No Passy Zone

Well let's see where we are in life...

C has been without her passy for over a week now and I have no plans on ever giving her one again. She wasn't super fussy for one anyway but we lost the only one she would take and I figured it was a good time to save $3 and not buy another one.

She still only has two front bottom teeth but I am certain the constant gnawing is a sign there are more to come. She is crawling at full speed, saying mama and dada, and standing up when she has something to hold on to. It's super funny when she's ready to sit because she has mastered the art of pulling up but not plopping down. She stand there with her knees bent squeeling.

Dalen confessed this morning he prays to Jesus when Daddy is mean to him and asks him to make him go away. He also stretched out his arms the other day and screamed JESUS! while I approached him acting like a monster. He knows who to call on!

The more I try to lose weight the more frustrated I become at how I will NEVER be skinny enough. Why is that? Is it the whole Hollywood curse or what? All I know is I want a tummy tuck and I want it now. Yes, the preacher's wife wants plastic surgery....judge me, stone me, defriend me on Facebook but I desperately want one! How much are those anyway? Actually they are $3,000-10,000....THANK YOU GOOGLE! I think that they should offer a mommy of two discount or put coupons in the Sunday paper. I also, NEED a root canal. We have health insurance but not dental and I wised up and contacted a dentist school in Gainsville and found out they have student clinics on campus supervised by real dentists and you can get them for WAAAAY cheap. Ok the real question is do they have those for tummy tucks??

Well that's that. I know my super interesting life has you begging for more....HA!

The Power We Ignore The Most

This picture was taken on Dalen's first Halloween. Every good post needs a super cute picture, right?? As promised, here is one of the blogs I told you to look forward to.

Because Mario and I are in youth ministry, we are in constant prayer and brainstorming how to be more effective in our approach to presenting the gospel. We have increased our knowledge in the areas of attention span and technology and change and I have quickly learned it isn't good enough to just know these things, we must put these things into practice.

People are constantly saying, "Knowledge is power!" I say, "Knowledge is power, until you ignore it's strength and then it becomes your defeat!" For example we KNOW the average attention span for teenager is 15-20 minutes BUT our service usually ends up being two hours long. How do we not lose these kids after 20 minutes?

After much reading and studying we found a long time ago how MTV captivates the youth of America; they are constantly changing the scenery, the story, the commercial every 5 minutes. Are we learning from MTV? You better believe we are! If they are going to use methods to entertain our youth with drug use, sexually explicit content, profane language, crude lyrics and so on you better believe we are going to take the same method and use it to captivate the hearts and minds of the youth for a kingdom minded principle.

Once this knowledge is put into practice we conquer the obstacle but if we simply tuck these facts into our minds without practice we are defeated losing the attention of our young people long before the time to do so. This is true in every area of life. Don't ignore the strength of knowing and practicing! Be on the winning side!

I survived!

Can you believe that I forgot my camera?? UGH! The important thing is I am alive and well and we all had a great time at the conference. The girls gave me no problems and we had a lot of great laughs and a lot of us even braved it and tried some natural food recipes made by a local doctor who was encouraging the girls to do away with processed foods. I'm not sure if it sank it but I do know right after the session they begged to go to McDonald's for fries. Why do I get the feeling that should tell me something??

The doctor did tell me something that I will be trying next month. Supposedly girls that have really bad cramps eat too much sugary foods because sugar embalanes your hormones. So if you cut sugar out you will not have cramps. Also, foods high in Magnesium help elliminate cramps and PMS. Pecans are a good source! Hmm, it's worth a try huh?

The rest of the Hoods took off to Animal Kingdom on Saturday. Dalen hasn't stopped talking about their trip since! He loved the Nemo show and I really hope we get to go as a whole family soon.

Sweaty Palms

Any of you that personally know me know that nervousness is NOT a dominate part of my nature. I am very confrontational, face my fears and try to deal with the outcome as soon as possible. Today I am nervous. Butterflies in my tummy, sweaty palms, overwhelming thoughts....all because I am taking youth members on an all girls trip to a conference on truth, purity and purpose.

We are just going right up the road and its only for one night but I am TERRIFIED. Not of anything horrific happening to the girls but of them doing something totally traumatizing to me. I have a pretty embarrassing confession to make-I used to be HORRIBLE of youth group trips. I am proud to say I never had a problem with lying, stealing, breaking curfew, drinking, doing drugs, sleeping around but I had a MAJOR problem being mischievous. I LOVE PRANKS!

