christmasy faves..

I love Christmas! I love autumn time, but I think I love Christmas more.. so here are just some of the things I love about the season!


1. Christmas cookies.. I think I like baking them more than eating them though, which is good right!?
2. Giving Christmas gifts, especially if it's something someone really wanted!
3. Advent Songs by Sojourn.
4. Santa. I still & always will get gifts from "Santa" on Christmas morning.
5. It's A Wonderful Life.
6. Christmas lights.
7. Peppermint Mocha's.
8. Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.
9. Being with the whole Fillmore clan.
10. Snowmen.

+ I love that the last two Christmas' I've had a get-together with all these lovelies...and the tradition continues net week!!

journals..

journal: (noun) a daily record of news and events of a personal nature; a diary.

I love them. I've been faithfully writing in a journal since I was in middle school(ish).. from time to time I dig them all out of this box I keep them in & read what ever I wrote on the day I'm reading it or the closest to it, always a good time..."Hmm what was Lindsay Fillmore doing on December 7th, 2004..."

It's embarrassing to read some of my really old journals because what I wrote & had to say when I was 12-15. A lot of it was quite insignificant & pointless, but always fun to read & try to remember what or why I was writing what I wrote..

Obviously over the years they've matured a little bit & have steered from what I did on a given day while I was in eighth grade to more of a place I can write out what is on my heart as a dialogue between God & I, that I don't talk about with even my closest friends.

My journals are kind of like a part of me, I typically always have it with me, & I get excited when I start a new one, but kind of sad when I end one! I've noticed lately that a lot of my journals reflect different seasons of my life, which I love, because it's kind of like a chapter book.
{I also like that I'm the only one who can read it.. how do I know this? Because I always have it with me!}

I write it more of a prayer journal, where it's mostly "God, this is what's going on in my life right now..." not just a "Dear Diary..." I like the exclusiveness of a conversation between just God & I, but since it's written down, I can always go back & read it!

It's been sweet to read the journals I've kept since high school, just seeing all God has done in my life, prayers He's answered, things He's taught me, & things He's showed me through highs, lows, pits, blessings, & every other season of my life I've experienced & written about.{on a side note, this week my two favorite songs this week are Rocketeer by Far East Movement + Strip Me by Natasha Bedingfeild.. I think God is telling me I need to run more because they both make me want to go running.}

the cliché thanksgiving blog..

I didn't want to do it, but it has to happen; the cliché thanksgiving blog..

First of all, it doesn't feel like Thanksgiving.. it definitely crept up on me, I don't know where November went + it's not as cold as Michigan typically is right now.

{side note: I feel like autumn is over right after Thanksgiving because the world is consumed by everything Christmas once it's over... even though it technically isn't winter until December 21st, so it makes me kind of sad that now I have to get ready for a long winter.}

Thanksgiving since I can remember in the Fillmore house {when we stay home} involves a lot of cooking, watching the parade, the whole clan under one roof, just spending time together, eating a lot, & the day typically ends with a lot of sweatshirts, pajamas, & being cozy while watching It's A Wonderful Life. It just makes me smile, happy, & feeling blessed.
So here are just some of the things I'm thankful for right now:my big family: mom & dad Fillmore, the sisters, & the brothers {my life would be so boring without them} + friends that I can talk about God with, what He's doing in our lives, & encourage each other + being a part of a church body that's alive & thriving to increase the Kingdom + second, third, fourth, hundredth chances.. how did I get so lucky & why has God blessed me so much?

{psalm one-hundred}

*I randomly saw Brandon Flowers last night {for FREE!} & can't stop listening to his song {Only the Young}, the video for it is pretty great.

Intrigued..

{I love words. I love thesaurus'. I love the word intrigue: verb- arouse the curiosity or interest of; fascinate}

I'm intrigued by a lot of things, but one thing that has & probably will always intrigue me is, ballet. Ballerinas. Ballet slippers. Tutu's. Toe shoes. Pointe. Barres. Everything. I love it.

I really can't imagine myself as a ballerina right now just because I am the most inflexible person in the world & can not dance gracefully to save my life! I'm sure if I would have stayed in Miss Michelle's ballet class there could have been hope, but it's hard to imagine!


For a short (very short!) time in my childhood I took a ballet at Fifth Position Dance Center. Miss Michelle was my teacher, we danced across the room to old, classical, scratchy, music on vinyl, for our recital we wore bumble bee tutu's, my favorite two books growing up (maybe still are, don't tell anyone though) were/are "Nina, Nina Ballerina" & "Dance Tanya Dance", & one day if I have a daughter named Gloria Jean (or Norah Jones) of course, I want to enroll her in ballet class & live a ballerina life vicariously through her.


I don't know what it is about ballerinas or ballet in general that I love, but it simply intrigues me & makes me smile. It's graceful, elegant, & lovely. It was a highlight of my winter last year to see the Nutcracker with my Babes... someday I will go see more live ballet!


Even if I'm not a ballerina, I still like to watch them move gracefully across a stage, look at pictures of them, & imitate their elegance.

{check out the ballet project..}

*real childlike magic...

mad props to my sister for this picture...i just had to steal it though. not to sound cliche, but i really do think a picture is worth more than a thousand words. i could go on for hours probably talking about this picture. it just shows so much innocence, simplicity, love, joy....

although there is a lot going on in this picture, obviously the three girls on the tire swing definitely stand out the most. i love that they are wearing their summer clothes, it looks like the blonde darling is wearing her bathing suite, they are having an amazing time at a week of camp, their hair is blowing from swinging, they are meeting new friends, they are laughing, learning, growing, they are holding on super tight, they are probably giggling, & they are totally embracing their turn on that tire swing. . . . i l o v e t h a t.

so how does a picture of the nashville skyline & the batman building have anything to do with a darling picture of some girls on a tire swing...

well, those girls in that swing, may or may not remember that experience at their week of camp in the summer of two thousand and eight, but i definitely have fond, delightful, enjoyable, wonderful, nostalgic memories of being in the nashville area with my family during a large chunk of my childhood.

i think that i have fallen in love with such a city because of all my favorite memories from growing up are related to being in the nashville area at my grandpas old house, his crazy huge backyard with a hill up one side, downtown franklin, uncles & aunts, 8-10 hour rides in the car to get there, downtown nashville, the batman building, country music, opry, driving with my uncle during his senior year of high school to pizza hut listening to brown eyed girl, rec-world for go-carting, driving around the hills to see crazy huge houses, even my grandpas new house with my younger cousins, always having deli-style sandwiches for lunch, riding scooters up & down my grandpas street...

sigh... along with all that, for a really long time i wanted to work in the music industry in nashville, because i really do love music and always thought that sort of job would be a lot of fun to have... but this last semester i definitely changed my mind and am 99.9% sure i want to be an elementary school teacher. i still want to live in nashville though.

i honestly pray often that God would send me down there eventually, and i do believe that God puts desires in our hearts & wants to bring us those desires. He knows i want to and long to live there so badly, i just have to wait on His timing, to see if that is where He takes me!

hopefully one day i can call the 615, nashvegas, or music city usa h o m e.

ps. it is raining at the moment..i l o v e the sound of rain outside. i also l o v e sitting in my grandpas covered back porch in nashville when it is raining...