1. My New Mug
At dinner one night this week, my husband handed me something all wrapped up in tissue paper. It was this mug he had painted for me at a local ceramics shop while I was in Israel.
It’s my favorite style of mug, painted in my favorite color, painted with my favorite flowers (tulips), made by my favorite person in the world.
Talk about a perfect combination to put a smile on my face and make me happy… And probably one of the most thoughtful gifts he’s ever given me because I know how much love went into it.
2. Flourless Chocolate Chip Cookies
I made these week and was really happy with how they turned out, how easy they were to make, and how they tasted.
They had a lot more texture than a typical chocolate chip, but for how healthful the ingredients were, I was really impressed with them! (They are from the Chocolate-Covered Katie cookbook — one of my favorite cookbooks for healthful and yummy desserts!)
3. Amazon Music
Do you have an Amazon Prime account? If so, you must check out Prime Music!! It’s free — and I absolutely love it! You can choose radio stations, find new recommendations based on what you listen to, create playlists, and much more. (And if you use Amazon Music, I’d love to hear what your favorite stations are!)
4. Carry On, Mr. Bowditch
If you’ve not read this book to your kids, I’d definitely recommend it. All three of the kids are really engaged and attentively listening when I read it and always beg me to read more when I’m done.
I’ve had this book on our shelf for a long time, but honestly, the cover just looked boring so I didn’t pick it up to start reading to the kids. I’m glad it was assigned reading in Sonlight, or we would have missed out on this gem of a book.
Yet another great example of why you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover! (Are you enjoying any read alouds as a family right now? I’d love to know!)
5. Freshly-Baked Doughnuts
After Silas’ baseball practice this morning, we went to Five Daughters Bakery to get doughnuts. They might be some of the most expensive doughnuts you’ll ever eat, but they are so, so yummy and worth splurging on occasionally!
I got a Chocolate Sea Salt doughnut… I wish I could show you a picture of it, but um, that baby is long gone. 😉 And I savored every bite!
What are YOU loving this week? Tell us in the comments.
Keelie Reason @ LoveHopeAdventure says
Tell Jesse that I love his artwork, and I think it is totally incredible! I love that he did it for you and that it turned out so great. How special
Jessica S. says
We just finished reading Sheep Tales by Ken Ham as an Easter story this year. It tells Biblical stories from the fictional perspective of the animals who were there. It has a unique perspective on the sacrifice that Jesus made. The kids loved it!
Jessica S. says
After looking through these recommendations I went to Sonlight’s web page and wrote down a bunch of their read aloud books. I feel like a kid in a candy store. I have no idea when we are going to read all the books I just added to my list! Thanks for all the great recommendations!
Davonne @ The Tidy Mom says
I love your list, as always and the book recommendations in the comments are particularly fun 🙂
My 5 things from last week:
1) A family trip to Nashville!
2) Spending the day with my cousin and her 4 boys while we were in Tennessee.
3) Having a full day free on Saturday for anything we wanted.
4) Great advice from my cousin when I mentioned something that we “should” do on our free day – she said, “I don’t think you should do anything you don’t want to do on Saturday.” What a freeing thought! We took her advice and had a glorious time walking around our hotel & the surrounding area and basically just hanging out with no schedule whatsoever.
5) SPRING!!! LOVE THIS INCREDIBLE WEATHER!!
Erica says
Aww!!! That is my good friend Stephanie’s Donut shop she runs with her family! I met you when you were in The Woodlands last year & its so fun to see what a small world it is and when your favorite people & things connect!
Jessica says
I’m loving my first ever knitting class! I think the teacher is my long-lost twin. We’re the same age, have little kids, same health issues, etc.
It’s a lace shawl class. My first lace knitting, first shawl and I’m learning a lot. Funny (or not so funny) thing is that two weeks before the class, the shop got a yarn “drive-thru”. As in, someone crashed their car through the front windows and destroyed the seating area, carpeting, yarn and so forth with shards of glass and metal. Nobody was hurt. They had to cancel a lot of classes for the clean-up.
So, I ended up being the only student in this class- private lesson! The class was a gift to me by my husband for my birthday. I have the second class this week.
Crystal Paine says
Yay! SO fun!!
Aimee says
MMM – flourless chocolate chip cookies! I’m gluten-free so I need to try these! Have an awesome week!
Linda says
We are reading some fairy tales from Lang’s Rainbow fairy tale book, and Five Children and It. Five Children and It has a taken us a long time to read though.
Susan in St. Louis says
So great! Thanks for the book recommendation, as my son was given that book for Christmas and it just didn’t appeal to him, I think, based on the cover and title. We’ll have to give it a shot!
I recently took a long road-trip with just my older two (ages almost 9 & 7), and we enjoyed listening to The Hobbit together for many hours. I decided to use my Prime membership to get the free 3 month Audible trial, and chose The Hobbit as my first free book. Yay!
