Life with Jocelyn

Jocelyn Larsen

DIY Map Coasters

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I made coasters. I needed some for my pretty-much-finished basement family room and for inspiration, I borrowed a theme I’d created on the wall of the same room. I call it my “two favorite cities” theme. {More on this later.} So I used maps of each of the two cities from an old atlas and followed the instructions at http://www.marthastewart.com/how-to/map-coasters.  I only have one mod-podge trick up my sleeve, and it’s probably not anything you haven’t thought of before: it is always so messy no matter how careful I am so I always keep a half wet/half dry paper towel on my workspace for a quick-fix for my gluey, sticky fingers.

They’re just your average mod-podge travel-looking coasters, but they tie into the room well and I think will hold up much better than the last non-mod-podge (glue-stick-only) coasters I made. Just ask my regular houseguests Erin, Rachelle, Robbie, and Zach.

I’m ba-a-a-ck! :)

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Hi friends!

Sorry I’ve been gone so long; I’ve been absent due to turning a major corner in my personal life. Actually, it was simultaneously much less and much more dramatic than that: my baby finally started sleeping through the night.

So why, then, have I been blogging less, not more, you ask? I really don’t know. I guess I’ve been too sublimely happy even to open my laptop. I guess my mind has been too preoccupied with simple thoughts of rapture even to do the work of forming sentences. Nevertheless, I’m back, and I’m proud to say that a few of my brain cells survived.

My post today is just to say “hi” and that I missed you and that I couldn’t help but return in time to blog about autumn: my favorite season! Pumpkin and cinnamon and crispy weather and the prettiest version of deciduous trees you’ll ever find… what are your favorite things about fall?

Thanks to treelink.org for this picture.

lemontree3…Coming Soon!

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This Wednesday, June 30, I’m launching a new blog with two of my besties. It’s called lemontree3 and we hatched the idea late one night in March. Now we’re making it come to life. In fact, you already know these two friends of mine because I wrote about them here. I’m so excited to be blogging with them. They’re both good writers and have interesting things to show and tell. I hope you’ll be even more enriched by reading lemontree3 than you’ve been so far by a-lemon-tree. You can subscribe to our new blog here.

As it did with the name, lemontree3 will probably also take over a lot of the content of this blog, though I haven’t yet decided what to do with www.a-lemon-tree.com. Dissolve it completely? Take it in a different direction? Any ideas?

Thanks for reading, friends. I am so honored that you’d share life with me.

XOXO,
Jocelyn

My Favorite Things for Summer

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For one of my baby showers last fall, my sister (who is married without kids – yet) bought me a gift bag-full of her favorite things for fall. She told me, “I don’t know about babies or what they need so I got you this instead.” I’ll never forget that gift. I absolutely loved it. It helped me stay fashionable and trendy as a new mom during a season when I didn’t have too much energy to think about myself. Plus, I loved opening each and every item and hearing her commentary about each one. So here are a few of my favorite things for this season. Take them for yourself or as gift ideas if you so desire.

*nautical stripes on anything and everything
*boat shoes (If you decide to invest in a great brand like Sperry Top Siders, go with a classic color – navy – like I did.)
*color: coral! (I bought a pair of jeweled H&M hair clips; my friend Steph gave me OPI’s new Hot N Spicy nail polish; my mom gave me a J.Crew cardigan for my spring birthday. Plenty of coral to saturate my summer.)
*black patent leather peep-toe flats (A classic that will span several seasons and an overall wise update for my wardrobe.)
*vanilla italian sodas with fresh lime (vanilla syrup + club soda + ice + fresh-squeezed lime slice = yummy and refreshing goodness!)
*Burts Bees shimmery body lotion with royal jelly (A pampering gift from my friend Brenda when I had a baby – I love this stuff!)
Happy summering!

How to Make Your In-Laws Happy

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I had a sublime idea (if I do say so myself!) that I wanted to share with you all so that you can claim it as your own and reap all of the happy benefits. I call it: A picture a day for a month. I don’t know where the idea came from. I guess God.

If you’re unmarried or don’t have kids yet, archive this one for future reference.

For every day this month, my husband and I are emailing one picture of our 6-month-old Howard to his grandparents (and my sister). Sometimes it comes with a little caption; it always comes with the subject line: A picture a day for the month of June. They LOVE it. They might even text you if it gets to 8pm and you haven’t sent a picture yet. I seriously feel like the daughter-in-law of the year. And I’m really not. And it’s so easy (especially if you have a smart phone) and really fun!

