Dr. Sean says…

My brother is a Medic in the Special Forces. Which means he knows everything (dentistry, birthin babies, vetrinarian, & everything else!), but isn’t technically licsenced to do any of it in the outside world (third world countries and military bases excluded). But still, I go to him with most of my bizzare medical questions.  For example…

When he was up in Raleigh visiting for his birthday(yes, I take every opportunity I can!) I asked him to take a look at my toe nail. It was numb and turning black and I wanted to know if I was gonna lose it.  You see, I was at the grocery store and when I wrestled the shopping cart out of its tangled nest-o-carts, it ran up and over my big toe. If you’ve never had that happen, let me assure you, it hurts. So, any who, he looked at it and said that, yes I would in fact lose my big toe nail soon. Great. Stupid shopping cart.

Just thought it would enrich your day to know that the toe nail on my right big toe is going to fall off. You’re welcome. Have a great day!

your crack is showing

I saw this commercial once for an anti-depression medication.  You know, the ones where its all sad and dark at the beginning, but at the end its all sunny and happy?  At the end of this particular commercial it showed one of the ladies who had been depressed jean shopping.  LOL, a guy OBVIOUSLY wrote that commercial, because jeans shopping is one of the most depressing things a girl can do! Right? Surely I’m not the only one?! But I’ve discovered something interesting about women’s jeans.  They are either super high mom-jeans, or they are so low all your junk hangs out.  A friend of mine called those low kind “standing room only”.  You know, the kind where they look great but as soon as you sit down you look like a plumber.  And is there anything worse than sitting behind (haha, good pun) a lady who doesn’t seem to know that her crack is showing? What do you do, tell her or let her just keep going about her breezy day?

One thing I’ve always been taught in Leadership Training is to “cover your leaders cracks”, and I always think about those jeans.  Haha and now you will too.  You’re welcome! But thats not exactly what that lesson is talking about, though sometimes it might, lol … I’m gonna stop now. Its talking about compensating for your leaders weaknesses instead of broadcasting them for the world to see.  Like say your boss is not very good at giving you deadlines for your projects.  Instead of complaining to your coworkers about how annoying it is that everything seems to be due NOW and everything is URGENT, when your boss gives you a new project you ask them what the deadline is and what the priorities are.  See? Covering the cracks.

The same is true with our husbands.  While they don’t wear “standing room only” jeans (hopefully!!), they do have faults.  And as their wife, we know those faults all too well! It seems so common to be in a group of women, and within 30 seconds the conversation always turns to husbands and thier faults.  And this is such a hard thing for me. The family I grew up in isn’t exactly the most positive, especially when it comes to men and thier abilities.  So its very easy for me to tell a story about something Jamie did that I didn’t like.  One of the things I try really hard to do now is to ask myself before I say something, “Is this uplifting or would he be embarassed for me to tell this story?”.  If its not uplifting and makes him look like anything less than the most amazing human being, I don’t say it. Granted, I’m still working on this, but at least I’m noticing what I am saying.  Next time you are in a conversation and it turns into male-bashing, say something super uplifting and encouraging about your husband and see what happens.  And the same concept applies to our children (selah!), but thats another post.

Whats even more, it goes beyond just what you say in front of others, what you tell yourself about your husband is super important!  Your thoughts become mindsets become attitudes become actions.  Lets look at an example.  Jamie and I differ on the way we put away dishes.  I have a particular spot for everything, and he is satisfied with everything being somewhere.  So the other day, I opened the silverware drawer and there were spoons of every shape and size all in the same section.  Instead of thinking, “Geez, can’t he just put the spoons in the right place? Its not THAT hard!”  I thought to myself, “Wow, he put the dishes away. He didn’t have to do that. How sweet!”  Beleive me, that is a major improvement and step forward for me! But it is so important.  If we aren’t our husband’s biggest fan, you don’t want to imagine who could fill that position.

