a scrapbook. I am busy taking care of two babies and need a little help which is why I love this little book so much. A sweet friend gave this 

to me as part of a wedding shower gift.  This scrapbook is wonderful because all you have to do is add photos. Now that is my kind of scrapbooking! This is a great book because of how easy it is, but also because of the tradition that goes with it.

 

Each year I make a Christmas card that has a family photo. A great tradition is to keep one Christmas card from each year (or to take a family photo around Christmas) and place it in a pre-made scrapbook. It becomes a family album and it is so fun to see the changes every year. Mark and I have had a significant change that is visible in each picture. The first year we had a wedding picture as well as a picture we took in Bethlehem. The second year a baby bump made an appearance in our card. The third year Elias was born and the fourth year Owen made his way into the picture.

 

What You Will Need:

A pre-made scrapbook

A new family picture each Christmas

Do you have a favorite Christmas recipe? I love to bake cookies and make other sweet treats this time of year. A few years ago I had my first taste of homemade eggnog. I wasn't sure what to expect, but I was pleasantly surprised and it's a recipe I like to have in my repertoire for holiday gatherings I may host/attend (especially if everyone else already has to sweets covered).

(recipe adapted from Alton Brown)

We just spent two days in Byron Bay and wish we could have stayed longer. I highly recommend it for a honeymoon spot FYI! I took my surf lesson and survived. At first, it was rough because my instructor, Gaz {short for Gary here, isn't that weird?}, made me go with my right foot back. Usually I am goofy foot {left foot back} when I snowboard and wake surf {neither of which I am good at and don't do often, so don't get any ideas that I am super athletic or coordinated... because that's sadly not the case}, but Gaz insisted I would never reach my potential as a surfer if I insisted on going goofy foot.

My real question is: do I really have any potential as a surfer either way? I mean, I'm 30. Micah and I want to start a family in the somewhat near future {no comments from eager grandparents-to-be please}. And again, I'm not naturally that athletic. If I can go surfing on a long board a few times a year and get up at least 50% of the time, I'm happy. I don't think going goofy foot is going to inhibit my future professional surfing career.

Nonetheless, Gaz insisted on changing my stance and my first few waves were rough and involved me falling awkwardly each time and possibly bruising my tailbone on the ocean floor. Finally, I started to get the hang of it {eyes on the beach to surf; eyes on the water to swim} and I will say I improved a little from my first surf lesson in Waikiki on our honeymoon.

Maybe I'll give it a go again in a couple years.

Now we are in Surfer's Paradise on Gold Coast. Rumor has it this place gets pretty crazy on weekend nights, but on a Tuesday during the day, it seems pretty tame and pleasant... just a big city with skyscrapers right up on the shore of the ocean. Today, Micah and I were walking back from breakfast {or brekkie as the locals would say} and we saw electric scooter rentals for super cheap - $20 for two hours. On a whim, we rented two of them and road them along the beach all the way north of town, where we arrived at a jetty called "The Spit." From there we could look back and see they city skyline right along the beach a few miles south of us. It was pretty spectacular. And the bikes were really fun. I think I want one to keep...

This afternoon we have a long drive ahead of us to the Town of 1770. Tomorrow we are taking a ferry ride to Lady Musgrave Island where we will snorkel the southern tip of the Great Barrier Reef. The sad news is that we lost our underwater camera in Byron Bay. The wrist strap on it broke and it was swept out to sea. The good news is that we are about to see the Great Barrier Reef with the naked eye, which is so much better than through a camera lens.

Tallow Beach {Byron Bay} at Sunset.

Today, I am delighted to introduce my friend, Ashley, to you. This woman is kind of a big deal in my life, because she is the first person who got me interested in blogging, which made start researching mommy bloggers, which made me change the concentration of my PhD.... and now I am going to write one of my dissertation chapters about her. No joke. Anyway... Ashley is fun, funny, and crafty to the max, like I'll never be. She scours Craigslist on the daily and turns free junk into treasures. In fact, she just opened a new Etsy shop and I definitely think you should check it out! She didn't ask me to say that... I really think you should hop on over there. You won't be disappointed!

* * * * *

"Hi Arizona Russums readers!  I'm so glad that we have all have so much in common - we love Jen!  She's amaze balls, and the real life highlight of my family's regular Arizona visits. I always try to jump at the opportunity to share some fun stuff with you guys whenever she offers, so here goes!  And make sure to jump over to visit me at Dirt Stains and Paint afterward!"

* * * * *

I just love the vintage charm that it adds to the Christmas decor.

So I headed to Home Depot, and picked up a simple 5'x5' drop cloth to start.

The steps were pretty simple, and I'd recommend just popping on some good Christmas tunes to keep you company.

Let's get started...

Step 1:
1.  Layout your drop cloth and iron out the wrinkles.  I put my iron on the lowest setting, and made sure to put a towel underneath so as not to sear anything to my lovely hardwood floors.  Husband would not have been too happy about that. :)

Step 2:
2.  I used our previous tree skirt, as seen under the tree yesterday, as a pattern. If you don't have a tree skirt to measure, you can simply use your math skills and measure out a circle to be your desired diameter.

Step 3:
3. Cut out said drop cloth following traced pattern.  Easy enough.

Step 4 & 5:
4.  Use a ruler, I determined the halfway point on the skirt, which happened to be at 11", and knew that would be the center of the thickest stripe.  I marked 11" all the way around the skirt because I'm terrible at eye-balling, and have always been a "color in the lines" type girl.  This stripe was 2 inches wide all the way around.

5.  For the smaller ticking stripe, I simply measured about an inch below the thicker stripe, and marked that all the way around the skirt.

I originally had marked off two thinner stripes, like the photo, but painting the stripes in took longer than I anticipated, so I bailed.  An additional thinner stripe probably would look a little better if I'm honest.


Step 5:
6.  I simply grabbed a small sponge brush and painted in my stripes all the way around.  The red that I used was Behr's Regal Red.  It happens to be the perfect Christmas red for my home this year, and I'm using it all over the place!

That's it!

It adds the perfect amount of vintage charm to the tree!


Not too shabby for $5.99!



Are you having a vintage Christmas?  How do you add vintage charm to your home without dropping a lot of money?

Hello TAR readers!  This is Erin Kimbell, Independent Consultant with Rodan and Fields, sometimes blogger at The Simply Fabulous and a stay at home mom.  I was thrilled when Jen contacted me about writing a guest post while she is on her adventure Down Under!