Happy Thanksgiving!

(this gorgeous photo came to me in an email from a friend, a long time ago...)

This year, as always, there is so much to be thankful for! I pray that God will open my eyes to see ever-more fully how richly He has blessed me, and blessed us, and expand my capacity to feel the passionate gratitude that His blessings and constant presence and attention warrant!

Tonight my family is scheduled to travel to Keith's mom's place in the mountains outside of Colville so that we can spend the Thanksgiving weekend with them up there. I look forward to this trip every year... It's like a retreat! No cell phones, one very slow dial-up computer, a blazing hot living room, freezing cold bedrooms, tons of yummy food, a thousand games of Scrabble and late-night movies... I can't wait!! It's possible that we won't be able to drive up tonight because of the roads, but in that event we'll hopefully go up early tomorrow morning, as soon as the sun hits the pavement!

What am I grateful for most especially this Thanksgiving...? Hmmm... Let's see...

A God Who knows me intimately and wants me to know Him more and more every day
My family. All of them. My husband, kids, mother and father, inlaws--everyone.
A fantastic job that I love and wake up every morning looking forward to.
A church full of real, loving, committed people
A beautiful home with lots of windows that's within walking distance of all of the kids' schools
A rejuvinated marriage
relatively good health
all of my senses
And oh so much more than I could ever hope to write about here...

I pray that God will help me to be faithful with the overflowing blessings He's showered upon me, and that He will help me to bless others in any possible way, at every possible opportunity. I pray also that He will continually remind me that all of this comes from Him... I didn't do anything to earn it or deserve it--it's absolutely 100% all about His grace and goodness! May His love, light, compassion, and heart for service take root and bring forth fruit in my life. Lord, You're amazing!

A Favorite Quote from Beth Moore

I just read this quote yesterday for the first time, but it rings so true in my heart and my life and resonates so deeply in my spirit, it has already become one of my all-time favorite quotes:

"I am so frantic not to veer from the path for the rest of my days that I have become maniacal about seeking wholeness in Christ. I hope to pursue His sanctification through and through with total abandon, no matter what the future holds." (Beth Moore, from the "When Godly People Do Ungodly Things" Bible Study Workbook)

(photo from the Internet)

Honey, I'm home!

I find it hard to describe how I feel right now... How I have been feeling for the last month or so. It's as though the real me has been on vacation for many months, and, after wandering and wading through the swamp and the muck of anger, pride, confusion, disillusionment, etc., has finally found a way to come home again. Beth Moore would call it a season of sifting, which God was using, has used, and is using, to sift some of the impurities out of my heart and life.

Our church is going through a Beth Moore Bible Study right now called, "When Godly People Do Ungodly Things." And pretty much through all of the videos, and all of Beth's messages after the main video sessions, and through all of the homework, my heart and my head are nodding in total agreement and as much human understanding as I am capable of right now. It's so absolutely, utterly perfect for my life at this point, that I can see with my spirit's eye God's fingerprints and design all over the road map of my life over the last 2 years or so. He is so wonderful!

It is such a joy, blessing, and gift to be back to a place of total and complete trust in Him. I thought I was trusting Him all along, but I see now that there was some major guck in there that was keeping me from trusting Him fully. Truth be told, I'm sure there still is quite a lot more guck in there, and as painful as I know the process might be, I pray that God will quickly and efficiently set about removing whatever other impurities might be lurking the darkest and most hidden recesses of my mind, heart, and motives. In Jesus' name, let it be so Lord!

I haven't forgotten

I haven't forgotten about this blog, or about how much blogging means to me. Someday soon, or someday later, I will start blogging again. I can feel my next post growing inside me, maturing, getting ready to make its way into the world. Hallelujah! :)

So much to catch up on...

Let's see... Where do I even begin?

Keith and I renewed our vows on Valentine's Day, and the ceremony was absolutely wonderful! If you'd like to see pictures, try this link. After that, we went on a 2nd honeymoon, just for a few days, but they were fairytale days. We enjoyed each other's company more thoroughly and peacefully than we ever have before. It was so amazing to feel zero stress! Everything about those days was good.

Now we're working at getting settled back in to all of us living together as a family. While my marriage is better than I ever imagined it could be, I still find myself feeling overwhelmed by the needs of the five children that live with us. I can't possibly meet the needs of 5 different people all the time, and am trying to find a balance that works for all of us. I so desperately want to have a home that is full of peace and joy, but is that even possible? Nothing is impossible with God. I keep telling myself that, like a mantra. And I take things one day at a time and try not to have unrealistic expectations.

I was doing pretty well losing weight there for a while, until the stress started building up again. Stress and me don't seem to get along very well. Cortisol, the stress hormone, turns on all of the fat storage programs in my body, apparently. Does that mean I'll never be able to lose weight until my kids are grown up and have left the nest? Dear Lord, I do hope not.

