Adopting Grown People & Bright Lights

Sometimes, God gives you grown people to adopt. Aaron lived with us while he was studying at Texas State and he proposed to this lovely girl in our front yard. We love having them in our family and getting to take pictures of special events in their lives. We have been through grief and joy equally. I am thankful for them every day.

So. Y'all remember my hideous bedroom. It has been such a sad and depressing place for so long. The walls looked like a sad old hunting lodge from a dark bygone era. It was mildly frightening. Still, the windows need some serious love. A few panes have actually fallen out and we have had to put boards over them. We need a ceiling. Our floor needs to be redone. Its bright and sunny now though. There is a thirteen foot wall of windows. The light had nothing to reflect off of before. I am so grateful to Alan for drywalling and taping and floating my room. It has given my heart some hope. Thank you, Alan.

Y'all, send me a bunch of money so I can get him back here.

You know, I stared at this below picture and I realized how long I lived like this. It was cold, dark and dreary. It was a humble space. I have a beautiful fondness for it though because many nights I would awaken by the nudge of the Holy Spirit. I have spent a lot of time crumpled up, face-down on that floor praying for whatever I felt pressed upon to do. Many times, I just kept repeating scripture as prayer. "I am my Beloved's and His desire is for me." He never left me alone. I think the lowly state of that room made the prayers more beautiful. It was just Jesus, a cold floor, and me. Sometimes there was a pregnant belly in the mix. Many times. There have been times of desperate grief and bounding joy. The thing I know is that I am grateful for restoration. Knowing the darkness so well has made me truly grateful for the light.

I took the following pictures with my iPad. You can see the gorgeous straight lines of our drywall team. 

Here is one of our walls of windows. These shades came out of our old house, but hopefully will be getting replaced soon with peacock blue panels. Hoping against all window hope, we will be able to restore, rebuild or replace these windows. That a/c unit can come out now because we have amazing hvac up here, but we are afraid to move it because the window might fall apart. Such is the life of a restoration specialist. Keep your sense of humor, y'all. It keeps the soul from undue grief.

Love y'all.

Give to Gomer's House.

Longing For More by Timothy Willard

You know, words grab me. The title of this book drew me in. Of course, you never know what you are going to be getting into no matter how a book appears. I stared at it in my review queue and read and reread the description. The ebb and flow of life he spoke of lured me in. I could tell our author was a poet. He wrote the book of devotions for the seasons of the year. It is a picture of the seasons of our lives and how each season can be used for God's glory.

As I read through the book I was not disappointed. He is a meaty, deep collaborator and author. He pulls you deeply into the words of scripture and expounds upon it with prose, with hymn, with the words of a powerful theologians.

This is a beautiful read and I highly recommend it. 

"Interesting how beauty and poetry find their origins in reflection." -Timothy Willard

This book was graciously provided for review by Bethany House Publishers.

Old Dogs and Good Friends

First, let's talk about something near and dear to my heart. Dry wall. Y'all, live without it for years and you'll gain an affinity for it too. Seriously, I have beautiful news. There was a divine appointment. Thursday a man is coming to sheet rock my/our bedroom. Yes. Yes. Let's all hug. I would like for you to pray beautiful prayers over him, his wife, and kids. Stop right now and pray. Thank you. I cannot tell you how excited I am. Just in case you forgot, my walls are covered in Lowe's house wrap. It's exotic, but I am ready for it to be covered up. 

Let's talk about some things. I love people. I haven't always. Or I did and then I didn't and now I do. Something to that effect. It's the process of healing. Jesus does good work in our hearts. I was very thankful to be able to spend the weekend with some of the people I love the most. Sometimes in life you meet plain old-fashioned good people. I have some of those. Having the blessing of earnestly seeking the Lord with people lights a fire in your soul. I am truly thankful for good friends. I am thankful for friends who love my man. 

Let's talk about something else. I am thankful for friends who can cook. Pepper gravy is my love language. My daddy makes the best gravy I have ever had. It ministers to me. Our friend John made the gravy. Y'all. Never in my life. The way he cooked and served 28 people actually brought a tear to my eye. It is always beautiful to see someone moving in their gifting. 

That gravy though. Y'all.

There was homemade pimento cheese too. I'll save that for another day. I have a weird pimento cheese story. 

So. Here are some pics of my people. I'm sorry I didn't get a group picture of the adults. Next time.  Love well, y'all. Preach the gospel to those you love even if it brings you pain. Submit your heart to Jesus Christ and love like the dickens. Obey in faith. There are wonders to behold and beauty afoot.

 Sometimes you get to see Gomer's House on the road.

Mothering From Scratch

I just finished up this lighthearted read. It is really down to earth. In stead of judging or condemning, it makes you feel pretty normal. You leave the pages feeling like you just might be able to do this thing and keep going. The book is full of every day stories that we can fully relate to as mothers. The types of stories and of mothers runs the full gamut. You can definitely find a style to relate to or one to strive for. Of course, this is all just advice from other moms. It isn't chock full of expert opinions. Of course, sometimes that's a good thing. Sometimes, I thought theses ladies were crazy, but I loved them all the same. That's what mothering is about, I think. Encourage your sisters.

