a random assortment of life lately

 

Happy Tuesday, friends! In scheduling blog posts for this week, this day was blank. I saw that it's been a while since I've done a post of random moments of life lately that are completely unrelated to each other. In doing so, I'll be sharing some pictures from my phone that have not been shared here before now.

My best friend and I have a constant text thread that never ends. We are always texting funny memes to each other that make us laugh and/or shake our heads. This one above was one such meme. We were talking about complicated people and how different we are. Have you ever been around someone like this? Someone who leads a hectic/chaotic life? I have. My best friend has as well and she and I both are polar opposite of that type of person. Well, she mostly is, her work life has her spinning in circles right now. She's usually not as busy as she has been in the last year, but none of it can be helped and all has to do with circumstances in her family that are out of her control. We're looking ahead to the next month and thinking about where we want to go. We share two girls trips each year—one in her birthday month (June) and one in mine (December). It works well and guarantees us time together since we NEVER see each other anymore.

To backtrack a bit from yesterday's post about why I dislike holidays that are basically designed for card companies, I woke up to the sweetest of cards from all of the guys in our house and one later from Drew that he gave to me after church. You can probably guess this, but I am a words girl. I love cards, affirmation, quality time and being showered with attention from the people I love most. I don't need things to make me happy, I just like genuine sentiment and being made to feel seen and appreciated each day. All of my guys are great at this and always thank me profusely for the things I do for them. Todd's card that he picked out for me was so sweet that I cried. Graham's made me cry as well. Noah's was really sweet, Drew's was really sweet and Jonah's made me laugh out loud because he started to write "Happy Birthd...J/K it's Mother's Day! Happy Mother's Day!"

I still smile every time I think about it. Do you save cards like me? I have all the cards they've given me over the years and most of the ones from our parents. I'm not sentimental about much, but this is one thing I love.

I love flowers. I love shopping for flowers! I love for our flower beds to be beautiful, but my thumb is as black as night. I am not gifted with the gift of a green thumb like my mom, who can bury a stick and have a beautiful shrub pop up in the same spot a year later. This was me shopping for flowers on Saturday morning. Remember me mentioning that when Dad and I were out on Friday that the rain kept catching us off guard? It happened when I tried to do this very thing on Friday afternoon. Thankfully I had my umbrella, but I was the crazy lady who was meandering through the rainy aisles at Lowe's looking for mother's day shrubs. 🤣

Here's our flower beds right now, but know that we paid to have them done and Todd maintains them.

Speaking of Mom, she made this cute wreath for me last year for the front door, but it was getting smooshed and I couldn't use it there. It's been sitting in the garage, so I brought it in on Friday and hung it here on the door that leads to our laundry room and garage.

I love this spot in our kitchen. I love the wreath, the set of six herb pictures and the contrast of paint with the white door and trim. About that paint though, I really want to paint inside our house. There's one area that I need to finish painting, but I'd also like to paint the kitchen and our dining room. Our house is a closed concept home, which just means that we can get away with different colors in each room. I have always like color, but I don't know what I'd like to do in our kitchen. I've thought about doing it the same color as our hallways, which is a gray color called Amazing Gray. Our trim needs to be painted too, and it's at this point that I confess to you that it's probably not going to get done unless we pay someone to do it. 

There's a lot of things we need to do. I can go on—we need a bathroom floor to be replaced, I'd love to tile the backsplash in our kitchen, but we're always thinking of getting new countertops, so why bother? We need to do some wall repair in our bathroom and the whole upstairs could use new carpet.

See what I mean?

These two pictures represent part of what my husband does. He brought that vehicle home all weekend a couple of weeks ago, because he was CDO of a big event in Memphis called Music Fest. On the third night of the event he was pulled from there and put on a search and rescue in a local river for a missing person. He's the one driving the boat closest to the bottom of the picture, on the far right. That's a sad situation. Whenever they're on those types of call outs, they're looking for a drowning victim.

I love this picture above! I think it's important to be as kind as possible to anyone that we come into contact with. I think that as a whole, Christians have a reputation for being very judgmental and rude. We should be the complete opposite of what we are reputed to be. I know you're like me in that you've come across such a person—whether in an online comment, witnessing someone you know being rude to the person working at whatever establishment they're at, or in disagreeing with someone we love. As Christians, we are called to be bearers of much fruit—the fruit of the Holy Spirit, which is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. 

