journey to 30 #2 again

after talking about my man I thought maybe you needed a reminder of how cute he is. So here he is, with Max just to up the cute factor.

have I ever told you how much I love him? cause I do.

journey to 30 #2

Slow starting on these journey to 30 posts. It's the start of a new school year and I am up to my neck in college students. I LOVE it, but it means less time for life.

#5. I want to be a submissive, supportive, helpful, and encouraging wife

Adam and I are entering a season where we are trying to be super intentional about our relationship. Our wonderful community group is studying Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas. We've just begun, but I've already enjoyed talking as a group about the purpose of marriage. Thomas states that God designed marriage not to make us happy, but to make us holy. I've been challenged by this line of thinking. Whenever I get frustrated with Adam because he doesn't understand my thoughts, my heart, or my needs I try to remember that those moments can cause me to throw myself at the foot of God to find what I seek. Instead of hashing it out with Adam so that I'm better understood and thus more happy, I take my heart to the throne of my Savior and ask Him to simply remake me to make me more like Him. It is a very selfless view to take, and completely contrary to my nature, but by the grace of God I can be transformed.

Each Friday night Adam and I are having "marriage night." We're discussing Sacred Marriage and then doing something to intentionally build our relationship. We've played a super fun little marriage mad lib game and we took a really great quiz about perspective in marriage.

I'm excited. I can't wait to look back in two years to see the glorious work God has done in our hearts. I expect big things from my Jesus and big things from my marriage. Truly, my heart's desire is that our marriage would make us more holy, that our relationship would serve as a fashioning tool for God to make us like His Son.

the one that's funny

Sorry its been a few days since I posted. My life is insane right now: it is the start of the Fall semester and my life is overtaken by college students. Which I LOVE. But, it makes for super late nights, no sleep, no time with my beautiful family. It'll all calm down soon. I don't have much energy to give you a thoughtful post, but here is a funny post.

Adam was comforting Chloe Belle when she was really upset. Jimmie and Max decided they needed to be comforted, too. They just hopped up in his lap for a little loving. It was awesome.

the one with the painting

Beth's little Joey will be arriving soon. I painted him a little something for his nursery. It's meant to match his bedding. So fun!

the one where I love mornings

I love mornings with Chloe Belle. When I get her out of the crib she only wants one thing: milk. She's pretty uninterested in me. But I love that about 10 minutes into nursing, she gets enough milk in her belly and is ready to love me. She'll roll back on the boppy and put her little hand on my cheek to say good morning. She'll play with my hair and stroke my cheek then go back to eating. She repeats this little cycle every few minutes. It's as if she doesn't want to go too long eating without stopping to say, "I love you mommy!" It's precious.
I love my baby girl.

journey to 30 #1

At last. My first Journey to 30 post. I've been thinking and mulling over these things for over a month now, and I'm glad to be getting them out. Here's my list:

By the time I'm 30 [July 9, 2012] I'd like these things to be a reality in my life:

1. I want to be an obedient, fruitful disciple of Christ
2. I want to have a intimate, abundant, authentic prayer life with the Lord
3. I want to commit more Scripture to memory [for reals-not just rote memory where it's forgotten a month later]
4. I want to share the Gospel once a week
5. I want to be a submissive, supportive, helpful, and encouraging wife
6. I want to be a godly, encouraging, inspiring, and nurturing mother
7. I want to become more involved in matters of social justice; including praying more for social justice issues around the world, educating myself more on needs and how I can meet them, and most importantly...
8. Adam and I want to begin the process of adoption to graft a child in need into our loving family.
9. I want to be more healthy; including cooking and providing healthy meals for my family and making exercise an important, habitual part of my life.
10. I want to learn how to sew and crochet so I can make little pretties for my children.

whew. This is alot, but I'm so excited about living with intentional purposes. I'm going to be talking about these goals alot on my blog. Please leave comments and let me know how you're pursuing your own goals. Let's keep each other accountable to grow and flourish as we're lavished with love and grace from our Father. Yay! So excited!

the one with the winner!

Thanks so much for participating on my last post. I thought it would be fun to have you join in, but it was more than just fun-I really enjoyed hearing what you wanted to be different in your life. I have written down what you said, and I will be praying for you as you seek to see God work in your life and make you more like His Son!
Praise God for good friends!

I was very sophisticated in selecting a winner-I just asked Adam to pick a number between 1-6. He picked 4! Yay for Meryl! I picked you out a lovely prezzie last night and I'm popping it in the mail tomorrow.

the one that's #100!

Hi friends! This is my 100th blog post. Fun huh?
I thought of some fun ways to celebrate. I'd like to do a fun give-away like cool blogs do, but I realized I don't really have anything to give away. I'm not that crafty or anything. I thought about giving away a book, but I'm too selfish. I like all the books on my book shelf...

