Terribly Interesting

A few years ago, I read Anne's Permission to Speak Freely. Her words were moving and fierce. Immediately, I loved her. I love her in her newest work as well.  Lean On Me confronts our go it alone mentality. We refuse accountability and care. Honestly, it's a hard thing to do. I think our society is consumer driven in every way, even relationships. We often use people for what we can get out of them and move on. It is a challenge to us to develop honest, sacrificial, soul-satisfying friendship. Anne, in all of her boldness and beauty, lays out for us what that looked like in her life. It leaves you to ponder, plan, pray for what it could look like in yours. Personally, I found her story encouraging. She stayed with friends and went on a retreat at a couple's home when she was walking through a difficult season. She spoke of how much it impacted her to have these people make themselves fully available to her. Of course, that is near and dear to my heart. We keep ou...

Frances Mayes inspired my heart with Under the Tuscan Sun . When I saw that she was coming out with a book about returning to her roots in the South, I was excited to read it. She and her husband bought and restored an old house in North Carolina. The book did not go through that journey so much as her reconciling with her roots.  The book was not what I expected at all. It was melancholy, full of raw moments. It reminded me of Maya Angelou's autobiography. You get punched in the gut with pain and then you see redemption in it. It is psychologically fascinating to see where the woman who wrote Under the Tuscan Sun hailed from. It gives such understanding to what she traversed in life to arrive depressed and divorced at a villa in Tuscany.  This is the story of her growing up in the South with an extremely dysfunctional family. We follow Frances through the death of her father, grand father, and later her mother. Then we follow her to an all girl college. The things ...

I am quite a bit behind on my updates here and my book reviews. The internet is crawling along like a snail here. I have also been traveling around this great state of Texas. I hosted two groups of over twenty people, took my Lulu to an awesome VBS, threw my Synda a baby shower, saw my daddy, saw my mama, and played with my girls in the waterpark on a regular basis. We are doing the camp thing this week with Denbigh. My Lulu is a camper over at the Wild! Deep sigh. She's practically grown. She's having the time of her life... I love her so. I've added a few things to my Etsy store if you would like to support Gomer. I am started a village effort called The Gospel Mom where moms can encourage one another by pouring gospel love into one another's homes. You can follow us on Instagram and Facebook. We are working on our website and app. Stay tuned. Follow. Share. Support. Let's catch up. So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart o...

Don Freeman was the illustrator of Corduroy, the darling little series about a bear. This book was published posthumously from some of his works that had not been formed into a book as yet. His work is lovely and endearing. His characters make you want to love them.  The book while cute, lacked a bit of his charm. An author added verse to his illustrations that were picked out from his collection. It is a good book for smaller children. There is one line of reading per page. The book takes you to all of the places that you can go in a day and a reminder that home is always waiting for you.  The littlest Cherry girls enjoyed this read.

My friend and yours, Ross King, gave me the opportunity to listen to and review his latest music project. I have been listening to Ross for over a decade. His lyrics are deep and rich. I am often moved by the how he says such powerful theology in a simple and understandable way. He's gifted. This project is no different. It's great singer/song-writer work. The words tackle some beautiful and terrible truths. He seems to hit every angle...from redeeming the orphan to our arrogance in church. One of my favorite songs is Love Is A Hammer. Opposite Day is a fun, lively number. They are all great, thought-provoking songs. Check it out! View In iTunes This Hope Will Guide Me, Ross' last cd is wonderful as well. We often sing a song from the album, Hallelujah for the Cross, in church. It's a gift to the church.

You can't say you love God and hate your brother. 1 John 4:20 Did y'all read Jessica's other book, Give Them Grace: Dazzling Your Kids With the Love of Jesus? That book daily encouraged me as I read it. I even downloaded the audio book to put on in the car when I needed someone to remind my heart of the importance of my motherhood. I think mom's need two things each day. We need to laugh and we need someone to preach the gospel to us. This book took that gospel grace and applied it to all of the other relationships in our lives. I have been asking God to remind me of his gospel in some relationships that I am in. Sometimes, you just want to cut bait and go home if you know what I mean. It is hard to deal with certain personalities and selfishness in the body of Christ. It is difficult to see people wounding one another and even wounding me. There are facades and crippling brokenness to come against. It is tiring to say the least. I need a daily dose of redemp...

I would like to share this lovely little book with those of you interested in watercolor. I usually keep the books that I am reviewing in a stack. This one I kept upright in front of me on my desk for several weeks. I just loved looking at it. It made me happy. This would be a great coffee table book to inspire creative energy.I simply really enjoyed every minute I looked at it. I do not know much about watercolor. Every thing that I have learned has been trial and error. This book is full of tidbits to push you on to watercolor success. Of course, the gorgeous little book is filled with paintings. If you are like me, those inspire and make you want to try them out. Pick it up and try it out. I am going to try a few techniques over summer. Follow me on Instagram to see what I come up with. This could easily be a book that you would buy simply for art appreciation.   What inspires you? This book was graciously provided by Crown Publishing so that I could share it ...