Literally I am horrified the girls may try some of the things I used to do to others on trips and to be honest I have daydreamed about the poor Joybell counselors who were locked in the church kitchen by my sister at a lock in. The last youth group trip I went on was to Alabama and by morning #2 our "wonderful" youth pastor called a meeting and warned us "If you guys don't start behaving I will send your butts back home on a Greyhound and bill your parents for the tickets." Yeah, we were THAT bad.

So if you think of it and PLEASE DO say a prayer for me and if you haven't seen any new posts by Monday please take it upon yourself to establish a search party.

PS-Check the kitchen first!

Many Thank Yous

This morning I was totally enlightened then tearful over a very obvious revelation I had. Lately I've been noticing the many thank yous I get from my husband and now three year old son. It's through these thank yous you realize what really matters to your family.

I think I have previously confessed I am not creative, horrible at cleaning and try my darndest to cook but most dishes turn out to be just "ok". Since moving and staying at home with two kids I have REALLY tried to keep things picked up, laundry done on time, and dinner in mind everyday. I got a little obssessive over it for a season and then I realized with a toddler who was potty training (at the time) there will always be urine scent in the air and pair of dirty undies in the laundry basket.

I started just trying to do enough laundry to get us through the week, have things off the floor and a few fun family activities to enjoy at night. It has changed my world. I am a lot more relaxed and enjoy more time with the kids. I realized a lot of hte things I was obssessing over weren't important to me and no one noticed anyway. I realized this through my many thanks yous. So, if you want to know what's important to the ones you love listen to their thanksgiving. And just for your enjoyment here are a few of my many thank yous...

Mario- Thanks for leaving the toothpaste in the middle! (We have his/her sinks and I ALWAYS leave the toothpaste on my side. This drives Mario CRAZY! And drives me even crazier that he even notices.)

Dalen- Thanks for cooking mom! This broccoli is really good!
Thanks for taking me to the mall mom. It was a day that was fun!

Blogs to come...The OCD Christian and The Power We Ignore Most

All Mine?

I've been doing a lot of thinking lately. I recently made a personal decision to pursue my calling in a more aggressive way. I wholeheartedly believe God has called me to ministry (long before I even met my husband) in the areas of speaking and writing. I have spent years knowing this and not pursuing this because I didn't know how being that I came from a background who doesn't ordain women as ministers.

Soon enough I will be launching a new blog to introduce others to my writing from the perspective from a minister's wife and woman called to ministry herself. I often ponder how much I should share about my kids. I have a choice to follow my calling but my kids don't. I don't find it fair to expose their entirety without giving them that choice but then again they are way to young to understand that choice.

I share a lot about them and their funny personalities and beautiful faces andI see it bring others so much joy but I can't help but to wonder what it will bring them in the long run. Embarrassment? Anger? Resentment? Fulfillment? Pride? How do you know as a parent how much is too much exposure from your calling? I just don't know.

Then of course you have to wonder about the people who are reading and peeking into your life to judge or even prey on your children. People like that actually exist. Of course, it seems it would be easier to just not mention them at all but then who am I without them? A piece of me would be missing. Any suggestions?

3

Dalen turned three Sunday! We celebrated mostly on Saturday by FINALLY stopping in on Mickey. It was such an amazing day. The weather was perfect-sunny, low humidity, and a constant breeze. We had a blast riding rides, meeting characters and watching the parade go by on our way home.

We left a day at Disney only spending $16.34 on lunch. One of our leaders at church and new friends blessed us with three tickets. We didn't even pay for parking! It was such a fun day. Dalen met Mickey and Minnie and kissed Minnie on the nose because "her mouth was too big". He keeps us laughing! It was a wonderful birthday for him. Our little mailbox was packed full of gifts and cards from people afar who sent him sweet birthday wishes.

Who Knew??

Who knew there was an entire community who offers support and encouragement to pastor's wives? Who knew they have some pretty awesome and enlightening blogs? Who would have ever thought I would give up time in my day to watch a live webcast just for pastor's wives twice a week?

They are out there! Check the side of my blog for recently blogs I have added that are for pastor's wives. And no they are not all old and none of them have beehive hairdos! That's a plus!

Has anyone read the book YOU CAN STILL WEAR CUTE SHOES? I want to order it just wondering if anyone had already read it?

All About Dalen

Since reading an article about birth order in a parenting magazine, I must confess I am in overdrive trying to be intentional about spending individual time with each of my kids. One part of the article factually stated that second borns get 3,000 hours less of attention than first borns do. I almost feel like it's been the opposite in our home. I try to give her so much attention that I feel like Dalen is often neglected. So here is a post all about Dalen!