So, ladies, just say NO to crack.

great resource

Hey y’all, Happy Monday! Unlike most people, I love Mondays.  I didn’t used to, but now Mondays are Jamie’s half day, so we get to hang out all morning.  And this particular Monday is exciting because Jamie comes home from Costa Rica!! Yay!! He has been having an awesome time with the Youth Team and doing some scouting for 2010.  And last night he even led a man to Christ! I’m so proud of him, he’s just awesome! And he comes home today! WooHoo… (can you tell I’m excited?! LOL).

Well, the past few days that Jamie has been in Costa Rica, I’ve had Charlotte all to myself.  Granted I’ve had A LOT of help from my just amazing “mother-in-love”, but I’m tired, haha! I have a couple posts in the works for ya, but I’m really wanting a little nappie time, so I’m gonna give you a really great resource, and save the meaty posts for later this week.

One of the best “women in leadership” books I have ever read is “I’ll Have What She’s Having” by Bobbie Houston.  Bobbie is the wife and co-pastor of Hillsong Church’s Brian Houston.  The book is really great! So you should go get a copy, and if you wanna borrow mine and wouldn’t mind all the notes in the margins, you can borrow mine! Happy reading…

a new direction

One of the turning points in my life was on my first mission trip.  While at an orphanage in Mexico, Pastor Micah pulled me aside and told me to “prepare myself” and then took me into the nursery of the orphanage where the infants were.  There was one little boy with whom I bonded instantly.  He was probably about 9 months old, and when I had to leave, he cried and cried and kept reaching his arms out to me.  It broke my heart.  And as I processed that grief with God, I realized that if for no other reason than to spend a few minutes with that little boy, to hold him, to give him love that he rarely received, that the whole trip was worth it.  And if all the heartache I’ve been through in my life could help encourage and change just one life, than it was worth it.

Being a stay-home mom has really begun to change my views on life.  I used to take a lot of pride in my knowledge, education, work, etc.  I’m a fairly intelligent person, I did very well in school, and I think I was good at my job.  I enjoyed having conversations with people when I knew what I was talking about.  I liked being the one who knew everything (but you’ve probably already guessed that if you know me at all).  But this whole mom business … I don’t have a clue!  Its so different than anything I’ve ever done before.  And I don’t feel like I know everything, or even have a slight idea about what things are.  So I’ve been soaking up as many resources and blogs and books as I can to try to learn what I don’t know, to see where I want to go and learn how to get there.

As I’ve been reading those blogs, I’ve begun to ask myself, what am I offering in my blog? What am I teaching, who am I encouraging? I know I can’t talk about mom stuff, or crafty things, or anything like that because I don’t know enough.  So I began to ponder, “what do I know?”  One thing that came to mind was that I am a pastor’s wife.  So I wondered, are there any blogs out there about that? There are, but mostly they are in very different denominations than I am, so their struggles are a little bit different.  On that note, I am going to begin taking a new direction with this blog.

As I said, if the things I’ve dealt with can help just one person avoid the heartache I’ve expereinced, then it was worth the tears.  So I want to share my journey as a young pastor’s wife, as a woman in leadership, as a mother in the spotlight, as a Christian in a glass house.  Some of you that read my blog may lose interest and others may find me because of this change.  But like I said, even if I help just one person, it’ll be worth it.

Here’s to a new start…

rhythms of life

Human beings are made up, in majority, of schedules, rhythms if you will.  Sleep and Wake.  Day and Night.  Work and Play.  Birth and Death.  Most of these rhythms you aren’t really aware of, you just do them.  For example, everyone has a bathroom routine.  Mine is as follows: turn on water as hot as it will go, brush my hair (keeps so much from going down the drain!), get in shower w/o touching the water, turn it back about half way, test it, turn it, test it, turn it, get in water, shampoo, rinse, conditioner, shave, wipe down shower/tub (might as well clean while I’m in there!), rinse, wash, rinse, turn off water, get out, dry off, lotion, brush hair, brush teeth.  Its a detailed routine, but I do it without even thinking, it just happens.  Like when you are driving somewhere familiar and you realize you don’t remember the last half mile… its on autopilot.  And many routines don’t develop out of conscious choice, but just out of one day leading to the next to the next.

