Friday Favorites

Hey friends!  I'm linking up tonight with Andrea, Erika, and Narci for Friday Favorites!

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#1: Favorite book genre - Biographies!

I knew it would happen eventually.  First, I started being clumsy.  Then, I had the freakishly powerful ability to find anything anywhere in the house.  When I became funny for the first time in my 30 years of life I knew only one thing stood between me and my complete reincarnation as my mother: the love of the biography.  I don't know why or how but all of a sudden it's my go-to genre.  I've never liked them.  Then poof!  I like them.  I know.  It's like if Howard woke up one morning and decided he had a hankering for  guacamole or if Jonah decided throwing food off his plate was actually not productive.  You think you know yourself...

Anyway, I digress.  I picked up the first start in this new literary love affair this week at the library:

I mean seriously.  I can't put it down!! (But I have to more times than I pick it up). It's better than any TV show or movie could be.  Though there is a movie called The Queen starting Helen Mirren that I cannot wait to watch after I finish this book.  I love when a good read becomes a whole shebang.

#2: Favorite toy - Jonah's bike!  

Jonah received a YBike from his aunt for Christmas and it's the coolest toy ever!  You can push it from the front or sit and ride Flinstone style (there are no pedals, toddlers just push with their feet).  It rolls on carpet so smoothly and turns well and has truly helped Jonah feel more mobile and I think it helped him develop his new walking skills!

#3: Favorite moment - Jonah's first steps!

Last week at the library, on my brother's birthday, Jonah took his first steps!  I was totally not expecting it and it was SO fun!!  The other moms clapped for him and the librarians said he made library history that day!  No one's ever taken his first steps there!  We've had lots of ideas for how to commemorate the occasion....bronzed footprints, an oil painting of Jonah in an armchair with a bubble pipe, etc.

I am so thankful for my schedule and that I got to be there for such a momentous occasion!  Earlier this evening he walked halfway across the living room several times and it was just the strangest coolest thing!  

#4: Favorite meal prep idea: A Slow Cooker Swap

So earlier this week a bunch of us girls met at a friend's house and had a slow cooker swap.  I'd never done one before but it was amazing.  You do no prep in advance.  You simply bring the groceries for your slow cooker 'dump' meal of choice minus the meat (something that can be assembled in a freezer bag, frozen, and dumped into your slow cooker before you leave for the day).  

You multiply the ingredients by however many girls come that night, assemble your meal there while sipping wine and chatting it up, and you leave with a ton of meals ready for the crockpot!  

I have 13 meals in my freezer ready to dump in my slow cooker with some frozen meat!!  Well, 12 actually.  We had one for dinner last night and it was amazing.  Amazing!  And I just opened a bag and dumped it right in that morning!  I'm obsessed.

#5: Favorite bible study: BSF

BSF stands for Bible Study Fellowship.  It's an international organization that leads members through a book of the Bible each year and provides a layering of study - individual, group, lecture, and notes.  They hold you accountable for doing your homework and attending so I've always been hesitant while in grad school and with a newborn.  But people keep asking me to go and given that our small town of about 20,000 people has 600 people going to just the evening women's group is something of a testament.

Well, they weren't kidding.  It's amazing.  My town's BSF is one of two pilot programs right now for a new study: Revelation (everyone else in BSF chapters are studying Moses).  It's incredible, and the homework is way more manageable than I expected.  It's absolutely so fulfilling to get fed in this way.  Check it out in your area!  

#6 Favorite photos from this week:

Happy weekend y'all!