Carl, Ellie and Naise Life

For those of you who do not know, my Granddad passed away four years ago.  When he passed, unfortunately, a giant rift was created on my Mom's side of the family.  My Mom felt she was slighted by the aunt who was in charge of the estate and it created this tension, hurt, and bitterness.  Since then, I think I can count on one hand the number of times my Mom and said aunt have been in the same room...let alone talked.   One thing that people learn about me is that I am deeply loyal to and love my family.  It hurts that we cannot be a big family like we were when my grandparents were alive.  I have cried about it during prayers multiple times...I have prayed for restoration. I have prayed for healing and forgiveness.  Unfortunately, my Mom has allowed the enemy to stay put in bitterness, hurt, and unforgiveness.  Last Christmas my cousin, Adam, texted his sister and me about having a big family Thanksgiving again.  I have talked about mi...

I can't . Two words.  One huge impact. Since our vacation at Table Rock Lake began, those two words have come out of my mouth more than I wish they had.  Granted, they were not without a certain someone telling me to get rid of them altogether in my vocabulary and my mindset.  Here are three cases of recent times when these two small words came out of my mouth. Before I begin, though, with these cases, let me just include the following as a little background for the first two...I am not a strong swimmer.  In fact, my swimming ability is pretty close to level zero.  I took swimming lessons when I was little, but after a near-drowning incident at a young age, it was like my brain lost all of that training and took me back to nothing.  I am notorious for plugging my nose to go underwater.  I hate jumping in unless I can plug my nose.  I pretty much just float around or tread water when I'm in it.  Now, in saying this, keep in mind...

Today begins National Infertility Awareness Week.  I changed my Facebook profile photo and added one of the borders, not to get comments or likes, but just to honor this week and all of us that suffer from infertility.  I began working on this post last week, as part of a series I'm working on for a teen girl's ministry I'll be starting up in the fall.  I finally finished it this afternoon, so I'm sharing it on here as well. _________________________________________________________________________ It was the summer of 2017.  I had just found out a month prior that I was pregnant with our first child.  Something that we both had been wanting for years and finally after five years of infertility (tests, needles, medicines, diet changes), we were going to be parents.  I could not have been more excited.  We took pictures.  We laughed.  We got strict about certain things -- Brandon's biggest was that there was to be no cell phone anywhe...

This is a new chapter for us - 2018. I have 34 previous chapters that have ranged from the highest of highs to the lowest of lows, but the start of my 35th chapter is this year (my 35th birthday is only a couple of weeks away).  As I have said in the past, I am one who finds that music speaks to different phases in my life.  This year, 2018, is no different.  I have not seen this movie yet, but definitely want to...but this particular song is my 2018 anthem.  It has been on loop since I heard it.  Which, by the way, was yesterday...that is how powerful this song grasped me.  Before I really begin writing, I really want you to watch this video, or listen to it and read the lyrics below.  Then I'll "come back." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLFEvHWD_NE   This Is Me I am not a stranger to the dark Hide away, they say 'Cause we don't want your broken parts I've...