A Great Day!

Today was the funnest day! Johnny & I took Ethan and Sophie to church at like 7:30am and they watched DVDs and ate poptarts in Daddy's office as we began to rearrange Pastor Dale's office. (FINALLY!) I think we've been planning on doing this since November?!? Taylor and Carter were off with Grandma & Grandpa and after 1 1/2 hours with the little guys we dropped them off with the 'rents too. Then we made a nice trip to IKEA (my favorite!) and got a lot of stuff to hook Dale up!

We got back around 1pm and spent the next several hours assembling, rearranging, sorting and hiding a lot of CRAP!!! I broke so many stinkin' nails today!!! Finally at like 4:30 we "saw the light" and were finally making noticible progress. Dale had a lot of CRAP! (Very important crap I am sure...but meh-ssy!) It's a wonder the guy can get anything done living in that clutter. It really DRIVES ME CRAZY!!!! So I am feeling much better tonight knowing things are much more organized!!!

I really am dying to hear his reaction! He is totally going to pee in his pants with excitement it is just so freakin' cool! I really can't believe we made it look as good as we did! I really think this is my "spiritual gift" (ha ha)...it would have made a really good show on TV. The "before" and "after" are dramatic contrasts!

I am so excited!...Does that make me totally pathetic?

Excuse Me, Waiter, There's a...

This is SO GROSS! Ok so tonight my parents took the boys to go "camp out" at Grandma & Grandpa's new house...so Johnny & I decided to go out on a date (with Sophie) and get some dinner and do some shopping. So Johnny & I decide to head toward the Northridge Mall. We decided to try out the Wood Ranch BBQ which we heard was really good but a little more pricey than say Chili's. So we went in...it seemed really nice. Sophie was a dream...she was just being so plesent and such a sweatheart to be around. We decided to split an entree add a salad, get an appetizer and Johnny got a $6 beer. So the meal was int he $35-40 range. Yikes! But we thought, "What the heck, we don't get the opportunity often!" So the food came...it was REALLY good although the portions were kinda skimpy. Anyway, Sophie is sharing with all of us. As Johnny is finishing up the mashed potatoes, Sophie and I were working on the Ceasar salad. We had eaten everything green on the plate and Sophie popped away the last crouton. Then she was looking at the plate and said, "Ewwww mommy, a bug!" I couldn't even believe it! There on the plate was a baby fly with part of his wings missing covered in parmesean cheese and sitting on my salad plate. I was SO GROSSED OUT!!!! Nasty!!! I mean really!!! You don't expect that from such a nice place!!! And then they only wanted to comp us our $3 salad and $3 appetizer. What a load of crap! $6 is all it's worth for someone to find a fly in their food! (And God only knows were the rest of the wings are. I thought I was going out for a nice meal...not an episode of Fear Factor!) So Johnny pressed the manager and they gave us the whole meal for free. Our legacy lives on!!! Way to go Sophie!!! What's a little fly wing if it saves you a forty dollar meal?!

I still am completely without appetite. The thought of it is still really gross!

It truely is a Good Friday!

Wow...well, after last night...I just feel...I don't know......understood...and not so alone.The Maundy Thursday service was really good for me. Man, I was just lost in worship...it's been a while and I've been thirsty for it...so thirsty. So I felt in many ways God was showering me with his grace and coming to my rescue. And today I felt relieved...understood...satisfied...at rest.

So this Friday has been a GOOD reminder to me of the love that was poured out for me years ago on that cross...but also the love that is poured out on me everyday. In my faltering or my victory His love never ceases to flow. And God knows I need it. Daily. To feel His presence...to be overcome by His love...that is the ONLY thing that then empowers me to love others. (Which lately has sometimes become harder to do.)

"In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and His love is perfected in us."

1 John 4:10-12

Oh, to be perfected in that love!

Creeping Me Out!!!

Ok so this week started off pretty bad. i woke up Wednesday morning to find a half eaten dead rat on my front door step (I am NOT even kidding!) and then later went to the bathroom and realized I was starting my period AGAIN after only ten days of freedom since last month's ended. NO wonder I was feeling depressed and already raided the kids Easter candy. (Thank God I didn't give anything up for lent!) I just thought how could it get any worse than this? It this a bad omen? Singn of things to come? I mean, come on...a dead rat! I kept thinking of the scene in the Godfather when that guy woke up to find a horse head in my bed. However I quickly ruled out the local mob or the Satanists when I realized I had seen a pretty scruffy stray cat the day before give me an ugly look.

