News & Current Events

The days have turned into weeks, and soon the first month mark will be here since the flooding began in Louisiana. Some still have water in their homes! For those who have suffered loss and those who are working tirelessly to house, feed, clothe and help them put their lives back together, FLOOD FATIGUE is a real thing. In case you aren't local and the national news made us but a blip on your radar, you should know that 20 inches of rain dumped over our area affecting 20 parishes, damaging over 146,000 homes, killing 13 people. It's estimated only 21% of the damaged homes had flood insurance as they were not in a flood plain. If you drive down...

It's not very often moms get to sneak away for a girls trip to the beach. It turns out we didn't pick the greatest weekend to do so, but we wouldn't realize that until after we arrived. So I gave hugs goodbye and left for a girls weekend away with three main instructions for my husband when it came to our son: Make sure he eats some veggies. Put him to bed at a reasonable time. No peeing outside. The third one sounds a little odd, but we'd been casually teaching our son about using the toilet and he was about to move up to the potty training class at daycare. Early on he would go outside with daddy. It was cute and...

Who doesn't love a t-shirt? Who doesn't love a t-shirt that also gives back? Ever since relief and recovery began, you've probably seen scores of inspirational t-shirt designs attached to charities flooding your newsfeed (pun not intended, but it works). As a mom whose wardrobe consists of mainly t-shirts (casual and formal, of course), I love this idea! It's a wonderful way not only to show your support of Louisiana and those affected by this disaster, but you also put a little money into the pockets of organizations and victims who need your support. Win-win! But with soooo many designs out there the choices are a bit overwhelming, so we've compiled a list (in no particular order) of the raddest designs...

“The disaster after the disaster.” I wasn’t familiar with this term until recently when my hometown endured widespread flooding. As one of the minority whose home did not flood, I jumped in with both feet into the relief effort. In doing so, I received a crash course in how donations can sometimes do more to hinder the relief efforts than help it. “But they’ve lost everything, right? Wouldn’t anything help?" Well, no. They haven’t lost their families. They haven’t lost their dignity. And they haven’t lost their desire to wear clean, unused underwear. Can I just be real for a moment? For as many thoughtful, wonderful helpful donations, I have seen just as many that leave me scratching my head. For example,...

  Losing your home and your things isn’t ideal under any circumstance. Tossing out our children’s toys was about as heartbreaking as tossing out ruined family photos for me. My kids didn’t deserve to lose what they lost. They aren’t able to grasp the reasons why this has happened to us. I kept silent about it for the first week. They knew we weren’t staying with family “just because.” They saw me cry and they heard conversations, but they never knew what was really going on. I took them both aside one morning before we headed back home to start demo. I told them that things would be different and the furniture we had would be replaced. I told them it...