Welcome to the Friday Recliner for this week friends – a little something to get your weekend started on a relaxed note and a quiet place to rest a while.

Last day of the school term for the kids today and last day of Year 11 for my boy ( I squeezed a celebratory high five out of him)  so I’m breaking out the triple choc swirl ice cream from Aldi. I know they’ll look at me as if to say “were not six anymore Mum” but I like to celebrate these things and who doesn’t love a bit of triple choc ice cream. I’m also pondering if its cold enough to light a fire in the back yard this weekend .  I’m pretty sure it is

First things first though  – – – –

A Good Word

These days my note to self reads:

Keep your eyes open.
Lean into new things.
Cultivate delight.
Savor what is good.
Bring it all to the canvas as you feel your way through life

— and don’t be afraid to get a little messy along the way.

Lanecia Rouse Tinsley

A Good Look

 

 Weekend outfit ready?  

A Good Idea

Last week  I shared Shaunas gratitude list because as she puts it “the little things ARE NOT the little things right now and when you decide to gather up all the tiny bits of goodness you can find & hold them together in your hand, you begin—slowly, slowly—to see that goodness prevails”

So here’s my list from the last couple of weeks 

1. Spring weather, sun, warm breezes
2. Coffee with a friend I hadn’t seen in way too long
3. My boy finishing his exams without flipping out (because at one stage the week before, it looked like he was totally going to flip out). 
4. Slow cookers that make dinner while I work  (and making the best and easiest Massaman Curry EVER! from a recipe my sister Jen sent. Let me know if you’d like it)
5. Pretty thrifted fabric that I got to make into even prettier cushions
6. The grass starting to grow again
7. Sunday afternoon drives with my girl (her Spotify play list turned up of course)
8. A $20 roll of bamboo screening that made old my garden fence look a million
9. Finding this podcast that soothed just the right nerve
10. Later starts at work

Now your turn.

A Good Read

How to Waste Your Life and Call it Beautiful

 

There are a thousand thousand reasons to live this life, every one of them sufficient.”   Marilynne Robinson, Gilead

When the baby of our family was born over nine years ago, I had a seven-year-old and a four-year-old.

With seven plus years of motherhood under my belt, I’d learned a few lessons about letting go, chilling out, and realizing that it’s all going to be okay. In light of this hard-won Zen version of myself, I decided to enjoy my third baby like nobody’s business.

I would not fret. I would not pursue unnecessary work or projects. I would bask in this last brief season of babyhood and love on my darling boy whose very name means “mercy.”

Mercy. That’s what he meant to my husband and me.

For a very long season, I assumed that I wouldn’t have another baby. My marriage had almost ended. I was working full-time. Life was terribly messy.

And then, it wasn’t.

God breathed compassion into our story. Our third child represented the underserved gift of new life for our family and I resolved to enjoy his babyhood in a way that my angsty, younger-mom self wasn’t able to do with my other children.

Today he is a curly-headed, third-grade boy with a perfect sprinkle of freckles across his nose. He’s much too big for me to carry and he talks like a teenager, compliments of his older brother and sister – – – –  Keep reading

And

10 of my favorite books to read over and over again

by Modern Mrs Darcy

Despite the welcome thrill of opening a brand new book, I’m a fond and frequent re reader. I turn to my favorite books again and again when I’m stuck in a reading slump, when I need a dose of comfort, or when I’m in the mood to deconstruct a story to figure out how the author put it together.

I wrote an entire ode to rereading in my book I’d Rather Be Reading, a collection of essays on the delights and dilemmas of reading life. Here’s an excerpt:

When I find myself in a dreaded reading slump, nothing boosts me out of it faster than revisiting an old favorite. Old books, like old friends, are good for the soul. But they’re not just comfort reads. No, a good book is exciting to return to, because even though I’ve been there before, the landscape is always changing. I notice something new each time I read a great book. As Italo Calvino wrote, “A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say.” Great books keep surprising me with new things.

Keep reading

Till next week friends, have a beautiful weekend – rest up, do something you love xx

Remember you can browse through the  previous articles and posts linked to in The Friday Recliner right  HERE.