Praise God!

In life, we are all faced with suffering; momentary affliction. We are constantly being told by society that we deserve the best, we deserve to be happy on our terms, we deserve to do what we want, we deserve the world and, for whatever reason, the world owes us. So we hit suffering, but lash out because we think we don't deserve it - it isn't fair.  But the Bible promises us suffering [Acts 14:22, John 15:20, 1 Peter 4:12, 2 Timothy 3:12]; it promises us that this life will be difficult - because this world has been infiltrated with sin and we don't necessarily belong here. We belong with our Heavenly Father in the New Jerusalem. We must remember that God works all things together for the good of His purpose (Romans 8:28) and that no matter what we are going through it will never overpower or out weigh God's glory. It will never trump His mercy and grace that He showed us at Calvary, where He gave His only Son who knew no sin, to be sin that we could be completely reconciled to God [2 Corinthians 5:21]-- That we could have a right relationship with Him. Christ suffered in ways that we will never suffer - He suffered for the wicked though He is completely innocent. In a way, he was framed - put on trial and received the death penalty while the real criminal got away with murder. Christ suffered, that we can have eternal life - and so we rejoice and praise God. BUT we need to remember that everything we suffer here is momentary; and in suffering unjustly [not just justly], we are given more of an understanding (though not a complete understanding) of what Christ did for us. We need to remember that God has a purpose for all things - and that we are but a miniscule part of a bigger picture, the faintest brush stroke. We need to remember to praise God in ALL circumstances (1 Thessalonians 5:18); praise Him in suffering as well as times of comfort. We're here for a much bigger purpose. We're here to glorify our Jesus until He returns and brings us home. So praise God at your lowest, praise God for circumstances that you don't understand, praise God for the ways He is growing you in faith, praise God in the sad times and praise Him in the happy times. Praise God for redeeming your soul; for pulling you out of eternal damnation to bring you into eternal life. Praise God. (1 Peter 4:12-19). How great it is to know that our suffering is worth it; that it serves a good purpose.

I leave this post with my go-to verse in times of trial.
Romans 8:18 " For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us."

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! I hope that you've all had a wonderful holiday celebrating with family and friends. I hope that it was safe. I've realized this past New Year's Eve how silly and responsible we can be. We left our friends' house early, were home by 10 and then started putting away laundry. I know you're jealous of how crazy we can get! It's almost like we're adults....oh wait, that already happened.

So Happy New Year. New Year. New Beginning. But is it really a new beginning? Or do we just make it out to be. It always seems to give us this feeling of a fresh start from our "old ways". A fresh start from the day-to-day routine we fall into that may or may not become monotonous and boring and just plain uninteresting. I feel like it shouldn't be a new beginning, and yet I woke up this morning feeling fresh and ready to conquer. Conquer the laundry that never ends (and we don't even have kids yet!), conquer the dishes, conquer my laziness, conquer my insecurities, conquer the job hunt, conquer the world... Ok - maybe not the world (I may be ambitious, but that's a little too ambitious if you ask me).

Before I go on and make a public declaration of what I intend to do (with God's guidance, mercy, grace, help, and re-direction if He doesn't want them to happen), here's a quick "top 10" things that we experienced in 2012. (well, more like the first 10 happy things I could think of that happened in 2012).

1. We bought our first house!
2. And we learned that appliances break...most of them.
3. We adopted Hershey, our second bunny.
4. Anthony went back to school :)
5. We learned how to balance a pool without a pool guy (thanks to procrastination AND impatience)
6. I made it to my annual ER visit (don't worry - nothing was serious... but I'm getting a good track record on this "once a year ER visit" deal).
7. We learned we will be welcoming another niece into the world in 2013!
8. A's parents moved out here.
9. My momma moved out here.
10. We learned a lot about God's blessings, humility, mercy, love, abundance, care, protection and provision...and that is precious.

And as for the things I intend on doing this year that can only be accomplished WITH God's help, because I am far too lazy and get far too distracted way too easily (oh look, there goes a bunny running up our stairs!).

1. Get closer to God//develop a stronger relationship with my Savior.
2. Read my bible daily//read the entire bible this year
3. Work hard to be a more Proverbs 21 wife//friend/daughter/sister/woman
4. Pray more
5. Love more
6. Finish painting the house
7. Read all 7 HP's.
8. Read more.
9. Make an effort to exercise.
10. Find a job since I'm out of one come Saturday.
11. Visit Ken, Maya, Ryan and Megan.
12. Organize the house.
13. Be more disciplined in ALL areas of my life.
14. See opportunities to serve others more AND be grateful for them.
15. Keep a positive attitude regardless of how I feel.