I think this saying above is an excellent reminder to us as believers. 

I know that most of you know what my life is like—it's pretty simple. I don't go to many places, but there are a few things that I do very frequently. I like to get my nails done every three weeks and I'm doing that today. I sometimes have meetings at my church, like yesterday when we caught up and met as a writing team. I love the days when we meet, because we all live such busy lives and have so many things going on that we rarely have time to catch up. We spent the first 45 minutes of our meeting doing that. I also visit the grocery store often and I usually go out on Saturdays. This week I have plans to go to church Wednesday night, which I've stopped doing recently, so that my best friend and I can go grab a bite to eat afterward. 

As for my nails, I have such a hard time picking a color each time. I don't like to do the same thing twice in a row and they don't give me a lot of time to sit and look at color options, so I always have to have something in mind before I go. I already have a color picked out for today. I'll share them later this week or today on my Instagram stories, in case you're there. If you are, you should follow me! I'm jenlloydgoodwin there. 

That's about all I've got for today, friends. I'll see you back here tomorrow! Thanks for reading my blog! Love to all. ❤

Hello Monday

 

Happy Monday, friends! I'm linking up with Holly and Sarah for this weekly blog post. I hope all of you had a great week. I don't remember if I've ever said this here before, but most of my close friends know that I love Mondays. I know it's different because I don't work outside of my home, but I love fresh starts. It can be a new day, week, month, season or year—I love them all. Fresh starts remind me of one of my favorite promises from God's word.

Because of the LORD's faithful love we do not perish, for his mercies never end. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness! I say, "The LORD is my portion, therefore I will put my hope in him." Lamentations 3:22-24

I had a good weekend and I hope you did as well! Mine got kicked off with my dad. I had to miss Friday with him last week because I was sick, so it was great to see him. We had kind of a crazy day and we both needed to get some running around done. We do that a few times a year—for Mother's day, my stepmom's birthday and at Christmas. It's always a fun time together and we love actually get out and doing things like that. We started with lunch at our favorite Japanese restaurant. We both had chicken fried rice and I had sushi as well and Dad even tried a piece and loved it! We had a couple of different stops to make, but the crazy part was that everywhere we went, we kept getting caught in rain. We would get in the car and it would stop and it just made us laugh. 

It was a great day. Todd worked that night and the others were gone, so I enjoyed pizza for dinner and I watched a couple of movies. One was another Diane Keaton movie—she's one of my favorite actresses—called Loving Companion and then I watched Dear Evan Hansen, which was so good that it surprised me. Have you seen it? It's a musical with Ben Platt. The music is good and the story is relevant for today and about people struggling with depression. 

Graham left to go out of town, so we were in charge of Oakley. I wasn't sure how it'd go with her going to bed with me, but she did good. I'm such a light sleeper, so when a dog gets up from or onto my bed, it wakes me up. She conked out. I was up early Saturday morning and then I spent the day with my mom and Trish. We had a yummy lunch and shopped at an adorable boutique that was next to Jason's deli in Memphis. We all tried on things and I came home with a new necklace that I love.

I had some money to spend from a gift and this is what I used it on. We also went to my favorite store (Home Goods) and I came home with two new bottles of hand soap and a new candle that is my favorite brand (DW Home) and that smells like summer.

Todd and I ate Mexican food for dinner that night and then came home and watched Red Notice on Netflix. Have you seen this? It has Dwayne the Rock and Ryan Reynolds in it and there's some language, but it was really good. Sunday I woke up to a card and some flowers from my husband and sweet cards from my family.

I have to confess something. I kind of dislike Mother's Day. I actually dislike most holidays that I feel like were designed to sell cards or to show off on social media. If you know this about me and disagree, can we still be friends? Here's why I dislike these type of holidays—I am all about honoring the people we love in our lives, but instead of one designated day, I think it's much better if we do that kind of thing everyday of our lives. I love the moms that the Lord has given to me and I think I honor them everyday by loving them, praying for them, calling them and seeing them in person. I always feel a little bit of a letdown on this day because I feel like I have unreasonable expectations and I hate that feeling. I try not to be like this way, but it always happens. 

