beautiful. and perfect.

{via}

my friend katie emailed this blog post to me,

which she found via donald miller's blog,

and it is by far the most honest & moving story i've ever read.

i couldn't get through explaining the post to my mom without crying.

truly beautiful and perfect.

the man in the red hat

see that man with the little red hat?

his name is gusto, and sarah & sergio took us to see him last week.

a long time ago, he felt that God called him

to build a cathedral... by himself.

he knew nothing about building/architecture/art,

so he bought some books and got started.

so for the past 49, he has spent every hour of everyday building

this house of worship.

the building is funded completely from donations,

and he does everything from the stained glass to laying bricks.

now that he is in his 80s, he accepts help from just a few people.

we definitely felt like we were in the presence of

a modern day noah,

and were especially touched by his humbleness

and obviously, his conviction.

heartbeat of madrid

clicking boots on cobblestone

metro swooshing by

sipping sangria, puffing smoke

dancing through the night

spanish rolling off the tongue

paella, tortilla, y jambon

sunny mornings, bright street lights

life floating in the air

floating, floating, floating

like a dream we're floating

moving through

picasso's masterpiece

glowing

lovers kissing lovers

the beating heart of madrid.

we fell in loveeee with madrid and had the most incredible week.

we felt very blessed to get to spend time with my best friend in such a remarkable city,

and for the chance to get to know her true love!

thank you smiller for sharing your city with us- can't wait to stay with you again!!

bits of my childhood {pt.1}

a couple of weeks ago i was looking for something in our "closet of death,"

(our one crazy jam-packed closet that required constant reorganizing)

and pulled out the big red box that holds an edited down collection of special toys/notes/pictures/awards/random stuff from my childhood.

during the weeks between graduation & my wedding,

i helped my mom clean out & pack up our home of 20+ years.

i tried my hardest to fit into one box all the things i absolutely could not toss out,

and simply hold on to the memories associated with everything else.

the light was really nice that day, so i thought it would be fun to snap a few photos of the different things that made it into the box.

what better way to start of this 'series' with some of

my most favorite {tiny} treasures:

how can these little tiny treasures not steal your heart?

i've always made a point not to buy this stuff,

as i'm afraid it would open the floodgates to a wallet draining addiction,

but here is my small collection of tiny things

that will someday decorate the dollhouse i will hopefully build

for a daughter ross & i will hopefully have

{in the way, way distant future!}

p.s. the lamp really lights up- how cool is that?

kinda cool, right?

logos and photos

dear friends,

thank you so much for your opinions,

advice and encouragement!

i'm still working on them, and trying to find the perfect one

for mrs. higley.

and speaking of stancy,

here are some more of the amazing photographs

she took of over valentine's day weekend.

she is so kind, generous, encouraging,

and talented.

we will treasure these always.

thank you again for all of the logo input!

help wanted

dear friends,

i post these in extreme humility.

i'm new to the graphic design world (can you tell?), and i'm trying to make a new logo

for the incredibly talented stancy of stancy higley photographie.

any thoughts/commets/criticisms on these {rough} drafts would be very, very welcomed and appreciated.

once we decide on a logo concept, we will create variations for her business cards, website, packages, etc.

gratefully,

katie

p.s. there are still a couple more in the works that i may post later

waco restores my soul

last weekend, ross & i were able to sneak out of town

and bask in the glory that is baylor

during the last weekend of sing.

don't worry that my husband bought tickets literally

the minute they went on sale. he's so "over sing." haha whatever...

we felt very blessed that so many of our friends

made time to hang out with us, drink coffee, eat froyo,

cook 'big brek,' give us a place to sleep (thanks roommate!),

and talk about sing for hours and hours and hours.

in fact, after watching sing for 6 hours,

we went back to sarahs house with a bottle of andre

and talked about sing until 4 in the morning,

just like the good ol' days.