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Thursday, January 31, 2013

Valentines Goodies

I love February. 
all the love. 
and the bursts of red
 in the landscape of dull browns. 
Here are some of favorite things:

any and all prints by katie daisy 

any and all bags by cath kidston.

 .
all the beautiful, (and well-priced) items from ruche. 
                       so many lovely things!!  


playing around over at picmonkey.


adorable FREE BANNER and other precious 
printables over at tomkat designs.  they have 12 
awesome ones available this month! 
go print some fun!


the delicious things at pier one right now!!
so dreamy!!


"You really shouldn't say "I love you" unless you mean it.
 But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. 
People forget. 
~Author unknown, attributed to an 8-year-old named Jessica~

Monday, January 28, 2013

the madness of motherhood

It's a snowy/rainy Monday morning, 
or wait, it's afternoon now.
I wouldn't know because I'm still in my pj's, as are the girls.
The boys got fed and dressed and off to school, 
does that count for "getting something done?"


Last night as I lay in bed I told Jake that I felt so overwhelmed at what will meet me in the morning, as it does every morning.  All the messes to clean up, (because I was just so tired I wanted to sleep and not spend another hour cleaning up from our Sunday loungefest).  I just wonder why I even clean up sometimes.  
EVERYTHING I DO GETS UNDONE. 

And honestly, most times I'm fine with it, it's "life" right now, our "season" of Motherhood. And then on other days/moments I feel so  frustrated by it.  How did all this pile up when Friday night it was perfectly clean and straightened up?  

So, instead of getting my butt into gear, I'm writing about how I don't want to.  But I know it will get done, it HAS to, there is no one else that will or can do it.  It is my portion for today.  And so I'm going to spend a few minutes extracting joy from it, I'm going to look around and count my blessings and name them one by one:

* the fire is roaring and keeping us all toasty warm.

* I have a house to clean, (a fellow neighbors home was completely destroyed in a fire the other night).  I heard the sirens and of course, the curious cat that I am, I had to find it's source. So, I bundled up at 2:45am and walked toward the billows of smoke, about one mile round trip.  It was freezing cold and exhilarating. 

Ok, so I'm sure there are more things I could squeeze out, but I don't have the mental energy right now. 

I'll pour another cup of coffee and put on some groovy praise music, (Bryan and Katie Torwalt is my newest favorite itunes purchase, a sweet gift from my friend Angie) and their pandora station is great too.  Here's to getting my hands a workin'.

If you're in the same boat I am, let's jump ship together and swim to shore before we all sink down into our sea of laundry!!

Bon voyage, dear friends!!  

"This mess is a place!"
  ~Author Unknown~


Thursday, January 17, 2013

haughty eyes and the whole mess

This life in Christ is about
GROWTH and DEATH
happening simultaneously.
Without the one, the other will not exist.

Black and lovely.

{PHOTOS FROM MY PARENT'S OLD HOME}
we're going to miss it so much.

"cry out for INSIGHT and understanding.
Search for them as you would for lost money.
THEN YOU WILL understand what it means
to the fear the Lord,
and you will gain knowledge of God.

THEN YOU WILL UNDERSTAND
what is right,
just and fair,
and you WILL KNOW
how to find the RIGHT COURSE OF ACTION EVERY TIME.

For wisdom will enter your heart
and knowledge will fill you with JOY."

Proverbs 2

Don't know about you, but
soul-searching makes me tired and 
digging wears me out.


Maybe it's partly a personality thing, (my fellow sanguines get me on this)!  There are friends and family that I have who almost effortlessly unearth the "deep", in themselves and in others.  And get this, THEY ENJOY IT!, it actually gives them LIFE.  I admire this in others, however when I apply it to myself, I get exhuasted, overwhelmed and sad
{Three things we sanguines try to avoid like the plague}! 

Exhausted because this has nothing to with other people, it's an introverted process, a going inward, a silencing.

Overwhelmed because it's so out of my control.  All this chaos of the heart, there's no order or direction or "place" labeled for the things I come upon.

And sad.  Sad because I see all the brokenness in me and how black my heart truly is.  It IS deceitful above all else, deceiving most of all, myself.  And just when I thought things were looking so good, (refer to the previous sentence of decieving myself)! 


BUT THIS IS RIGHT WHERE I NEED TO BE,
WHERE'S HE'S CALLED ME TO BE.
A place of forced searching out. 

There's a lamp at my feet and little bit of light at my path, (psalm 119:105), and that's about it, and it's really all I need right now.   There are a lot of verses about lamps in the Bible, never realized that before, here are a few:

"For You, O Lord, are my Lamp;
the Lord brightens my darkness."
II Samuel 22:29

"For You cause my lamp to be lighted and to shine; the Lord my God illumines my darkness."
Psalm 18:28

"The spirit of man, is the lamp of the Lord,
searching all his innermost parts."
Proverbs 20:27

(verses from Amplified version).


