Sunday, January 31, 2010

A Little Fluff






































I thought I would share a few pictures of Bella Grace's room with you! Thought you would enjoy a little fluff in honor of the upcoming month! I absolutely love anything pink and girly. What about you? 


Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Be Beautiful









Be beautiful. Yes you. Didn't you know that you are beautiful? You are. It is true. Don't hide it inside. Don't worry about what other people say or what they think. Allow that special part of you that has been hidden and tucked away to come out into the light.  Most often the negativity sent out by others has everything to do with them and very little to do with you. It has everything to do with them despising the light that is within you. Let it shine anyway. Be even more beautiful. Be a bright light for your Heavenly Father and a force of beauty to be reckoned with. You are the gift who can change the world. Pay no attention to those who have tried to strip away at your crown and your light and your beauty.
Be beautiful anyway......


OUR DEEPEST FEAR
By~ Marianne Williamson~ A Return to Love.

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves
Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.

Your playing small does not serve the world.
There's nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure around you.

We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest
The glory of God that is within us.

It's not just in some of us;
It's in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine,
We unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear,
Our presence automatically liberates others.



Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Our Very Best

~




How do we give Him our very best?

In the midst of uncertain times? In the midst of tremendous suffering?  How do we give our very best in the midst of a job loss? A miscarriage?  Another betrayal? A loss of finances? Hurtful words?  A separation? A divorce? An illness?

How do we get up every, single morning and offer the One who created it all ..............our very best ?
This is not an easy thing.
It seems impossible.
We are after all...... merely human and everything human within us wants to give up at the 20 yard line and we tell ourselves that we cannot do this anymore. 

But we can.

I have learned (the hard way) that it is a simple act of worship.
It is a spiritual posture.
It is a choice.
We can choose to give up at the twenty. The thirty. And even the fifty. Or we can choose
to press in and press on keeping our eyes on Him and not on our situations and make it to the very end.

To choose to count it all joy no matter the circumstances. No matter how difficult. No matter how unfair it is. No matter how painful it is.
 I have learned over the years that when we are busy giving Him our very best instead of our very best leftovers we end up doing the very thing that we think we cannot do. The very thing.


When we press in and press on ~ instead of giving up~ pretty soon we will look up and find ourselves in the end zone. Maybe you and I will have to do the death crawl to get there. But we will get there friend.

I love this video clip from the movie Facing The Giants.  It really ministered to me and I pray that it speaks to you as well.  Picture yourself as the one doing the death crawl and picture that football field as your circumstances. Then imagine the coach in this movie as your Heavenly Father pushing you toward your goal.
I pray that this ministers to you and blesses you and encourages you today sweet friend.

Give Him your very best.....

~This post is dedicated to my incredible husband . Look up sweetheart, we are in the end zone........~

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Our Own Hands




Photo credit: Martha Stewart


One week ago today almost 3 million individual lives were changed forever. In an instant. In a matter of seconds. Just like that. It doesn't seem fair. Not one bit. I have been able to think of little else for a solid week. Just like many of you, I can't watch the news any more . I'm either too sick to my stomach at the sheer devastation of it all or my heart is breaking into a million pieces for those precious  people~ especially the babies. I felt as if my heart was being ripped out of my chest as I watched a bulldozer scrape up hundreds of bodies and empty them into a dump truck. A bulldozer. A dump truck. Human beings. God's precious people. Mothers and Fathers. Sons and Daughters. I felt like I had been punched in the stomach.

 I want to get on a plane and go over there and scoop those babies up in my arms and tell them with everything that is in me that it's going to be okay and that God still loves them even though it looks like He doesn't.  I want to take whatever we have and give every single bit of it.  I want my Husband to take a week off from work and stay with our children so I can go to Haiti and hold babies and pray over them for God's mercy, protection and provision. It's not the first time he has heard these requests. This is life with a wife with a mercy gift.

The other night I kept him up talking about the devastation of it all and about how on earth we continue with life as normal when so many are suffering right now. Not only in Haiti, in many, many places. But especially Haiti. It doesn't seem right. We can't just get up tomorrow and carry on with "normal" for Heavens sake. There are children in Haiti about to have a leg cut off with a hacksaw because the airport is backed up and they can't get the medical supplies to the makeshift hospital. I can't wrap my brain around it all. Or my heart.

What can I do? I feel so helpless. So I pray. In praying this week one thing the Lord placed on my heart was that I should do whatever I can with my own hands. I can pray. I love to pray. I can give. I love to give. I can write to encourage others to do what they can. I love to write. I can collect clothes, blankets and other items to give as donations. I should do whatever I possibly can with my own hands. Not only for the earthquake victims but in every day life as well. It doesn't do anyone any good just to live life for a party of one. To sit on our gifts. To withhold our talents. He has called us to be like Him to one another. What are your gifts sweet reader? What are your talents? How can you give? What can you share with the world to help and to bring about healing in the life of another? How can you use what He has given you to be a blessing to someone else? These are just a few petitions we can bring before Him this week. I know Him to be faithful to highlight, show and even speak to our hearts the many ways in which each one of us can be a blessing to someone else this week with our very own hands. Can't wait to hear about what He places on your hearts.......


We can text "HAITI" to 90999 to automatically give to the American Red Cross.


















Monday, January 11, 2010

Are You Going to Blissdom?





I am so looking forward to meeting everyone and soaking up every drop of wisdom from such an awesome group of speakers! Let me know if you are planning to attend! I would love the chance to meet you!

A great big thank you to Mr. Pearls and Grace for such a wonderful gift.........you made my heart sing!