I was very thankful for the cards that I woke up to, though, even though I had a moment of, "That's all?" thoughts that ran through my mind. (I'm just being completely vulnerable here and throwing myself under the bus, because you know that's how I try to be here. There are no pretenses.) There were some years that wasn't the case and I feel the sting of what moms who go through that must feel like as they scroll social media. I try to be sensitive to this of thing and also to the ones who didn't have a loving mom or who don't have children. I know it's not an easy day, just like Christmas is hard for some people. I would never want to be the one to cause someone to stumble. I try to always pray my way through these feelings and that does wonders, though sometimes I'm stubborn and it doesn't seem like my prayers are being answered. I know, that's ridiculous, right? Thankfully by the time I made it to church and prayed, the Lord gave me a new perspective.

We sang a song that I loved yesterday in worship. It's called Have Made Me Glad and the lyrics say this:

I will bless the Lord forever

And I will trust Him at all times

He has delivered me from all fear

And He has set my feet upon a rock

I will not be moved, and I'll say of the Lord

You are my shield, my strength, my portion, deliverer

My shelter, strong tower

My very present help in time of need

I love when we sing this song, because I truly sing it from my heart. I was singing it to Him this morning as we worshiped in the choir loft yesterday morning. Every word of the lyrics are true and are taken from Psalm 18:1-2.

I love you, LORD, my strength. The LORD is my rock, my fortress, and my deliverer, my God, my rock where I seek refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.

I love it when songs come straight from Scripture! I happen to love that the camera zoomed onto me in a moment that I was caught up in worship.

The rest of my day was low key. Drew came over for a while and brought me Zaxby's chicken tenders for lunch  as he ate our leftover chicken fajitas from last night and everyone was in and out for the rest of the day. I had a glorious nap and then I sat and read for a long time. Todd never worked again this weekend, so it was nice having him at home. Graham eventually came home and that's how we ended our weekend. I have a few things on today's agenda—I have a meeting with the writing team at ten this morning and then I'm going to pick up the groceries I ordered from Kroger Clicklist. We're experimenting with leaving little Oakley out of her kennel for small segments of time, so I'll get back home right after that and do things around the house for the rest of the day. I always use Monday to reset from the weekend. 

I'll leave you with what I posted yesterday on social media about my sons.

About these pictures and all the moments of motherhood—not every moment was beautiful and easy. Most of what goes unnoticed about motherhood is how demanding, ugly, exhausting, hard and frustrating it can be. I messed up countless times and always seemed to be apologizing for how I reacted or what I said. Just ask them, they can attest to this. I was and am a very flawed wife and mom, but by the grace of God, He helped me through and gave me humility, wisdom, patience and love. There were many nights when I sat straight up in bed and thought to myself how I must be ruining them. I still wonder that, but I trust God and the fact that there are loads of great counselors available to them should they ever need them. 

I tried to never take myself too seriously in the years of raising four boys. I tried to laugh often and to enjoy every moment and I think I did. Like I said, it doesn't mean each moment was perfect, but the good moments far outweighed some that were the opposite. That would be the advice I'd give to a young mom—to remember to laugh, to let go of what's not important, to let them be little, to let the grandparents spoil them rotten with love and affection, to teach them all about Jesus. My pastor gave this statistic yesterday: by the age of two years, their worldview is already developing. Teach them to love to Jesus and to walk in His ways. That's far more important than anything else, I promise.

How was your weekend? What do you use Mondays for? I'd love to hear from you! Thanks for reading my blog, friends. Love to all!

Friday Favorites, my favorite hero edition (5.6.22.)

Happy Friday, friends! I'm linking up with Erika and Andrea for today's blog post, where a bunch of us talk about our favorites from the week—it can be a product or a moment. This week, mine is all about a moment in time.

Most of you know that my husband is a first responder. He volunteers with our county's sheriff's department and he's been doing this for fifteen years. Before he did this he was a volunteer firefighter, which he did for about six years. Even though this is essentially a second full time job sometimes, it also happens to be his hobby. He enjoys doing this one thing more than anything else and he has seen some crazy things, needless to say. 