SO there are serious and important things (like #1 -5) and fun things (#6,11) and things that really don't matter other than they seem fun (#7).  The most important things are at the top, cause let's face it - there's always room for more Jesus and having my life centered on Him more and more will make all other areas that much more attainable; it'll make all other areas that much better, that much sweeter, that much more rewarding, that much more joyful.

SO here's to a fresh start - to a year of focusing on getting close to my Jesus and growing in Him and becoming a better wife for my husband, a better daughter for my moms, a better sister for my siblings, a better friend for my friends, a better woman for anyone I may come in contact with - that they will see Jesus in me and not me in me; that they will see His purpose and not mine; that they will see me and want to get closer to Him. That my life would be just for Him more and more this year. SO here's to a year of new beginnings, that you will be disciplined and work hard to accomplish the things you're working towards, that you would have a year of love and learning and laughter and accomplishments, that you would look back and not think that you've wasted your year, that you would look back and rejoice in the things that occurred. Happy fresh start.
May your joy be found in Jesus, the one who gave His life that we may have a relationship with God and live eternally.
Love to you all,
S

Chistmas and a bad attitude

I'll be the first to admit that I've had a bad attitude - horrible actually. I've been sad and I've been selfish and I haven't been looking forward to Christmas and it's not fun and it's not worth it. Christmas is supposed to be all about celebrating the birth of my (and our) Lord, King, and Savior Jesus Christ. The birth of the God's son who came into this world humbly and beautifully so that He could save my soul and your soul and many others' souls years later - that God would look upon us and see us as perfect as His Son is. And yet here I've been, being upset and sad because I feel like I've had to give up things I don't want to. How merciful my God is that He would humble me in this. Humbled so I can see how selfish I've been in light of the most selfless birth ever to grace our universe. To everyone I've been mopey around and sad around and not very chatty too (though that's probably a perk), I'm so sorry for being selfish and for stealing the joy of the celebration of the most miraculous, wonderful birth ever in the history of eternity. So what if I have to put aside what I want for the benefit of others. I should be gracious and honored to have the privilege to do so.

So now, thankful for the mercy and grace God, Jesus, my family and friends have shown me - I am able to enter this week in thanksgiving. Thankful that I have the honor to celebrate the virgin birth of my King. Thankful that I have things to give up. Thankful that I have family to be with. Thankful that I have time off of work. Thankful that I have the ability to bless others. Thankful that I can be humbled. Thankful that I can be thankful. Thankful that I can learn. Thankful that God is never giving up on me, even when I do. Thankful that God would send His Son through Mary to be born a virgin birth that He would save a heart like mine that so often loses sight of the big picture. Just thankful.

Again, I'm so sorry for my bad attitude and I hope that you can learn from me that it's really not worth it to be selfish, especially when we have the Savior of our souls to celebrate. <3

Peace, love and joy to you. May you have the merriest of all Christmases celebrating our Jesus who loves you so much!

S

JOY Pillows!

Another Christmas Project- inspired by my mother in law (AKA Moms) - because I couldn't sleep as much as I wanted to.

JOY Pillows - front side is grey and yellow and sparkle snowflakes (matches our color scheme), back side is yellow. I know the J is funky - but have you ever tried to do the curves on a sewing machine? Plus I'm new to this whole sewing thing. And anyways, things that don't look store bought are mo' bettah'. ;)

And it's my Grampa's birthday today - so Happy Birthday Grampa :) I love you & hope you have a wonderful day!

It's Christmasy Time! (picture heavy post)

Iiiiitttt's Christmasy Time! 

And that means everyone is busy and people are crazy and I'm totally okay with that! I have been busy with fun Christmas projects and Anthony has been a wonderful supporter of these projects. So this is mainly going to be pictures of things I and we have done to get ready for Christmas :D

AND I'm REALLY REALLY REALLY VERY excited that this year we are celebrating Christmas in our first house! It's exciting and things are going along nicely (the bunnies even got Anthony a gift)!

Christmas Card Photo Shoot with Frank Wise of Digital Obsession Photography (He's awesome. Check him out)

 

Christmas Project: Christmas Cookies Round 1

 

Christmas Project: First time hanging house lights!

