January's box is our second Barkbox.  I had full intention of taking photos of our first box, but we were so excited and ripped into it immediately!  Miss Calliope has really enjoyed her Barkbox toys & treats all month long.  I know we're only 2 months in, but so far we're loving it!

Callie has a lot of toys.  She loves her toys.  She has a toy box in the living room and every morning she drags out every single one, and plays with every single one in little doggy circuit training hah.  Now I just need to train her to pick up her toys at the end of the day...  My living room looks like a toddler's playroom!

I decided to get a Barkbox subscription because with the money we were spending on trips to the local pet store, we might as well be getting a fun sub box with unique toys and treats.  I think the pricing is fair and so far completely worth it.

Let's jump in!

This month's box is travel themed.  Every month, the packaging in your box matches the theme.  Look at the custom tissue paper!  So cute.

This month's description:

Pack your bags! We're going traveling with this month's BarkBox. Whether you're schlepping to Kathmandu or shuffling to the kitchen, we've included everything your dog needs to trot the globe like a pro. Now the only question is: will your pup smile for their passport photo? Tasty treats are WAY better than the in-flight meal, and the tough chews and fun toys are perfect for making a long flight fly by. Just don’t forget your passport!

Each Pup in the Air box is thoughtfully curated with 5 items.

||NOTE||

The regular subscription box comes with 2 toys, 2 treats, and a chew of some sort.  When I subscribed, I was gifted the additional premium toy add-on for free.  So you'll see 3 toys in our box. 

Dentists Say "Play Twice A Day" Toothpaste: You’ll both be grinning after tug of war with this toothpaste and brush-shaped toy. It has a stretchy give that will offer your dog’s toofers the tension they crave when it’s time to play.

Suitcase: Can we all agree flying would be so much better if we got to sit among dog passengers? With this toy designed to look like suitcase, we are one step closer to living in that perfect, perfect world. Until then, the durable ballistic nylon stitching means your K-9 co-pilot will be busy commandeering the precious cargo inside: a squeaker toy.

Squeakin' on a Jet Plane: This cushy toy is perfect for business or pleasure. Your dog can get to work shaking out a very bumpy ride, or, because it’s so plush, use the plane to dock a worn-out snout. And remember. Every time the aircraft squeaks, a pupper gets its wings!

Duck Chew: 7", Rawhide Free, 100% American made, great for teeth and gums

Snack Rings with Lamb & Cheddar: First class ingredients like real lamb and cheddar cheese make for one smooth sailing snack. These grain-free treats are shaped like mini circles so they’re easy to catch. The soft texture leads to a chewy bite, so they’ll keep your dog distracted as you get to the next stop.

Farm Fresh Chicken, Pea, Kale, & Quinoa: These dried jerky treats are GMO free and made with whole muscle USDA inspected chicken. If that isn’t feel-good enough, consider the additional ingredients of peas, quinoa and kale fresh from the farm. Your dog won’t even know how good he’s being during snack time. We won’t tell him if you won’t.

||BREAKDOWN||

♥Crunchy Duck Chew: $3.00

♥Toothpaste toy: $8.00

♥Farm Fresh treats: $8.00

♥Snack Rings: $6.00

♥Jet Plane: $8.00

♥Suitcase: $10.00

Value =$43

Price of Box (w/6 month subscription) =$24.00

We'd LOVE to gift you your first box for FREE!  Just hop on over to Barkbox using my special link: https://www.barkbox.com/r/JW7VQIW00L

Callie and I also filmed an impromptu unboxing video on snapchat.  I uploaded it to YouTube and you can see it now...

January || MEMORY PAGES

I haven't been using my MO2Ps much in my spiral bound planner.  I have been doing my monthly planning in my filofax.  So I had these blank month pages and I wasn't sure what to do with them.  Then I decided I wanted to 'memory keep' on my month pages.

I went to a RHCP concert on the 14th and gathered some memorabilia to put together these pages.  I decided to film it when I sat down to create.  So I hope you enjoy!

2017 || A New Year

I love New Years Day...  I love new beginnings, goals, plans, and aspirations.  A new year sends us into reflection and self discovery.  Who are you?  Where are you?  Are you who you want to be, and where you want to be?  Have you lived the previous year being the best version of you?

Resolutions have long been the brunt of mockery.  The statistics for resolutions are somewhere around 80% failure.  Failure.  What a harsh word for self improvement.  Of course we don't reach every goal every year.  That's just how life works!  You learn more each year on what changes you need to make in your life to achieve your goals.  It's a process, Rome wasn't build in a day!