But then on a snowy night in February of 2021, he saw something he'd never seen before and was on the call of a lifetime. A sixteen year old boy was sledding with his sled attached to the back of a four-wheeler when he hit a patch of ice and flew off the sled. When he stopped sliding, he found himself impaled by the spike of a hay-baling tractor. The spike went through his rib cage area up through his neck, narrowly missing his lungs and carotid artery. 

There were TONS of emergency personnel who answered that insane call and they all worked together to ensure he made it out alive. There were police officers on the scene, firefighters and paramedics, deputies and Emergency Services, which is what my husband is on. They were holding the young man still, some were consoling, some were with the horrified onlookers, and there was a huge crew of them involved in helping them saw the spike off from the tractor so they could transport him to the hospital. Along with sawing the spike off, still others were passing bottles of water down an assembly line to pour over the metal as they were sawing it off the tractor, otherwise if it'd gotten overheated, it would have cooked his organs and caused more damage. 

They accomplished all of that and were able to transport him to our local trauma center in the downtown area of Memphis. From there he was taken into surgery and they successfully removed the spike and repaired the damage. In all, the only injuries he sustained were some broken and bruised ribs and a punctured lung. I think he was in the hospital for just a couple of weeks, but today he is normal and healthy. My husband has a picture of that spike on his phone that someone texted him from the trauma center, but I'll spare you that image. You can look on Google, if you're really curious, but it's a miracle he survived. 

The trauma center is actually who nominated these guys for an honorable award, The Star of Life award that is stateside. There are eight regions in our state, with one nominee for each area. This is the first time our county has ever been nominated for such an honor! That's where we were this week. We live near Memphis and we drove to Nashville for the night to attend this event, then we got home again yesterday. Needless to say, I took some pictures that I thought I'd share with you. 

These were some of the personnel who were on the call that night. They each got a reward, a lapel pin and the county was given a trophy of sorts.

This is the young man who was the patient. The cool thing about this night was that the patients all came to present their awards to each division, but ours was the only region whose patient or other family member didn't come. I know that was a huge disappointment to all these men. 

It was fun to dress up and attend this.

Our hotel had this cool mural outside on one of its walls. Below are us, Chris (one of Todd's regular partners and good friends) and his wife Terra. We traveled and hung with them the whole time.

It was a great evening. Aside from doing this, we did a few other things when we first rolled into Nashville, one of which was that we had lunch at a yummy local place. I had turkey tacos that were incredible!

We checked into our hotel after this and got settled in our rooms.

We had a nice room/suite with a great view at the end of our hall. After that we toured a local distillery.

And this was our ride, which was super nice and comfy. It's a new model Tahoe that the sheriff's department owns. 

Needless to say, it was a fun twenty four hours. I am so proud of my husband, my favorite hero. I've always called him my Superman, but he really is just like a real life one. As much fun as it was, I'm always glad to be back home...there's no place quite like it. Thanks for reading my blog, friends! Sharing life with you all is one of my favorite things. I'm grateful for the friendships I've found here! Thank you for always encouraging me. Love to all! 

Thankful Thursday

 

Happy Thursday, friends! Rebecca Jo and I are back for another installment of Thankful Thursday and we'd love for you to join us! I say it almost every week, but if you want a tried and tested way to be grateful everyday, start your own gratitude list. I promise it'll turn your situation around, whatever it is you're struggling with. We all have bad days, we all have days when we're down in the dumps, and while it's normal to experience times like that, don't stay there in those feelings for too long. If you're a Christian, the enemy lurks while we're in that kind of mindset and he thrives in that environment. Look up! Find something to thank the Lord for, even if it's just one thing. Your list will grow day by day and before you know it, you'll probably find yourself spending your time of prayer with prayers of thanksgiving and praise. 

I love the imagery that the following verses give for one who walks closely with Jesus. These scriptures are found in Psalm 1.

How happy is the one who does not walk in the advice of the wicked or stand in the pathway with sinners or sit in the company of mockers! Instead, his delight is in the LORD's instruction, and he meditates on it day and night. He is like a tree planted beside flowing streams that bears its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers. The wicked are not like this; instead, they are like chaff that the wind blows away. Therefore the wicked will not stand up in the judgment, nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. For the LORD watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked leads to ruin.