A few weeks ago Mario took Dalen swimming and was lifting up in the air and then dunking him in the water. Dalen noticed Mario's collarbone and asked, "What are thems?" Mario explained they were collarbones and informed Dalen he also had them too. When he felt them Mario says he began to laugh and excitedly say, "I got bones!"

So, the obsession began with bones after the incident. You can only imagine how much it increased when my mom called to inform me my dad broke his foot. We immediately got on the IPAD and showed Dalen in skeleton form the bones in our feet and he can now identify and say "metatarsals". He prays for papa's metatarsals and asks him daily how they are. Here is a hilarious conversation he had with someone the other day.

D: Bishop, my papa broke his metatarsals!
B: Oh wow!
Me: He has developed a slight obsession over bones lately.
B: What other bones do you know?
D: All 206 of them, man!

And my favorite line ever he just said to my dad tonight...

"Papa, my pelvis helps me shake my butt hiney!"

He has also called him to say, "My sternum hurts!"

Today Mario went swimming with D and I took him to ice cream tonight. On the way to Cold Stone he began talking...

D: Is B's car pensive (expensive)?
Me: Uhh, yeah. (It's a BMW)
D: Is our car pensive?
Me: Well at one time it was. Like, a long time ago when it was new.
D: But, it's not now?
Me: No, not anymore.
*silence*
D:Yeah, I didn't think so.

Too bad he has realized our car occaisonally smokes, the radio is broken, our driver's side window won't roll down, the driver's side mirror won't move and too many other things I don't have time to mention.

Worth.

While diamonds aren't my best friend, they definitely speak a language I can understand and only a language my Groom can speak and in this case I would not be talking about my husband. Bear with me and open your minds to a spiritual experience I had recently.

One random Sunday morning between our two morning services at church, a lady I have never seen before asked to speak to me. As soon as she asked me to into a quiet corner so we could be alone, peace came over me and I believe the Lord was letting me know everything that was going to occur within the next few moments had been ordained by Him.

The lady proceeded to tell me God had been compelling her to sow a seed into the life of someone else. She was uncertain at first what He wanted her to sow and who's life she was to sow it into. While praying, God allowed her to see my husband in her mind and she took it as direction to sow into his life. As sure as his face came into her mind He then spoke to her telling her, "No, I want you to sow into the life of my bride." She then knew he was referring to me.

The Lord used this woman to sow a diamond bracelet in my life (which I thought was rather odd at first) until she began to explain God was reminding me of my worth, through this bracelet. I later found out (through Google and my pastor's wife) the jeweler the bracelet was made by is one of best jewelers known. This is an area I have been struggling with and I knew this moment was orchestrated by God.

Today I received and e-mail from Twitter notifying me one of my favorite authors had requested to follow me on Twitter. I went through the house screaming, nearly giving my husband a heart attack. After accepting the request negative thoughts began to pour from my mouth. I shared them with my husband. They went a little like this...
"She probably has an assistant who does this. Why would she want to follow me?"
"She probably just got me tweet name b-c I follow her, there's no way she would know who I am."
"Maybe they are asking to follow her b-c her new book is coming out and her assistant is trying to get people who have shown interest in her work to buy the book."

My husband became pretty irritated of the questions and thoughts I was sharing because they were all established from a low self worth. My husband (biggest fan) began asking me some questions like...
"She may read your blog!" To which I laughed hysterically and replied, "Yeah right!" "Someone she knows may read your blog and they may have her about you."

Why is it that I know, God recently reminded me I am of great worth and that I am his bride and I continuously doubt I have no worth to anyone? I am pretty certain she doesn't read my blog (and just in case you do I am not a psycho!) but who is say it couldn't ever be a possibility?

We are all valued in the eyes of God! We need to realize it more and more. God is sending us reminders of how much we are worth everyday by protecting us, sparing us and blessing us. Besides so what if an assistant asked me to follow her maybe, just, maybe she will see something I say and be moved by it just I have been so very moved by her writings.

Fortunate

Since my husband hasn't been feeling well, we traded places for a day. I am at the office working on youth ministry stuff and preparing to speak for him tonight. He is at home with the kiddos. It is 2:37 and I am just taking a breath since getting here at around 10 am. I have a newfound respect for him and ALL that it takes to run a ministry. I am thinking in stead of wife swap they should make a new show where husbands and wives trade places for a day...things would get VERY interesting!

I am loving being back behind a desk, having a platform to be creative and feeling the excitement of being able to share it with others in a few hours. Maybe it's about that time to go back to work...who knows.