Goodbye 2016.

I don't recall making resolutions for 2016 and it was probably one of my most unproductive years.  2016 was stagnant and I allowed it to be.  I put so much focus on the 'hustle' that I was just asking myself to make excuses.  This morning while listening to podcasts I heard Gary Vaynerchuk tell his listeners to "suffocate excuses".  I wrote it down immediately.  Suffocate excuses.  What a powerful visual.  Those 2 words are going on the dashboard of my Filofax for 2017.  I'm ready to put 2016 behind me and move forward on a more positive path.  Balance is something I'm working on for 2017.  I tend to go all or nothing until I burn out and lose motivation to even breathe.

Hello 2017.

This morning while I enjoyed my coffee, I started making my lists.  My goals and plans.  Pure brain dump.  I have a pretty good start here on how I want 2017 to go.  Not just in my business life, but my personal life.  Which let's be real, as an entrepreneur there's a fine line between those two lives...

I'm not going to make a bullet list for you of what I want for 2017 (yet).  But basically the focus will be on balancing the weight of all my balloons.  Evenly distributing myself and my time.  For example, when my Etsy shop is hopping with orders, my blog and youtube get ignored.  When I have a lot going on with the blog, Etsy and Youtube get ignored.  I have a plan to make sure my time is more even across the board.  That's the goals for the 'work' me.  My personal goals are a little more stereotypical.  Make better choices for my health, get into the gym more, etc etc.  I'm also getting myself back into the Flylady routine for my housework.  I fell out of that habit last year and I felt the struggle from doing so.  For me, the Flylady cleaning routine/schedule just makes everything so streamlined and easier to keep up with.  Another focus for me personally this year which piggy-backs on Flylady is sticking to a morning & evening routine.  When I start my day off in an intentional way, things just go smoother.  I feel better and more productive.

I plan on sharing more details of all of this with you when I share my 2017 Filofax setup (coming this week).  You'll see how I'm using my Filofax to implement these changes in my life for the new year.

What are your plans for the new year?  Do you make goals and resolutions?  I'd love to hear about it!

adorn your iPhone [November 2016]

Monthly look at what wallpaper I'm decorating my iPhone/iPad with.

It's November and that brings reminders to be "thankful".  Of course we all really need to remember to be thankful at all times, but thankfulness is definitely the theme for November.

I turned to Pinterest to find what wallpaper I wanted to use for my devices this month.  I used to be a big fan of CocoPPA but I have found that Pinterest has just as much and it's easier to get.

This month's lockscreen wallpaper has an adorable turkey and the colors are beautiful.  I enjoyed the brighter pink paired with the fall colors in the graphic. 

For my home screen wallpaper, I chose another reminder to be thankful.  I loved the bright girly colors in this wallpaper.  I always match up wallpaper across my devices so my iPad and iPhone both have these wallpapers.

Usually I'll have links to where you can get these yourself, but unfortunately it looks like I didn't actually pin these wallpapers.  I must've just clicked on them and downloaded them from their website.  I did find them on Pinterest and probably searched "November wallpaper" or "Thanksgiving wallpaper".

I highly recommend updating your wallpaper monthly.  It's a quick easy way to refresh your devices and keep you in the spirit of whatever season or holiday is upcoming.

October in review || 2016

//October in review across social media, Etsy, and YouTube

We're closing in on the end of October!  Can you believe it?  Christmas will be here before we know it!  Ack, are you ready?  I'm not...  Okay I'm very ready for the colder weather and the jolly season.  I'm just prepared yet in my gift shopping.  That being said, I'm super ready for Thanksgiving!  Bring on the yummy holiday food!  October was an awesome month for Emilee Speaks and I'm so proud of my brand and I'm humbled daily by all of you.  Let's check out what happened in October.

||Etsy||

I released several new clips this month.  Stepped out of my norm and made a few amazing pieces (some not released yet).  I've added hoodies, a camera, and an adorable fall weather charm (below).

||YouTube||

Filming for September was very minimal.  I got a new puppy (yes, I'll blog about her soon) and she really took up a lot of my time.  She's a handful, she owns my heart, but she's a handful.  She has kept me crazy busy the last 2 months.  Halloween is my favorite holiday though so I made time for some awesome Halloween Planner Decoration videos.  I branched out and found a few different digital stamp shops on Etsy and used a few of those stamps.  I'm not finished with my Halloween filming yet.  I still have 1 more spread I want to do and I'll do a flip through of the completed month.  I'm amping myself up to do a talk through true Plan With Me style video.  So be looking forward to that soon!