Spend time with Jesus. Pray and read His word. Those two things also make a world of difference. I don't say any of this to shame you into spending time with Him, but I do pray that you're encouraged to begin the habit of spending time with Him everyday. You can't put a time limit on such things, but a good way is to just judge for yourself by evaluating your day. Do you have kids who are up with the sun and in bed early? Spend your time with Jesus in the evening. Or do you work outside of your home? Maybe you can fit in some time on your lunch break. Do you spend hours reading or watching movies or shows, like I can tend to do? I know for me, that was convicting. I began to put time with Jesus first, along with completing Bible study homework or studying for a writing project before I allowed myself to do those other things I love to do to escape or unwind. 

If you have hours to spend, great! That's usually not the case, though, but don't skim on the prayer time. I read the best book about this last year called How to Develop a Powerful Prayer Life by Dr. Gregory R. Frizzell. If you want a practical how to guide of how pray faithfully everyday, I would highly recommend this book.

Here's a link if you want to check it out.

When you remain in or abide with Jesus, you will be like that tree planted by streams of water that David talks about in Psalm 1. Your roots will so deeply imbedded in the hydrating soil that is His word, you will bear much fruit for His glory and you will never wither away.

Well, I didn't mean for this post to take this path, but alas, here I am. I'll just wrap it all up with this last little bit. I am so thankful for the relationship the Lord has led me to have with Him. You can have it too, my friend. Even if you know Him, are you close to Him? There's nothing special about what I do to have this type of walk in my faith, all it requires is that I make time for Him. Sure, there are days when I don't read the Bible or pray, like when I was sick for the last week, but the Lord knows my heart and He knows that my normal self yearns to spend time with Him daily. Do you know Him? Do you closely walk with Him? James 4:8a is another verse that I love and am so thankful for.

Draw near to God and he will draw near to you.

It's true and I've experienced it time and again. Please reach out if you'd like to talk more. You can comment here or you can email me at allboys@gmail.com.

As you read this, I'm waking up in a fancy hotel in downtown Nashville. I'll share more about this tomorrow or next week, but that's another thing I'm grateful—time away with my guy. Thanks for reading my blog, friends. What's one thing you're grateful for this week? I'd love to hear from you! Love to all. ❤

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"currently"

 

Happy Wednesday, friends! I'm writing a bonus post today, since I had already scheduled one for today earlier this week. If you'd like to see that post, you can click here. I'm linking up with Anne from In Residence for this blog post. Here is what I'm currently consuming, feeling, finding, following and spending. 

Consuming:

I'm coming off a week long stomach flu, so I'm not consuming much, if I'm honest. I have trust issues with food now and I am just barely easing back into eating again. In the last week I've consumed only things I could tolerate, like oatmeal, toast, plain baked chicken, rice, bananas, applesauce and for some odd reason, pistachios. In my normal and healthy version of life, I've been loving little packs of guacamole for a snack with a few tortilla chips. I also normally cannot get enough of hummus and carrots or celery. I love little snack type lunches in where I eat little bits of several things. 

This would be a good example of my favorite type of lunch. Another thing I can't ever get enough is Mexican food. 

Feeling:

At the moment I'm feeling excited, because my husband and I are leaving in a couple of hours for Nashville for just one night. The short version of the story is that we're going for him to get an award for saving a life earlier last year. It's not just him getting the Star of Life award, but all the first responders  who were on the call that night. It's an honor for him to get this and it's a "company trip", meaning we're not paying a dime for anything while we're gone.

Come back Friday and read more about it!

Finding:

I've been finding motivation to get things done. Sometimes I seriously lack in this area of life and I only do enough to just get by. Do you do that? It's like I'm burned out or something, which is not a feeling that I enjoy. I'm thankful to be moving past this. Along with this, I also always find lots of time to read.

Following:

One of my favorite social media accounts that I'm following is Sally Clarkson. I love her podcasts, her Instagram posts and the book by her I'm currently reading.

