Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

friday favorites

First Friday Five {February}

Another first Friday means another chance to tell you some of my favorite things. I know, it’s your favorite time of the month, right?

Here’s what I’m loving this month.

  1. Royal dramas. The Crown on Netflix and Victoria on PBS. The first is a historical fiction about the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, the second about Queen Victoria, obviously. I’m not sure I would recommend having both of these shows “in progress” concurrently but they are fascinating (and yes, they are fiction based on true events) looks at female leadership in male-dominated worlds. (Also, they give me a Doctor Who fix. In The Crown, Matt Smith plays Elizabeth’s husband, Philip and in Victoria Jenna Coleman is the title character. When I can’t watch the Doctor, I can watch my favorite actors.)
  2. Unroll me. I’m not sure where I saw this, but it’s an e-mail service that helps you unsubscribe and consolidate your inbox. You choose what to do with each sender: keep it in your inbox, unsubscribe, or roll it up. Then, each day, you get ONE email with all your rolled up emails (I’ve gotten as few as 2, as many as 11) and you can click on each individual one to read it or just skim over it. My inbox is still out of control, but this is keeping the crazy at bay.
  3. The Price is Right. I used to watch this game show religiously in the summers as a kid, but I’ve stayed away from daytime TV as a stay-at-home mom (unless you count Netflix and I don’t. So there.) until recently. My husband was out of work for a few weeks and we made an 11 o’clock couch date each day to tune in to The Price is Right while we ate lunch. I have another entire blog post brewing about watching this show, but Drew Carey and this game show are one of the highlights of the last month.
  4. Ticket to Ride. We first played this board game with friends months ago and loved it. Then Santa brought us our own game fro Christmas and we have played it almost once a week (or more) with the kids. It’s the kind of game that’s really never boring no matter how many times you play it because it all depends on strategy and planning instead of luck.
  5. Dystopian fiction. Before the last few months, I’m not sure I had read a single work of dystopian fiction. Late last year I read The Hunger Games series and this month I read the Divergent series. Tell me what I should read next in this genre! I preferred the Divergent series but devoured both series in a matter of days.

Favorites in your life from the past month? Share away!

First Friday Five {January edition}

It’s a new year, so I have some new favorites, and most of them are Christmas-related because for all of December, I was immersed in Christmas!

  1. Christmas movies. In addition to the once-a-year tradition of watching White Christmas, this year I also watched a ton of sappy Hallmark/Lifetime Christmas movies on Netflix and Amazon. Some were good, others were okay, and others were a waste of time. But I needed a little (or a lot) of Christmas in December and movies were one way to do that.
  2. Christmas music. Especially new and different Christmas music. We finally bought the Christmas album of our favorite artist, Jason Gray, and we listened to that in the car on repeat. I also heard for the first time a carol called Bring A Torch, Jeanette, Isabella and I loved it instantly. Other non-traditional favorites included Sufjan Stevens, JJ Heller, Josh Garrels and the tiny bit of the Behold the Lamb of God tour by Andrew Peterson that we got to watch online.
  3. Smoothies. We had some fresh spinach left over from a recipe, so I began experimenting with smoothie recipes. Then I bought some almond milk. I’ve tried half a dozen different combinations, probably, and there are a few I’ve really liked. Others I’ve tolerated. (If you’ve got a surefire smoothie recipe, send it along! Also, how do you get kale and spinach to blend smoothly?)
  4. Go Noodle. I don’t know how I ever lived without this app/video series before. Think inside exercise/recess activities. The songs aren’t overly annoying and the kids love them. When I need to get them moving this winter, this is my first stop.
  5. Family time. With Christmas and New Year’s Day falling on Sundays this year, our foursome got a lot of special together time in recent weeks. We played board games, cooked together, did craft projects. On Fridays between Thanksgiving and Christmas, my husband worked late so the kids and I watched movies and ate popcorn (on the weeks when we didn’t have family in town, which was two in a row). I’m not always eager for the togetherness because it can quickly turn to fighting and impatience and exasperation, but sometimes that’s just my attitude. I love the time our family has gotten to spend together.

What have you loved about life in the past month?