2020 Favorites & Highlights
Whew, 2020. What a year. Lots of disappointment, pivoting, sadness, but also so much beauty, growth, and hope. Here’s my Instagram Top 9 from the year: Book-writing, celebrating, farming, life-learning, lots and lots of flowers with a side of unicorns. 🌸🌼🦄 These photo highlights show that our biggest adventures together this year were at home here on Kindred Farm with our people, and that was more than enough for me.
Because we MADE it. We got through it like we get through everything - together.
My word for 2020 was RECLAMATION, and it’s a word that will continue to follow me, whatever I do. Having this word on my heart this year really helped me clean out some fear and people-pleasing, take more ownership on the farm, and grab onto the authority I have in Christ to use my voice and contribute to the world. I still believe what I said in this post: Reclamation takes ACTIVE work. It also implies that I have a right to something that’s always been mine. And I do. As a child of God, I have a RIGHT to live freely.
My sweet friend Suz gave me this mug for my birthday, and I love having the constant reminder:
Here are a few more things that characterized 2020…
Favorite Food
Like any good Italian girl, my favorite food was PIZZA. And not just any pizza, my husband Steven’s amazing homemade pizza made with our new Gozney pizza oven with perfect crust and flowers on top, of course. This was definitely the year of pizza, as we hosted some (socially-distanced) Kindred Dinners on the farm this summer and did a LOT of “recipe-testing” a.k.a. stuffing as much pizza as possible in our faces under the guise of “making sure it tastes good for our dinner guests.” My favorite was his black garlic whipped ricotta with caramelized mushrooms. Drooling just thinking about it.
Favorite Book I Read On My Own
My favorite book I read this year in book club was This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger. The last line of the book still makes me a little teary when I think about it. When I finished this book, I felt like I had actually traveled down the Mississippi River myself. It’s everything I love about a novel - characters you feel like are real, accurate historical elements, intricate storylines interwoven with each other, shocking twists and turns, and redemption.
The most practical and helpful book I read this year was Don’t Overthink It by Anne Bogel.
Favorite Book I Read With My Girls
In Spring 2020, in the middle of quarantine, we were in the middle of reading all the way through The Chronicles of Narnia. It was my first time reading all 7 books, and nothing will ever compare to the wonder of reading them for the first time with my girls. We read during the day and got in more chapters at bedtime until my throat went hoarse and my eyes begged to close. My favorite book, hands-down, was The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
Most of us have heard the famous quote from the book, “Courage, dear heart.” It’s printed on shirts and mugs and greeting cards. I’ve heard it a hundred times before and thought, "Oh, that's a nice sentiment...yeah, who doesn't want more courage?" But reading the story in context is a shimmering allegory for how God provides for us in the scariest of times, in exactly the way we need. You mean there’s actually a way to live without fear? I’ve been pondering this for months and will take scenes from this book with me for the rest of my life.
Favorite Movie
I’m not a huge TV or movie-watcher, but watching Hamilton on Disney+ this summer was, of course, unreal.
Favorite Music
My new favorite artist is Surfaces! It is THE perfect chill jam music that everyone in our family loves - especially great when driving on a sunny day with the windows down. I never get tired of listening to them!
My favorite worship album was Shane and Shane: Vintage. It’s all the best songs from 1990s youth group, but done in a new, fresh, non-cheesy way. Makes me wish I’d saved all my awesome flannel button-downs and high-waisted jorts. “In the Quiet” is my favorite song on the album.
Other music I’ve played a lot of this year are Sailr, JJ Heller, our Kindred Dinner playlist, the Hamilton Soundtrack (of course), and the Over the Moon Soundtrack (gah, Phillipa Soo - everything she does is brilliant).
And the song, “Holy” by Justin Bieber (feat. Chance the Rapper) about a bazillion times.
Favorite Podcast(s)
Oh, this is a tough one, because so much of my podcast-listening is usually done in the car, driving 30-45 minutes around town from place to place, and that was greatly reduced this year. Here are some I especially loved:
The Eternal Current, especially this episode and this one.
This episode with Andrew Peterson on JJ Heller’s podcast, Instrumental.
Basically everything on The Next Right Thing.
This episode on Sacramentality on Tsh Oxenreider’s new podcast - love the direction the podcast is going this year as it’s changed over to A Drink With A Friend.