Spending:

I've been spending lots of time with the Lord each morning. I seem to get into ruts with prayer time pretty frequently, but now is not such a time, for which I'm grateful. I have this routine about my mornings each day—I wake up around five and spend the first hour of my day drinking cup of coffee number one and reading blogs, emails, and social media (for no longer than five minutes). At six thirty, I get up to make Noah his lunch for the day and coffee that he takes to work, I pull out things for the rest of their lunches, then I get my second cup of coffee and drink it while I pray. I almost always spend at least 30 minutes in prayer with Him, which may seem like a lot, but really isn't. The time flies by and sometimes more time than that goes by. I read a wonderful book on this last year that I plan on reading again. It's called How to Develop a Powerful Prayer Life by Dr. Gregory R. Frizzell. (Click on the title for the book.) It's a short, very impactful and practical book on the topic of prayer that my pastor recommended. He taught a class on this last year that I took.

Well, thanks for reading my blog, friends! Love to all.

one year later of this new phase of life

 

Happy Wednesday, friends! Do you ever go back and look on your Timehop app or Facebook memories and just want to remember and possibly even relive those days? That's been me this week. I don't necessarily want to relive the days that have gone by, but I always want to remember them. No matter the age of our sons, I have tried to love and be present at every point in their lives and I think both Todd and I have succeeded at that. We rarely wish to go back to the days when they were younger, though sometimes I do reminisce and long for simpler days when I thought life was hard. (More about that on another day, though.) 

I can't believe it's been a whole year since Jonah and Noah graduated. I mention just the two of them because they're our youngest and when they finished school was when my life drastically changed. It was a gradual change over the summer, but still. When Graham graduated in 2017 and then Drew in 2018, I still had the other two to keep me going and busier at home, even though they were independent even at that point. It was at the end of their high school careers that I became "retired" from my job of homeschooling them the decade prior to them graduating.

Most of you know that they opted not to go to college, and we're okay with this. I don't really feel like I need to explain this here, because I think most of you know us by now and how much we love our sons and want them to succeed in life. College wasn't for us as their parents, either and for a lot of people, I believe that is the case. The only requirement we had for them was that if they opted out of school, that they would work full time. Not just for them, but for all of them. 

We did have one son who went to school the fall after he graduated, so he didn't work an actual "job", but he did work around town to make money by cutting yards and helping people when they needed a strong back. Graham went to work full time at the end of July in 2017 and Jonah and Noah went to work full time at the beginning of August in 2021. To say we're proud of all of our sons is the understatement of the year, regardless of their choices on school or their occupations. 

When they were young and impressionable, I remember telling them over and over one very important thing.

So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God. 1 Corinthians 10:31.

I don't know if they would remember the reference or even the verse if you were to ask them, but once you mentioned it, I assure you they would remember me telling them that over and over as we sat around the kitchen table. I always told them we didn't care if they were doctors, lawyers, teachers, garbage collectors or maintenance workers—that as long as they did whatever they did for the glory of God, that that one thing was all that mattered. I do also believe that in glorifying God, whatever you choose to do, you need to do with all of your heart and to the best of your ability. My husband instilled that in each of them and it's true of all of them as they work. 

We are happy for them, we are proud of them and we support them in whatever they do in making the effort to becoming independent. We used to have plans in mind for this phase of life and when they were all younger and still in school, but basically all of that has flown out the window. At this point in life, we're happy to see them be successful and able to support themselves. Now, you know that three of them still live at home, but they pay for everything. They eat our food and I'm prone to buying them fun stuff like socks and conditioner when they run out, but they're also more than capable of buying that for themselves. I think it's a funny statement that we used to have plans for this phase of life—isn't that just how life goes? There's nothing quite like thinking you know how it'll all play out and then having life come and just knock the breath out of you.

You have no idea how often I've repented of being so prideful in those days! The Lord has been sweet to show me a thing or two about all of this whole parenting adults thing. I have no problem saying that either, because nobody knows better than me how judgmental we can all be as women, as wives, as moms, even for some men, I would guess. And by the way, I don't really still consider myself to be "parenting", but rather walking alongside them, encouraging them and offering them advice or wisdom when they are seeking it. I have sons, though, so I believe it's different for someone who has daughters. Now my husband is another story and he's busier than he's ever been with our sons and there are days that they wear him out. He never says it or complains, but I know it to be true. He may not freely admit it to you if you were to ask, but I believe that deep down he loves that they call him and always seem to be needing him.