KFC says
Things I’m loving this week:
my vision board, sushi, planning our summer trip to portland, oregon!
Melissa says
You gotta tell me you know about Read aloud Revival! It has done wonders for our reading list and our before bed time. Check it out at readaloudrevival.com !
Crystal Paine says
YES! I love it — and like you, have found so many great book recommendations there, too!
Dana says
Another “don’t judge the cover” book is The Single Shard by Linda Sue Park. Boring cover, great book!
I’ve also been meaning to recommend The Hired Girl by Laura Amy Schlitz for you. It seems like one that would be right up your alley!
Crystal Paine says
Thanks so much for the recommendation!
Kelli says
We read that book too, it’s our first year with SonLight:) Now we are reading Caddie Woodlawn and Twenty and Ten…both SO SO good!
J F says
Highly recommend The Green Ember for upper elementary students. Also Sixty Eight Rooms series by Marianne Malone is well worth reading for those who love mysteries!
Jo says
Our entire school read “The World According to Humphrey” together. I thought it would be kind of silly, but all kinds of families are represented in this book as the hamster visits them. It made for some great discussion and families were identifying with the families. It was great fun.
Jen says
We haven’t read these books but our local library has many of them on CD. My daughter has loved listening to all of Humphrey’s adventures!
We even had a carnival themed birthday party for her last year because of Richie Rinaldi’s party.
Laura says
My 5 year old daughter is loving “Guns for General Washington” right now. We live near Montpelier (Henry Knox’s mansion) and are really enjoying all things Revolutionary War.
Jordan says
We have loved reading anything by Dick King Smith, the author of Babe. We just finished The Stray and my favorite is Spider Sparrow. He wrote hundreds of children’s stories, so we haven’t even scratched the surface, but so far they have all been wonderful. Owls in the Family by Farley Mowat was really good and funny (also a true story). Little Britches, by Ralph Moody was an amazing true story full of life lessons that kept my 8 year old spell bound.
Tosha says
I’m reading The Great Brain series with my 9 year old. Second time around reading it in my family. Love it!!
Lisa says
I am loving that you went to Five Daughters bakery which is where my niece Elizabeth works! Since we live in Georgia, we only get to drool over the photos she takes. My son and I are reading Crispin, the Cross of Lead right now and thoroughly enjoying it. My all time favorite read aloud is Madeline L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time.
Amy says
We are reading the Chilldren’s Homer while we learn about Ancient Greece. My kids love it, and beg me to have “book club” with them. It was assigned with our curriculum.
Another series they have like is The Children of Noisy Village.
Angela says
We’ve been reading the Droon series. It’s about these three friends that find a magic staircase and find a hidden world. I’d say it’s probably second or third grade reading level and they are shorter which is always nice
Tess says
Right now reading aloud “Plain Girl”- Lovely story, delicately describing how we each share similar experiences, regardless of our upbringings or faith. We can each find ourselves in “The Prodigal Son”…
Teri Meekhof says
Ah, we love Mr. Bowditch as well, and also found it through Sonlight…as is true with many of our favorites! (Walk the World’s Rim, Master Puppeteer, just to start). Currently reading and loving, Shadow Spinner. Just enough suspense to be exciting without causing nightmares in my little people! 🙂 The fun of having a large family is the joy of going with the littles through the books that the big ones and I loved years ago. I get excited to have the excuse to reread them!
Danielle says
That mug! <3 awww
Carol says
This week my kids got their first library cards from our local library.. 5, 8 and 12 my 5 year old can’t read yet but loves to be read to. Each kid checked out 5 books to read for the next 3 weeks. Love this tradition of going to the library!!
Crystal Paine says
SO fun!!
Brooke says
I have been reading the Anne of Green Gables series to my 8yr old daughter. We both love the books. Even my three yr old son will sit and listen sometimes.
Stephanie K. says
We finished up The Winds of Light series a little bit ago and my kids loved it. They were books that I read as a kid. I too have been known to judge a book by its cover. Thanks for the reminder that appearances aren’t always as they seem! 🙂
Crystal Paine says
Thanks so much for the recommendation!
Valerie says
“Carry on Mr. Bowditch” is one of my favorite read alouds. We live near Salem MA and have done the Nat Bowditch field trip twice. It is amazing.
My favorite read aloud of all time is “Manic Magee”. I cry every time that I have read it with a child.
Crystal Paine says
Oh, thanks so much for that recommendation!
Sarah@TheOrthodoxMama says
I just finished reading The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe with my oldest (age 6). We’re going on to Prince Caspian next. So fun to share book that I love with my kiddos!
Crystal Paine says
My kids LOVED those books!
Jo says
My favorite book ever.