Favorite Activity
Picking flowers in our own field with my girls. Just the simplest of joys that will never, ever get old. This year we multiplied our flower fields and are adding even more this year - CANNOT WAIT.
Runner up: my oldest daughter, who helped plant our 400 feet of corn in early spring, asking me to lie in the corn rows with her in summer and look up at the sky.
What I Miss About Life Before C*VID
I miss “the beautiful commonness of the day” (a phrase from The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah). The casual-ness of going out in the world - stopping by Whole Foods for a drink and a snack and eating it out in the sun on the patio. Whole Foods is kinda depressing now. I think the staff is doing their best, but the personal shoppers seem to now outnumber the regular customers who used to be shopping slowly and contentedly. The tables and chairs are blocked off and stacked, and the entire eating area has become a processing center for Amazon packages.
I miss people looking each other in the eyes. I miss seeing people’s whole faces out in public. I miss when people didn’t look at each other with paranoia, like everyone is a threat to their health and safety.
I miss not having to tell my girls “grab your masks” before we get out of the car. I miss going to the library and staying as long as we want, instead of rushing to grab books because we can’t breathe freely, or having to call the library from the curb to grab something for me and bring it out to the car.
Best Things I’ve Learned Because of C*VID
So many friends and acquaintances have said that this past year they were given “the gift of time.” Some friends say that being forced to homeschool has been unexpectedly life-giving for them and their children.
Anything that was fragile or already on thin ice before C*VID, I think it has taken to a breaking point. It has been a refining fire, revealing what is - and isn’t - actually true and valuable and important to us and our families. We cannot survive life without close friends, connection, sharing meals around the table, time in nature, healthy food, and beauty.
Favorite Scripture
The Passion Translation and The Message have been my favorite ways to read Scriptures this year. I’ve returned to this verse time and time again from Psalm 125:2 in The Message, "God encircles his people—always has and always will." The Passion Translation says it this way: “The Lord’s wrap-around presence surrounds his people, protecting them now and forever.”
Favorite Quote
This isn’t a new one, but I’ve meditated on it time and again this year…
“You are the one in whom Christ dwells and delights. You live in the strong and unshakable kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is not in trouble, and neither are you.”
A Great Trip
We were grateful for the opportunity to take a trip to the North Carolina mountains in August with Steven’s parents, his sister, and her family. Lots of little cousins! We basically stayed in our rental house every day and found adventures all round us - rolling down the hills at golden hour, playing the playhouse, exploring the forest, picking wild blueberries, and cooking lots and lots of meals together.
A Good Memory
There were a million memorable moments, but I’m gonna go with the first day we went on an outing after being in quarantine for a month. We loaded into Steven’s truck and got steaming hot pesto cheese pizza takeout (here we go again with the pizza…) and ate in the car while driving country roads with the windows down. It felt absolutely luxurious.
A Work of Art
Our produce field. We worked hard to make the edges uniform and measured the rows so they would all be the exactly same width. It helped so much when planting and made it look pretty stunning in the height of the growing season!
Favorite work of art from others? This painting an old friend made of this very scene on the farm. What a gift.
A Meaningful Confession
“Trying to avoid pain is so exhausting.”
An Important Decision
Finally making some big changes in our homeschool life was difficult, but so needed, and we’ve been seeing the fruits of it, big time. Every time I’m resistant to change, but push through with it anyway, I see how much better things are on the other side.
A Significant Exception
Canning and preserving is something I once said I “don’t do” (along with running, diets, competitive sports, and making my bed.) In past years, Steven has been the one cooking up the jam and I’ve been the sidekick helper. This year, I made most of the jams and pickles myself.
Now I guard our arsenal of jams and pickled things on the shelves in the barn kitchen like they’re actual treasure. And they are - the tangible, jewel-toned results of months and months of labor.
So, apparently I do canning now.
And I also make my bed.
Progress Made (Big or Small)
I wrote almost 50,000 words for my book manuscript in 2020. My daughters worked hard and made progress in spelling, reading, and math at River Lake Sunshine School. And Steven’s private chef business grew leaps and bounds this year - he is seeing the fruit of SO MANY years of hard work as the chef side of Kindred continues to grow. I love seeing him in his stride, doing what he loves.