But what happens when you get into a bad rhythm?  That’s when you have to consciously make a new rhythm.  I know I’ve talked a lot recently about Karen Jasmine’s class, but its just that good.  The thing we are learning and working on this week is to get ourselves into a new rhythm.  Not just letting our food choices happen, but making a thought-out decision about what to eat and when to eat it over the course of a whole week.  And one week becomes two weeks becomes three weeks becomes a month becomes a lifestyle.  That’s the goal.  A new lifestyle.

I noticed this morning that Jamie and I have developed a day-off morning routine that I’m starting to really really like.  I wake up with Charlotte at 7am, feed her and play until 8:30 when she goes down for a nap.  Then I go back to bed and Jamie gets up with her at 10am and plays with her until I wake up at 11am.  That way we both sorta get to sleep in.  I’m liking it. Granted, its not something we can do every day, but once a week ain’t bad!  Its the little rhythms, the little things in life that make it so sweet.

Does your family have any special rhythms?

simple love

I’ve had all these ideas to blog about, but nothing seems to form a complete thought, a complete sentence even.  But, not surprisingly, thats how my brain has felt lately.  Dull. Boring. Broken phrases. I seem to have hit some kind of mental road block, or maybe I just stalled out in the middle of traffic.  And I think the best way to get past it is to throw it into neutral, get out, and push.  To do that, I think I just need to start writing.  So if you will bear with me, this might actually end up with a coherent thought.  Then again… maybe not! Hehe!

Life feels like its in a holding pattern right now.  There are so many things on the horizon, but the horizon isn’t getting any closer.  Having the house on the market is great and exciting, but keeping the house in spotless condition is tough.  I feel like I can’t do anything.  I don’t want to get out the sewing machine and start any projects because I don’t want to have to rush to put it all away if we get a call from a realtor to show the house.  I feel like I’m living in someone else’s house.  Which I guess it kind of is since we want someone to buy it, lol.  But maybe I’m just using that as an excuse.  If I didn’t have to keep the house spotless and I could leave a sewing project out on the table for a day or two, would I? Or would I find some other excuse not to create.  I joke that HGTV is my creative outlet.  How sad is that? That I must live out my creative life vicariously through some stranger on tv?! I read all these blogs about all the wonderful things people are creating.  Why am I not doing this too?  I want to, I have ideas of things to do, I have dreams of things I want to create … so why am I not?

I just finished reading a really great book called “The 4:8 Principle”.  It talks about changing your habitual thought patterns to make your life more joyful and successful.  One of the things Tommy Newberry said was to visualize yourself doing what you dream of doing.  If your vision for your life is not crystal clear, then your brain doesn’t start taking steps to make it a reality.  Your brain doesn’t distinguish between vivid fantasy and reality.  So if you can visualize what you want your future to be in a clear and vivid way, then your brain thinks its reality and starts clearing mental road blocks and opening up “lost” information to make it so.  He suggested that you create a personal mission statement.  What do I want my life to look like in 5 years?  What do I want my family to be in 5 years?  What will I look back on 5 years from now and be grateful I did?  When I look back, what will I wish I hadn’t wasted my time on?

I love music, I really identify with emotions and life through that.  I heard a song recently by Allison Kraus called “Simple Love”.  It said, “I want a simple love like that, Always giving never asking back, When I’m in my final hour looking back, I hope I had a simple love like that”. Well, see for yourself…

I think thats a good place to start.

naked

Have you ever noticed that kids don’t like having their diaper changed?  I think its because they want to be naked, but we always insist on putting a stupid diaper back on just so they don’t pee all over everything (or poop, omw that would be awful).  As soon as they can, they start trying to take their clothes off.  And what adult wouldn’t honestly say that if they were the only human being on the entire planet, that they would walk around naked.  Its just the best.