Sunday, January 10, 2010

A Surprise Inside 2010




In the early morning of the first day of the first month of a brand new beautiful year, we turned on some of our favorite music and turned it up loud. Really Loud. The children were so excited and were running around the house jumping and yelling and shouting and dancing as loud as the music we had roaring in the background. We then handed the children some little surprises.....
 
  "What is this Mama?" "Yea, what IS this?" "It's a stick!" one said. "YEAH...a stick, a stick!!" said another. And like a chain reaction, one by one they began jumping up and down and waving their shiny, new surprises around like majorettes on game day.







"Be careful baby.  There is a surprise inside."

Confetti and a lot of it was packed inside each silver stick......



And I thought to myself......How symbolic Lord.






One by one they shook their little sticks in every room in the house until there was "no surprise left."

I stopped in my tracks as I watched each one of them immediately scoop up the confetti and run upstairs to throw it over the banister to "recreate" the moment again.

And  I thought to myself ....How symbolic Lord.

Who among us wants the blessings to end? Who among us wants the fun to be over with?







It's called "Flutter Fetti" and it promises to float five times longer than regular confetti.

You didn't have to tell me twice. I bought two boxes. We had some celebrating to do. And no amount of "regular confetti" was going to do for this party. We were saying goodbye and ending a very rough year for our family. And we were saying hello to something brand new and very beautiful.

It did "float" a lot longer than the regular confetti but even Flutter Fetti eventually hits the ground.


As I watched the children I thought to myself.....

how symbolic Lord....








For hours on the morning of January 1, 2010 we danced away the sorrow and disappointment that had nearly broken us in 2009 and we rejoiced in the possibility, opportunity, potential, and possible "surprises" that God has in store for us in 2010.






I sat in the floor and watched my children raise their hands up in the air to "receive" and "catch" the hundreds of pieces of colored paper....



 and I thought to myself...how symbolic Lord.





I watched as they rolled around on the floor the entire morning creating "confetti-angels" with one another. I watched as they ran, jumped, rolled, danced, hugged and literally soaked up every second of the very first day of this new year.



 And I thought to myself....how symbolic Lord.








I laughed and laughed and laughed until I began to weep as my spirit began to bear witness
with what He was showing me.



He has not forgotten. He knows. He knows every single burden. Every single need. Every single worry and fear. He knows every single thing that the enemy has stolen from you and me. He knows every single disappointment and ounce of dispair that may have played a part of your 2009.  He knows about the loneliness that may have been your closest friend last year. He knows that longing inside your heart for a friend, a mate, a spouse, a husband. He knows that ache that cuts you to the core every time you see a new baby in someone else's arms.....and you go to bed one more night with empty arms. He knows. He knows all about the job that you still need and the breakthrough in finances that has yet to come. He knows about that house that needs to sell.......................and what might happen if it doesn't. He knows all about timing and details. He knows.

 
And just when we think it's over and we've shaken our own empty "Flutter Fetti stick " at the Lord. Just when we've done everything we can to make it work on our own, including scooping everything up with our own hands and taking matters into our own hands and trying to make things happen with our own hands ~ And just when we think this is it. It's just not going to happen for me. I guess this is as good as it gets for me Lord. I guess that it's just not meant to be..........



 God has a surprise inside.





Just like when the kids thought it was over and they were too tired to keep scooping up all that confetti with their own hands and running up the staircase to recreate the moment......

Daddy came through.




And I thought to myself...how symbolic Lord.






Meet the surprise.

This sweet readers is a wet/dry vac with an optional "blower" setting.


Did you know that your Heavenly Father has one? He does.

And he is about to use it in your life in the coming year. He has the ability to vacuum up any disappointment or dispair from the previous year and fill your life with every dream and desire in your heart and soul.  He also has the ability to switch the settings on every single thing in your life that looks like it's over, or looks like it is dead or looks like it has ended ~ He has the ability to switch the settings in your life and blow blessings beyond your wildest dreams into your circumstances. He has the ability to resurrect certain situations that seemed almost lifeless. He has the ability to breathe His breath~ the breath of life, into your situation and cause whatever didn't happen for you last year~ to happen for you this year~ plus double. Did you know that His word says that we get double honor for our former shame? It does. That's where the surprise is.

It's in this year. I pray that over you sweet reader. I pray that this year would be full to overflowing with the surprises of the Lord inside every single area of your life. I pray that for every pain from your past you will receive double honor for that former shame and receive it this year. In this beautiful, new year full of opportunity, promise, provision, restoration and recompense.


Instead of your former shame you shall have double honor....Isaiah 61:7



Monday, January 4, 2010

A Sugar Plum Fairy Birthday Party



























We recently celebrated Bella Grace's 7th Birthday with a Sugar Plum Fairy Birthday Party! It isn't the easiest thing to have a birthday right around Christmas but each year I do my very best to come up with some wonderful way to honor and celebrate her!  She loves to decorate Gingerbread houses , loves to dress up  and loves all things pink and fluffy so this is what I created for her this year! I love creative and original birthday parties! I had so much fun staging this! There was pink tulle, sparkle snow, glitter and pink fluff as far as the eye could see! I loved watching eleven little girls all dressed in Sugar Plum costumes giggling and dancing and prancing around!  I downloaded the entire Nutcracker soundtrack and that played throughout the house during the party.The girls enjoyed a lunch of angel sandwiches, fruit kabobs on magic wands, pink lemonade and other Christmas goodies. Then everyone had the chance to decorate their own houses! At the very end Bella Grace sprinkled each house with sparkle snow and glitter! I think this was her very favorite birthday party ever. I cannot believe my little Sugar Plum is seven...trying to hold my heart in my chest. 




What Didn't Make The Card~ 2009