Mother's Day

For me all holiday's are usually hit and miss. Example? On my birthday this year my entire family was sick - thus my children think I'm still a year younger than I really am. We've actually had mock arguments about whether or not I had a birthday this year. I really did - it just passed with no notice.  It's a trend in my life. Once when I was still in elementary school I had a sleep over on my birthday and my sister somehow convinced all of my friends to go sleep in her room - and I wasn't invited. Another year she did makeover's for all of my friends during my Superbowl party - knowing full well that I was allergic to make-up.

So I've come to expect little from holidays. Mother's Day is no different. It started out with me over-sleeping. We had planned to go to church with my in-laws, but their service starts 20 minutes before ours and I can't stand walking in late - which we always do anyway. So at 10:37  when we were finally all ready to go (7 minutes after the service started), I declared that it was too late to go to their church and we detoured to ours. I felt guilty all the way through service about making that selfish decision. 

After church was over we stopped by the store to pick up my Mother-in-law's flowers and cake. While we were there we ran into one of the ladies from my in-laws church. She asked us how my Father-in-law was doing. Mr. Amazing said we were on our way to their house, but when we talked to them earlier in the week they were doing well. So she suggested that we detour to the hospital. He had fallen down the steps at the church that morning after Sunday school and had to go to the ER. Thankfully, other than the concussion, and gash on his head, he is doing well and they were just leaving when we got there. However, he wasn't allowed to eat for 24 hours, so the cake that we bought went un-touched. We had also hoped to take them out to eat, and well... that didn't happen either. All-in-all, I think it would be fair to say that my Mother's Day was 100 times better than my Mother-in-law's. 

We ended up going out to eat without the in-laws. I would have loved to have them there, but we still had a pretty good time. Despite the fact that the restaurant burnt my chicken.

The best part of my day? After we ate Mr. Amazing and the kids took me to the bookstore. They know how nerdy I am :) I got 4 books and a membership card to Books-A-Million - he spoils me. I can't say that it was a great day, but I got new books so it wasn't all bad :)

It's very possible that you might see a post on bookstores vs. shopping online from me sometime soon - but I haven't decided where to post that yet...

Body Image Lies Women Believe: Free Kindle eBook & $100 Giveaway

By Shelley Hitz and contributing authors

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About the Book, Body Image Lies Women Believe:

• Are you insecure about your looks?
• Have you ever compared yourself to someone else and found yourself wanting?
• Do complements or put downs determine the image you have of your beauty?

Real Stories of Overcoming Body Image Lies Women Believe with God's Truth

Throughout this book, Christian women share their stories of how they have struggled with body image lies and a distorted view of themselves. However, each of their stories also contains hope - the hope of replacing these lies with God's truth. Our prayer for you is that you find encouragement within these pages and allow Christ to transform you with His truth.

We Are Each Created Unique

God has created each one of us with unique abilities, unique talents and a unique personality. As women we are influencers and God has given us that role and our beauty to share with others. Yet so often we settle for a counterfeit. The enemy has counterfeited our idea of beauty, convincing us to share our beauty with the world in a distorted way. Today that often means that we see our beauty as what we look like on the outside.

What Lies Have You Been Believing?

Join us for the journey of replacing body image lies with truth from God's Word.

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 Shelley Hitz

Shelley Hitz is an award-winning and international best-selling author. Her openness and vulnerability as she shares her own story of hope and healing through her books will inspire and encourage you. Shelley has been ministering alongside her husband, CJ, since 1998. They currently travel and speak to teens and adults around the country. Shelley's main passion is to share God's truth and the freedom in Christ she has found with others. She does this through her books, websites and speaking engagements.


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What's In Your Heart?

Well, we are finally moved into our new home - and loving it! We are still surrounded by boxes, but we have the necessities taken care of and room to unpack the rest. However, while I've been MIA from the online world, God has been teaching me a lot. We had a women's event at church on Saturday and while I didn't overly relate or become inspired by the speaker, she did say one thing that really stuck with me. She referenced the many failures of David - the one the Bible refers to as the man after God's own heart.

Most of us know that David was an adulterous murderer, but she didn't stop there, she brought up the point that his children were... well, we'll say less than perfect as well. So many times as Christian women, we feel like our children are a direct reflection of us as Christians. When they mess up, or repeat something that we said or did that we know is wrong, we feel like failures. David's son raped his sister - I can't imagine how I would feel if one of my boys did that (to anyone, but even more so to their sister!). I would feel like a wretched failure and blame myself in some way - I'm pretty sure of that much. But look at David. God said about him: ‘I have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.’ (Acts 13:22) - God saw David for what was in his heart - not for his failures and the failures of his children. That's a message that I needed.

