Good Wednesday Links

Hi, friends! I took a last minute trip to Denver to see my sister this week, so I don't have posts lined up. But! I wanted to share some mid-week goodness.

First up? This amazing gluten free strawberry scone recipe I discovered via Purely Elizabeth's Instagram (side note: I have a girl crush on her).  YUM. 

I also have a new obsession with rugs ever since I (basically) stole this one from Target. I loved this list of chic rugs for under $100 via Designing Vibes. 

This Moroccanoil Dry Shampoo is my new summer love. Confession: I don't own it. But, a friend let me use hers a few times and now I just want to smell it all the time. 

This verse is everything right now. Loving it, remembering it, leaning on it. 

Want a little warmth in your heart? Loving this read: 17 Quotes From Mister Rogers The World Really Needs Right Now.

Have the best week! 

You Have Influence!

One of the unexpected, awesome things about The Letter Project is that it has enabled me to talk to a ton of women in various walks of life. This has been moving, humbling and so, so inspiring. Yesterday, I spoke with two women on the phone, one right after the other. One is the CEO of an awesome bra company. The other is a nonprofit guru. Both of them were 21. 

21!

I don't know about you, but I definitely wasn't fit to be a CEO at 21 and I'm not sure anyone would have called me a "guru" of anything. Except for maybe of hanging out with my friends? 

It was humbling to hear them both generously think of ways they can help grow The Letter Project.

It also made me realize that we often underestimate ourselves as women. We have a lot of power to do good and spread love when we bind together. A rising tide really does lift others and I was honored that they wanted to help me with their own quickly rising tides. 

I guess I just wanted to tell you, today, that you have influence. It might be smaller than a CEO's and you might feel like no one is listening on some days. You might feel like a little bumble bee, just buzzing around. But if you keep on going, pollinating the good things around you, you'll make a bigger difference than you realize. Before you know it, you'll be making honey, honey. 

image via

the life you were given vs. the one you think you should have

If I don't meet a guy today, I told my roommate, Melly, I'm going to lose it.

I was at my wit's end. I felt like I couldn't go more day being single. I was lonely, felt stuck and wasn't enjoying this season of my 20s at all. I felt so far behind my friends; it was as if they had all boarded a cruise ship and I was stuck on the shore, waving goodbye, holding back tears.

I liked my job and loved Atlanta, but the life I had created felt secondary to the one I was waiting for: the one that included a husband and babies. I felt like a casette player, cycling through the same tired magentic tape, waiting for someone to switch it out and give me a new song to sing. 

The loneliness felt unbearable. The waiting unrelenting.

I tried making plans to meet a guy, thinking that perhaps he, too, enjoyed dinner at Whole Foods or a 6 a.m. Flywheel class. I gave myself pep talks, repeating the not-so-encouraging platitudes I'd been given: You can meet a guy anywhere! Stay positive; positivity attracts a relationship! 

One day after church, an older woman stopped me as I exited the pew. As she took my name and age, I thought, Yes! This is it! She's going to set me up with her son! I was already planning a happy dance. I'd love for you to babysit my grandchildren, she exclaimed. It wasn't quite the Friday night I was looking for. 

I stalked other couples' relationships on Facebook, trying to figure out if they were older than me so I could calculate just how far behind I was. When I'd meet an engaged girl at a party, I'd ask very pointed questions: How did you meet your husband? What did you talk about? How long did it take for you to go on a date after meeting? I thought researching enough would provide a formula for how and when you can meet your husband. 

If you've been around this blog enough, you know I quit dating for a while before I met my husband. This was an essential step for me to break free from the idol that marriage had become.

I also had to break free from the future I'd planned, the concern that my ovaries were going out of commission and the belief that my life would begin when I met my husband. 

Those things are lies and those lies will suffocate you. They will take all of the joy out of this season of life. They will paralyze you, give you anxiety and make you panic every time you near your birthday. 

I've learned lately that singleness isn't the only thing that will do this to you. Every step throughout our lives has the power to make us believe we are behind -  but only if we let it. As we enter into our second year of marriage and begin discussing a house and a family, it would be easy to lose touch with the phase we're currently in. It is tempting to look to that future with wanting eyes, feeling stuck in our rental.  But we aren't going to do that this time around. 

I've learned we have to let go of the lives we thought we'd have in order to embrace the lives we are meant to have. 

I recently heard Deidra Riggs speak about expectations vs. reality. She said she's learned you have to walk through the doors that are opened to you and stop trying to knock on the ones that are closed. Her message resonated deeply with me.

