looking back over the year

Wow - I began this blog a little over a year ago. I started it at a time when I needed a distraction and I needed some simple joy in my life. This has been a difficult year to say the least!! I have had many seasons of trial in my past, but this season takes the prize. There have been many days that I thought for sure I had reached my limit and still God would ask me to take more. But God is so good to me. He takes such good care of my heart.

I have learned that I really am as strong as I thought I was and that I am stronger than I ever thought I could be. I learned that I am okay with having to watch my children suffer. I am truly okay with letting go of all this world has to offer.

I have learned that I had a lot of false belief regarding how the world works and how the institution of the church works. I have been disappointed and learned that there is no rescue other than from our God. The church is much larger than those four walls I attend each week and there is much (sometimes more) encouragement to be found outside of those walls than within them. Thank you God for blessing me through Your church!

I have learned that there are times to share your heart and times to protect it in a healthy way. That we people really do say the stupidest things sometimes. I have learned to accept those hurtful things and not allow them to damage my relationships but to press on assuming the best. Most of those hurtful comments really are not the issue, it is more my interpretation that is the issue.

I have learned to not judge. Being judged hurts. I will never look at people the same - when I see that girl with the new jeans who I know cannot afford them - I will never assume. She may have gotten them for free or bought them with a gift card she got for Christmas. How quick we are to judge one another when we do not have the whole story.

This year has pushed all the limits in my relationship with my husband. The stress and pressure can put a damper on the romance and love that you KNOW you have for one another. But when you are struggling with things like failure, hopelessness and sometimes desperation it can build a rather big wall between you. We spent this past weekend tearing down that wall - thank you Lord for the freedom that brings to us!

But God is bigger than all the stress, failure, fear, worry, doubt, disappointment and disillusionment that this world can bring. Thank you God for the gifts YOU gave - the painful, stretching - the offering of more of Yourself and less of the world! Thank You God for Your faithfulness to me - little old childish, selfish, scared and sometimes coming undone me. Me - Your warrior princess, Your trusting, beautiful, glorious creation, Your wanted trusted friend who is choosing to live in true contentment!

A Productive Day!

Today we were blessed by a home group from our church that came to help out for the morning. They installed shelving, started all the sanding of the kitchen cabinets, sanded windows for trim to be installed, and did a lot of painting.
Here is a group shot of them after the lunch they provided. It was so nice to have so much help. We got a lot done in the hours they were here and it definitely boosted our spirits!

Most of the interior wall painting is now complete. Here is a photo with the fireplace I started a month or so ago. We still have to do the tile in front of it. Right now it is the storage spot for our musical inspiration while we work!

This is Cody's room. He did two walls lime and two white. The contraption made of wood is actually a closet that comes down out of the ceiling with a remote. I am told this is pretty cool. We still have to paint it but it is close to being done.
Notice the window trim got installed today also. Andrew came over after the other crew left to help out for awhile.

Emma's paint and window trim was completed today also. The pink and tan looks really great together - but the basketball flooring has got to go! It should be a beautiful maple floor after this next week.

Our bedroom has a color I am liking more all the time. It has a bluish-green color on a couple walls and then the tan on the other two. Our floor is a stained heated concrete floor that I hope I will like.

It was so nice to get so much done in one day. It has been a slow but steady process and we are thinking we will meet our goal of Thanksgiving. Thank you to all the people who have blessed us so much this week. You have lifted our spirits more than you can imagine!!

Oh, How I Love Them!!

Yesterday, my dear friend Annette and I went to spend some time "helping" the MOM's ministry girls at our church get ready for the season. I say help them loosely - mostly I just sit there in awe of how much they get done! These women are so beyond what I was when I was a starting out mom! I was lucky most days to just get dressed and make dinner. Many of them do canning, bake homemade bread, have businesses, make all kinds of incredible crafty things and they serve people. I love being around them - they give me energy and inspiration. Yesterday one of them, who is a kindred spirit, gave me this wonderful verse that I want to share:

"Oh, bless our God, you peoples!

and make the voice of His praise to be heard,

Who keeps our soul among the living,

and does not allow our feet to be moved.