This book was graciously provided by the publisher for review.

Just in case you wonder how I get to blog, here's me typing thus blog.

Take Heart

Here is the moulding that I am working on. It is such a slow process to remove a hundred years of paint without sanding. I mean s. l. o.w. If you want to buy me a gift, I use Citristrip by the bucket. I'm high maintenance. I know. 

I am also sketching away and making new things. I am currently working on a fifty inch canvas for a consulting firm. The painting is of a fashion diva. 

http://www.softsurroundings.com/P/Chalet_Quilt/

For the six years we have been working on our house, we have put our bedroom for the last thing. We have been consistently working on every other room so that the house is a haven for guests. This year, with my Christmas money, I wanted to start making our bedroom into a sanctuary. Well, I did buy a new comforter. Y'all. Come over here. You will want one straight away. It's gorgeous in a lovely spa blue. It's fuzzy like a blanket on one side and like a quilt on the other. Come take a nap. 

As things go sometimes, our car died the other day. It needed some new hoses and other things. Our brakes are leaking. This will make $1,300 we have spent on brakes in the last six months. We needed other things, but they will have to wait or we are going to have to google them and do it ourselves. Needless to say, Firestone is getting my Christmas money and I will be waiting on my bedroom. I cried a little bit. We spend so much time on the road that it would be nice to have a place of retreat to come into...instead of seeing the Lowe's house wrap on the wall. I'm thankful to be able to pay for it. It could be much worse. Some day I will have drywall, fixed windows, and curtains. 

In other news, I took a dive down our stairs the other day and hurt my knee. Oh man, y'all. As we arrived in our hotel room last weekend, our heater started smoking and burned up at the wall. This whole thing seems like a comedy of errors. I realize that God is using us and moving deeply in our hearts and that is why discouragement comes. I am thankful for the sweet encouragement of Jesus. I opened my Instagram this morning and saw this new shirt that just came out. I thought I simply must have that. Get yourself one.

http://www.shedoesjusticeshop.com/collections/clothes/products/take-heart-long-sleeve-preorder-designer-edition

Take Heart. He sees us.

Give to Gomer's House.

Discipleship by J Heinrich Arnold

I do believe I was being primed to read this book over the last month or so. It's one of those things where you can feel the Holy Spirit putting things in place to knock you straight on your rear. Right off the bat, it boldly confronts sin in a way that books and preachers don't do any more. I was deeply convicted and encouraged to submit my heart to the work of Jesus.

The book is a collection of short paragraphs and excerpts from letters and other writings the collection of J. Heinrich Arnold. How a man can pack such a punch in seven lines is a mystery to me. Of course, there were things I wasn't totally sure I agreed with. That is pretty much every book I read though. 

I loved so many thoughts that he had and how he reminded my heart that Scripture isn't the WORD, it has only bore witness to it. We must look to the living Word for our salvation.

In Christ Alone.

This book was graciously provide by Plough Publishing for review.

Here's An Update

At the beginning of 2014 we found ourselves in a mini crisis with our lender and had to come up with  the not so small amount of $28,000. Do y'all remember? The Lord did the thing. As we refinanced for a much smaller amount than when we began this journey. As I was looking at our loan, I came to the realization that if we paid an extra $10,000 a year, this joint could be paid off in seven years. Somehow, by the extreme providence of God, on December 31st, we wrote our first check for $10,000. I can hardly even wrap my mind around that. That brings our pay off down to $102,000. I'm still breathing, but I might have gasped a bit. Due to some extremely generous people, we even have a great operating budget for the year. 

Let's recap. We were able to pay $38,000 off of this house in 2014 (on top of payments). We also received the gift of HVAC that will be finished up this year. 

I want to personally thank you for buying art from me. I give every single penny to redeeming Gomer.

I wish I could tell you what all we are up to here. Please know that we are being the church to the best of our ability. Our table is always open. Thank you for helping us to deck it with food. We are humbled and thankful and grateful for you.

In other news, I am removing paint from an old door frame. Exciting, I know. This weekend we are off to lead worship and love people at the Mid-winter Retreat at Carolina Creek. Say a little prayer for us. 

Give to Gomer's House or visit my Etsy store.

Watch For The Light

I read through this book during the season of Advent. Right off the bat, I thought it was amazing. Usually, Advent and Christmas devotionals tend to be somewhat the same. It's a lot of warm and fuzzy feelings. This is not that book. It was convicting, inspiring, beautiful. As you can see from the cast of characters that have been included in this book, it pulled no punches. It preached the gospel to me. I also enjoyed that it went on through Christmas to Epiphany. It gave the holiday a center and a focus. I highly recommend it. Get it and tuck it away for Christmas 2015.

There is also a book of readings for Lent and Easter.