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We were blessed to get to spend the last 6 days in Michigan at the Life Action Family Camp. Honestly, we came to camp this week knowing we were supposed to be there, but not really sure why. We were tired and drained and thinking maybe it was a mistake to be headed to camp in such an exhausted state. But oh my goodness! I'm so glad we came! The best part? All week long we had an amazing family assistant who was assigned solely to helping us/watching our kids/doing anything we need to do this entire week (I had heard that they assigned family assistants, but I had no idea that meant it'd be like a personal assistant/nanny!) God knew what we needed and He clearly orchestrated us being here this past week. We left today feeling so refreshed, rested, and filled up! Here are 5 things I'm loving this week: 
1. A Family Mud Run We did the Jungle Mud Run at camp and what a blast it was. This picture doesn't do it justice at all - because we got a lot muddier than we look and Silas really did have a fun time doing it. (He was beyond DONE at this point. Camp was a little rough for this routine-minded little guy. But he hung in there.) Kathrynne decided to start a new fashion trend by wearing her work boots with floral shorts. It cracks me up how little that girl cares about what she looks like or what other people think! {See more pictures from the Mud Run over on my Instagram account.} 
2. A Date Night With Jesse Can I just say that we are such nerds?? One night at camp, they have a Date Night where they plan activities for the kids and give the parents a night to do whatever they'd like. What did we do? We drove to South Bend, IN (about 30 minutes from camp) and hung out at Barnes and Noble and looked at books on fitness and nutrition and reviewed our budget. {By the way, Jesse is trying to turn me into a YouNeedABudget convert. I'm so not techie and kind of despise anything to do with money that does not come in green cash form, but I'm slowly seeing how this method of tracking our expenditures is a good fit for us. Of course we still use cash for a lot of our budget categories, but if this makes budgeting more fun for Jesse, I'm all about it. Especially since I do not touch spreadsheets with a ten-foot pole and happily delegate all budgeting details to him to track. I'm so glad that he finds joy in these types of things. Because if the tracking and spreadsheeting and charting and tallying were left to me, we'd be in a sorry financial mess.} 
3. Anchored by Kayla Aimee I loved finally getting to dive into the story of Kayla Aimee's daughter being born as a micro-preemie and the pain and heartache and struggle that she walked through while fighting for her daughter's life. It's funny AND heart-wrenching at the same time - which is a mark of a talented author, in my opinion. (I always say that I consider a highly talented author to be someone whose writing makes me laugh and tear up in the same page.) After the first chapter, I found myself thinking, "I hope Kayla Aimee writes many more books because I want to read them all!" I love her down-to-earth funny and honest writing style. {This book resonates with me at a very personal level because my husband was born at 27 weeks. His mom died when he was young and I never got the chance to meet her - which has always been hard for me because I wish so much that I could ask her all about what Jesse's birth and long hospital stay was like for her. This book is giving me a glimpse into some of the emotions and heartache and fears Jesse's mom must have experienced and it feels like such a gift to understand more of what that was like from her perspective.} 
4. Swinging One night, I spent some time swinging on the playground swing set at family camp. By myself. Don't judge.  I love swinging. Always have, always will. Anyone else? Just like coloring, there's something incredibly cathartic about it for me. It makes me stop, breathe, quiet my heart, and just take in fresh air and the scenery from a different angle. {Also, do you know how hard it is to get a selfie while swinging? Near impossible. I will spare you the multiple dork pictures I took while trying to get one that showed the swing, the sky, and part of my face. I know I could have asked one of the adults watching their kids on the playground to take a picture of me, but, um, pretty sure they would have wondered about my sanity. I can just hear it now: "there was some grown woman swinging on the playground with abandon and, get this, she ASKED ME TO TAKE HER PICTURE while swinging. Like she'd just learned how to swing or something!" Yeah. I figured the incognito selfies I shot while I was pretty sure no one was looking were the better option!} 
So my friend, Erin, told me that I must, must, must check out Boomerang. Honestly, I figured it wouldn't work at all for me and almost didn't bother, but I'm so glad that I did because it is changing my life. I kid you not. I get hundreds of emails every day - many that need to be responded to and some that need rather lengthy responses. Some I can delegate to my team, but many are ones that need a direct response from me. I had been filing emails in my To Answer file that I didn't have time to get to right away, but it was quickly becoming so stacked with emails needing answers - and long answers, at that - that it would just make me feel defeated and bog me down. So I decided to just try Boomerang and see if it made any difference. To my surprise, I'm falling madly in love. In just a few days, I'm back to Inbox Zero again, I'm being so much more productive on emails, and staying so much more caught up. I love that I'm now able to control when the longer emails come in and have them land in my inbox on days and at times when I've got blocks scheduled for working on email. In addition, I can space them out so that there aren't 25 emails coming into my inbox in one afternoon needing 20-minute responses but that I only get a few of those each day. I'm really hopeful that this simple solution is going to continue to make such a difference! What are YOU loving this week? Tell us in the comments! | 