 

Christmas tree shopping. Yes, in heels

 Christmas Project: Hershey helping with the Christmas Tree Skirt

Christmas Project: Christmas Tree Skirt

 

Christmas Project: Christmas Tree Skirt

 

2012 Christmas Ornament

 

Placing the angel

And then fixing the angel

Christmas Project: Stockings

 Christmas Project: Stockings

 Christmas Project: Christmas Stockings

 Christmas Project: Christmas Stockings

Christmas Projects: Christmas Tree Skirt and Stockings (made by me with my awesome new sewing machine)

New Sectional

 Christmas Card Garland :)

 Christmas Project: Baby Christmas Tree Skirt

 Christmas Project: Snowmen Cake Pops

Lots of Hot Air Balloons, Ground Level around the corner from our house!

Waves

It's interesting to me how our lives seem to move in waves. We're really not all that busy, but then a wave hits. It seems like we've had a much bigger wave going on lately and we've been moving way fast for awhile now.  I know a big part of that is that I've been working full-time at my nanny job while still picking up makeup gigs and now the holidays are among us!

We are starting to make progress on our house again too. :) We've finally hooked up the new dryer and sold both our old washer and dryer (yay!), we bought a new couch which is amazing and wonderful and fits in our living/family room much better, put away the fall decor and are starting to bring out the Christmas decorations :D, mounted the TV (Anthony is really happy about that).

We will probably get back to painting soon...and maybe, just maybe we'll have the common areas finished painting by Christmas :p

Appliance wise we just need to switch our garage fridge with our kitchen fridge - because the one in the garage is so much nicer and get our oven fixed so I can get back to cooking and baking! :D


The waves are good though. They come at the perfect time so we're not too busy to go crazy, but not too not busy to feel unproductive. We've finished our Christmas shopping (so thankful we got it done early) and are now working on getting things together to donate. It's so much better to give things away than to hold onto to things that wont aren't needed.

I'm missing old friends again. It's hard. We've left so many great, mature, wonderful relationships in Cali - I miss the longevity of them and the familiarity and comfort of them. We've been out here a year and I still feel like we don't really know anyone. I mean, we know lots of people, but we don't REALLY know people - not like California - not yet. I miss all our random get togethers at the apartment or my in-law's or Lauren's or Marina's or Katie's or...or...or... It doesn't seem like that really happens out here...not yet. On the other side of things though, I am cherishing (and cherishing SO MUCH) the relationships/friendships we are cultivating out here and loving getting to know the hearts of those we do get to meet. I know it all has to do with time - time to meet people, time to meet with people, time to grow - and that - all of that - I am cherishing deeply and continue to look forward to.

Another random thing - I bought a book at a garage sale the other day for our kids. I am not pregnant (sorry Bethses, no plans of it yet - I know your ears perked up a little bit at that though :P). I just really wanted this particular book for our babies when we have them and it was a smokin' deal. Originally $40 and I got it for $1. It was exciting. I couldn't pass it up :)

Anyways,  I know this is really all over the place - I'm just writing what comes to my mind and not editing it because I just don't feel like it. Sorry. So I'll end it here.

There's the randomness...I guess my thoughts come in waves too.  I will start posting recipes again soon (I will Kat, I will).

Did I Tell You My Laptop is Still Out of Commission?

'Cause it is - hence no crafty things and no recipes for awhile now.   It will happen again - at some point. Though I don't know when. Right now A and I are currently sharing a laptop because he has the good fast one that works.... So I've hi-jacked it for a moment to share some pictures with you that I said I would get to (eventually).
Here we go!



Faux Wall in the Living/Family Room - the dark spot is a spot on the inside of lens of the camera...it's in all the pictures.

 

Closer up faux wall - ignore the spot it's not really there



"Chai Latte" in the down stairs bathroom - it's like a muted pale orangey color

With our fun Pier 1 decoartions thanks to Jon & Katie and wedding giftcards :)

I repositioned one of the Scripture signs. As cute as I thought it was before, you could only see the Corinthians one when you were sitting at the table.

And the Bunny Gate so they don't go where they shouldn't! So far it's working!!!!

We have finally put together our room & put up pictures :)

We finally put up the guest bathroom picture instead of just having it leaned up against the wall.