For years, I was banging on doors that were not meant to be opened. I wasted a lot of energy looking for keys to those doors. As I've gotten older, I've tried to leave the closed doors alone and, instead, run through the ones that are already opened to me. 

I can't help but wonder how many of us are standing in front of doors that aren't meant to be opened today. Perhaps it's a relationship, a job or grad school. Perhaps it's followers on social media or business success. Perhaps it's a new baby or city.

I'm learning that there are so many doors that are already opened to us, but so often we get stuck standing behind ones that aren't meant to be ours. When we stop resisting where we are in life and, instead, open our hands up to the possibility of each season, we unlock the beauty in it. 

Nothing has changed my life more than learning to embrace the one I already have - the messy, the complicated, the unplanned - and resisting the urge to covet what I think I should have. Comparing where I am to where I think I should be is like swimming up stream - it's tiring and you don't get anywhere in the end. When we learn to move with the rhythm of each season, not against it, we wind up exactly where we are meant to be. 

What I Learned During Our First Year of Marriage

It's early morning and I'm sitting on our back porch drinking coffee. The birds are singing and pollen is falling, my computer will soon be coated in yellow dust. I'm trying to work, but am struggling to focus. I've only had a few sips of caffeine but a giddiness has overcome me this morning. Tomorrow is our one year anniversary.

I can't stop reflecting on where we were a year ago - what we were doing, who was coming into town, how we were feeling. Our wedding was pure magic to us and I think of the entire weekend as a haze of happiness and light. 

During our engagement, we worked hard to focus on the union more than the wedding day. Something we talked about openly was that we both had some fear of marriage.

We didn't have doubts about each other and knew we wanted to get married. But, as with most millennials, we'd both seen the pain of a broken marriage at some point in our lives. I don't know anyone our age who hasn't at least had a cousin or best friend who has been impacted by the darker side of the institution. 

We desperately wanted to build a healthy relationship, but, without ever having been married, felt like we could only do so much to prepare for it while engaged. We had to get in the pool to learn to swim. 

As I sat on our porch last week, I reflected on how much we learned during our first year. By no means am I an expert, it's only been 365 days, after all. But I thought I'd share some of the insights in case any of you also think of marriage as a bit of an unknown. 

1. You are going to get some things right and some things very wrong. 

When we first got married, we were so focused on getting it right that we didn't give ourselves much margin to make mistakes. What we've learned in the last year is that some days, you're going to crush it. You're going to make enough time for each other, you'll serve one another, you'll be kind and gentle. You'll rock your marriage.

Other days, though? You'll mess up. You will be selfish. You will say things you don't mean. You will be passive aggressive. You will make mistakes. 

We were reminded how important it is to give grace to one another is in these moments, yes. But, what we really learned was the process of giving grace to ourselves. I had no problem forgiving Chris, but, when I made a mistake, I would kick myself and struggle to let it go. He'd already forgiven me, yet I was still sitting in my mess.

We were both so eager to have a good marriage that we were trying to be perfect. Bad news Saxons: you ain't perfect. You human. 

2. Don't keep secrets.

I know this can be controversial - I've heard many women say something along the lines of: oh! He doesn't need to know everything. There has to be some mystery. To that I say: good for you, not for me. We don't keep anything a secret. If I made a mistake, spent more money than I intended to or had a dream about another guy, I tell Chris. I have no doubt this would be overkill in other marriages, but it works for us. 

On our first date, Chris said: OK, tell me all the bad stuff about you now. I'm going to find out someday, so let's just tell each other right away. I laughed. Then I told him everything - even the hard stuff. Since that day, it has been our policy. 

3. Gentleness is everything. 

Tone, facial expressions, abruptness - all of it matters for us. I constantly pray to be more gentle with Chris because it makes such a difference in our day-to-day.

4. Serve one another.

Nothing can soften me toward Chris in a moment of frustration more than offering to help him. Or doing something thoughtful for him. When we both make serving each other a daily practice, our marriage is more joyful.

5. Don't take life so seriously.

We both have a habit of wanting to do things very well and in an organized manner. This sounds great on paper but can sometimes lead to us being a little high strung. We've had moments where we've found ourselves taking planning a vacation wayyyy to seriously. We have to step back and remind ourselves we're doing something super fun! We ought to enjoy it. I am sure there will be many hard, sad, serious seasons ahead and we are trying to keep buoyancy alive where we can.