And naked food is the best too. On Wednesday nights, I’m taking Karen Jasmine’s “Ladies Fitness and Nutrition” class.  It is simply amazing.  By no means is it your typical “eat right and exercise” type of class, no ma’am! She tells you like it is, no sugar coating (dadadum!), its in your face, honest-to-goodness stuff you need to hear.  My toes hurt, but its a breath of fresh air! To finally have someone be real about health and weight issues, to dig to the heart of the matter… its invigorating, and inspiring! The last class, Karen said something that I had technically heard before, but in a way that really struck me.  She pretty much said that if your food needs a label to tell you what it is, you probably shouldn’t be eating it.  Wow. How true? But NOOOOO One ever says that.   Too many people try to tell you what new diet food to eat or whatever, but if you just eat the foods that God made, the way He made them, you’ll be on the right track.  So, my goal is to slowly weed out the labels in my house.  Its a lofty goal, in this age of convenience (and oh am I the queen of convenient?!), but a healthy family is better than all that. Plus, the labels are big fat liars.  Funny story: I was at BJ’s the other day and saw a huge tub-o-peanut butter that said “Now made with No Partially Hydrogenated Oils”, and I thought “wow, I wonder what the ingredients are”, so I turned the tub over.  And they were right, they aren’t using partially hydrogenated oils, they are using fully hydrogenated oils.

[i had a really disgusting picture of hydrogenated oil to put here, but mozilla keeps crashing on me when i try to upload an image. sorry]

Sigh.  They must think we are all illiterate morons.  I embarassed my mom in the middle of BJs by laughing so loud about it. Isn’t it sad, that I was lured into looking at the ingredients because I was amazed a company would stop using a product that is dangerously unhealthy?  Sad times.  But there is a remedy, a solution, a way to fight back.

What changes can you make in your diet to make it more naked?  Or better yet, as Karen says, have a day where you eat just raw veggies… and I’m putting my twist on it, go NAKED one day! hehe, how fun would that be? (lets be real people, please don’t go around all nakie-free-bird, I’m talking about food here, geez).

I wonder how many hits I’m going to have because of the title, LOL.

internal mutiny

Have you ever noticed that you seem to be working against yourself sometimes? You do everything right, but then you somehow end up making some kind of mess along the way?  Or, you know what to do, but dont’ seem to do it?

We put our house on the market about 2 weeks ago.  And if you know me or know my parents, you’ll know that keeping the house spotless is a challenge.  And spotless is what it has to be every second of every day because you never know when someone will come for a showing.  If it took you 10 minutes to get all your gear and get out the door, it now takes you 30 minutes because you have to go through the house, straightening, turning on the right lamps, fluffing pillows, spraying yummy smelling room spray, and opening the blinds to “show off the view”.

Its always been my dream/goal/ambition to have a spotless house that people could show up at anytime and I’m not all embarrassed and rushing to hide the dirty dishes.  But now that I pretty much do have the house that way, I find myself purposefully not keeping everything 100% spotless. I tried it for a couple days, but I’m not comfortable in a pristine house, with no flaws or things to work on.  For example, the kitchen will be perfectly clean, but there is probably going to be one cup in the sink drying rack thing.  Or, the high chair is wiped down and clean, but I’m going to leave the bib hanging on it, “for next time”, of course.

I’ve always been good at analyzing people’s deeper motives, but when it comes to myself, I’m not so good (aren’t we all like that though?!).  But I’ve been pondering this… why do I do this, why can’t I be comfortable in a spotless house?  After much searching, I’ve come to a conclusion.

When the house is spotless, when there is nothing left to work on, accomplish, or tidy up, the only thing left to focus on is me, and what I need to work on inside myself.  As long as I can focus on the physical mess in front of me, I can effectually ignore any mess thats inside of me.  I think this is the same issue that meddling moms have.  They don’t have kids living in their home anymore, and therefore are forced to really see themselves, are unwilling to do that, so they seek out their adult children to continue fixing.  Its also the same when you can’t seem to turn off the noise, like tv or radio, or whatever.  Something HAS to be playing, HAS to be going on, otherwise you can hear your own voice (and the voice of the Holy Spirit, Selah), and you don’t wanna do that right now.

So, my new goal — keep the house clean which will therefore force me to spend time with me.  Sigh, I hope I’m still the best friend I remember!

and just where have you been?

