Tina The Storyteller

It seems like it has been a long week. I woke up on Tuesday thinking that it was Sunday or maybe it was yesterday that I did that. Anyway, I'm thankful that today is Thursday because it means that it's the start of our weekend. I'm also thankful for my daughter's artistic endeavors  they keep our walls covered and her hands busy. I'm thankful for the opportunity to see her show her talents in public as well. She did some great singing this week. I'm thankful for my husband. He unexpectedly did some of my chores for me this week. It was quite a treat. I'm thankful for birthdays! We've had three family birthdays this week and more in the next two weeks. One of the things that we try to do on family birthdays when we can't be with them is to eat a meal that they would like or have a little treat in honor of them. It's not much, but it's one way that I've tried to make sure that my daughter stays connected with the people we gr...

Recently, one of my friends had a pretty nasty thing happen on the internet. She's a photographer and shares a ton of pictures and sometimes pictures of her kids. Well, randomly, on Instagram, someone told her that they think her photos were being stolen. They weren't just being stolen to say "This is my work, let me be your photographer" they were stolen to say "This is my family, aren't we beautiful." It was scary from the outside, can't even imagine what it was like on the inside. But the thing that struck me the most is what she said in the midst of it. She indicated that she's been getting the feeling that she should spend less time on social media and more time doing other things. And that this particular instance, could have been a push from God to get her to do what she's been asked to do. I think we had the same thing happen recently. I've been getting a little tired of attitudes and conversations that I've been having duri...

A couple years back, I was in a big mess. It was an emotional nightmare. I would get panicked about going out in public, and was eventually diagnosed with clinical depression. I can tell you that it w one of the biggest messes of my life and it was only by the grace of God that I was able to deal with it. There is no cleaning up clinical depression, no ten step process, no sure fire cure. It's more of a treatment. You find things that help you function. I personally was helped by the medical profession and the use of prescription medications. I won't cured by them and when I came off of them, I wondered how the benefit could ever outweigh the cost of what occurs during detox, but they did help me to function and survive. My best advice to you if you find yourself in the midst of depression is to find someone that you can talk to. Cry out to God, he is always present to hear us. And cry out to your neighbors, friends and family. Don't suffer in the midst of the darkness alon...

I always find it interesting how life can be very much so like dominoes sometimes. Let's see, my husband went out of town this last fall. I volunteered to preach for him while he was gone. I told a friend about the online copy of the sermon. She forwarded it to a few folks, next thing you know, I'm doing a short testimony at my weekly Bible study. What I'm really wondering it "What next?" You see, when I got done preaching, and my husband came back into town, we talked about how people reacted to the sermon. Then we talked some more when I was asked to share again. And the question was, maybe I'm supposed to be open to talking more often. To be honest, I haven't done a lot of talking in groups since I had a really bad experience a few years ago. I was always opinionated, in fact I still am. I have lots of opinions about most everything from how warm my house should be to which way the car should take me from point a to b. But I found myself in a group ...

I don't know that I have any particular mess to share with you, though I did find a pretty amazing product recently. I am one of those people who for the past eleven years has just lived with the fact that the caulking around my tub was going to be gross and disgusting, ranging in color from orange to black. I struck gold though, I asked some friends what they use. One of them told me that they used Lysol's Mold and Mildew. It's purple and it has bleach in it. I went to my grocery store and looked for it, no luck. BUT there was a Tilex product there with the same description Mold and Mildew with bleach. I bought it. I took it home, sprayed it in my bathroom and walked away for the recommended 5 minutes. I came back expecting to see what I saw when I left, but no, it was white! I still have some that is persisting, but honestly I think that the caulking may need to be replaced. It is absolutely amazing how well this stuff worked, especially considering I didn't have to d...

Praying Circles around Your Children is an encouraging, quick read. It's a little book based off of Mark Batterson's previous work The Circle Maker. Because I haven't read that particular title, I do think that I missed some of the references in this book, but it was still a very encouraging and insightful book in regards to praying for our daughter. The five circles covered are promises of God, prayer lists, prayer mantras, prayer circles, and the Bible. I enjoyed learning new ways to pray for my daughter and can see that they have already started to make a difference in the way that I interact with her. One particular prayer that I've been doing is that I took a word that I wanted for her, which is compassionate, which I turned into a acronym of different aspects that I desire for her life. It was fun to think about all the desires that I have for her as well as to be able to lift them up in a single word prayer. I'm contemplating doing the same for my husban...

I'm guessing from the number of armed robberies that I'm seeing on the news lately and in my Facebook feed, that the bills from Christmas have started showing up in people's mailboxes. It's tough to remember what all the hype is about just a few weeks afterwards. I'm serious, here, what was your favorite gift from Christmas this last year and what difference has it made in your life so far? I ask because this year, I happened to get a gift that I had not received before that seems to be getting better with time. We did a little some thing different this year with some of our extended family. Instead of exchanging gifts for one another, we gave charitable donations. One of the things that I "got" was a latrine, some trees, and hand washing station. My daughter "got" goats, a pen and vaccinations for them. I've been thinking about her gift a lot, because her gift is a very real way of providing income for a family. And not just a short term i...

I think today, I'm mostly thankful for the fact that I'm almost back to 100%. It was a draining cold. And I have my suspicions that my little Christmas cookie binge did not help prevent it. I can tell you that having been low carb for a couple of months and then trying to see if I could incorporate some back in was met with disastrous results. Mentally, I'm still whirling, physically, I'm still recovering, spiritually, I'm ready for a new day. I'm thankful for my husband! Who works hard, but at the end of every day, he comes home. Love that man! I'm thankful for my daughter. She's beautiful in ways that I never expected to see in another human. Motherhood is quite an adventure. What are you thankful for today?

Okay, this is one of those things that you realize that things in society have gotten a little out of hand, when you feel like a real renegade because you are willing to consume a raw egg, but I have to tell you, this recipe right here , is awesome. I saw it on Pinterest and thought, that's worth a shot. Doesn't it look pretty. After reading the recipe, I wasn't quite sure what was exactly going to happen with the raw egg to make it look like that and where exactly the cream ended up I wasn't too sure either. Well, it doesn't look like the picture at all. It looks like coffee with cream but it tastes like a latte or some other steamed milk creation. I made Joel try it, we both agreed that it's weird. And not weird in a "what the heck was I thinking?" kind of way, but weird in a "how does that happen?" kind of way. It's tasty, give it a try. Click on this link , brew a cup of coffee, crack an egg and enjoy!

I'm thinking about doing less book reviews this year. Just one every now and then to keep things interesting, but not just about one a week or every other week like I did last year. I like reading, but it's tough to read almost 40 books in a year because at the end you realize as much as you enjoyed all or most of them, you didn't really have time to linger with them afterwards that helps them change your life. So instead, I'm thinking about doing this Monday Mess thing. After all, the blog is called HoHa (Hands on Home arts) for a reason. Though this last year, I did not share very much of my art. The thing is I believe that the majority of what we do as home makers is a form of art that isn't always appreciated and doesn't always feel like it in the midst of it or even at the end of it or ever at all if I'm honest. But deep down, I want to believe that caring for my home is a form of art and that I want to share that with you all. So today, I'm tr...

I'm sick, but I wanted to let you know that I'm thankful for my family, near and far, tissues, flowing clean water, and a warm comfy house. What are thankful for?