I'm the girl who can be cry laughing about Handmade Ryan Gosling one second, and crying about the world's problems the next.

I'm the girl who wants to just sit quietly and pin pretty things on Pinterest one second, until I come across a pin like this one, and wants to turn everything we are doing upside down.

I'm the girl who has a pity party about ridiculous rich people problems one second, and wants to get rid of everything I own the next.

I'm the girl who is a people pleaser who loves happy things, sparkles and unicorns.
But I have had my heart shattered.  Opened up to much more than my beautiful, abundantly blessed, lovely life.
A heart that can't ignore.  Can't pretend.  Can't just sit at her Apple computer, drinking clean water, in her Starbuck's cold cup, while her much longed for children sleep safely upstairs.

I want more than this world has to offer.

I want to make a dent in the world's water crisis.

I want to use my words for good.
I want to use my blog for a purpose.

I want to see all of us fund another well.

I want to see a community changed.  Given a chance at life.

It's not much.
But it is everything.

Everything that we cannot even begin to imagine.
Because imagining it is too scary.  There are no sparkles and unicorns in unsafe water.

Donate now.
Every penny of every single dollar you donate goes directly into the field.
Every penny of every single dollar has the ability to save a life.

If Ryan Gosling could give you a hug I bet he would.
I would too.  But he is much hotter.

Change the world.  With me.  With Fake Ryan Gosling.

Unicorns and sparkles.

{More rad giveaways have linked up.
So much goodness out there for water!
Check them out here.}

Are you ready to build another well with us?
Are you ready to tangibly change the face of an entire community half a world away?

My darling friends have come up with some amazing prize bundles, full of happiness and awesomeness.

Each $10 donation to the Project 320 campaign page is good for one entry in one of the prize bundles.

Lovely generous crafters, shop owners, bloggers and just plain rad humans, have dug down deep and donated to be a part of something bigger than themselves.

Think of how just $10 can give one person water for ten years.  Try to wrap your mind around that.
Think of how you can donate.  Perhaps forgo a gift or two and give water instead.  We even have a pretty printable on our Facebook page to assist you in gift giving.  How easy and meaningful is that?

When I was thinking of what I could do in terms of putting together a prize bundle, I came up with a slightly different plan.  I want to support and augment the other generous giveaways.  I want everyone to have a chance to win.  So I computered, powertooled, painted, sanded and sewed.
For water.  For you.

{New ones are being added each day.  Yay!}
Visit each giveaway by clicking the thumbnails below.
After you have donated, send a screenshot or forward your Charity Water receipt to

project320blog {at} gmail dot com.

Thanks for your heart to help.
To share what you have to save and change lives.

All of us from Project 320 love and appreciate you being a part of our passion and dream.

Lets fund this well.
{Bonus treats applies to all donations made by Monday December, 19th.}

I am pretty sure that on more than once occasion I said that I would never do one of these.
But I did.
In artsy black & white.  Because everyone is cuter in artsy black & white.
With my new glasses.  Which are not sunglasses, although they look like they are.  That would be weird.
Weirder than me in my new hipster glasses.
Because given the choice between Sarah Palin professional woman glasses or nerdy hipster glasses, I obviously chose the latter.
Back to the vlog...
In which I talk about some stuff.  In my not-sunglasses-glasses.



Visit the Project 320 blog here.

A community half a world away has you to thank for bringing them something that could change their future.

This is why I blog.
I am overwhelmed, humbled, and honestly a little bit weepy.  That together we could come together, despite the economy, or the craziness of the season, and see a miracle unfold in front of us.

Thank you so much Drew B., Lisa Leonard and The Pleated Poppy, for donating such lovely prizes.

I know that Kellie Conklin is one happy lady today.

Hugs and gratitude from this water loving girl to you.

This verse is the entire reason behind Project 320.


Time and time again, God shows up and proves His word to be true.
The well has never ever so close to funding...


Our dreams are unfolding in front of us because of His power at work.


All we had to do was dare to hope.


Thank you to the God of infinitely more.


A few more hours to donate and enter all of the abundant giveaways.


Tomorrow we rejoice.

Thank all of your for your heart and your donations to the 

When we started planning and dreaming what Project 320 would look like this year, my biggest wish was to giveaway a Silhouette SD machine.  Fast forward a couple months and I find myself putting the Silhouette at the very top of my birthday and Christmas list.  I then spent way too much time entering all of the giveaways throughout the blogosphere over Thanksgiving weekend.  Can you guess what happened?  Out of thousands and thousands of entries, I actually won one of my very own over at Infarrantly Creative.

I screamed.  I celebrated.  I was so very, very excited.
But then I got to thinking.  To praying.
Suddenly I realized that this little Silhouette that landed in my lap, was an answer to prayer.  I wanted to give away a Silhouette to help raise money for water.  I now had a Silhouette.

It didn't come in the way that I expected, but I love how that is often how God shows up.


If you don't know what a Silhouette is, or what it can do, the question is more like what can't it do?
Any shape.  Any font.  No cartridges required.
Just imagine the fun crafts and gifts you could make with this little marvel!!!


I am amazed by Lisa Leonard.
She helps me seek little reminders of grace and evidence of beauty in my mundane.
She has the gift of encouragement, creativity and is abundantly generous.  I am constantly inspired by her lovely blog and love to give her thoughtful jewelry as gifts.



