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A Wildwood Story

“It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.” -Dumbledore

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Instant pot

Black Friday: a few of my favorite things

November 29, 2019 by Rachel

(I may receive commissions for purchases made through links in this post. You can read my disclosure here.)

We all love this day so much because of pumpkin pie for breakfast, right?!?

I am not a big Black Friday in-store shopper, though I’ve done it a couple of times and it’s certainly fun with friends and family! (I’ll never forget the time I kept losing my brother Ian at the mall and he kept calling from the Apple Store to find us.)

In recent years I’ve been trying to be thoughtful about my holiday purchases and where and why the money is going. That money, I tell ya-it’s slippery like a newborn baby.

via GIPHY

My preferred way to shop Black Friday sales is via my own internet and cozy home with the aforementioned pumpkin pie and a cup of coffee on hand. I am sharing a sampling of things here that I have purchased myself and love:

…

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Filed Under: Favorites List, Holidays, Thanksgiving Tagged With: Black Friday, Books, favorites, Instant pot

Letter 36 {Oven Rice}

April 21, 2018 by Rachel

Dear Candace,

I have rice cooking in the oven right now, because it seems like the easiest way for me to make a large amount of it without any tragedy. Those days of almost or always burning it on the stove-top are long gone for me, thanks to this method and my instant pot. I used to have a rice maker but it wasn’t the greatest and would stick something awful. Baking it in the oven also means you don’t need any fancy appliances! {I generally do 4 cups rice with 8 cups water or broth in a large glass rectangular dish.}

The other day when I was at Target, I noticed a professionally dressed woman, about my age, strolling with her daughter. I immediately felt drawn to her not in a creepy way, but in a I-have-found-my-kind way. She wasn’t wearing hose with her pencil skirt and heels, and her white legs matched her white arms and white face which also matched mine. She was rocking the not-tan look, meanwhile I have been contemplating the merits of gradual tan lotion. I don’t see many others like me in the wild (case in point-at yoga that same day everybody looked fresh from the beach while I looked fresh from the depths of a cave).

I felt in the mood for something entirely different in my reading life, so when Madeleine from Top Shelf Text mentioned The Lace Reader as an excellent, riveting novel with a big plot twist, I immediately requested it from the library. The unreliable narrator (I love a good unreliable narrator!) has returned to her childhood home in Salem, Massachusetts after the disappearance of her aunt. This New York Times bestseller serves up realism with a thread of natural magic, the untimely death of a twin sister, forgotten memories, and tea-making. I’m a few chapters in and it’s obviously the kind of book I’ll be tempted to forego sleep to finish…

I need to majorly empty and revamp my closet. I thought I did pretty well at keeping it contained this winter, but when I was going through my hanging clothes recently I realized there were several things I hadn’t worn in over a year, and many more that just didn’t fit properly or needed to be replaced. So I plan on doing two things at once over the next few weeks-work on rounding out my winter wardrobe with clearance items even as I pack (most) of it away in storage, and figure out what I need to purchase for spring and summer. Since you have so much time on your hands, idling away the days with five children, surely you would like to do this for me? I trust your taste implicitly.

Love,

Rachel

Letter 35 {Netflix & Patio Tacos}

Letter 37 {Baby Walks}

This letter contains affiliate links, which means if you make a purchase after clicking through one of my links, I may receive a {very small} commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you for supporting this blog! It means the world and a stack of letters to me.

Photo by Natalia Y on Unsplash

Filed Under: Everyday stories, Letters to Candace Tagged With: Books, Cooking, Instant pot, laugh with me, Letter, Reading

Letter 15 {Things I’m Loving}

April 22, 2017 by Rachel

My Dear Candace,

This letter is a day late because, while I knew today was Saturday, I thought it was Friday. It completely made sense in my mind world until I sat down to write to you and everything slowly jelled together…Friday is not actually part of Saturday and did in fact end at 11:59pm the night before. These are hard realities to grasp sometimes.

Drew is watching an episode of The Andy Griffith Show right now and for the last 15 minutes all I’ve heard from the living room is the sound of a baby crying and Aunt Bea’s worried voice. I don’t recall this episode or have any clue what the story-line is. Now Aunt Bea AND the baby are crying and I’m about to join them from the exhaustion of it all. This is not my idea of “let’s relax a little before bedtime.” Listen to pretend TV show babies cry on a not-Friday-night after a busy day? Check!

In addition to my fascination with my new BFF coffeemaker, here are some things I’m loving this week:

The word “Epistolary.”

Music: Alice, by Bianca Ryan

Reading: Sixty Million Frenchmen Can’t Be Wrong: Why We Love France but Not the French

Food: The miracle of cooking brown rice in my instant pot! I’ve been using this recipe.

You should know about these things.

Happy Weekend!

Rachel

Letter 14

Letter 16

This letter contains affiliate links, which means if you make a purchase after clicking through one of my links, I will receive a {very small} commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you for supporting this blog! It means the world and a pile of letters to me.

 

 

 

Filed Under: Everyday stories, Letters to Candace Tagged With: Books, Instant pot, Letter, Reading

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Welcome! My name is Rachel...

I'm devoted to faith, family, travel, hospitality, finding new coffee shops, living with humor, and trying not to run into walls. Read More…

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