The Mothership

”So get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives, and humbly accept the word God has planted in your hearts, for it has the power to save your souls.“ ‭‭James‬ ‭1‬:‭21‬ ‭NLT‬‬ What word has God planted in your heart that has the power to save your soul? A friend of my called me the threader. My family is interconnected through threads. What they pickup from me will determine if they are able to bend and flex or if they will be tight with tension. If my stress and angst is known, then my threads are taut and unable to be flexible. But if I am looking for the peace in all situations, my threads are able to move freely, and yet with intention. Depending on circumstances, my husband or I or even a child help keep the peace. We talk a lot about “keeping the peace” not with the intent to people please. But with the thought of how can we come to each interaction, love the person well, with a lens of boundaries that helps keep the peace in our hearts? Peace is always accessible, ...

In church we have been going through a series titled "Emotional by Design." Knowing I am emotional is not a mystery to most of you. However, if for some reason this is the first time you've stumbled upon my writings, this is something that is integral to the understanding of my mind.  Writing about how emotional I am, or why it is a good thing and not a bad thing or how God has wired me, is not for this post. But, I did want to give you backstory of where something came to mind. During one of the services my pastor was discussing healthy emotions and unhealthy emotions. I went back to thinking of a time when my emotions, thoughts, and every part of my being were unhealthy. My heart immediately rushed out to the years of my adolescence. The actual feelings of loneliness, depression, comparison, and insecurity flooded my body with physical reactions. Isn't that amazing that the memory of a feeling has the ability to bring you back in to a crippling state of anxiety and ...

So many people have said so many words. Some words are worthy to stand behind and others not so much. I am not here to debate but simply to pour out my words that I’ve been chewing.  My husband and I sat and watched the beginning of a series called “1968” and for a moment my heart was heavy. I thought, “this was so long ago and yet the same issues.” I think, through years and years of blood sweat and tears, there have been advances and more and more people are “woke,” to civil injustice than before. But the fact of the matter is, there is still an enemy at large. Still an enemy to fight and battle every single day. Everyone’s battle looks different. And just when it seems we have an upper hand on it, that same enemy shows his face again and again. Not just in violence but in fear, sickness, anxiety, depression, division, and on and on.  And you know what? The ONLY thing keeping that enemy from winning my battle is HOPE. The only thing that can truly and completely drive out th...

My heart hurts. It hurts for those who have to feel the loss of a loved one. For those who deal with pain, physically and mentally, on a daily basis. It hurts for those that don’t feel loved. And it hurts for those that feel they have to hurt others. I have been trying to formulate words about the violence in our world. I feel with every fiber of my heart what I’m sure is only a spec of the pain that God feels when we hurt. During worship one evening I feel like he encouraged me with this. I hope this encourages you. A girl runs effortlessly through a field in the midst of a valley. She runs with abandoned insecurities. She twirls as if there is nothing to loose. Some days she runs and some days she walks through the valley taking in all the details. It’s a familiar place. And all she can see is beauty before her. Joy spread across her cheeks. Joyful because she knows the love and the protection that lies within. She KNOWS his voice. It is written on her heart, in her mind, and s...

Everyone has them... Some show them more than others... Some show more of them than others... Emotions...I have them big and small...and for all the days. Some people process their emotions in different ways - silence, yelling, tantrums, and the most common for me...TEARS.  Big fat ones all the time stroll down my face for happy, sad, compassion, joy, tired, hangry, exhausted, hormonal, angry, embarrassed, scared, nervous, or just processing life... All of these emotions bring the same result...TEARS And you know what, I don't think I'm worse for wear because of them; my tears or my emotions.  I hear from my old self and others, apologies for tears. Apologies for emotions.  And I'm not sure that's the appropriate response. Since when do I need to apologize for the way I feel? Everyone feels differently and it manifests in everyone differently.  It's what we do with the emotions, how we react, that warrant an apology.   I believe a lot of u...

To my friend whose life has changed since Thanksgiving...hearing your voice speak THAT word... such an ugly word; chemo...cancer. And they both mean the same thing essentially...poison in the body. And yet, might I say, you are NOT changed for the worst. This disease is only that, a disease.  You have NOT let it define you! I will never know a day in your shoes, and nor will I ever pretend to know what your mind, heart, and body have been through. But there are some things you have taught me these past 7 months. You have taught me... there is absolutely NO excuse to not getting my laundry folded...not even the fitted sheets. my excuses for NOT exercising carry no weight...they are just empty words. what humility looks like...accepting and receiving help is not easy - at least I know not for you and me. how smart and clever you are. I knew it before, but the amount of information you keep in your head - even after children and chemo - is astounding. that children are const...

Comparison is the thief of joy - Theodore Roosevelt I feel as if I live a fairly joyous life. Yeah. I would say I am generally happy. I have beautiful kids, my husband and I have fun together and walk in relationship with Jesus...and many other blessings. I am a fairly positive person moving through life...and yet the enemy can still attack...not often, but he does it just enough.  And it is usually when I have realized a different piece in my calling.   He attacks me in my identity and tries to plant lies. He tries to strangle those seeds that God has planted and that are growing and squish the life from them.  The way he does this to me is mostly through comparison. He whispers: they are more fun than you they are nicer than you they are a better mom than you you are not looking like a Christian that person doesn't like you because you're not ... they are better at everything than you you are not enough And on and on it goes until I put a stop to it beca...

