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Here are a few recent one-liners from my 3 soon to be 4 year old…:)
(At Amish Country) “Mommy, why are the buggies chasing the horses?!!”
“Mommy, why did God make Eve from Adam’s ribbon?”
“Mommy, you can’t buy that shirt. It’s too ’spensive!”
“When I go to church, everyone will think I look beautiful!” (This of course is the whole point of going to church…lol)
“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.”
This is one of my favorite Bible verses. It never had so much meaning to me as it did when I was going through cancer. When I first found out (and for several months after) it seemed my world was hopelessly muddled, upside down, and inside out. Before, everything had seemed so right, and now, I began to feel hopeless and forgotten by God…Then, I went where I should have gone in the first place…back to God’s Word. This verse stuck out to me-God knows my end…He has planned it, and it will BE right…even if it does not seem right to me or it is not what I was expecting! Everything that comes into my life (and yours), if you have Christ as your Savior, is for our greatest good and God’s greatest glory. One of the things I have struggled with is the fact that this does not mean everything will go well or end well for us while we are on this earth. Bad things happen. As Job said, “Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” However, I have come to feel thankful for the experiences I have been through because even though some things have been hard, I KNOW God’s presence is real because I’ve EXPERIENCED the inner strength and peace that the Holy Spirit gives. Psalm 118:14 puts it very well, ” The LORD is my strength and song, and is become my salvation.”
God’s Word is so beautifully written! If you are going through a difficult time, try reading the Psalms and Proverbs and Jer. 29:11:-) I pray God’s words will wash over your soul and bless you as they have blessed me.
Here is the third and last verse of “What a friend we have in Jesus!”
“Are we weak and heavy laden,
Cumbered with a load of care?
Precious Savior still our refuge;
Take it to the Lord in prayer.
Do thy friends despise forsake thee?
take it to the Lord in prayer!
In His arms He’ll take and shield thee;
Thou wilt find a solace there.“
“Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest.” Matt. 11:28
Here is the second verse of the hymn written by Joseph Scriven during the 1800’s.
“Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged;
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful
who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness;
take it to the Lord in prayer.”
So many today are searching for unconditional love, acceptance, and faithfulness. Look to Jesus! People will try to fill the void, but nobody can satisfy like Christ. He loves completely, accepts unconditionally, and because of His nature He can not fail. “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else. “ Isaiah 45:22 KJV
Christian hymns carry such a beautiful message. I have been trying to really listen to the words as we sing in church each Sunday. As I learn about the stories behind these hymns, I see that the authors experienced abundant life in Christ regardless, or maybe even in spite of, the circumstances surrounding them. What amazes me is how God used ordinary people to write words which still inspire and convict us today. An older friend of mine in my church grew up with an alcoholic, very difficult father. Her mother was determined, though, to stay with him in spite of the anguish he caused her. My friend remembers her mother in times of struggle singing softly, “What a friend we have in Jesus, All our sins and griefs to bear…” This song written many years ago, still gives solace today. I have sung it over to myself many times when I felt I needed a friend, and I know it has been and will be a blessing to many more.
“What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear! What a privilege to carry, everything to God in prayer!
O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear, all because we do not carry, everything to God in prayer.”
We are getting ready to move, and I really, really do not want to pay for boxes. I happened to be grocery shopping at Meijer around 8:00 the other night when employees were stocking the shelves. There were tons of those great sturdy banana boxes sitting empty in the aisle. They let me take as many as I could fit in my cart. Then, as I was driving out of the parking lot, I saw an employee coming out of Radio Shack heading for the dumpster with a huge cart of broken down boxes. I turned my car around, followed him to the dumpster and sheepishly asked if I could have the boxes before he threw them away! He very kindly gave them to me. I could barely see out the car windows because of all the boxes. Gives new meaning to “Ask and ye shall receive.” 
I found some great tips for moving here. If you have any tips for moving frugally I’d love to hear them! Please post a comment!
Making Peace with the Waiting Game
We are buying our first house! What an exciting and exhausting and emotional process this is! You find a home listing you like and WAIT to go see it. You find a house you like, make an offer, and WAIT to receive acceptance or denial. The seller accepts your offer, and then you WAIT to have the house inspected. If that goes well, you WAIT 20 or 30 days for all the loan paperwork to be done…It is definitely a more arduous process than renting an apartment or buying a car. But it certainly will be worth it!