Disclaimer: Be selective and wise in who you send the pictures to; not many people can tolerate a picture of your little one (as adorable as he or she may seem to you) every day for 30 days straight.

Just to whet your appetite, this was today’s entry:

Mom took me on a bike ride in our new bike trailer…

Easy Healthy Fruity Frozen Dessert

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We’re cleaning out our fridge and freezer these days. I’ve found that it’s a good habit to get into every six months or so. And so we’re having to get creative in the food department. Let’s just say that some creativity turns out better than others.

I don’t know about you, but frozen bananas are a staple in my freezer: I peel, saran wrap, and freeze mine whole whenever they’re starting to get brown. There are many yummy things I’ve found that you can do with them. Here’s one.

 Fruity Frozen Dessert
1 frozen banana, coined
1 cup frozen berries (blackberries and blueberries are the faves at our house)
1/2 cup vanilla coffee creamer (This may sound weird, but if you think about it, it’s pretty much lower-calorie melted ice cream!)

Pour creamer over frozen fruit. The fruit makes the creamer almost instantly slushy. You can put the whole thing in the freezer for an additional minute or two if you want. Enjoy!

I Heart: Homemade Pesto

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How great is pesto!? I love it because:
1. It’s heart-healthy
2. It’s easy-as-pie to make a big batch and freeze
3. It whips out of the freezer and plops onto plain noodles or pizza dough (with meat and/or veggies if you want) with panache

4. A little bit goes a long way
5. My hubby likes it a lot

Here’s the recipe I used recently:
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup pine nuts, chopped
2 cups fresh basil leaves, firmly packed
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
5 cloves garlic, peeled and quartered
a dash of s & p
We had it a few nights ago atop whole wheat spaghetti noodles, alongside chicken pieces, sauteed asparagus, peas, onions, and mushrooms, and topped with feta cheese. Yum!

An Antidote for Hard Times: Gratefulness

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I’m a new mom. And it’s hard. I think it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done to date.

I’m disappointed that hard times bring out the worst in me. My friend Todd told me once that it’s hardest for him to care about others’ needs when he’s sick or going through a hard time personally. I’ve noticed the same trend in my life.

I was reminded recently about gratefulness and how important it is to practice being grateful. It might sound weird to practice gratefulness, but I know that for me it doesn’t just come naturally. Especially during hard times. But it’s exceptionally important for me to be grateful in hard times because it helps me get the focus off myself and on God and other people, which I think is the best place to live. And life could always be worse than it is.

So I’ve resolved to exercise my grateful-muscle more often. Here’s a start:

I’m grateful for a healthy baby Howard who lives at my house and not in the hospital.
I’m grateful for a husband who cares for me and Howard, and that I don’t have to care for Howard all by myself.
I’m grateful that Howard is napping right now so that I can even be writing this post.

How have you seen gratefulness change your perspective?

Book Review: A Million Miles in a Thousand Years

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A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: What I Learned While Editing My LifeI just finished Donald Miller’s newest book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. It has the usual Donald Miller feel: raw, memoir-esque, easy to read, personal. I was both personally challenged and pleasantly surprised by its relevancy for many 18-35 year old readers. (It is a frequent concern of mine that many current bestsellers – especially Christian bestsellers – are good, but published just one generation too late.)

My husband and I have been having a ton of fun dreaming together lately about all of the possibilities of what our lives might still hold. What might we do? Where might we go? We keep telling God that our lives are His and that He can do whatever He wants with them. In a scary and delightful way we wonder, then, just what might God do?

Thank you, Donald Miller, for affirming those dreams and calling me out to live a bigger story than the safe but extremely boring one my affinity for comfort secures for me.


A few quotables:

“…people are just people even if they are world leaders.” 165

“Part of me wonders if our stories aren’t being stolen by the easy life.” 186

“When you stop expecting people to be perfect, you can like them for who they are. And when you stop expecting material possessions to complete you, you’d be surprised at how much pleasure you get in material possessions. And when you stop expecting God to end all your troubles, you’d be surprised how much you like spending time with God.” 206

“A good movie has memorable scenes, and so does a good life.” 212

Has anyone else read A Million Miles in a Thousand Years recently? What did you like and learn?