What God has done for me this week

Baby A and I attend a bible study every Wednesday morning. It's something we both look forward to every week and learn SO much from. This week my discussion leader shared that one time she was a part of another bible study and her leader would ask them each week to tell one thing that God is doing for them this week. The point was to take a moment and see God at work in your life each and every week.

This spoke VOLUMES to me. Sure I see God at work in my life. I see how he leads me out of the valleys and how he guides us when we are confused or seeking His will. But it's more than that. He is with me EVERY moment of EVERY day. So I am making it a point to sit down and tell what God has done for me each week.
This will be my Friday post here. I thought about just writing it in my bible study notebook but what good is it if I don't tell what God has done for me to others. I am no evangelist or eloquent speaker but neither was Moses (Exodus 6: 28-30) and he did great things for the Kingdom of God.  So I am sharing what God is doing for me each week and if nothing else it will be a great way for me to look back and see ALL the wonderful things He has done for me in the year 2014 and I just know He has some great things in store for me in 2014.

This week God has given me great patience. Thursday was a VERY trying day with Baby A. She whined about everything, nothing was ever good enough for her and I was finding myself ready to end the day at 8:00 in the morning. But then God showed his love to me through music. Baby A and I had to run a few errands that morning and getting her into the van was quite the struggle.  Our favorite song right now is One Sonic Society's Never Once and as we backed out of the drive it came on the radio. Both Baby A and I lit up as we caught each other's eyes in the rear view mirror and we both started singing (I was singing through tears) about God's faithfulness. The tension in the air was gone and it was replaced with unspeakable JOY! It was like a great big hug from God letting me know that he was right there with me through the struggles of raising a 3 year old. The smile on Baby A's face as she sang praise to God, was something that held me through the rest of the week with her three year old tantrums.
To make things even better that afternoon we went to get the boys from school and we heard the song again. Then while waiting in car line I picked up my Jesus Calling devotion book. I haven't read it much since I started my bible study but I just felt interested in what that day's verse may say. So I picked it up and the devotion said this: "Don't expect an easy path as you journey hand in hand with me, but do remember that I, your very-present Helper, am omnipotent". God is so good and I am so thankful for his grace and unconditional love.

For nothing is impossible with God  Luke 1:37 

***If you usually skip over my Monday Wellness posts, make sure to read the one I will have up this coming Monday. I get pretty real... more real than I have ever been on my blog before and it's a good one... you will not want to miss it!

Wordless Wednesday: Bible Reading

Random

*The other night while I was walking with my friend, Tim was at home with the kids like we always do. The kids were sucked into Homeward Bound and Tim was sitting in the recliners paying bills and such. The kids had been so quite and he noticed a few sniffles coming from Baby A. He looked up and sure enough she was crying. He tried to figure out what was wrong but couldn't. He picked her up and asked her why she was crying and she replied "I don't know why". By this point she was really really upset and he somehow figured out it was because of the movie. There is a part where a little girl (around 4 years old or so) got lost in the woods and was crying. The 3 animals found her and stayed with her keeping her warm through the night. This apparently made Baby A very sad and even though Tim explained that the little girl was ok and her parents found her she still was very upset. She kept repeating "I don't know why I am crying" and the boys kept asking why on earth she was crying at the movie, HA. Tim was at a loss.... he is clueless (as are all guys) to crying at sad movies, books or blog posts. He managed to take her outside and finally calm her down. Bless his heart when the hormonal teenage years get here. He might need to lock himself in his room to get through them.

* Scooter is not an very organized guy. His back pack is ALWAYS filled with tons of crumpled papers that are late getting to me because he just threw them in his bag. This drives me CRAZY! I have tried punishing him for not turning things in and forgetting homework..... that didn't help. I have tried reminding him a billion times to turn things in and that doesn't help. I am at a loss. I need some kind of tips on how to get your child organized in school. If you have tips or a good book that I could read please pass them on. I searched pintrest for some ideas but most deal with keeping rooms cleaned... we have very little problem with that, it's mostly school stuff. HELP!!!!

