Fab 5: Dawnene and Justine

Hello and happy Friday!  I'm super excited to introduce you to two lovely ladies as part of my Fab 5 series.  If you're new to this series, it is basically a spotlight on the woman behind the blog.  Sometimes bloggers get lost behind the blog and I want you to get to know the person as well as check out their awesome blog!  The last Friday of each month will be dedicated to this series.

Today, you'll be meeting Dawnene from Beans and Peanuts and Justine from Little Dove.  Like I mentioned, I'm really excited for you to meet these two amazing women so I'll let them take it from here!

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Dawnene  |  Beans and Peanuts

Background:
I grew up in a town about 1 hour east of Vancouver, BC, Canada.  I moved away for 4 years while I attended University and then moved back to my hometown, where I reside now with my little family!  Both of my daughters were born in the same hospital as myself and my mom.  Kinda neat.  My husband, Tyler, and I met when we were 13 years old.  We started dating when we were 17 and haven't looked back.  We've been together for 12 years and married for 6 years.  We have 2 daughters, Natalie (almost 4 years old) and Hailee (2 years old).  Tyler started his own company framing houses 3 years ago.  It's a small crew, just himself and his cousin.  He works 6 days a week so that I can stay at home with the girls, so Sundays are a special day for our family.

Describe your blog:
I started blogging in June 2016.  I started my blog because I've always enjoyed writing and I wanted to have a project and do something for myself.  I try to blog about topics that will help moms and moms-to-be in some way by sharing my personal stories, thoughts, and tidbits of information that have worked for me as a mom.  Motherhood can be hard so I'm just really trying to make being a parent easier and let other moms know they're not alone in their thoughts and feelings.

What are your favorite things to do with your free time?
As a stay at home mom I really don't have too much free time, which is fine because I love doing things with my girls.  When they're sleeping you'll most likely find me working on my blog and social media channels.  I love to exercise and I try to take 30 minutes a day to do so.  I grew up doing ballet and just recently started doing an adult ballet class once a week.  It's been so nice to get back into it.  I always leave class so happy!  I also always make time to watch Grey's Anatomy, and Tyler and I also love Game of Thrones!

What is a typical day like for you?
This is a little hard because depending on what we have going on, every day is a little different.  On preschool days we need to be up and out of the house early, but other days we're able to have relaxing mornings (which I really take advantage of because next year when Natalie starts kindergarten we will no longer have lazy weekday mornings!).  But everyday consists of: breakfast (usually in bed), getting ready for the day, some type of laundry, some type of errand (whether it be preschool in the morning or dance in the afternoon), lunch, nap time/quiet time, I always make time to play with my girls in the afternoon, have dinner, play a bit more, bath time, bed time, and then working on the blog!

What is your dream vacation?  
Good question.  At this point, any vacation would be a dream!  We're really concentrating on saving money for a down payment to buy a house so a vacation isn't really in our immediate future!  I really, really want to be able to take the girls to Disney.  And I absolutely love Maui so I really want to go back.  But my dream vacation would have to be going to Italy and eating all the pasta I want, which would never happen because I need to eat gluten free, hence the dream part!  I would also love to go to Greece.  It looks so beautiful and I would love to see it in person.

What is your favorite animal and why?
I'm a huge animal lover.  I wish I could snuggle every single one.  But my favorite always has and always will be cats.  I'm really not sure why.  I'm just drawn to them and they seem to be drawn to me.

Bonus question: If you could meet a celebrity, who would it be and why?  
This took me a while to think of.  I'm so out of the loop when it comes to celebrities.  I used to know them all, and now when I look at magazines in the grocery store line up and think "who the heck is that?!"  But after some thought, I realized that I would love to meet Taylor Swift.  My cousin and I went to her concert last August when she was in Vancouver, and she was absolutely amazing.  She has such an incredible message to send and she's a great role model for young women.  As a mother of 2 girls I listened to her speak and wished that she could sit down with them and tell them everything she said at her concert.  She was amazing and I left that concert feeling like there's hope for my girls in this world, that there are actually some positive people out there.

