Keep on Fighting that Frump–And More Inspiration!

Wifey Wednesday: I Have No Libido! Great Mother’s Day Gift Ideas–and Oth...

Keep on Fighting that Frump–And More Inspiration!

Welcome, Crosswalk Readers! A great place to go first to find out about my marriage posts is right here. But don’t miss our Ultimate Homemaking Bundle Sale, either!

We’re in the middle of the most awesome sale this week! It’s the Ultimate Homemaking Bundle: 97 books for $29.97. Plus you get some ecourses and $140 worth of freebies! Learn more about everything that’s offered here, or buy it now!

It’s such a great deal I don’t want you to miss out, so I want to focus on some specific categories of books today, and see how they relate to some of the things that we talk about most here at To Love, Honor and Vacuum.

Obviously there are marriage books (and my own 31 Days to Great Sex is featured)!

Let’s Fight the Frump Again

But after our Fight the Frump week a few weeks ago, I had many of you saying:

I wish I knew how to get stylish clothes cheaply! Because for me, money is the issue.

I totally understand. And other than saying, “go to consignment stores”, I didn’t have much to add.

But now I’ve got a great resource that can help you so much more!

The No-Brainer Wardrobe (normally $7.99, but just 31 cents as part of the bundle) walks you through how to create a minimalist wardrobe–just the pieces that you really need, the “Essentials”. Then you have your “Additions” which make an outfit interesting. And then you have your “Finishers” which give it that Wow factor.

The key, she believes, is to limit your wardrobe so that it’s easy to coordinate things. That way, when you get up in the morning, it really is a “no brainer” to figure out what to wear, because the outfits create themselves.

She details how to go through your wardrobe right now and figure out what to keep and what to throw away.

And then she shows you how to build it deliberately.

But you don’t have to spend a lot of money! In fact, my favourite part of the book was when she took a few pictures from her “Style” board on Pinterest with her to a thrift store. Those pictures were her inspiration.

And with those pictures, she was able to reject some clothes and choose others, so that in the end she had an outfit that bore a remarkable resemblance to the one she started out trying to find. And she has so many pictures and so many explanations of what to look for (good quality collars, shirts that aren’t bulky at the back, etc. etc.) that you really can do it yourself. She’d show you how to examine the picture and figure out what you liked about it: a frilly top under a structured jacket. But if you can’t find a structured jacket, a structured sweater give the same feel. She shows how to ask these questions.

You just find a picture like this:

..and take it to thrift store and look at how to recreate it!

I love it!

So you don’t have to spend a ton! You just have to be strategic, stick to a plan, and keep your wardrobe to the minimum so that it’s no fuss.

That’s not the only inspiration for those of you with little money to spend on clothes, though.

In Reuse, Refresh, Repurpose, Frugal Girl gives step by step instructions on how to salvage old clothes and turn them into shopping bags, cloth napkins, skirts, doll clothes, and more! She also gives a great tutorial on how to dye clothing, or how to cut parts off of clothing that you don’t like so that you can keep the parts you do (like if it has a weird collar or something).

My favourite part was when she turned old clothes into fabric gift bags. They were so cute! I really want to do that. It’s just rectangles, so it looks like even I could handle it.

Finally, if you need inspiration on fighting the frump, Sarah Mae can give it to you!

She starts out by telling us that you can’t really fight the frump unless you figure out your “why”–why are you doing it? And no one else can tell you that why. It’s all individual. But we all feel it–that need to be ready for anything, that urge towards more discipline and more purpose, that urge towards energy.

Then, in each of her daily devotionals, she helps us focus on baby steps that add up to big changes.

And she wrestles with us through grace-based living and rules-based living. Too much of fighting the frump can become rules based living, and you don’t want that. What you do want is to be more powerful and more purposeful.

And why do we want to fight the frump? Because we mean business. Sure, yoga pants are comfortable. But you don’t mean business in casual. And cute and pretty can also be comfortable. So the question is: are you pursuing excellence or not?

I love this book because it’s so down to earth. It’s so real. She’s honest about wanting massive amounts of coffee, fighting getting out of bed in the morning, and desperate to find a time to shower. But she fights it because she wants to be excellent. To be purposeful. To be energetic.

So there you have it: Three books that will help you fight the frump in totally different ways! And there’s even more books in the beauty category of the bundle.

Bible Memorization

Let’s take something totally different now. A ton of people arrive on this site looking for articles on fighting the frump. But a ton more arrive on this site looking for my post about the 50 Best Bible Verses to Memorize.

We want to take Scripture seriously.

And there are a ton of resources that can help you do that, too–especially with your children! Here’s a quote from The ABC’s for Godly Boys and Godly Girls Curriculum:

I so agree with this sentiment. If we want our kids to grow up to love God, they have to also KNOW God. You see, most issues in our lives stem from the fact that we believe lies. So if we’re insecure, it’s because we believe we’re not good enough. If we fear rejection, it’s because we fear that we’re not loveable. Even with sex, as we often talk about on this blog, we can get all messed up because we believe lies. It’s not our fault–often we were very hurt. But the lies are there nonetheless.

And the only way to counter lies is with the truth. So if we can spend our children’s early years surrounding them with truth and feeding them truth and helping them to understand truth, they’ll be in such a good spot when they’re older and they start to have issues. They can fight back with truth.

That’s why I’m so passionate about Scripture memory. We don’t do that enough anymore as churches, and we certainly don’t do it enough as families. And if you’re stumped as to where to start, my 50 Best Memory Verses can help.

But if you want a program to help you memorize with small children, God’s Word in My Heart gives suggestions as to how to handle it with kids of all ages, looking at what to do with babies, and toddlers, and older children. And then they present 26 verses you can use, each beginning with a different letter of the alphabet. Then they have a list for when children are older of other ones to tackle. And she shows you how to tackle them so they stick.

I love this resource! And there are others in the bundle that also help you work through God’s Word with your children, whether you homeschool or send your kids to school. It’s too important a job to miss.

So there you go–two totally different aspects of life, each covered really well in the bundles.

My Challenges for You:

And my challenges for you today: How can you incorporate more Scripture memory into your life? Try to start a regular plan to actually fill your life with truth! Let me know in the comments what you do with your family.

And if you find yourself being drawn towards frump, I’d challenge you to think about it this way: I have an awesome job to do. I am a wife. I am a mom (if you are). I am an ambassador for God. This world needs people who will make a difference, get engaged, raise great kids, and keep the community strong. That takes energy, commitment, and oomph. So when do I feel like I have the most oomph? The most energy? When do I portray excellence? Ask yourself that. Think it through. And then, perhaps, it will become easier to fight the frump (and not nearly as expensive as you thought, either!)

Of course, you can also get the bundle! And if you want to see what else is included, there’s a whole list here.