When I was a kid, it seemed like I was always waiting and adults always got to do whatever they wanted whenever they wanted. Yeah, right! The older I get the more I realize that the major difference between children and adults is that adults are expected to wait longer and more patiently. You get engaged and WAIT several months to have the wedding. Find out you’re pregnant…9 month WAIT to see the baby. Rent an apartment, and WAIT while saving money for a house. Buy a house and WAIT to move in, etc…
But during these times of waiting you get to think and plan, change your mind about wedding colors (maybe rainbow colors and puffed sleeves are not the way to go…) and reception food (maybe I should include some meat dishes for the nonvegetarian guests), read baby books and form your parenting goals, save money to furnish your house that you will have. I have learned that having a few extra months to think on things can sometimes prevent major planning disasters and also gives me time to get myself together so I can really enjoy the finished product! Hmmm…maybe waiting is not so bad…
Preschool on a Dime…
With the economy being as tough as it is, I have been looking for ways to “trim the fat” from our monthly spending. Although far from being adept at frugality…my 3 year old and I have had more fun than ever just by using up items we have around our home. Here are 5 budget-friendly ideas we have enjoyed:
1.Make sewing cards from manila folders. Cut out a large shape. (We cut out the shapes of #1-9.) Use a hole punch to punch holes evenly spaced throughout the shape. Thread a piece of yarn through the first hole and secure to the back side with tape. Little fingers will enjoy threading the yarn in and out and may also get a jump on learning letters/numbers! Your child may also enjoy coloring and decorating the shape. This is durable and can be used again and again. (Walmart sells child sewing needles in their sewing aisle. They are cheap and my daughter really felt like she was sewing.)
2.When you get a package in the mail, save the packing peanuts. They can be painted and glued to paper to make shapes. They can be used as manipulatives to count. (This should always be supervised so the child does not try to swallow the “peanuts.”)
3.Use stale cereal, uncooked beans or rice to glue pictures and patterns on paper. This helps develop fine motor skills. Put a strip of glue down in the shape of a letter then your child can put the pieces on and learn the shape of the letter at the same time.
4.Hopscotch is a fun way to learn numbers, and only cost the price of sidewalk chalk (which lasts us a long time).
5.She really enjoys “creating” things in the kitchen—pb&j sandwiches, cupcakes, etc. This has helped with her sequencing skills.
I would love to hear your ideas for frugal preschool fun!
I am exploring abundant life in Christ. The Christians of the time this verse was written certainly were not materially wealthy or well respected in the world. But Christ promised abundant life, joy, and satisfaction then, and He still does today. Over the past three years I have been attempting to grasp what that means…
Three years ago my husband and I had a beautiful little girl, and we decided that I would stay home to raise her. That has been a tremendous blessing! However, we got off to a bumpy start financially as we realized how difficult it can be to “make it” on just one income. To add to the financial pressure, about a year after our daughter was born, I noticed a large lump on my neck that would not go away. The doctor said it was a swollen lymph node. After a biopsy it was confirmed that I had Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (cancer). I was 25! I went through 6 months of chemotherapy and the nausea, exhaustion, and overall drugged feeling that accompanies it. I lost my hair, and I felt like I was losing myself also. But God was so gracious to me. He surrounded me with the support, help, and unconditional love of family, my little girl, and my wonderful husband (who never made me feel ugly even though I certainly was not at my best…although I was at my baldest. HA!) After 6 months of treatment, the cancer was gone as far as the doctors and CAT scans could tell. It has been almost two years now, and I have been cancer free. I feel great. And am optimistic that the cancer will never return.
Wow, what a long and short few years it has been! But I have learned so much about the strength that Christ gives, about what it really means to rely on His Word, and about what is truly important in life. I know this abundant life in Christ can be had even when things are happening in our lives that we did not want and did not ask for! I know because I’ve experienced it—financial struggles, baldness, sickness, pain, and yet through it all more joy and peace than I knew what to do with… When I let go of what I thought I wanted for my life and accepted what God wanted to give me, I realized that some things I thought I wanted weren’t really as important as I once thought.
The abundance Christ offers is everywhere. We just need to learn how to grab a hold of it. That’s what this blog is about. Tips, tricks, musings and ideas for living our lives abundantly in Christ.
Don’t wait until everything is perfect to love your life in Christ—until you have your dream house or the perfect job or 2.4 kids or a published book or a finished collection of Longaberger Baskets. Let’s say with Paul, “ II have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.” (Phil. 4:11)