Social Media Links

Blog: Beans and Peanuts

Facebook: Beans and Peanuts 

Instagram: @beansandpeanuts

Pinterest: @beansandpeanuts

Twitter: @beansandpeanuts

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Justine  |  Little Dove

Background:
I grew up in southern California.  I lived in the same house in Huntington Beach for about 20 years.  I even had my wedding reception in our backyard.  After my husband and I got married we lived in UCLA student housing while he finished dental school and we had baby number one, then we lived in Texas for a couple years where he worked for a non-profit and we had baby number two (and I started my blog!), then we came back west and had babies number three and four in northern California.

Describe your blog: 
When I started my blog soon after having my son nearly six years ago, it was mainly a place where I could (in theory) sell some of the things I had started making for my little on.  Blankets, leg warmers, customized onesies, etc.  At the time I had no clue about the hustle that's involved in blogging or running your own business and I wasn't very successful.  But the blogging bug definitely bit me hard and I kept at it.  I have learned a lot over the years and the past few years it has grown and evolved into a DIY/lifestyle blog and I love the direction it's taken!  Earlier this year I re-branded and I feel like that's helped my blog and business growth a lot.

What are your favorite things to do with your free time? 
Honestly, I don't have a lot of "free time", lol.  I have four children age six and under that occupy a lot of my time.  Plus, I feel like as a blogger and small business owner there is always something you could be doing to improve and network, you know?  But I do love reading (when I have time), relaxing in front of the tv (especially to decompress at the end of the day), and I love baking, although that typically ends up on the blog so that's sort of working... ;)  I also like to go jogging, scrapbook, and go out on dates with my hubby.

Tell us about your shop:
I create custom graphic tees and onesies mostly.  I try to be original with my work, and create pieces that people can really connect with.  When I see an order come through for one of my pieces it just makes my day because I feel like I have a kindred spirit out there that feels the same way about motherhood or diet soda as I do.  I also do a lot of custom orders and I always love helping my customer's vision come to light.  As far as small businesses go, I'm pretty tiny, but I am really proud of how far my shop has come and I love it!

What is your favorite season/holiday? 
I love every season and every holiday, seriously.  I love any excuse to decorate or bake cute treats.  And I think that every season has something great about it.  I love taking my kids to the lake in the summer, I love the weather in the Fall and visiting the pumpkin patch, I love spending time with family at Thanksgiving, I love teaching my kids about the real meaning behind Easter and Christmas...  The only "holiday" I can't stand is April Fools Day.  Ugh.

What is your favorite food?  
Asking me what my favorite food is, is like asking me who my favorite child is, it changes daily.  ;)  Just kidding!  But seriously, there is so much food that I love I really don't think I can narrow it down.  I love cheeseburgers and cupcakes.  Italian food and ice cream.  And above all else, Diet Coke.  Does that count as food?

Bonus question: How did you meet your husband?  
I met my husband on a blind date in August 2006.  I was "technically" dating someone else at the time...but that's a long story.  We were set up by the mutual efforts of his brother, my cousin, and my mom.  I guess it took a lot of convincing to get him to ask me out, lol.  Our first date was pretty successful, despite the fact I started feeling sick at the end of it and we called it quits early to go home and play Scrabble.  Our relationship was pretty interesting though: we broke up in October, got back together in November, broke up in March, and then got back together and engaged in April.  We got married in Newport Beach in June 2007.  Again, that's all a long story.  I guess basically he just had to realize how awesome I was and that he couldn't live life without me. ;)

Social Media Links

Blog: Little Dove

Store: Little Dove Creations

Facebook: Little Dove 

Bloglovin: Little Dove Blog

Instagram: @littledove.justine

Pinterest: Justine Y @ Little Dove

Twitter: @LittleDove_blog

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As you can see, these are a couple of pretty amazing women!  I hope you'll take the time to hop over and check out their blogs and other social media.

Next month, I'll be interviewing two new bloggers for my Fab 5 series, so stay tuned.

Have a lovely weekend!