October Already??!!

I am just flabbergasted that it is October already! I love the change in the season and October is one of my favorite times of the year.

The change of the seasons is a good time for new beginnings and I'm ready for one. I have been doing a terrible job on eating right here lately and that has shown up on the scale. I really don't want to be tied to the scale anymore because I don't think it is healthy for me at all. I really need to seek God's face and ask Him what the discipline in my eating will look like....do I go back to Weight Watchers and count points or do I just focus on getting all the healthy stuff in when I'm hungry and not over eat, that is what I need my Father in heaven to reveal to me!

I will not be the size I wanted to be for William and Amy's wedding but maybe that is a good thing too! I get so caught up in my outward appearance that I forget to work on my inward person which it the real me! I tend to forget that I am a beautiful daughter of the Most High God and He is the One who made me...me and I need to be thankful for that. "I am fearfully and wonderful made!"

Yes, I know it is my sin of over eating that has put the extra weight on my wonderfully made body and I will carry consequences of that sin for the rest of my life but I don't have to stay in that sin. With God's help and His strength alone I can overcome the stronghold this sin has over my life....I will not let Satan and this sin defeat me!

Getting Older is NOT for Sissys!

Sunday last was a typical Sunday for me. I was in the nursery Sunday evening having fun with the kids. Bradley wanted to play London Bridges Falling Down so Lou and I obliged him! We were on our second round of this little childhood favorite when I felt a pain spread through my lower back!

Thankfully it wasn't as bad as it could have been! I have been decently mobile but every move I make does cause a certain amount of pain. I had to miss my exercise class on Monday and I'm afraid I will have to miss tomorrow night and Friday night too if things don't get better and I mean real soon.

I'm afraid that, because I've been fairly immobile, I have gained back the 2 pounds that I lost last week. I know this couldn't be helped but it will still be very disappointing if it is true.

Mission Florida, 2009!

At the last minute I decided to go with the youth on their mission trip to Mary Esther, FL. I was supposed to go to New Mexico instead but I didn't really want to make that trip by myself. So, I called my brother and we arranged for Deon, Karah and myself to go to his house for Christmas. The hard part of this decision was to call my Grandma and tell her I wasn't coming to stay with her on my way to and from my brother's house. I will have to go for a visit with here sometime in August. I miss her so much.








We left our church parking lot at 7:15am on Saturday, July 11th and arrived at First Baptist Church in Mary Esther, FL at 8:55pm! It was a long drive and we soon settled into the youth and singles education department above the fellowship hall.



We attended the early worship service and then Sunday school because we helped prepare lunch for the World Changers that we would be feeding through out the week. Sunday night after the services we meet some of the singles and youth out on the Boardwalk beach to play some beach volleyball. Only Erskin, Haddie, Jordan and Scott played, the rest of us walked up and down the beach and played in the edge of the water.





Each morning was pretty much the same. We would get up and go down to breakfast. We would eat cereal or leftover from the previous day if there were any. My favorite breakfast was the chicken wrap that I had Wednesy morning and the cold pizza I had on Thursday morning.







When breakfast was done we would go back upstairs to get ready for the day. That included a quiet time with the Lord.



At 10am each day, except Wednesday (pizza day), we would go down to the fellowship hall and prepare lunch for theWorld Changers. We fed two teams each day. These team were re-roofing a couple of houses in the neighborhood.










I was in a team with Loree, Karah, Scott and Kayleigh. We went to the work site every day and set up their lunch and when they were all served we would have lunch with them. It was an awesome opportunity to interact with them and love on them and get to know them. It was a real blessing to serve the World Changers.



















We also had our own service projects to do after we fed the World Changers. We went to three of the sweetest ladies homes and did yard work for them. Monday we went to Miss Louise's house. Tuesday we went to miss Cindy's house and Thursday we went to miss Sally's house. There was a lot of leaves to be raked and bagged, lots of trimming to do. Aaron mowed for us and we also did some power washing of a couple of decks. It was hot, hard work but so worth it!























We headed to the beach every day except Thursday. We were treated to pizza and a pool on Thursday by Curtis and Mary. It was a special treat.






Even though we went to the beach five times we only swam three times. The beach was awsome and we had tons of fun playing in the waves. I really enjoyed walking along the beach and watching the people and the birds and the waves. It was such a worshipful time for me.