That was just so freakin' creepy!

Proverbs 25:21-22

"If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat, and if he is thirsty , give him water to drink, for you will heap burning coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you."

I don't really have control over not being hurt. I will continue to be hurt. It is so hard to live in these two realms. One fully aware of the situation and the other pretending like nothing ever happened. Living in this fake reality totally goes against who I am. But it's not my job to change people. All I can do is seek the Lord, find my refuge in His strength and be abundantly filled with love-even if that is what got me in trouble in the first place.

I will not cease being me - the me God created me to be - even if that makes people uncomfortable and exposes sin issues or whatever. It's like what Nathan said last night, I will continue to be honest (which at times can be harsh), but I need God to fill me with His grace so that my every response and action brings God the glory even if I am being treated unfairly in the process.

God, whatever you are doing may it simply drive me to your throne facedown in worship...what more could I ever ask for or desire?

Purposely Pursuing Passion

I've been so reminded this week of what it is like when you are serving in your area of passion. On Sunday, man seeing Nathan worship with every fiber of his being, it was like, "Man, that is what you were created to do!" And then the same thing I noticed Monday night at the Beth Moore Bible Study. That lady is passionate about teaching the truths of God.

Sometimes I struggle with that because I feel like I gave up my own personal passions when I became a mom. I love my kids and I love raising them up in the Lord...but it hasn't come without a cost...and now that the kids are getting older I am really being reminded of the passions I once had for ministry and I wonder if I am ever gonna be able to recapture that again...

Ah...more contemplation.

Stuck on Sunday

Ya know...this week has been weird for me. Some really good highs and still some moments of thoughtful contemplation that leave me sad and depressed. My marriage has seemed to have taken a turn for the best this week. Johnny & I are really connecting even in the chaos of life. There is more of a feeling of teamwork - like we're in this together and we've got to both be diligent to battle life and fight for time with the family. On Friday I was actually able to get the house clean, wash, fold AND put away the laundry BEFORE Johnny got home AND I cleaned the bathrooms! That was QUITE an accomplishment! (I thought this might be a sign of the Lord's retuning...but no such luck...)

But today I went to church and was just overcome with the feeling of loss over a recent friendship that for all practical purposes has ended as I predicted it would. It makes me sad...and lonely.To know someone and feel known by them...to have the access and freedom to be willing to share your "Real" self and then have that all go away...it still is painful for me.

I recently read a Christianity Today interview with Eugene Peterson (author of The Message) and he was discussing the term "spirituality". He was talking about true Christianity being in relationship with people where you are open, honest and vulnerable. That is where the true Christian life is lived out. And what hurts so much is that I feel like I had that (or was really close to living that way in community) and now it's gone. But the "friendship" remains and I am forced to now go on living life and moving back to the surface (chit-chatting about taxes, or the kids or whatever, or the "How are you?" "Fine." surface level fluff) when my heart is longing to reconnect. I guess I just struggle with just letting go of something that was once very precious to me.

It hasn't really gotten all that easier with time...it still hurts. It makes conversation awkward. All I want to do is just sit down for an hour and find out how my friend is REALLY doing...but I fear that is a priviledge I am no longer allowed to have. And that makes me really sad.

I still haven't yet learned how to live in this "new normal"...it still hurts from time to time...and I'm not really sure how to just let it go...so I still feel somewhat stuck...and sad.

Was this how it was supposed to end up? Is it just done, and this is now what life is like? Hmmm...Talk about regret...

I just miss my friend.

"Recapturing Malia"

I am feeling a bit run down from my life as a mom, wife, housekeeper, chef, nurse, tutor, p.e. coach, interpretur, butt wiper, referee, and personal slave. I am dying to "Recapture Malia". I want to be utilized for me; who I am apart from what I do as a wife and mother. I want to remember the "Malia" side of me. The side of me that holds my passions and my secrets locked up, the side of me most people don't know...but the side of me that gets me out of bed each morning and keeps me pressing on. I long for the day where I am no longer defined by the number of kids I have and therefore put in a box and told where my place is in the world. I love my kids and I love raising them...I just want to do something I am passionate about FOR ME every once in awhile...but I don't really know if that is even possible...