For You, O God, have tested us;

You have refined us as silver is refined.

You brought us into the net;

you laid affliction on our backs.

You have caused me to ride over our heads;

We went through fire and through water;

but You brought us out to rich fulfillment."

Psalm 66:8-12

Thank you girls for being yourselves and sharing who you are with others!

Happenings

When summer comes, that means we spend more time riding in our dad's 1968 Nova. This photo was just a couple days before us girls chopped of our hair. Our hair blows around a lot in this car, since it was made before air conditioning =).
Last week we went to a dinner party that a few of us had purchased at an auction. It was at the Dillon's house and prepared for us by the pastors of our church. It was a beautiful night in a great backyard.
The food was fabulous and the friends were great.

Notice how the two hip ones with the short hair (Val & I) are on the left side and the ones who are still hanging on to those longer locks (Shannon & Amy) are on the right.

Thanks Bruce, Vicky, Chris, Diana, Aimee, Connie & Carol for a wonderful dinner!!

Then this week, my son and hubby and brother are off to here....

My son and his small group boys were looking forward to a great week. Thank you God for opportunities to get closer to you and to others.

Reasoning Together

Tonight with our home group after some time of prayer, we shared some questions we wish we could understand...things we are wrestling through with God. Things like, why do bad things happen that seem unfair, does God really love me, do I really believe all this stuff in the Bible, can I trust that God is really going to come through with taking care of me?, etc.

So when I got home I was reading Oswald Chambers devotional for tomorrow (I know, I shouldn't read ahead, but sometimes I can't help it). He was talking about some of our questions and the reference was Romans 8. He said "God does not keep a man immune from trouble; He says - I will be with him in the trouble." Romans 8:35 says "who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or harship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?" We are not promised to not have those things but to be able to be more than conquerors in those things (vs. 37).

The questions Oswald poses are "can God's love hold when everything says that His love is a lie? Can we not only believe in the love of God but be more than conquerors even while being starved? " We have to choose to hold on to the love of God when the odds are all against God's favor. We have to surrender our expectations, our fleshly desires and choose to believe. Trusting that God is who He says He is and laying down our own lives as we walk through those trials. Fortunately the passage ends with Romans 8:39 saying that nothing in all of creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus!

Thank you God that even when I can not fully understand, your word to me is so very clear! Help me Lord to be able to take those things I know with my head and feel them fully in my heart.

Too Funny not to share!!!

My mom and I were going through old photos at her house last night and we came across some real treasures from the late 80's - early 90's. This photo is of two of our long time friends. We were serving in ministry together at a church here in town and were needing to raise big money for the youth group, so all the leaders had a huge weekend garage sale at my parents. Here the gentlemen models were sporting some of the amazing treasures up for sale!

Now this one is of one of those friends sporting a fabulous mullet - I feel quite certain it is safe to show this because he just admitted he had one last Sunday at church.

Unfortunately, even my boyfriend (now hubby) grew one for himself!! It was lovely...um, not really!! Fortunately, for me he cut it for our wedding day in 1990. This beautiful dress I am wearing was given to me by this boyfriend as a gift during one of his messages to the students. I think he was just trying to make points! It must have worked.

It was great

Our son enjoyed his weekend in the snow with the middle school ministry. He liked his small group and small group leader, Joe, a lot. He got to be on the winning team - Go Green! - for the competitions. I was told that the sledding was awesome. The speaker was really good and the worship was extremely loud, which to him means it was really good.
As for this first year youth mom, I had a great sense of peace the whole weekend. It was so fun to pick him up on Sunday and know that he loved it. Hopefully, I will have that same peace when he goes off to summer camp again this summer - ugh!