* If you guys would send up a prayer for us we would greatly appreciate it. Rascal's teacher doesn't seem to care much about his allergy (or if she does she isn't showing it very well). This may sound so minor to most but it's not and trying to get EVERYONE to see it's not is wearing me down. Don't get me wrong... I am my child's advocate and I will surely step in when I have to but that doesn't make it easy. I manage to stay strong for the most part but last week was hard.. I mean really hard for me. I threw myself many pity parties wishing we didn't have to deal with this stuff, stuff like: reading EVERY single label on EVERY single item (not just food items but lotions and lip balms too), talking to teachers and parents about his allergy and getting looks like I am overreacting or exaggerating....... I get this EVERYWHERE and I want to jump in their face and let them hear how just ingesting a simple nut sends my son into an anaphylactic reaction, (Meaning his face starts swelling, tongue starts swelling and next comes difficulty breathing or even cardiac arrest. Scary huh??). I wish we didn't have to worry about him being singled out or left out due to his allergy. I can't send him to just any friend's house, birthday parties etc.. and if I do I have to pack his epi pen and benedryl and go through a brief (yet most likely intimidating) tutorial on how to use the epi pen and what signs to looks for. It means we skip out on things like muffins with mom and donuts with dad because we don' know if there are nuts in the products and if not, were they cross contaminated with nuts because that will send him into a reaction too. I have to send him to school, church and other people's homes and pray that he doesn't accidentally come in contact with a surface that has nut bits/oils on them (including children sneezing/ coughing after eating nuts or not washing there hands after eating nuts). 

So anyways after throwing myself pity parties I read a wonderful devotion that simply said . Entrust your loved ones in My hands. They are much better off there than in your own hands!!!!! How great is that??? I love that my creator knows my heart aches and the fact that I am trying to be the best protector I can for my children but even that isn't enough. Only placing them in His hands is the best. There is no doubt I would not be able to let Rascal out of my house (the only place that is TRULY safe for him) if it wasn't for the peace of knowing God has this in his hands. I read a new verse that day that spoke to me in a very powerful way:

The Lord replied, " I will personally go with you, Moses, and I will give you rest- everything will be fine for you." Now just insert your name in there instead of Moses and this can apply to every single one of us.... including Rascal! 

* Lucy has started chasing shadows. Now I know that sounds funny (and it is) but we aren't talking about an occasional playtime. I'm talking about 99% of her day is spent sitting in a corner staring at the wall waiting for shadows to move. It is the most annoying thing ever, mainly because when she sees the shadows move she barks, whines, or scratches/ bites at it. This has been going on for a good 3 weeks now... ever since she lost her balance while walking on her back feet and falling to hit her head. I really am wondering if she made herself crazy by that fall. We may contact the vet to see what they think. Here is a picture of her with her face behind our door just waiting for a shadow:

She sat this way for a good 30 minutes. One plus to this is we always know where to find her and it always looks like we have trained her to sit in time out. lol! 

*The kids were playing in the front yard a few weeks ago and the boys were trying to pull each other on a sled by just a skateboard. Well as you can assume, this didn't work so well and they were getting frustrated. I was out walking with my friend and so Tim decided to remedy the problem for them. He hooked up the sled behind the riding lawn mower and gave them rides around the yard. Can we say redneck? I was a bit shocked when I walked by our yard and saw this. He claims he was just helping the kids have a little fun. I am not sure I want to know what our neighbors think of us now. 

* I posted several low carb recipes on my recipe blog. If you would like to see them just look for the low carb label to the right. If you click on low carb all recipes under that label will appear. 

Scooter's Writing Assignment

Scooter's school has school wide writing assignments periodically through out the year. 

In November they had one and were asked to write about what Veteran's day meant to them. 