I've been too focused on my failures - so much so that I've been hiding the light that God has given me for fear of messing up. That's not what He wants for me, and it's not what He wants for you either. It's not about  us. It's not about our imperfections or successes. It's not about our motives. It's not about us at all. It's about what Christ has already done. God just wants us to come as we are.

Migraine Scriptures

If you've followed my blog or know me in real life, you probably already know that I suffer from migraines. They started back in 2008 when I slipped on some ice and fell down the stairs in front of our home - carrying one of my twin girls that was just a few months old at the time. She was fine - I, on the other hand, cracked my elbow and got whiplash. The whiplash triggered migraines that have just never went away. Seeing a chiropractor helped for a while, but since we recently moved, I haven't found a new one yet. So today, I pulled out this list of Scriptures that I compiled several years ago to help me deal with the pain - and then I realize that I never posted them here. 

If you've ever dealt with migraines, you already know that they aren't fun. I hope that God can use these in your life as He does in mine. I find them both encouraging and strengthening:  

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

Rejoice always; pray without ceasing; in everything give thanks; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.

Ecclesiastes 7:14

In the day of prosperity be happy, But in the day of adversity consider--God has made the one as well as the other So that man will not discover anything that will be after him.

Matthew 4:24

The news about Him spread throughout all Syria; and they brought to Him all who were ill, those suffering with various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, paralytics; and He healed them.

Job 5:18

"For He inflicts pain, and gives relief; He wounds, and His hands also heal.

Revelation 21:4

and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away

Job 6:10

"But it is still my consolation, And I rejoice in unsparing pain, That I have not denied the words of the Holy One.

Psalm 69:29

But I am afflicted and in pain; May Your salvation, O God, set me securely on high.

Ecclesiastes 1:18

Because in much wisdom there is much grief, and increasing knowledge results in increasing pain.

2 Corinthians 12:7-10

Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me--to keep me from exalting myself! Concerning this I implored the Lord three times that it might leave me. And He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness " Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.

Psalm 139:14

I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well.

2 Corinthians 4:16

Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day.

Philippians 4:4

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!

2 Corinthians 5:1

For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

Philippians 4:11

Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am.

*All Scriptures are taken from the New International Version of the Bible - Copyright 1984

The TV Delima

Mr. Amazing has a wonderful job working for the local phone company. They also do internet and television, so we were blessed with free cable. Although I'm not sure "blessed" is the right word. Mr. Amazing and I debated it for several months before I finally caved and let them install our free cable and I still have really mixed feelings about it. 

On the one hand, I love Bubble Guppies. They are so darn cute! Also, we use to live off of library movies, but the local library here doesn't have a huge selection, and none of them are really what I want the kids to be watching. But on the other hand, there are so many things on TV that I don't want my kids exposed to. They all learned the very first day that we would NEVER watch Sponge Bob in this house. If I ever catch them watching it, the TV will be gone within seconds. They have diligently obeyed that rule.

And then there are shows like Max and Ruby. Max is this chubby little rabbit who likes mud pies and is being raised by his big sister, Ruby. Max is a bad little rabbit. He directly disobeys his sister on every show that I've seen, and what does she do? She laughs at his disobedience. At first, I was awed by her kind spirit, but now I'm seeing a different side of it. He continually disobeys because he gets away with it - I mean, wouldn't you? If you knew you didn't have to listen to what your mom/adult in your life said because she'd just laugh if you did it anyway? I might even disobey to get her to laugh. The show is teaching the worst kind of sin. Selfishness and disobedience. 

Admission: I really thought that Ruby was Maxes mom, but apparently they don't have parents, just a grandmother who visits on occasion... I'm not sure if that makes the whole thing better or worse.

Have any of you seen this show? What are your thoughts on it? What shows do you let your children watch on TV?

Our Hopeful House

Last week I told you about the house that we are planning on buying. This is it. It's a 3 bedroom 2 1/2 bath 1 story home. We'll have a 2 car garage and live in a wonderful neighborhood. I'd love to show you photos of the street we'll live on from Christmas, but I couldn't find any. This is "THE" street to go down during the Christmas season. It's a dead end road, but they line the entire thing with candy cane sticks and lights - then they lay out the 12 days of Christmas on big wooden signs. The north side of the street has the first 6 days and the south side has the last 6 days. It's pretty awesome.