But, I've decided to celebrate in another way. I've been evaluating this whole blog thing recently, trying to decide what honorable purpose it holds in my life.
Simultaneously, I've been thinking alot about where I am in life and where I'm going. I have several friends who blog and have been talking about a certain milestone that is now looming ahead in our future. I am 688 days away from being 30. It doesn't sound too bad, but two years pass by fast. I want to be more than what I currently am when I hit a new decade of life.

Alas, blogging and my journey to 30 collide. In addition to updates about the mundane, fun, and precious moments of my life, [including all things Chloe Belle] I want to start using this blog as an accountability for all the change I'd like to see happen in my life in the next two years.
So, regular old blog posts will still be labeled, "the one..." but I'll also have lots of blogs about my "journey to 30." [by the way, I shamelessly stole the name journey to 30 from a friend from high school. It is the name of her blog. Anna, I sure hope you find imitation the surest form of flattery and don't instead think I'm a jerk.]

So, I'm excited about this new little venture of mine. I hope you are too.
I just reread my post and decided that if indeed you stuck in and read this entire, self-indulgent post, that I will do a give-away. Seeing as how the only followers of this blog are my friends, I will tailor the giveaway to who you are! I'll send you a little prezzie or a baked goodie in the mail if you win. Here's how you win:
Leave a comment about one thing you'd like to be different by the time you reach 30. If you're over 30, just pick the next age milestone for you. I'll randomly select a winner on Sunday, announce the winner Sunday night, and pop you a happy in the mail Monday morning.
Love you, faithful blog reading friends!

the one about ...

I've always said I'd never be a so-called "booby blogger." I've tried really hard to keep my posts about breastfeeding to a minimum. It's a real shame though, because let me assure you: the funniest things that have happened in my life the last 7 months have all been about breastfeeding.

Like tonight, for example. Hysterical. It's just such a shame I'm not going to tell you about it, cause its for real funny.

the one where I wonder...

...are you tired of me posting baby food pics? So sorry if you are, but I'm just loving this!
pears and sweet potatoes...mmm mmm mmm.

the one where I'm inspired

Totally inspired yesterday by some talks on TED.com. Want to be totally challenged by what you eat and what you're doing about food problems at home and around the world? watch these:

Ellen Gustafson on obesity and hunger

Jamie Oliver about children and food

Ann Cooper on school lunches

the one that's for Adam

My computer has been messed up for a month now, and I haven't done anything about it. typical me.
Chloe Belle and I send picture messages to Adam sometimes, and i just tried to do it forgetting that I can't send attachments. so, this post is just for adam.

Hey Adam, I tried to get CB to send you a message, but she was more interested in destroying the paper than smiling for the camera. She wants you to know that even though she ate your sign, she still loves you and hopes you have a great first day of school!

the one where I share

Article in RELEVANT. It's good-it's a conversation we're constantly having in UMin. Read it.

the one about my father

Tonight was the FORUM at church. FORUM is when all the Sunday School Leadership of the whole church-from preschool teachers all the way to senior adult teachers-get together to plan for the coming semester. We meet all as a group for dinner and then break out according to where you teach.
Our Education Pastor always teaches for a few minutes at the beginning. Tonight he talked about legacy and how as Sunday School teachers we must be focusing on leaving a legacy for our students. He talked about a few teachers in our church who have left great legacies-a preschool teacher who has taught for 60+ years, a beloved 1st grade teacher who has taught for 54 years, a couple who has taught newlyweds for 30 years. He mentioned my dad and what a great legacy he has taught teaching 5th and 6th graders for 20 something years. When he said my dad's name, you could hear people in the audience respond at the sound of his name. Just at his name, they showed appreciation.
It's funny, they weren't talking about me, but it sure felt good. I guess when my father received glory, it made me feel good. I basked in his glory and loved it.

It made me think: if I get all warm and fuzzy when someone brings glory to my earthly father, why don't I respond with even greater emotion when someone brings glory to my heavenly Father?
My earthly father sure does have his flaws. We could make a list. But my heavenly Father has none. His perfect glory fills the heavens and the earth.

And to top it all off, my Father loves nothing more than His own glory. I was really convicted tonight that I need to make a much greater effort to lavish glory on my Father. I want to exalt His name in my life; I want His praise to ever be on my lips; I want to declare His glory among the nations.

Because He's my daddy, He's the King of Glory, and He is totally worthy of my praise.

Lift up your heads, O you gates;
be lifted up, you ancient doors,
that the King of glory may come in.

Who is this King of glory?
The LORD strong and mighty,
the LORD mighty in battle.

Lift up your heads, O you gates;
lift them up, you ancient doors,
that the King of glory may come in.