I remember thinking a year ago about all of the free time I would suddenly have. (Not that I didn't have it before, this was just the guilt free version.) I had aspirations to get a part time job and to fill my time with all sorts of fun things. And as it goes, this past year has been almost the polar opposite. I've never stayed home more in all of my life! Seriously. I don't know why, either, because it's not like anyone is forcing me to be at home. For one thing, I'm a mom to dogs, so they require dedication and care. I even have a grand dog, as you also know, whom I feel terrible for leaving in her kennel for too long. (She wouldn't complain, trust me—she came from someone's back yard and is probably just happy to be living and that she has owners who love and nurture her and don't threaten to put her down.) 

And I tried getting a part time job! Not once, but twice. I almost tried one more time and I had an overwhelming sense of peace wash over me that maybe it just wasn't my time to do that at the moment, so I quit trying. My husband was not asking me to do that, it was just something I put on myself and expected to be an easy thing to get. (Maybe it is, but I wanted one job in particular—I wanted to work at the library.) I remember one day a lady from the library called me and we talked on the phone for an hour. She'd gotten wind of my name through an application I'd filled out on online to be on the library board, which also is one more thing that didn't happen. She encouraged me to volunteer at the library and to get my name out there, so that when an opening appeared again, they'd know me and likely hire me. But I never did that either, even though I filled out the application, I just felt like it wasn't right at the moment.

So, what have I done, you wonder? Well, not much outside of our home. I do all the typical wifey things in the daily mundane schedule, but I've done some other things. I've written articles for magazines. I've started and stopped writing books that I want to write. I've talked to a literary agent and then ruled out the need for one. I've gotten offers to publish a children's book that I wrote. (I had no idea it cost so much money to write a book! Anyone can write a book and pay to have it published, but only the good authors get advances on publishing deals and for now, that is not me.) I've co-written another women's Bible study. I've edited said study. I've blogged more frequently and gained a bit of a slight "audience", or friends as I like to say. I've learned a whole new techy thing at church and have started doing the words for our worship pastor or sound for women's events. I've helped plan a retreat. I've been on a girls getaway writer's retreat with my co-authors and dear friends. I participated in one of the studies we wrote and led a small group and I've done the same in the spring semester of this year. I've prayed and prayed and prayed until I am blue in the face and through it all I've said one thing repeatedly to God—that I am ready for Him to use me, however He sees fit and that I trust Him wholeheartedly with all of my life. 

I trust Him with my husband as I grow into a godlier wife who is finally, after 25 and a half years of marriage, easing more into that role, not that I have fully arrived by any means. But I'm better than I was and that, my friends, is progress in the right direction.

I trust Him with our sons, who sometimes let me down with choices they make. Now, I say that they let me down, but I still love them unconditionally. I pray for them endlessly everyday of my life, as do their grandparents, and I have hope that they'll come back around in their later twenties. I say that because it was at that age that the Lord got ahold of me. They're following in the footsteps that I didn't want them to, but I know they love the Lord in their own ways and that as much as I love them, He loves them even more.

I trust Him with our safety and wellbeing. We've walked through a few hairy moments, like when Jonah totaled my car on the interstate last summer by hydroplaning on the interstate and ending facing oncoming traffic. And then Drew and Jonah were recently involved in another minor accident. Graham was involved in a minor accident as well and Noah's car's brakes (or something made them not work) went out completely one day on his way in to work. There've been countless trips to and from different places for all of them and the Lord had His angels watching over them the whole time, as my dad likes to say. I trust Him with our mental wellbeing as well, as we've walked through a few iffy moments with Drew working in an impossibly difficult and heavy job. (Again, more about that another day, there's a whole story there.)

I trust that He accomplishes exactly what His will is for our lives. I trust that His word never returns to Him void. I trust that He never tires of me praying for their safety as I lay in bed at night and wonder where they are or when they'll be home, because I DO NOT WANT TO BE A NAGGING MOM. I trust that He has completely healed me of anxiety and that it's been at least eight months since I last suffered from an anxiety or panic attack. I trust that He works out everything for our good and for His purpose. 