Okay, so, we need to talk.  Its been a while, huh?  The combination of not having a computer at the house all the time, having a 10 month old, and just not having an interest in blogging for a while, has taken its toll.  Isn’t it always the things you harass other people about that gets you… lol.  So I’m going to try to turn over a new leaf.  I’m going to be blogging more regularly, and by regularly I mean at least once a week.  So check back. Or for those of you who have Google Reader, just wait for it to pop up there!

All righty then, lets get down to business.  I watched a new show last night on hulu.com (amazing website, probably my best friend).  Its called Glee.

Its about a teacher trying to revive the glee club at his cheerleader-dominated high school.  I was bored last night (Jamie was driving to High Point w/ Patrick for some Craigslist trade), so I watched it.  And I liked it.  Well, almost liked it.  The one thing that I’m sure is going to be a major theme in the show is the failing marriage of the teacher.  I mean, in episode 1 he’s complaining to his attractive co-worker about his marital problems… not a good start.  And I’m not sure how I feel about how they portray Christians with the football guys girlfriend being the President of the Celibacy Club … though it was pretty funny, “[kiss kiss kiss] hold on, let’s pray”.  If it wasn’t for the marriage issues, I’d really like this show. And I’m not sure if I should keep watching it or not.

We all want to hold high standards for our children, to teach them right from wrong, but yet we rarely hold those same standards for ourselves.  98% of the shows we watch are not suitable for Charlotte.  (Besides designing shows on hgtv, I can’t think of any that would be appropriate for her).  So why do we watch them?  I like to think that its because I’m an adult and can judge right from wrong, and even though I see/hear something wrong in a tv show, I know that is not how I will live my life.  Just because I see crazy serial killers on Bones/CSI/Law&Order, doesn’t mean that I’m going to go kill people.  Just because two unmarried characters are sleeping together on just about every show out there, doesn’t mean I’m gonna go shack up with someone.  BUT, when I watch stuff like that, it goes into my brain.  All that junk is in there somewhere.  BUT, I can’t hide myself from the world because when you are out and about among people you are going to see and hear things that aren’t “wholesome”, but you are able to differientiate between the good and bad.

Am I trying to justify wrong choices of entertainment, or overreacting about nothing?  What do you guys think? Where do you draw the line?

now or later

With all the babies being born or about to be born in the church, I have been thinking about the strangeness of exactly how we came to be who we are.  Just think.  If you had been conceived just one month earlier or one month later, you would be a completely different person.  Or… if even one day later, you could be a totally different person!  The complexities of genetics are amazing.  If my parents hadn’t “accidentally” had me (yeah, thats right, I was the “we didn’t plan on having more children, but oops” baby!) when they did, if it had been any other time, I wouldnt be me. Which means I wouldnt be married to Jamie which means I wouldn’t have Charlotte.  If Jamie and I had tried for a baby earlier or later, Charlotte wouldn’t be Charlotte.  But the Bible says that God knew us before we were formed in our mommas bellies (I hate that “w” word, sorry).  So, our parents had free will to “do” when they “did”, but yet God knew who we would be.  Think about that for a minute and tell me your brain doesn’t hurt!!  So, if Jamie and I wait longer to have another baby, who is that baby going to be?  If we had a baby now, who would THAT baby be?? What if the baby we would have now is better than the baby we would have in like 6 months??  But if God knows our children before we do, does he have like a set list of children for us, and He combines the necessary genes together to make that particular child?  Like if I saw the index card for my parents children, would it have said “Erin, Sean, Jennifer” years and years and years before my parents were even born?  Woah, what if there were supposed to be other siblings… Okay, my brain is kinda hurting.  Oh, and then think about that family with 19 kids (the Duggars). Did God really have a list of all those kids?  And then that brings me into the conversation about Gods Will and Biology. I won’t go there today, maybe another post.  Anyway… so my concluding thought to tie it all together is this… God made me exactly the way I am, no accidents, and He made my daughter exactly the way He wanted her to be, and He will make all my children exactly according to His plan.  I just have to trust and hope (confident expectation!!) that I’ll hear His voice and know when the right timing is to have more children.

Sigh, enough of that for one evening. Time to go to sleep!! ttyl!