Friday evening after the beach we went to Dewey Destin's to eat. It was an interesting little place right on the water. It really looked like it could be a fish camp! The food was incredible and we walked out on the pier after supper and just enjoyed the night. It was a really great way to end our mission trip.















Saturday morning we got up bright and early and piled back into the van and headed home. It was a pretty quiet trip home. I have to admit I slept a lot on the way home simply to make the trip go by faster!








It was an incredible trip and God is still revealing to me things that He wants me to learn from this experience.

Some Times in Life Just Make Me Long For Heaven Even More!

This past weekend I suffered one of my "headaches" that I inherited from my mom. It occurred to me that I can learn a couple of very wonderful lessons from that kind of suffering. The first lesson being that no matter what I felt or thought I suffered through it cannot compare to the pain that my Jesus endured on the way to the cross and on the cross. So, thinking about Him makes it easier to come through the pain.

The second lesson would be that times of pain and suffering remind me that Heaven is coming. Oh what a day that's going to be, no more suffering or struggling with my weight and no more sorrow, wow! Now don't get me wrong, I want to be on this old earth for as long and God wants me here but not a minute longer! I love my life here but I long for me life in the presence of Jesus!

Even so, come Lord Jesus!

God is Good ALL the Time!

I just want to praise God for allowing me to offer Him a love song this morning during our worship service. I have not been able to sing a special at church in quite some time due to anxiety! I finally gave it to God today and sang for Him! All I could do when I finished was say over and over again. I Praise You, I Praise You, I Praise You.

I truly believe that this break through this morning also gave my the strength to ask God to keep me from over eating today as well. I give Him all the praise and honor and glory!

Picnic at the Lake!

God's beauty...

Great friends...

What a combination!

Last night was one of those nights right out of a fairy tale. It was perfect, great friends, a cool breeze, the sound of the water lapping up on the shore and fire flies on the way home! When these kinds of evenings happen it is such a blessing....God is so good!

We started out the evening with a toast to our Lord and Savior thanking Him for a perfect end to a perfect day! We ended the evening with Karah catching a fire fly when we got back to our house! It truly was perfect. Thanks girls!

Haddie and Karah take the bravery award! They gushed in the mud and had lots of fun doing it. I was a bit jealous but I really didn't want to get my feet muddy because I was wearing flip flops and I don't usually wear them and they would have rubbed such blisters on my feet had I joined the girls in the mud!

We each wrote our nicknames in the sand...

Viv, Melis, Candi, TRae, Rarah

and Hadassah!

Good times!

My Experiment was a Success!

Last Friday when I weighed in I decided to do an experiment. I would allow myself to eat absolutely anything I wanted to eat but....here is the catch, I had to wait until my tummy audibly growled! At that point I would eat slowly so I could tell when my tummy was satisfied and that is when I stopped eating! So, instead of saving my best bites for last I ate them first since I didn't know when my tummy would signal satisfaction.

Did I perfectly do this all week? No! But I didn't do too badly with it. This is not as easy as it sounds at all....give it a try sometime and see for yourself!

What were the results, you may ask....I lost 2.8 pounds this week! I'm so over-joyed that I can hardly stand it. I have felt a freedom in this that I have not felt in over a year on this "diet" journey I've been on. I do believe I'm going to continue down this road and see where it takes me!

New Beginnings, AGAIN!

I think that just maybe my Lord has finally gotten through to my heart! I cannot continue this journey of health and weight loss until I understand how He made me. I am fearfully and wonderfully made and He made me in such a way as to know when I need fuel for my body.

This is another new beginning for me but that is ok. I am not going to quit this journey. Quitting is simply not an option. I will learn to feed my body, mind and most importantly my spirit with the good things of God.

Last Friday, May 8th was the start of relearning my bodies hunger and full signals. So far, with the Lord's help, I have not done too badly. Yes, I have had to ask the Lord to forgive me for overeating just a bit but not near like I was! It has been a struggle to eat only when my body tells me it is hungry....it was such a part of who I was to just eat anytime my flesh wanted me too!

I can't tell you how liberated and free I feel....to know that I can eat absolutely anything I want to as long as I'm truly hungry and if and only if I can stop when I'm satisfied! I feel like I have broken free from the chains that have kept me captive to food for so many years!

Now onto my second new beginning....

My sweet Abbs (aka Haddie) has helped me give the blog site a new look so maybe now I will come and blog more often!! I really have a desire to write my thoughts but somehow getting them from my head to the page is more difficult than one would imagine!