Surely you know of The Pleated Poppy, and Lindsey, the girl behind all of the pretty?
She is a wonder with all kinds of mad skillz, yet is even sweeter than toffee crack.
Her blog is full of fun, fashion, and her magazine worthy home.  Her shop is full of happy, girly, fabric deliciousness.




I could write a grad school thesis on all of the ways I love and look up to Drew B.
She is like the sister that I always wished I had, an adoring wife, phenomenal mother, an encourager,  stinking funny, insanely generous, and way, way, way too talented.

If you ever have the opportunity to sit in front of her camera, she will capture your life in a way that will change you and your family forever.  She has given us such a gift in each image that she shot.  A gift that will last long, long, after our lives on this earth end.  Photographs have unique the ability to do that.  To freeze time.  To make a lasting memory.

On top of that, she shares her vast knowledge, and has translated it into normal, understandable, human language, through Momtog, the UNmanual and the UNposing Guide.  Drew has helped me fall madly in love with my camera and to embrace it's possibility.  Each time I stop time through the click of the shutter, I am so very thankful for what she has taught me.  When my memory gets hazy, and I can't fully imagine what my girls looked like when they were this young, I will be able to flip through the photographs that I've taken, and be transported right back to these busy years.  As much as I would love each of them to stay little, in some way, they will through the lens.



So how does this all work?

One $10 donation to the Project 320 Well
equals ONE entry.

Donate at the Project 320 charity:water page first.
Then come back to this post and leave one comment for each entry.


Make sure that either your email is attached to your profile, or is included in each comment.

Comments will stay open until midnight pacific time on Sunday, December 19th.

Donations will be verified,
and one happy winner will be chosen to receive all four prizes
on Monday, December 20th.

Win prizes.
Save lives.
{Which in itself, is the best prize in the entire world.}

Thank you for having the heart to make this earth a safer, healthier, happier place for a community an ocean away.

{Be sure to click over to the Project 320 blog and check out all of the other wonderful giveaways.  How encouraging is it to see social media being used to change the world?}

Starting on Monday, December 13th, bloggers with a passion to give, share and save lives, will be hosting exciting giveaways, all to help fund a well through Charity:Water.


Little things always have a way of turning into very big things.


Want to participate?


Visit the Project 320 blog for all of the details.


Mark your calendars.  Monday morning is going to change everything for a community in need.

You know that person in disaster movies?
The one in the command center that they turn to as an asteroid/ bomb/ train is hurtling to the nearest metropolitan area?
The one who gets asked "What is the worst possible scenario we are looking at?"

I would be so good at that job.
I all too often am assessing that exact same question in my mind.  In my the-glass-is-half-empty mind.
But just like in the movies, the worst case scenario never, ever seems to come to fruition.
Disaster is always avoided.
Even my imaginary troubles are averted.

Last week I was having a day.
You know those kinds of days.
Full of calamity and catastrophe.
Not one, but two sewing machines decided it was their day to die.
My computer was giving me a whole lot of spinning rainbow wheel attitude.
I was facing a week with not only too much on my plate, but not enough pretty plates in all of the world in which to hold all that was being thrown my way.
I was stressed, tired, thirty three days off of sugar, and acting like a general psycho.

That jerk Taylor Swift and her song Never Grow Up sent me right in to the really, really, really ugly cry.
From there I had to crumple up my to do list, accept that fact that a majority of what I wanted to get done would remain unfinished.  But that most importantly, nobody would even notice what was missing amongst all that wasn't.

I sent myself to bed early with a good book and signed up for a next day do-over.  Come morning, I was less of a psycho, and tried my best to pretend to be a half full girl.

The half full life is so, so, so much better.  My disaster scenario turned into what could be a very, very, very beautiful answer to prayer.

Project 320 is going to look a little different this year.  But sometimes different is good.

I can't wait to tell you about it tomorrow.
Maybe tomorrow will bring about the one of the best days ever.

How can someone possibly do something good everyday?

It sounds exhausting, doesn't it?

I get that.

But there are so many ways to do small, good, things.  If I can fall asleep, at what is most likely way to late of an hour, knowing that I made an effort to make the world better in a very small way, then I rest sweeter.

Do I save the world every day?

Hardly.

My version of goodness might just be spending an extra few minutes chatting with my neighbor who is struggling in life,
sending a quick text message to a friend,
or choosing to be thankful as I fold and sort a mountain of laundry, because that mountain of laundry represents the little ones entrusted to my care.

But some days the only good in me is holding my tongue when I want to absolutely
FREAK OUT
that my jumpy, fidgety daughter has yet again, spilled all over the table.

Because, let me tell you.  All that is in me wants to freak out.  Some days I just pray that we can survive breakfast without a spill.  I consider those mornings a gift.

But in my annoyance when I am spending my nearly daily ritual of cleaning up some sort of spill, I rarely see past the fact that in my frustration, I am taking something for granted.

Clean water.

Water that does my laundry.  Water that bathes my children.  Water that I mop the floor with.  Water that fills our cups.

So some days, my goodness is small.  Globally insignificant.

But other days I want my goodness to change the world.  If only for one person.  One family.  One community.

Last year God planted a dream in my heart.  A dream that my sweet friends believed in.  A dream that you believed in.

Together we built
TWO WELLS.

{posted on facebook the day before the earthquake}