close

closer

looking out on the river

the boys

logs and trees on the river

the falls

Three Things Thursday

Husband edition:

1. my in-laws are in town this weekend for
it's going to be a fun weekend. we have a banquet to go to on friday night and we are going to do some shopping and the guys are going to go tubing down a river on sunday. it's good to see my in-laws because i haven't seen them since christmas.

2. my hubby's graduation and
he is graduating on saturday and we are very excited that he's done. well not really because he still has an independant study class to finish and then he will be done. but he gets to walk this weekend.

3. he's graduating with two masters.
his masters are in counseling and a masters of divintiy.

Sending a Shout Out...new blog buddy

hey friends! i just wanted to introduce you guys to my really good friend

doraj at the blog Quiet. she is a friend of mine from college. we met our freshman year in college and became fast friends and have been ever since. i was a bridesmaid in her wedding and she was one in mine and i just love her lots. she wants to be a Three Things Thursday player so i wanted to let all you bloggers out there to know about her and to check her blog out.

Welcome to the fun doraj!

Chapter 3 Haunted

Are we haunted by Eve? Do we deal, on a daily basis, with the fear of abandonment or is our core question "am I lovely?" Why do so few women have anything close to a life of romance? Lonliness and emptiness are far more common themes. Are most of your relationships with women fraught with hardship? Is our lonliness a problem because our relationship with God isn't right or in check. What are your deepest worries or fears? Is it, will I be a good wife, will I have children one day, will I be a good mom, will I make friends, am I good enough to be all these things or more? Are you a dominationg woman or are you a desolate woman?

So many questions and so few answers right now. Most of them need to be searched out in your own lives and heart and that is one reason that I feel drawn to this book Captivating, because it really helps you to take a look at your own life and to answer some questions that you wouldn't necessarily think on your own.

Eve failed as Adam's ezer kenegdo. Rather than bringing him life, she invited him to his death. And Adam failed Eve as well. He offered not his strength but his silence; not his protection but his passivity.

We hide only our truest selves and offer only what we believe is wanted, what is safe. Ladies stop hiding. We need each other and the encouragement and friendships of others. Open up and share your lives with those around you. Here are a few encouraging words that a good friend of mine shared with me just this week prior to our study: I think we can all learn from each other...especially you. I would encourage you to just be vulnerable and honest with your answers...which I know is difficult sometimes, but we will all benefit from hearing each others struggles and victories!! I'm sure you are doing this already, but prayerfully consider what the Lord is saying to you as you work through the chapters. I am really excited to do this study with you and am so glad you are in this group---we need you! Don't let Satan enter your thoughts and try and tell you that your answers are wrong or too different to share! Speak out sister, you probably have some powerful things to share and Satan is afraid of what may happen if you voice them. "God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and love." The SON is shining :) What an awesome encouragement she was to me when I most needed it. This is what we need. This is what I need.

Three Things Thursday

favorite pictures

1. pretty much anything by Jack Vettriano but especially

this one

there is just something elegant and beautiful about it.

2.

this one

was one that i got as a graduation presant from high school and i took it with me to college where i had it hanging in my dorm room for three out the four years that i lived there. it's still one of my favorites.

3. i'm not sure where or when i saw

this picture

but i love it and i would love to have a copy of it one day. i think the princess/romantic in me loves it.

Side by Side

Shadow

Red

Blue and White

Flowers from my Hubby

Before

After

View from balcony

lamppost

Relax

Open

Three Things Thursday

MAIL

1. i love to get mail. mainly letters in the mail. bills are not fun. ever since i was little it was a huge thing for me to be able to check the mail and the excitement of actually have something in the mail addressed to you. to insure that happened.........

2. me and a good friend of mine started to write letters to each other because he too knew my obsession with getting mail and i guess he had one too. so we would send each other letters through mail even though we both lived in the same town and saw each other at least twice a week. that transfered into another friend who wanted to get in on the mail action so i had two people that i was getting mail from and sending mail too.

3. now me and and my best friend are regular snail mail senders. although i am a big slacker in the sending letters area. see it's my turn and it's been my turn for about a month and a half now. i need to get on it. sorry T, i love you.

Chapter 2 Going to the beginning with Eve

Diving into the second chapter of Captivating I found myself discouraged. I wasn't feeling inspired as the first chapter left me and the discouragement came from a majority of the chapter talking about unveiling beauty and why it matters. And while I long to be the beauty, I found myself frustrated and not feeling like it. So that's where my frustration and discouragement was left.

However, what excited me about the chapter was...well picture this (as the Eldredge's put it)
Darkness over everything and God's breath over the waters, then the voice speaks, "Let there be light." On and on the voice, God's voice speaks bringing more and more things into creation........land, water, grass, trees, fish of the sea, birds of the air, land animals and man. The master piece seems complete, yet somthing isn't right and then God creates Eve. The finishing touches on His creation, His master piece. We, as women, aren't second thoughts but the finale. As women we don't normally think like that but we should be encouraged that that was the plan in our creation.

This was one aspect of the chapter that captured me. The other was that we are created in the image of God, male and female He created them. Women are relational right? Well those same desires we have as women, longing for love, to be sought after, desired, God wants those things too, from us.

Back to my frustration with the chapter. Sometime after speaking to my husband and sharing with him, my frustration with part of the chapter and my internal struggles in our group I mentioned about how I desire for our house to be neat, clean, the bed made, all that good stuff but I sturggle with actually accomplishing those things and he said, maybe that's one way that you unveil beauty and I just stopped ranting (which I do) and smiled at him thinking that was the coolest thing that he could see past all the struggles into the beauty and maybe what I was longing to see myself. And in all that my frustration became my joy.

Taking you Back.

remembering..... platform shoes, bell bottoms, disco's, flower power, polyester, leisure suits, "All in the Family", "The Mary Tyler Moore Show", Chicago and The Bettles. here's just some of the things to take you back to the 1970. some friends of ours did that just last weekend. we threw a 70's disco party and had a blast dancing to so great music and just hanging out together.

Three Things Thrusday.....hobbies

it's been really busy around here. about 2 weeks ago my boss came in to work and asked us if we wanted some time off in june. why we ask? he then tells us that he was asked by the school that he graduated from to be the lead doctor on a mission to Fiji.

oh my gosh! so here we are trying to take this news in and the other girl that i work with says, "are you going to take us with you?" it was like a lightbulb went off in his head and he said yeah. by thursday afternoon we had a meeting about it where he said that he would take us me and the two other girls that i work with and pay for the trip.

AHHHHHHHHHHHH! this is so amazing. so the next week i then ask him about my husband coming too, fully aware that we would be paying for his trip and the next day he tells me yeah there's enough room for him to go too.

oh and there's more. so as my hubby's talking to the travel agent that is setting it all up she tell him that we should stay a couple more days on the main island and have a vacation since we probably will never get back there. i ask for the time off and get the coverage and so now we're staying there about 4 more days.

the hole trip was a huge blessing in and of itself because it's been somewhere my husband has wanted to go for a long time and then on top of that we are going to get to help people while we are there.

1. knitting

2. reading

3. if i had a bike then i guess it would be riding my bike