2017 Gift Guide for Her Featuring Texas and Handmade Goodness

By[email protected] December 15, 2017February 3, 2022

Still have some last minute Christmas shopping left to do? Just in time for #FreeShipFriday (Did y’all know this was a thing?!), here’s this year’s 2017 gift guide for her. I hope you’ll find a few of my favorite things for the ladies in your life.

This post contains affiliate links. Please see full disclosure policy here.

Table of Contents

2017 Gift Guide for Her featuring Texas and Handmade Goodness

Handcrafted jewelry

In case you haven’t noticed, leather and metal jewelery is my jam. My friend Danielle Brower at Create Hope Cuffs in Minnesota makes a few of my favorites. I also adore Texas’ own James Avery Artisan Jewelery. (I especially love their new leather and sterling silver, interchangeable charm bracelet.)

I’m also digging local nonprofit Austin Angels‘ vegan suede diffuser necklace for essential oils lovers. Sales support foster children and their families in central Texas.

Journaling Bible with pens and watercolors

Bible journaling is kind of my favorite these days.

If you have a creative friend, sister, mom, daughter, or mother-in-law, this large print, DaySpring leather journaling Bible is perfect. Pair it with Poppin pens (a new favorite) and Sakura watercolors with water brush set.

Handmade, vintage-style apron

Imagine Goods is a sustainable clothing company supporting artisans in places like Cambodia and Haiti with fair wages. I absolutely adore this vintage-style Beatrice apron.

Press with Texas artisan coffee

I love a beautiful and functional French press. This Bodum pour over coffeemaker is stunning, especially packaged up with local Austin-area favorite Summer Moon Wood-fired Coffee’s Velvet Blaze signature blend.

Hand-poured Texas soy candles

I love Sugar Land Candle Company soy candles and wax melts. Their candles are naturally made in Sugar Land, Texas, of course. My favorite hand-poured scents for my home are Daydreamin’ and Lone Star.

Handmade Texas goats’ milk soap and body oil

My current favorite Texas-made skincare products are Bella Belly goats’ milk soap and scar and stretch mark oil and Rachel’s Plan Bee coconut beach body oil. These product lines are crafted with love right here in Austin and Buda. They feel and smell AMAZING on your skin!!

Texas

10 Signs that You Grew Up in Austin in the 90s

By[email protected] January 21, 2016April 21, 2021

I was born at Seton Hospital in Austin in 1984. I think it’s safe to say that my hometown has experienced a few changes since then. After all, I was here before the hipsters arrived, before SXSW started, before Sandra Bullock and everyone else decided ATX was the place to be. In honor of all my fellow native Austinites,…

Texas

Meet Hayley Hansen: Texas Strong Woman of the Month

By[email protected] March 14, 2016March 26, 2021

I’m thrilled to introduce you to this month’s Texas Strong Woman of the Month–Hayley Hansen. I have known Hayley for over 10 years. For many of those years, she felt more like a sister than a friend. She lived with my parents at the start of my mother’s illness. And she helped me move out of my…

Alzheimer's Disease and Dementia | Faith | Grief and Mental Health

How I’m Navigating the Alzheimer’s Grieving Process As I Lose My Mother

By[email protected] March 16, 2013March 20, 2021

In a 2008 television interview with my parents about my mother’s early-onset Alzheimer’s diagnosis, I told the reporter, “it’s like we’re losing her in slow motion.” Lately, it seems like I have been surrounded by loss. Several friends have recently lost parents after long battles with cancer, and, of course, most recently, friends from church…

Alzheimer's Disease and Dementia | Faith | Marriage | Motherhood and Parenting

Out of Sorts: The Student and the Teacher

By[email protected] November 2, 2015

When I was a small child, my mother often found me teaching class in my bedroom, my, then, compliant baby brother lined up in a neat row betwixt my stuffed animals on the floor. I wanted to be many things as I got older–a country singer, a travel agent, a marine biologist, even, in high…

Marriage | Motherhood and Parenting | Texas

Meet Cristina White-Jones: Texas Strong Woman of the Month

By[email protected] January 23, 2017August 8, 2022

I am pleased to introduce you to the first Texas Strong Woman of the Month for 2017, Cristina White-Jones–an incredible mixed media artist and teacher, who happens to be my Buda neighbor. Meet Cristina White-Jones I met Cristina last summer when my young daughters began attending her fun and creative art classes at a local…

Alzheimer's Disease and Dementia | Faith | Grief and Mental Health

Why I Am Different, and I’m Pretty Sure That’s a Good Thing

By[email protected] July 4, 2024July 4, 2024

Someone I thought was a friend once described me as “different.” She meant it in a negative way. And it used to bother me. But now I think that it’s a good thing. Because I am different.