Here is what Scooter wrote:

"Veteran's Day means to me is to honor those who gave there all and those who have died or lost body parts, and how brave they are to sacrifice there self for our country, to how free they have made us and how free God has made us and how blessed we are with this country. So we will keep fighting and one day a horse will come down from heaven and on that horse Jesus will be riding down from heaven and Satan will tremble at his name. The Veteran's that we honor are not just for nothing, there for our country. So we will honor those who gave there all, so we will be blessed with this country and for there bravery, we honor them."

I was in tears reading this! This was FAR better than touchdowns, home runs or any award he could ever receive.  The boy is so very SMART and he soaks up all the scripture he hears. That is more motivation for me to surround my children with the word of God.

No Time today

My kids are up and I am off to start a very busy day......no time to write but PLEASE head over to Lucy's blog and read about how she is doing!!!! It will bless your heart to see how God has his healing hand on her, such a miracle....... I promise you don't want to miss it!

Faith

I am starting this book today:

I hate reading, I don't have much time for reading and I rarely finish a book I start.  This time is different.......since this year has proven to be a rather difficult one for me, I have been searching for a good bible study book that I could use during my quiet times each morning. 

One of my favorite blogs I read is Lysa Terkeurst (from Proverbs 31 ministries) and so I started searching through all the books she has wrote. I came across this one, What Happens When Women Walk In Faith. I read a small bit about it and thought I would give it a try.
Once I got the book in the mail I read the introduction and now I am both excited and scared! This is what just a small part of the introduction says:

The introduction starts out by saying every woman (and I think this can apply to men also) has a dream that is tailored to her talents and His purposes. Just as the Israelites were promised a land flowing with milk and honey if they only had the faith to move ahead and take the promised land. They had to overcome giants in the land and it struck fear in them. Such is true with each woman as she moves forward towards her dream. Obstacles come up and we have to have faith in God to get through them.

Now I am not so sure what my "dream" is, but I do know that during this particularly difficult year, that I find myself clinging to the promises of God. So for now my dream is God use me, mold me to be a woman of God and use me. Not sure how that will be and saying that and then surrendering to him is one of the scariest yet exciting things one can ever do.

Here is another part of the introduction that I liked:

"These are five phases of faith you'll pass through to achieve your dream:
1) Leaving: In order to go to a new level of faith with God, you've got to leave the old behind.
2)Famine: In this new place, you'll realize your comfort zone is gone and you'll learn to depend on God like never before.
3) Believing: You've always wanted to really believe God but now your experience of Him becomes too real to deny.
4) Death: Coming to the end of your ability to make things happen seems like death to you. But to God, this is the only way to new life with Him.
5) Resurrection: In a way only He could, God makes your dream come true. Only then do you understand that real joy isn't in the dream itself but rather in the richer faith you acquired along the way."

So I am off to read some more and start this scary yet exciting journey to walking in faith.
Say a prayer for me or better yet, join me....the world could use a lot more women (and men) truly walking in faith.

Some of my favorite verses

Here are a few verses that I seem to keep flipping through my bible to find lately.  They are so awesome and speak such volume to me. I love that I serve a God who always comforts me in my time of needs and to feel his overwhelming embrace, is something that I can't explain but I am so grateful for.

~Don't worry about anything; instead pray about everything. Tell God what you need and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God's peace which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:6-7

~For the mountains may move and hills disappear, but even then my faithful love for you will remain. My covenant of blessing will never be broken, says the Lord, who has mercy on you. Isaiah 54:10

~For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty savior. He will take delight in you with gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs. Zephaniah 3:17

~From the ends of the earth, I cry to you for help when my heart is overwhelmed. Lead me to the towering rock of safety, for you are my safe refuge, a fortress, where my enemies cannot reach me. Let me live forever in your sanctuary, safe beneath the shelter of your wings. Psalm 61: 2-4

~So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most. Hebrews 4:14

**These are all from The New Living translation **