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Hi! I'm Brenda. I am building a calm & modern business and a homeschooling mom of 4 with a passion for reading and hospitality. I'm also wife to an executive chef and reliant on Jesus for grace along the way. Follow our journey with our sometimes daily email where I share life and business insights plus quick SquareSpace web design and Dubsado automation tutorials.

Woman wearing orange shirt walking down tree lined dirt road at sunrise
Featured Post

✨ New inspiration for spring movement

Hi Reader I’ve been thinking more about aging as my 50th birthday approaches in a little over a month. When I was younger, I was a star athlete. I did gymnastics, ran track, played volleyball and basketball. In college, I took enough dance classes to get a minor (but they didn’t offer one). But motherhood, homeschooling, starting an online business, and the stress of frequent moves and of adulting have undone so much of this early foundation. I’ve been consistently inconsistent and plagued by...

Pruning sheers pruning a rose bush

Hi Reader Sometimes you need to cut back some things in order to make room for new growth. Yesterday, I started helping prune the rose bushes in my mother’s garden. I’ve been doing it every year that I live close by since I was teenager. Every time it’s a bit hard to get started. There are new leaf buds everywhere, a tangled mess of last year’s tiny stems, and thick, old dead canes that are always really hard to get to. The only way to start is to start somewhere. Pick a cane and make a cut....

Yellow mini daffodils

Hi Reader I’ve been working on doing hard things. Or at least hard things for me or things I’m scared of. My entire parenting, homeschooling and business journey has been filled with them. Designing my first website, designing my first client website, posting my first blog post, asking for my first testimonial, posting my first social media business post, the list goes on. Yesterday, I mentioned one of my focuses this year was on writing better emails. Another thing I’ve been working on is...

Brenda and Lejjer at the park enjoying the sunshine

Hi Reader I just got off our monthly campaign planning call for the Email School Membership that I am in. It happens every 3rd or 4th Wednesday of the month. One of the main things I’ve been working on this year is writing. Thankfully, I met Cody Burch last year in the VIP Day group I am in. He was killing it and sharing his success in the group. I wanted to know his secret. He was helping people set up FB ads, emails, and storytelling. I wanted to know how he did it so I looked him up and...

The book, The Plan by Kendra Adachi with a teal water bottle and white tea cup

Hi Reader I’ve been reading The Plan by Kendra Adachi. The thing that has stood out the most so far is truly identifying and embracing the season of life you’re in right now and choosing the one thing that is most important to you for this season. Then and only then, make your plans. This week we are in a short “season” of sickness. Just keeping everyone hydrated and getting through this week is the top priority. My two littlest are the last to get sick and are almost through the worst of it....

Grow your list summit speaker bio photos

Hi Reader Is it just me, or is social media getting to be TOO MUCH? All the policy changes, spending HOURS creating content that has a shorter shelf life than most produce, and feeling like you have to be “on” all the time. It’s exhausting. That's why I stopped playing the game a few years ago. But still many of you keep doing it because that’s what the 7-figure experts say you should do to grow your email list. “Post every day, multiple times a day”“Make reels with trending audios”“Keep up...

Gold & teal graphic that says: Online Biz Tools & People I’m Loving & Learning From This Month!

Hi Reader Online business is not for the faint of heart. There are so many tools and teachers to learn from. You can't possibly try them all. I've tried on a few occasions and it's led me down a deep dark time stealing journey I don't wish on anyone. So I've found a few people that I highly respect and resonate with especially for their opinions on what works for their business. It has helped me make a short list to start my research from. I hope that I can be that for you. Today I wanted to...

Brenda Thorpe headshot wearing navy shirt with a lamp, globe and window in the background

Hi Reader I had a great chat this morning with about 40 other Squarespace Designers from around the world. Some of them are the big name designers and presenters from yesterday’s summit. I loved having the opportunity to just be in the room with them in an informal way. My biggest take aways from the chat is that many of the designers still struggle with imposter syndrome no matter how long they’ve been in business. One developer who’s created an amazing Squarespace tool and has gained 20,000...

New Squarespace pricing + Today's Website Designer Summit Link

Hi Reader I’ve been a bit MIA the last couple of weeks as all of my kids are performing or running tech for my oldest first High School Musical: The Little Mermaid. It’s been a lot of rehearsals and so many late nights! Now we're into week 2 of the show. 6 done, 4 to go! She’s doing well and finally had a night with no microphone issues/failures and was super excited that the audience got her quippy jokes for the first time. She has two different semi-main roles for every other show all while...

Red door with Private sign above a mail slot

Hi Reader Today is International Data Privacy Day, a day to raise awareness and promote privacy and data protection best practices! This may not be on your list of holidays to celebrate, but it’s a day I take seriously as your web designer and educator and I want to remind you to protect your data and websites!In honor of Data Privacy Day, today would be a great day to: 1. Reset your passwords for common platforms you use 2. Unsubscribe from emails from companies you don't work with 3. Stop...