Author: Mackayla Turley

When’s the last time you waved to your neighbor? I may be biased, but we have the best neighbors I’ve ever met. Our neighbors make sure our kiddos have the real trick-or-treating experience, smile and chat over the fence, and have even spotted the tooth fairy with a last-minute $1 bill when she only had quarters. I always offer to share chocolate chip cookies or banana bread on baking day. One of my neighbors makes the best ribs I’ve ever had, and always smokes us an extra rack – in exchange, I make buttermilk cornbread for the meals. My other…

A few decades ago, you would only know the inside of a few homes and lives. Your own home, some family members’ homes, and maybe a few friends’ and neighbors’ homes. Sure, you’d be able to buy some home decor magazines and browse decor books at the library, but in doing so, you’d know those photos were curated and staged. Today, you can find thousands of pictures and videos of home interiors with a quick tap-tap-tap on a keyboard. That’s great for inspiration, but not so great for comparison. It’s easy to get caught up in the swirls of Pinterest…

I’m a sucker for improvement. Goals and challenges are my bread and butter. Though I’m a big advocator of making big changes the moment you realize you want to make them, I can also appreciate the anticipation of planning out smaller adjustments. Every year, I print out what I call “Turley Traditions”. They’re small, monthly checklists that go in my command station. It started a few years ago when I was in the throes of baby + toddler chaos. I wanted to list out the monthly traditions that tend to slip past unnoticed. By doing these consistently throughout their childhoods,…

With any luck, you’re reading this on Christmas Day, sitting in your pjs, sipping on a cup of hot cocoa or peppermint mocha coffee while the kids happily play with their new gifts. I want to take this moment to congratulate you, Mama. You did it. You created the magic, and whatever that looked like, it is enough. Elf on the shelf or not, perfectly wrapped presents or not, fancy dinner or not, your efforts are enough. Instead of scrolling through social media and letting the mom-guilt build, put down your phone and enjoy what you’ve built. Remind yourself that…

Christmas parties, dinners, and pot lucks. Cookie exchanges, game nights, and movie marathons. White elephant, secret santa, and gift exchanges for family and friends far & near. Crafting, baking, and cooking. Taking a picture with Santa, coordinating family photos, and mailing Christmas cards. Caroling, volunteer work, and angel trees. Winter walks, drive-thru light displays, and Nutcracker ballets. Winter wonderlands, visits trips up the mountain to see snow, and ice skating. There are enough Christmas “must-dos” to fill a calendar daily for months, but there is no need to. I’m a big fan of optimization, and not all events are equal.…

Making magic is hands-down my favorite part of being a mama. Seeing the kids light up in wonder keeps me going on the hard days. The tooth fairy, Santa, and Easter Bunny are all solid winners to me. I fully admit to researching handwriting fonts for separate imaginary characters in my very limited free time. That being said, I was not gung-ho about becoming an Elf on the Shelf mom at first. I liked my Christmas magic less constant: waking up to a decorated house the day after Thanksgiving, seeing the twinkle of lights while eating sugar cookies, and getting…

Putting out our Christmas decorations is something I look forward to every year. Thanksgiving night, after the children have gone to bed, I put out our stockings, hang my festive aprons, and clip past years’ art work to the dining room grids. If I’m flirty enough, sometimes I can talk my husband into quietly, sneakily put up the tree (full transparency: it didn’t happen this year – we were all sick Thanksgiving week). Doing it then allows for the full effect to hit my kids when they wake up to our Black Friday tradition of decorating the tree together. If…

We were supposed to visit a neighbor’s home for this year’s Thanksgiving feast, but they were scheduled for overtime. My local besties both already have plans – one in Arkansas and the other in Vegas – and both kindly invited us to join. However, my kiddos overheard hubby & I discussing options and were throughly overjoyed at doing our own Thanksgiving – so that became the plan. I haven’t hosted a traditional Thanksgiving meal since undergrad, and I knew this experience would be drastically different than hosting 20 dorm-residents that had stayed behind for work. On those occasions, I had…

Christmas advertisements have been clamoring since mid-October with one goal in mind: getting you to spend your hard earned money. The messages are all the same under the glitz and glitter: what you have isn’t good enough and you’ll be happy if you buy this. Halloween comes with decorations, candy, costumes, scary movies, spooky books, boo baskets, and crafts. Christmas comes with ornaments, garland, trees, accessories, gift sets, ugly sweaters, cookies, cakes, candies, gift bags, wrapping paper, bows, excess galore. Thanksgiving gets one measly fall aisle for a week or so if it’s lucky. There’s a reason for it -…

With 2025 rushing to it’s close, new goals seem to pop up out of thin air. This column is written to remind you: you can choose anytime. You don’t have to wait to improve your health. You can assess what’s working for you and what’s not and adjust at anytime. You can decide drinking isn’t worth the headache and give away that unopened birthday bottle of wine. You can notice you’re out of breath playing with the kids and schedule a daily family walk to improve your fitness. You can take the stairs or park further away every chance you…