What I'm Into: May

Kombucha on tap and Pour-Over coffee at West Oak Coffee Bar | Denton, TX

May is just like a reverse September.  Or is it the other way around since May comes first on the calendar?  

The whole month is spent tying up loose ends and trying not to lose your marbles.  In our little family alone we completed the following things:  full-time job (transitioning to part time hours at the same office), a Masters of Arts & Religion seminary degree, a semester of small group that met in our home, 18 weeks of an intense weekly gathering for healing prayer, a White House internship in D.C., freshman year at University of North Texas, preliminary and semi-final rounds in Funniest Person in Austin competition, and junior year of highschool.  One of us got engaged and one of us got our Red Cross lifeguard re-certification and one of us wore red shoes for Pentecost. Two of us moved back home for the summer and 1 of us began packing to leave for a summer of lifeguarding in upstate NY. We celebrated seminary degrees with BBQ and the engagement with mimosas and Fridays with garden-fresh vegetables.  It's been a very good and very busy month.  We are grateful. 

Here are some other things I've been into lately...

[photo credit]

I've been trying to remember to record season 3 of Father Brown (based on G.K. Chesterton's detective priest) on Sunday nights.  Mark Williams does a wonderful job being both disheveled and savvy, balancing compassion for all people (even the whos in the whodunnit) as well as a fine sense of justice. We've also been taking advantage of the fine decision Netflix made to stream all 11 seasons of MASH. 

One of my favorite companions to dishes and meal prep comes from a beautiful partnership between The Perennial Plate and PBS:  Victory Garden's Edible Feast

Brian and the kids celebrated the end of the semester at Mad Max:Fury Road.  Then in a splurge of celebration he and I went to see Ex Machina.  Phew, that's some amount of fury right there.  I think summed up, the moral of the combine storylines could be to quit objectifying women if you know what's good for you.  

This year, I'm using a fun challenge checklist with a Facebook group of friends (and sisters!).  You can find the checklist here:  Take Our Ultimate Reading Challenge  If you'd like to join our Reading Challenge 2015 group on Facebook, let me know and I'll send you an invite! 

I listed this months reads in a post:  5 favorite reads in May [from the book pile, 2015] 

June's hope-to-read list: Brooklyn, A Call to Action: Women, Religion, Violence and Power, The Mind of the Maker,  Animal Dreams and re-read Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson (because I find a fine used paperback at Savers).

Audio streaming anything makes the daily mundane of my life better:  albums, playlists, podcasts, sermons, live concerts, your kids saying cute stuff on Facebook. On rare occasions (rarer than I'd like) the sound comes alive in a concert or house show or public reading. Here's some of what I heard and enjoyed in the past few months.

• My Spotify playlist for the weeks of Pentecost: Pentecost
• I also made a playlist of songs that remind me of what my sisters and mom and I have been discussing while reading Surprised by Hope:  Surprised by Hope
• What a delight to discover archived retreat talks on the Laity Lodge website.  I started with David Taylor's talk from last month's retreat for ministers to artists:  The Emotional Life of Art and Artists and have been working my way from there. 
• Home, Josh Garrells
• All Things Considered's Roadtrip Playlist  

CSA from Telecote Farm | I've gushed several times already about this wonderful adventure in Community Supported Agriculture and neighbors sharing vegetables on Fridays. In one month's time we've tried about 7 varieties of vegetables for the first time:  pattypan squash, Lebanese zucchini, cured German red garlic, Swiss chard, fresh fennel, French Sorrel (blushing to confess we've never cooked with some of these ingredients)

Make the Bed Remodel | A My first week transitioning from a forty hour workweek to 20 hours made me feel so full of new life I sprang into spring cleaning.  Well, I least cleaned all of our bedding, air-fluffed our pillows in the dryer, rotated our mattress and took the comforter to the laundromat.  Ahhh....a fresh bed is a beautiful way to celebrate new life.

How to have hanging ferns that are the envy of the neighborhood | I'm on a quest to keep our Boston Fern alive all summer.  It seems the secret lies in repotting the plant into a coir-lined wire basket.  I swear the fern thanked me audibly after giving her a new home.

Fork & Taco on Burnet | We went on a double date with our future daughter-in-law's parents to this new taco joint on Burnet.  YUM!  All four of us everything, and may I suggest you not miss the Mexican Street Corn?

 West Oak Coffee Bar in Denton, TX | A lovely weekend visiting my lovely daughter and this vibey coffee bar with kombucha on tap.  A perfect day.

(top posts in May)

7 quick family update takes |  So many dreams begun, in progress and fulfilled this month.

{pretty, happy, funny, real} Brian graduates edition | What a happy week!

your Practice Resurrection photo stories | One of my favorite blog series ever.  Simple, beautiful, joyous mini-stories of the ways you practice life every day.  Thank you, friends!

16 thoughts for 16 stanzas about practicing resurrection & regretting that hashtag | Holding the Mad Farmer's poetry in one hand and the newspaper in the other.

What were you into in May?

Linking up with Leigh Kramer to share what I’ve been into lately.