Yay! Things are coming together...now if only we could just finish painting upstairs. hahaha

 

Life Lesson (and I promise I'll post painting progress pictures soon)

I'm learning a lesson in life right now and God is revealing to me my fear of man. That's lame. The fear of man thing, not the learning thing. I'm realizing how much I'm afraid to do certain things or be responsible for certain things because they aren't what other people want for me. And that's just ridiculous - because other people can't possibly know me better than God does. I was discussing this with a friend the other day and she, in her wisdom, told me that I can't let people affect me that way. Fast forward to later in the week, I was talking about the same thing with A and he told me that

If I am more concerned about what other people want for me, then I won't be able to find joy in the things that do happen.

 

I think God is trying to get a message through my head. And it's true. Things in life happen and you hae to make a choice - however, DON'T let someone else determine how you react or what you decide to do UNLESS that person is God. We should be more concerned with how God wants us to react than we are with how others will react.

 

 

In other "news" (because it's not really "newsworthy") - we've taken a LONG break from painting. It's half way driving me nuts, but I haven't been feeling 100% so I need to work on getting the house back in order than painting. BUT our faux wall in the living/family room (because I don't know the difference) is DONE and part of upstairs is painted, but then we ran out of paint.

 

We got our kitchen table and I love it! It was very exciting. It can be a very skinny accent table, a table that seats 4 or a table that seats 6! It's pretty rad and we got a good deal on chairs for it since it originally came with 2. They're slightly different, but I love the effect.

 

We hung our first picture the other day. It was our caricature from Valentine's weekend a couple years ago. hhehehehe.

 

AND I think we've finally outsmarted the bunnies with the additional of a "bunny" (baby) gate. They, so far, have not figured out how to get through it. BUT I'm sure it's only a matter of time before they get through the bars and we have to put up screening.

We are currently trying to organize a BYOP (Bring Your Own Pumpkin) get together with one of our small groups. I'm hoping it'll be as fun as it was when we did it in Cali :)

 

We planted a tree and some flowers in our backyard yesterday - and by we, I mean Anthony. It looks nice and I'm excited to be getting to the front of the house at some point.

 

BUT - now I've wasted more time rambling and really need to get to cleaning the house and putting away laundry and fun stuff like that. SO I hope that you have a wonderful Monday that is full of happiness and joy!

xo

S

My heart

Sometimes -- but in all reality frequently -- I wonder why God created my heart the way he did. I wonder why He created my heart to be so fragile. I hope I remember to ask Him this when I see Him face to face.

encouragement and other stuff

It's been awhile since I've posted on either of my blogs. My laptop is still getting worked on - so I'm left with my phone which is a little frustrating to write with - and I haven't located the Kindle charger which would totally be easier than this. New goal - find the charger.

Anyways, I'm now back to working full-time which is good, but last night it hot me that I'm not doing great with the transition. Prayers would be appreciated . :)

On top of all that, I've been frustrates with my lack of time in God's word. I've been reading, but it's been distracted reading. God has made it clear that a big part of the issue is my prayer life, so I've been reading some books to help me get back into a routine and to remember how important a strong prayer life is and hoe beneficial a strong prayer life is.  It's definitely helping and I'm seeing God more in the little this than before. Praise Him for that!
As I was reading Power Prayers for women this morning, I came across a description of the Bible that brought more excitement in me than I've felt in a long time - so I felt the need to share.

"Adventure, danger, romance - just a few story themes from the beat-selling book of all time. Undoubtedly, billions of copies have been printed and distributed.
Unlike fairytales, this book us true and starts with 'In the beginning.' here you learn of kings and conquerors, love and loss, rebellion and redemption. Turn the pages to discover where you came from, why you are here, and where you are going. You'll find out how to handle money and have better relationships. Most important, you can learn who God is and how you can live with Him forever.
What is this astonishing book? The Bible. Inspired by God, this sixty-six-book compilation is the true story of God's love for all people, including you and me. It's the explanation of a promised deliverance, and freedom for all who obey." -Jackie M. Johnson

I encourage anyone reading this to get a Bible - buy one, borrow one - and open it up. Pray that God will show you who He really is and who you really are through His book,-through His words. Meet God and allow Him to transform your life. It won't be easy and it may not always seem like it's getting better - but its worth it. And when you struggle with how it appears your life is going, take a moment to look back and who you were and where your life was heading, meditate on His promises, and look ahead to where you're going. Look to His glorious Kingdom that is waiting His beautiful children - be faithful and steadfast and cling to the hope that is in the Cross.

I love you all and am praying,
S