Who is he, this King of glory?
The LORD Almighty—
he is the King of glory.
Psalm 24:7-10

the one that recaps the week of friends

[I'm catching up on blogging this morning...expect multiple posts]

I had the coolest week! Pretty much each day of my week was splitting at the seams with good friends. I am blessed to have tons of lovely friends, but I can't remember the last time I hung out with so many of them in such a short amount of time. Here's my recap:

Saturday:
spent time with amazing old friends Patrick, Kevin, and Bethany

Sunday:
church is always full of friends

Monday:
had end of summer dinner with UMin girls discipleship. I have really enjoyed getting to know Leah better this summer

Tuesday:
Ashley Morgan spent the afternoon on my couch. I love her passion, honesty, and love for Jesus. Then I went to community group. Ah, community group. Faithful friends. Particularly love seeing Holly each week. This week Kelley was on a roll-homegirl should start a blog. Reading Kelley Smith would be hilarious.

Wednesday:
Spent the afternoon with the precious Ashley Johnson and Tiff Healy. Then went to UMin faculty dinner. I am so blessed to do ministry with friends and people I love. I guess here I should say I spent some time at work with my friend Chad. I work with him each week, but he is an awesome friend so I shouldn't forget him!

Thursday:
Dinner with Adam and Beth. I love when its just the three of us. We're really are like a cord of three strands that won't be broken.

Friday:
Lunch with Kristi Griem. Praise the Lord for her listening ear and faithful wisdom and love!! God placed her across that lunch table from me exactly when I needed it!
Met up and hung out with Rachel [Keener] McDaniel. I LOVE old friends!!!

But you know what the best part of my week was? I got to live another week with my best friend, Adam. I love that man something fierce.

the one with new stuff

I've been wanting to show off my new stuff for a while, and I just haven't taken the time to do it. But here it is! As lots of you know, we're super frugal, so new stuff is rare. Chloe Belle had to have a bag and lunch box for school [she starts in a week and a half! yikes!] and then we had a $10 pay pal gift that I wanted to spend on pretties for baby girl.
After much deliberation, I decided on the ladybug Stephen Joseph duffle, and I LOVE it. I got the matching lunch box [and her name is monogrammed in purple on the back of the bag]. And then we found these adorable hair clips on etsy for 99 cents!
Yay for new things!

the one that's a bit intense

I've been studying the Patriarchs this summer in preparation for the Fall. Chad and I will be teaching the Patriarchs at Worship + Study during the Fall semester. It has been a really rich study so far, full of difficult little nuggets of goodness. However, Genesis 19 has in the past been a particularly hard passage for me. Read it here.

I guess it was in college that I really struggled with how women are treated in the Old Testament. God's silence feels like tolerance of what happens. Genesis 19 is a pretty appalling instance where women are seemingly worthless. I have always found Lot's behavior abhorrent and totally worthy of punishment, yet somehow he gets credited as righteous in the New Testament.

I looked at the passage this morning with fresh [hopefully wiser] eyes. I realized that I am no different from Lot. He was trying to live righteously, but he put himself too close to the home of sin. He tolerated a little sin, and it came it and infected his family. Some seriously bad habits were established in his family!!

My sin is abhorrent before the Lord. And although I am on a path of obedience, I do allow myself to set up camp in some areas of my life that are just a little too close to sin. And I see the negative impact it has on my life.

I need to quit being appalled by Lot's sin and start being appalled by my own. I want to take Paul's advice and flee from sin so that my camp is no where near sin's camp. I desperately want to live a life of righteousness, obedience, and whole-hearted pursuit of the Lord. That way, my daughter will reap not the fruit of my sinful habits, but the fruit of wholeness and righteousness!

the one about friends

My 10 year high school reunion was this past Saturday. I got to spend the day with my three favorite high school friends. It was awesome. Although I've hung out with each of them bunches since high school, I do think that this is the first time since we started college that all four of us were in the same room together. It was bliss.
Bethany and I met in elementary school, and were undisputed best friends by the third grade. We've been in each other's lives since. Ours is the kind of friendship that stories are about: we literally have walked through life together. Its awesome. I met Patrick in third grade at church; he went to a different elementary school. We were super awesome buds. I still remember doing some SS play about the ark of the covenant together in 3rd grade. Sulli has been my buddy ever since. Kevin entered our life in middle school: 7th grade is when all our little universes collided and we were a group. Sure, things happened when we weren't always as close, [mainly Patrick dating another girl and me going off and being weird] but we'll always be buds.
ok, was that enough nostalgia for you?

love you friends.

the one with lots of orange

I made butternut squash for Chloe Belle the other day. It took forever to roast, but it made the whole house smell like heaven.

mmm. homemade baby food is yummy and cute!

She loves it! Look at her diving into that spoon...