When I've read verses like this before I would often think "my darkness" refers to the trials or hardships one is going through and maybe that's what it does mean.  But today it took on another LITERAL meaning....THE DARKNESS IN ME, "my darkness."  The things inside me that MUST BE ILLUMINATED, brought INTO HIS LIGHT, surrendered, often again and again.


It was interesting to me that the first two verses from
II Samuel and from Psalm had something to say about a haughty spirit.  If you read it, you'll see that the previous verse in BOTH passages talks about the Lord "bringing down" the haughty and those with haughty looks and THEN it talks about the Lord being a lamp.  I thought about the fact that pride in ourselves and our own ways of "rightness" BLIND US to the TRUTH of ourselves and our sin, our darkness.  In those dark places we cannot even sense HIS LIGHT, let alone see His lamp gently shining on our issues when we are "captured" by our own brightness/pride of self/how "far" we've come/how much "truth" we know/all the conferences we've attended/the experiences we've had/the Bible studies we've completed. 

And, sad, but true, it is from that place that we have "haughty eyes", (HIGH EYES), not only comparing ourselves and looking "down" at others, but thinking others are "less" then we are.

Comparing our journeys.

When I cast my eye upon others,
scoping out their splintered ways while I'm stumbling over my own logs


We can't even SEE our own sin on the stage of our life, it's all backstage rushing through a costume change,
but boy, we've got great seats to the sins of others, 
front-row-center!  

"Haughty eyes push us toward seeing everybody else's sins. Good eyesight means seeing our true condition."
~Todd Freeman~


This past week I heard a teaching by Beth Moore, (from her study "James~Mercy Triumphs").  She was speaking of her journey toward wholeness and what that has looked like, still looks like. 
This is a loose quote,
but still gets the point across of what she was saying:

"wholeness = taking all my pieces and laying them at His feet,
 saying 'here, You can have the whole mess.'"

And perhaps ONLY after we give Him our whole mess,
does He leads us into WHOLENESS. 


His faithfulness pulls us in.
All of us, every.part.
He says He will redeem us, every.part.
This is the good news, such good news that, as our Pastor once said, "it takes a lifetime to absorb." 

The opposites collide to create such beauty within us. the joy for mourning and beauty for ashes kind of stuff. praises for burdens. rebuilding the ancient ruins of the human heart.  sense of our wanderings. 


I'll take a seat to that production....
front-row-center, please.



"You don't measure me like man may see,
You're looking at my heart,
the core of me."  
~Misty Edwards~ 


Wednesday, January 16, 2013

between shoulders


"Let the beloved of the LORD rest secure in him, 
for He shields him all day long, and the one the LORD loves 
rests between his shoulders."
Deuteronomy 33:12



I've often wondering what "resting between shoulders" looked like.
And then it came to me the other week as Capri was taking a nap on me....there she was on my chest, 
between my shoulders
And it sank deep into me
 along with her heavy body and steady breathing.
I have a resting place too, 
a place I long for, but often pay no attention to.
There's too much noise for my eyes, 
all around me, distracting me.
nice, good things, but distractions nonetheless. 

At the kitchen sink, (my second home) 
I thought of how mundane Motherhood can be.
laundry~cleaning~cooking~picking up toys~swapping out clothing~taxi driving~teaching~training~repeat
And I'm ok with that, it's where I am right now, 
where many of us are right now.
However, I'm not ok with just existing here, 
I long to enjoy now and not wish it away
or frown upon it.
I long to find true fulfillment in the daily duties.
I don't want to live, 
frustrated.

God, show me the way of rest.
What it looks like right where I'm at, 
in the middle of the madness.
Is it possible?  Is there rest to be found in the dailiness of life?
Is there rest in broken relationships waiting for restoration?
Is there rest in betrayal and shattered trust?
Is there rest in the weariness? In the overwhelming place?
In the fear?

Here is a beautiful article that spoke right to me, 
refreshed me from my eyes to my heart.
"3 ways to really enter into His rest right now." 
by Ann Voscamp

"We have to take time to connect with Him, 
share our heart with Him, 
and let Him clear our mind 
and soothe our spirit."
~an excerpt from another fabulous article~

Friday, January 11, 2013

Meadow Memories


Earlier this Fall we had a photoshoot at my parent's home. 
They have sold their home and will be moving to Strasburg THIS WEEKEND!!  We are so excited to have them close by! We wanted to capture our little family in the meadows around their home for the last time. Thank you to the talented Sara Lazio from Lazio Images for bottling up these moments for us!





































I told Luke if he wins I'm never going to make him dinner again, 
and just like that, he shot back, "well, if you win I'm going to take all your jewelry and sell it!" This was that moment:



I love my meadow gang. 
My field of gold. 




“Today you are You, that is truer than true. 
There is no one alive who is Youer than You.” 
~Dr. Suess~