October Videos:

October Monthly Pages

Halloween Week 1

Zombie Girl

Zombie Girl Digital Stamp Coloring

Zombie Girl 2

||Blog||

October, I brought a couple awesome DIY tutorials for you.  I made Halloween tutu treat bags, and a fall candle in a coffee mug.  If you haven't checked those out yet, you definitely need to.  I had so much fun making these tutorials and plan on bringing you more like them in the very near future.

Coffee Mug Candle DIY

Halloween Tutu Treat Bags

Looking ahead: For November I plan on bringing you more YouTube videos (hopefully some voice overs or talk through's).  I'll also be bringing you some posts about the new love of my life, the new puppy.  If you can't wait to see her, check out her Instagram "@calliope_speaks".  November's theme is going to be about being Thankful & Grateful.  I have several great posts lined up for some awesome inspiration.

As always, thank you all for everything.  I love each and every one of you!

Perfect Fall DIY: Coffee Mug Candle & Vanilla Cupcake Coffee

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #CoffeeCreamerCombos #CollectiveBias

It's no secret I love coffee.  I literally cannot start my day without it.  I also love seasonal living and today I'm bringing the two together in this perfect Fall DIY.  I burn candles year round with seasonal inspired scents.  When the wick is done and your candle will no longer burn, there's always a good inch of wax left in the candle.  I hate wasting this wax, I always hoard save it.  One of my favorite fall candle scents is a fall leaves scent.  I had enough wax hoarded saved in this scent that I decided to make my own candle.  It was so easy and I was so pleased with my project, I decided to write a DIY for you.  Today I will be using a new unused jar candle that the glass was broken on.  Instead of throwing it away (and wasting that money) I'm making it usable again.

You'll want to get a large pot (preferably an older one that you don't care about just in case) and fill it with water and bring to a boil.  Lower the heat to med/med high.  If you're using wax bits from old candles, add them to a glass dish or an old empty candle jar that you have.  Since I'm using a brand new candle with a broken jar, I just placed it directly into the water as is.  Now you'll just be patient and wait for the wax to fully melt.

Get your mug ready while your wax is melting.  I purposely picked up some inexpensive fall colored mugs for this project.

If you're melting old saved wax from past candles, you'll need wick.  You can pick up wick pretty cheap at your local craft store.  Since I was using a full unused candle, I just used the wick this candle already had.  You'll need to secure the wick in the center of your mug.  You can use anything for this.  Chop sticks, pencils, cake pop sticks, whatever you have on hand.  I chose colored pencils that I had on hand.  I secured the ends of the pencils with washi tape to hold them in place.

Once your wax is melted you will pour it into the mug.  This has the potential to be messy.  I luckily didn't make a mess at all which is very surprising because I'm pretty clumsy.  Be sure that you're doing the pouring over a covered surface in case there's a mess.

Let it sit until it cools!  By the way... your home is going to smell amazing while you make this project.  My home was filled with my fall leaves candle scent the entire day after I made this candle.  I'm not complaining!

Now you have an adorable coffee mug candle to get you in the fall spirit.  Curl up with a book, burn your candle, and enjoy your favorite cup of coffee.  I enjoy my morning coffee black or with a small amount of cream.  I look at my morning coffee as an enjoyable tool that gets my day started.  I also drink a lot of it.  However, for an evening comfort coffee I really like to experiment and make something fun and fancy.  Like a dessert!  Let me tell you what I have been indulging on...

This tasty little treat is perfect for a fall day.  It's easy and requires very little ingredients.  All you need is Dunkin Donuts® Bakery Series® in Vanilla Cupcake, Dunkin’ Donuts® Coffee Creamer in Extra Extra, some whipped topping, and sprinkles.  How CUTE are these fall pumpkin sprinkles I found at Dillons?!  Just brew up your Dunkin Donuts® Coffee, add however much Dunkin’ Donuts® Coffee Creamer you prefer, top it with the whipped topping and sprinkles.

Dunkin Donuts® Bakery Series® coffee is located at your local Kroger or Kroger banner store in the coffee isle.  I'm so excited about the Dunkin Donuts® Bakery Series® coffee and can't wait to create more decadent coffee treats with it!  

Have you tried the Dunkin Donuts® Bakery Series® coffee?  

Tell me what your favorite fall coffee is.  I'd love to know!