I trust Him, needless to say. His plans are much better than any I could have made and I know that if it is within His will that I go back to work someday, that He will let me in on it at some point. He knows I am willing and that I want to serve Him all the  days of my life. I'm always excited for what is to come and I believe He has something up His sleeve. 😉 Meanwhile, I'll be here waiting patiently and enjoying the days when I have unexpected times of one of them being at home with me, like yesterday when Jonah worked from home all day.

Who knew a year would go by so quickly? 

This was me all unassuming last year at their graduation, which will be one year ago Saturday. Time flies! Thanks for reading my blog, friends and allowing me some creative space to ponder on all that has happened. Love to all! 

Prime Purchases! April edition.

 

Happy Tuesday, friends! This is one of the best Tuesdays of the month, in my humble opinion, when we link up with Tanya and talk about our Prime Purchases from the month. I'll jump right in! Click on the picture to be re-directed to Amazon.

I've made a couple of purchases for my curly hair in the last week. One is a conditioner and the other is mousse. Depending on who you talk to, mousse may or may not be the best choice for curly hair girls, but for me it works. Except for this one that I just bought. I'm rolling my eyes, because I hate that I don't like it, but I refuse to let it go to waste and I'll use it as a backup.

Mine actually says "air-dry waves" on the front, but you get the gist. I don't like that I can't feel this product. I have very thick and curly hair that actually needs a little crunch to hold it in place. When I used this, I could feel my hair growing outwardly throughout the day, which is ironic since the brand is Frizz Ease. It made my hair feel more frizzy. I'll use it as a backup, though or to supplement with on the days that I don't wash.

The second hair product that I bought was this conditioner.

Contrary to the mousse, I love this conditioner! I'm normally a Pantene girl, but for some reason it's hard to find right now. I was looking for hydrating and this does the trick so far. It also smells amazing, which I kept noticing the day I washed my hair. If anyone with curly hair is reading this, do you have issues with tangling? Mine gets all knotted up underneath my hair, right in the back. I bought a good quality detangle spray by the LUS brand, but it's no different from the old kids' brand I used on my boys when they were little. I'd love to know if you have issues with this and if so, what you use to help combat all the tangles. I'd prefer to go longer than a couple of days in between washes, but I don't know if that's possible. 

Most young men Jonah's age are into TikTok and YouTube videos about cars and such, right? Not Jonah. He watches cleaning and washing videos on both those sites I mentioned. We've been on a cleaning spree and we washed our pillows last week. He sent me a video link and pictures of the washing machine dials that the woman used on the video he watched. I'm all for that kind of thing and wanted to wash mine as well, so I did that and then I ordered this four pack of pillow protectors.

This whole segment has made me laugh and shake my head. Jonah is not the typical nineteen year old young man. I love all of his little quirks and cleaning binges. As I write this post on Monday afternoon, he's upstairs cleaning his room and their bathroom. He's had a slow day at work and has been home in between calls today. I've loved having him here! 

I bought a new eyeshadow palette that I love! 

It has over 25 thousand five star ratings, so I felt good making this purchase. I like the colors and that they're high in pigment, which just means that a little goes a long way. I like the bronze and shimmery colors for summer, when my skin gets a little darker. 

I also bought this age erase wand of magic.

The color I bought is number 160 and just says "brightener". I've used this stuff for over ten years and it's something I always buy again when I'm finished with the tube. I use it under my eyes and at the corner of my eyes for a little brightening action. I love this stuff.

The last thing I bought was this dress for the banquet we're going to in Nashville on Wednesday night.

I was super hesitant to buy this, but I made sure I had plenty of time to return it if needed and to find another one. That being said, for my first ever personal clothing purchase, this one is a winner. I'm impressed that it looks EXACTLY like this on me, including the length and I was surprised by the quality after I washed it yesterday. It got softer without shrinking an inch. I tried it on again just to make sure! I love the print and the fit and am excited to have a long dress for this event and for church. The base color of the dress is navy blue and the flowers are a true periwinkle, AND IT HAS POCKETS. That alone could have sold me. I'll have more pictures when we get back from our trip on Thursday. Stay tuned! 

It's your turn! What have you bought and loved recently from Amazon? I'd love to hear from you! Thanks for reading my blog, friends. Love to all.