Lisa and Kristina are both doing very well. They're happy, and in relationships with men who are very good for them, and that they are very good for themselves. Things are really working out so very well for both of them, and I'm so grateful to be able to witness it all.

I've been having a great time keeping in touch with people (including myself) through Facebook and text messaging. And sometimes on the bus I'm able to do some reading, when it's not too hot. If it's too hot on the bus, I can't read because I get motion sickness.

I know I'm rambling, but at least these thoughts are being written down before they fly the coop, so to speak.

Life is good, God is GREAT, and I'm so excited to be back with my family again, I can hardly find words to express it. Love and gratitude are simply overflowing.

I took this picture on our second honeymoon, when we went for a walk on the one sunny day we had.

Learned and Learning

I’m sitting here trying to think of some of the main concepts I’ve learned since August 3^rd, 2009, a day that will live in bittersweet infamy for the rest of my life. This is like a test for myself, to see how well I can do at remembering these ideas, without the books being right in front of me. Of course, some of what I’ve learned has already been so ingrained in my thinking that they are no longer conscious thoughts. But I still think it’s important to recall and articulate the basic principles so I can remind myself, and so I can teach them to my children. I’m going to write these things down as I think of them, so they’re not in any particular order:

Lesson No. 1: Always tell the truth, even when it’s hard or uncomfortable. I’ve been notoriously bad about hiding and/or distorting the truth of how I feel, what I like and dislike, what I want and don’t want, what I believe and don’t believe, etc, etc, etc, for the sake of preserving what I believe to be the perceptions other people have of me. “Changes the Heal” taught me the importance of being real. Jesus said “Woe to you when all men think well of you.” Well, that was me. Pretty much everyone liked me, and it was because I had conformed myself to an image of what I thought they wanted, so much so that I lost who I really was, and am still in the process of finding that lost person.

Lessons 2-? (there’s more than one lesson in this paragraph): That I am an adult, and am free to make my own choices. It is my responsibility to live with the consequences of those choices, and to allow others to live with the consequences of theirs. It’s important to be sensitive and empathetic regarding the feelings of others, while refusing to take responsibility for those feelings. A person’s feelings, thoughts, actions, attitudes, choices, desires, likes, dislikes, etc. belong to that person, and when one person takes responsibility for something that falls within the ownership of someone else, boundary lines are blurred, individuality is lost, and authenticity is threatened. People can connect in real and intimate ways with other people most effectively when they are honest and transparent first with themselves, and then with each other.

I suppose I should post this now, considering I’ve been working on it off and on for three days. J There’s a lot more that I’ve learned these last few months, and I hope to record those lessons as well, as they come to mind. (Photo from the Internet, added on 2/8/10)

Thank you

Thank you Everyone for the welcoming, gracious, supportive and encouraging comments. I have missed you all so much. I nabbed this picture from an email someone sent me this morning... Isn't it beautiful?

Please pray for my daughter, Megan. She's in the hospital. I can't share more than that because she swore me to secrecy, but let's just say that she - and we - desperately need to see God's grace and glory revealed in this situation.

Many blessings and grace and peace to all of you and your families. I will post when I can. The posts without pictures are the ones I'm posting via email, and pictures don't come through that way for some reason.

Until we meet again... :)

Something new to look forward to

One of the biggest changes in the way I think and feel is that I really, really want to be a stay-at-home mom. I’ve haven’t wanted that in a long time, if ever. Basically, the idea scared me half to death. For many years I’ve been clinging to my work as my lifeline to sanity. I feel competent and confident at work in a way that I never have at home – as a wife, a mother, or a homemaker. However, after reading two fabulously incredible books, “Changes that Heal” by Dr. Henry Cloud and “Boundaries in Marriage” by Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend, I feel far more ready to face and embrace the challenges, hard work, and rewards that necessarily go hand-in-hand with such a life. (photo from the internet, added on 2/8/10)

Rethinking Already

After I published that last post, I decided to invite my closest friends and family to read my blog, if they want to. And if they don’t want to, that’s totally okay, too. Whomever reads this, my prayer is that your life is being flooded with the grace, peace, abundance and vitality of Christ! (Photo from the internet, added on 2/8/10)

A Blog that is a journal - for real!

This is my first post in a long time. It feels foreign. But the biggest change is that I'm posting just for myself instead of other people. And the biggest reason is because I don't want my blog to be deleted or deactivated due to extended periods of not being used. I've invested too much time and thought into this blog to allow it to be deleted.

Keith and I will be renewing our vows at 3:00 p.m. on Valentine's Day 2010 at a teeny tiny service in our home. Our family and some of our closest friends will be there. After that, he and I will be departing for a little bit of a honeymoon in Coeur d'Alene. I anticipate doing a lot of sleeping that first night, because I will be so exhausted from moving out of my apartment and back into the house the week before the ceremony.

I am so excited for our new life together to start!

God is so good. I love You, Lord! :)