Are you ready to go inside?

This is the entryway. It's too small to be anything useful, but it's there. We're hoping to knock out the wall eventually and make it bigger, but for now, it's just an entry way.

This will be the living room. It's actually the original garage that they used as an addition to the house. The downside? See that itty-bitty window. Yeah, it's the only one in the room. We'll eventually put in a window on the front side of the house to this room, but until then, it will be a bit dark.

This is our dining room. 

And my office :) Well, I'll share it with Mr. Amazing. It will also double as a guest bedroom until we can fix up the guest house (Yes, you read that right).

This is our kitchen. It's a small hallway like room. But I like it.

This is a view of the other side of the kitchen. We still need to get a fridge, but the dishwasher is nice.

And here is the bathroom. It's a little old school, but I think that gives it character.

This is going to be Mr. Amazing and I's room - it's green. I like green.

This will be the girl's room - somehow I forgot to take pictures of the boy's bedroom... but there really is a third bedroom. I promise. 

And this is the view of the back of our house and back yard from the back fence. It's a BIG yard. The downside? It's full of stickers. We're going to have to do some major landscaping before we can let our dog out :(

And this is the guest house. A little bit of history, this was the original house that the original owners lived in before they built the big house. It's kind of like a stucco cabin. It has a bedroom, main room, kitchen and bathroom. It had some water damage last winter, and really needs cleaned up, but it's pretty neat to have a guest house.   

 And that's it. I hope you enjoyed your tour!

The Sailor's Savior

I mentioned earlier this week that I'm studying the book of Jonah. I'm actually going through a book called, Lord, Teach Me to Study the Bible in 28 Days by Kay Arthur - and I have some pretty mixed feelings about it. Some days I read 2-3 chapters (days) at a time and still feel like I didn't get any where, other days - like today - one chapter is all it takes for her to help me find something amazing. The best part is, that while she sends me on "Bible Errands" as I'm calling them, she doesn't tell me any answers. At first, this really annoyed me - especially during the days where she thought I would learn something astounding and I obviously didn't see the dots that she thought I would connect. But today, it was a good thing. Here's what I found (yes, we're still in chapter 1):

Most of the time when we read the book of Jonah, our focus is on Jonah. But have you ever stopped to look at the other people on the boat with him? I relate so well to these people. I go about my life until a storm hits, and then I look to the false gods in my life to fix it - I pray to the false god of reason, I offer sacrifices to the false god of time, and I bow down to the false god of other humans. And finally, when none of those things work, I suck it up and decide to fix it myself. I start doing everything in my power to "lighten the load" or save myself. Just like the sailors did.

When the storm came upon the ship, they prayed to their false gods and they tried to solve the problem for themselves, and finally, they gave up and decided that Jonah held the key - and he did. And while Jonah held the key, he wasn't the key himself, the key was his God - our God. And God holds the key to solving our problems as well.

As the sailors listed to Jonah tell them how to solve the problem, they rejected it. Throw him overboard?! That's absurd! Have you ever said that to God? I have. I'm like, "God, I know You know best - but that's a stupid idea." So just as the sailors kept struggling to try to save themselves, I do the same thing. God's already shown me the way to go, and I'm too stubborn to follow Him.

Of course we all know that the sailor's eventually gave in and threw Jonah overboard, and of course he was swallowed by a whale. Everyone talks about how him being in the belly of the whale for 3 days and nights was a picture of Christ in the tomb, but did you ever stop to realize that God also used him to save the men on the boat?

These men were scared for their lives and knew that Jonah held the key - even if it wasn't the solution they were hoping for. But they did what he said, and they were saved. He willingly (yes, being thrown overboard appears to have been Jonah's idea) sacrificed himself for them - he was their savior... and not just the savior of their lives, but he also pointed them to the one true God. Because of Jonah's sin, they came to know and worship God. The last few verses of Jonah chapter 1 says that they made vows to Him, now I don't know what kind of vows those were, but I'd like to think that they dedicated their lives to Him (but again, I don't know for sure because it doesn't say).

...My girls have woken up and emerged from their room and disturbed my entire train of thought, so I guess I'm done now.   Oh the joy's of being a mom.