Good night sweet heart, well it's time to go... Good night sweet heart, well it's time to go... I hate to leave you, I really must say, Oh, good night sweetheart, goodnight. Sad emoji face... Such sweet words... I sang this to all my sweet babies after they would fall asleep from a nightly feeding.  Oh how I enjoyed those feedings.  Maybe not the waking up part.  But most definitely the snuggling, and inhaling the sweet smell of that baby. I believe that this time has come to an end... I have been blessed with three beautiful babes and am so thankful for all their different characters and personalities.  But, I always, obviously not realistically, envisioned myself as a Mother of young children. so this is hard, people... We recently switched the nursery, that I so carefully planned, into my 4 yr old daughter's bedroom.  No more nursery.  I always knew that the end of my baby making years would be rough, but I did not expect to be...

I was supposed to have surgery today... but God had bigger plans for me.  Bigger plans than I could have ever dreamed. They always say healing happens, and when it happens it is usually not just for physical healing but for some kind of transformation...well, He's been working on more than my wrist. About a year ago I tore cartilage in my wrist...opening salsa...I know, true story.  Who does that ?  Anyway, it became so painful that I went to a doctor and after a few tests decided that surgery was the next step.  The doctor left it up to me as to when I should have surgery...having an 18 month old and surgery don't really mix.  So I waited...talked to God a bit...waited... and the pain increased. I could no longer do a push-up, open a can of beans, garden, clean the house, shake an inhaler for my son, lift my toddler into his car seat, crab-walk across a gym, pretend to be a horse for my kids to ride, sleep through the night without waking in pain...on a...

I've been convicted.  My heart needs a change.  At times, this mothering thing is more difficult than I would have ever thought.  I hate looking back on things and having regrets...and I indeed can think of many times when I have reacted in a way that brings me a feeling of regret.  None of them are some huge, tragic incident that deems this horrific display of parenting.  It's just the day-to-day simple life happenings - which shouldn't get me in such a tizzy - and yet I'm afraid that my children are going to remember me for these reactions instead of a graceful, patient, and merciful mom.  I can be better. I read a blog post on Momastery and she wrote about "Mompetition".  Moms performing and doing amazing things with their child, posting about it on Facebook, and her sarcastically saying that these moms are clearly doing all these things AT HER. Exercising...AT HER, cooking fabulous meals...AT HER...epic birthday parties...AT HER, breast/bottle f...

Luke has recently really gotten into saying his prayers at night.  I have tried to compile some of our dialog during prayers.  They usually start out this way: Me: You want to say prayers? Luke: MmmHhmmm Me: Let's do it then. Luke: Dear Godt, kay-you for me, kay-you for mommy, Cece, kay-you for Daddy, kay-you made me and my torpedos. Amen and another time... Luke: Dear Godt, kay-you for making trees, and gorillas, and my family...AAAAAANNNNDDD my CARs another... Luke: Godt, kay-you for mommy, daddy, Cece, and kay-you make me, and Dave and Jess, and Dave and Ho-hawk (mo-hawk).  Amen.  Dave do that again? another... Luke: Dear Godt, kay-you for make me, my house, my food, my cool house, and for my toads, yeah toads...they say croak, me see toads morrow? Amen. another one...(this one really gets me right there ya know) Luke: kay-you for my mommy, my daddy, Cece, and...., and..., and...Mommy you so beautiful:) As you can tell, prayers are a compil...

My grandma and I were very close.  In fact we didn't even call her Grandma, we called her "Bobbie."  Every weekend, two of the five of us would spend the night with her.  Somehow I was special...I spent almost EVERY weekend with her.  I LOVED my Bobbie and couldn't do most things without her.  I don't think a day, or maybe two, would go by without talking to her. I remember... ...how she would let me put on makeup and nail polish.  On the way home on Sunday mornings, I would be peeling off the nail polish so my parents wouldn't know.  It was just between us.  ...how she would feed us grapes and soup in the bathtub.  And after the bath, use all her fancy powder brushes to powder our bodies.  Plus the feeling of the nice, warm, night gowns that she would heat up in the dryer for us. ...her taking me to the beauty parlor every Saturday morning to sit and talk with the older ladies while Bobbie "got her hair done." ...watching Touc...

It is amazing how God makes himself known and quite boldly. Recently, I have had a hard time disciplining Luke and then feeling VERY guilty about how I handled each situation.  I also have been struggling with the want to CHANGE Luke's aggressive behavior and sometimes only seeing the "bad" things he does instead of focusing on what Luke does well.  This is another side-effect of being a people pleaser.  I have been praying for many weeks now that I have more peace and understanding of how to handle Luke and love his heart just the way it is, and of course to have more patience (I mean, what parent DOESN'T pray for more patience). I read a quote the other day saying, "Don't try so hard to fix your kid and forget that you already have a good one."  I believe God put that there for me to see because right after reading that some things in the house have changed...now, everything is not hunky-dory, but I am beginning to see Luke in a new light. Luke i...