I scarfed down some chinese for lunch and found not one, but TWO fortunes in my fortune cookie!

Fortune #1-You have a lively family.
SOOOOO true...Thank you Dalen!

Fortune #2- You have much skill in expressing yourself to be effective.
What in the world does this mean? And why do I get the feeling that it may be a slam to my personality??

I am just taking the light shower of white papers falling out of my cookie as a reminder I have a lot to be fortunate for.

Since 10 a.m. here is what I have accomplished...
*Made sermon notes
*Completed sermon power point
*Took down old flyers around the church
*Made new signage for our new series-yikes! my husband is waaaay better at that than I am.
*Sent my husband some info. he needed.
*Created three illustrations for my message.
*made sign up sheet for girls conference weekend
*found facts on the internet about Lebron James (message related)
*made a call about girls conference weekend

Doesn't look like a lot but it is. My husband does a great job! What things are you fortunate for??

Downtown

We have been to Downtown Disney twice in the last four days, endured a sick husband/dad, made it through a 7 month old gaining two teeth and somehow managed to have a nice Labor Day.

Mario has been battling a sinus thing and Dalen and I took off to Downtown Disney today to meet up with my cousins. We had a great time UNTIL Dalen decided to have his first shoplifting experience. I honestly don't think he understood what he had done and no I am not one of those moms who thinks their children can do no wrong.

We were looking in a store called Once Upon A Toy and upon leaving I looked back at Dalen just to make sure he was close and noticed an angry older women snapping saying, "Get back here!" I then noticed a bright yellow ball in Dalen's left hand-that I had NOT paid for. He really did look totally confused and yelled back, "NO WAY, LADY!" Yay, for refusing a stranger Boo, for stealing! We quickly returned the ball and I explained how we can't just take things from stores. Since the incident he has asked to proudly tell every person that us called or that we have called. Maybe he will soon realize there are no bragging rights to almost being carted away for stealing.

After that incident I felt somewhat overwhelmed when I realized that is just ANOTHER thing Dalen has to be taught. Its just common sense to us adults not to steal (well for most of us anyway)but not to our kiddos who are blank slates. We had a great time in DT Disney.

Can all of you Clevelanders believe that Francine Rivers is going to be in town this month!? She will be touring in Cleveland, Chattanooga, Knoxville and Alabama. You can find her tour dates on her Facebok page. This has been a dream of mine for sometime and I must throw a BIG pity party NOW b-c she is coming just a few months after I moved! UGH! I even begged my husband to buy me plane tickets home just so I could meet her and to my surprise he said, SURE! Then I realized the cheap airline doesn't fly that week. The ONE and ONLY week it has off ALL year. Yeah, I could honestly say some not so nice words there.

Tasty Combos

I've never really asked anything of my readers so I don't feel bad for doing this but as stated before I am in need of interaction. So, everyone that reads this post MUST participate. If you are going to be a party pooper & not respond...you can stop reading HERE.

Because so much of my time is spent observing two kids, I think a lot. And if you have been reading for a while you must know by now I often think of things that don't matter. Well today is the start of football and I just had to wonder who started some of the most common tasty trends...

Like have you ever wondered why most people can't go to a football game without getting a big hot dog and coke? Or why is it that the movies is always paired with a big bag of buttery popcorn? Here are few Tasty combos I thought about and then you can comment and let me know what combos you think of...remember they don't HAVE to be food.

Football and hotdogs
Dinner and a movie
Movie and popcorn
Wine and Cheese

and some not so tasty ones

Do you ever wonder why God put the sand with the beach?
or what about
when you think of a therapist you probably think of a middle aged woman with glasses and a low bun.

What are some combos that come to your mind

Quarter Life

I am positive there is such thing as a quarter life crisis and if I happen to be right (for once in my life) I can guarantee you I am right in the middle of mine. I feel like the main character of Eat Pray Love. I am just so bored with my life. I get up and do the exact same thing everyday.

I really hate to admit that I am bored with my life considering millions of women would die to be a stay at home mom but some days I just get bored. I love my kids and I think it's important to stay at home with your kids for a good bit but I just need to find some way to change my scenery and entertain myself every once in a while.

I have totally found that life does not pursue you, you must pursue life. When you pursue life and the things you love it is there that you find the passion to live in fullness again. I think of the things I am passionate about and where I thought I would be at this point in my life and I realize I am not even close to acheiving those things. That fact is depressing but I know that pursuing those passionate dreams will one day pay off...at least I hope!

So here's to pursuing...cheers!