Brothers and Sisters

         It is my very favorite show! It comes on ABC on Sunday nights at 9p.m. If I am not home to watch it I always make it a point to tivo it. The show is about a family with 5 siblings and the life happenings of all of them. There has not been an episode yet where one of the siblings did not have some sort of major decision or major life event happening. The best part of the show is not the "drama" but instead it is the way that even during arguments the family rallies together, loves each other hard and solves problems as a team.


      I come from a large family. I have 3 brothers and Brian has 1 sister we often joke about how similar our real life is to the show. It seems that one of us always has something going on. A big decision, upsetting news, exciting news...there is always something. When one of us has a big decision to make it is our siblings that we always turn to. When one of us receives upsetting news the first people we go to are our siblings. When we have exciting news the first people to hear the news are our siblings. It is truly a joy to share life with brothers and sisters who root for you and deeply desire the best for each others lives.

   My brothers and sisters have seen me at my absolute worst. They have seen me at my absolute best and through it all they have loved me unconditionally. The same is true of them. I have seen them at both their worst and their best. I have loved them through it all. We have delivered tough messages to each other. Sometimes the truth hurts but it is what we all need to hear.

    This past weekend over the Thanksgiving holiday we were able to spend almost the entire weekend together. We laughed, talked about our futures, played and even cooked ducks at my house(this was my least favorite activity). The gift of siblings is a gift from God and I thank Him for creating the bond that we get to share! I also thank mine and Brian's parents for having siblings for us to enjoy :)

  My hope is that you all had a blessed Thanksgiving!!

A Week of Thanksgiving!

           Today kicks off the start of Thanksgiving week. This is a week where we gather with family, eat too much, watch parades and football and reflect on what we are thankful for. During the short life I have lived the amount of things I am thankful for are more numerous than I could list or describe. The blessings that have been poured out on me are not blessings that I earned or blessings that I deserved they are truly gifts and I am so thankful for all of them!

         I wanted to mention one blessing the best blessing that I have received in this lifetime. The cross/salvation/endless love from a heavenly father/forgiveness of sins. This blessing has changed my life for the better and I can truly say I will never be the same again! Without the cross or his forgiveness I would be a ruined sinner cast out as trash. But because of a Heavenly Father who loved me more than I could ever deserve or imagine I am free. My debt has been paid and I can shout that I am free!

    May we all stop this week and say thank you to Jesus for loving us and for freeing us. May we all stop and see that the love that God has for us is endless. It stretches farther than our eyes can see and it is bigger than we could ever imagine! May we all make a special effort to be more like Christ in what we say and do!

Some words from one of my favorite songs...

Thank You for the Cross Lord
Thank You for the Price You Paid
Bearing All My Sin and Shame
In Love You Came
And Gave Amazing Grace
Worthy is the Lamb
Seated on the Throne
The Darling of Heaven Crucified
Worthy is the Lamb

The Heart

       So small yet so powerful...the heart. It beats to keep us alive, it flutters when that special someone looks our way and when it is broken the pain is worse than any words can describe.

        An infection around the heart is what started my dad's whirlwind of sickness. The doctors say that the infection had most likely been around his heart since he was a small child. His heart had fought the infection for fourty plus years before a piece of it broke off and caused the hemorrhagic stroke. Thankfully even with the infection, stroke, brain surgery and heart surgery his heart is pumping as a normal 50 year old man's heart should.

       Brian and I got to experience our hearts flutter by leaps and bounds today. We got to hear the sweetest sound we have ever heard. We heard our baby's heartbeat, the rapid, repetitive beats were hard at work and reminded us of just how Powerful our God is! He makes the day, the night and in between he weaves babies together in the most perfect of ways. Flutter, flutter even typing this my heart flutters again with excitement!

      The broken hearted. Almost all of us have been there, we have felt the pain, loneliness and fear. I have seen people lose weight, cry themselves to sleep and feel that the hurt would never go away. In time the pain has been less severe and life moves on. At church we have been charged to pray "God break my heart with the things that break Your heart." A powerful prayer and how scary of the things that are revealed to us during this prayer.

    The heart. It is life saving and life changing may we never forget that God who is above all and in all is in charge of our every heart beat. He is in charge of the exciting things that happen in our lives and the bad things that occur. May we love Him more than we love ourselves and may we all pray
"God Break My Heart With the Things That Break Your Heart."

The Greatest Gift

   This summer Brian and I had the priveledge to go on a mission trip to Panama. The trip was for a week and for the majority of the trip we were in a remote jungle town. We had a medical clinic, pharmacy, dental office, optometrist and devotionals each night. The lines formed early every morning and people waited (without complaining) for hours. I got to work in all sorts of different areas while Brian was in the dental clinic everyday, all day. We got to witness so much but there is one thing that will remain in my heart for the rest of my life.

   Everyday the line to the dental clinic was very long, people waiting for hours and hours. This day was no exception the line was long and the number of teeth needing to be extracted seemed endless for Larry and Brian. One of the teens on the trip with us, Jesse Stroud, walked into the dental clinic and said that a dad had carried his paralyzed son to the clinic and that they were waiting in line. The son needed an extraction, the boy laid in his dad's arms and Jesse said the dad was very tired from carrying his son this whole way. We told Jesse to bring him to the front of the line. Now when I say "carried" I mean "carried" in the jungle there are no wheelchairs for the paralyzed, no walkers, no canes nothing. This boy was probably 11 years old and weighed probably 65-80 pounds and his dad had carried him all this way. Jesse took the boy from his father and carried him over to Larry. An interpreter told Larry which tooth was bothering the boy and Larry extracted it while the boy laid across Jesse's lap. The thing about this that I will never forget is the look in the father's eyes after Larry pulled his son's tooth. He had huge tears in his eye's and was so greatful that someone had taken care of his boy.

   As a parent can you imagine not being able to help your child? Not being able to make them feel better? This dad has dealt with this everyday of his son's life. His son was dealt a tough card and his disability, no doubt, effects their life every single day. Even with the hardships dealt to them he found a way to still be thankful. His eyes showed just how thankful he was. In this life we will all be dealt hardships of some sort may we all still look for reasons to be thankful and no matter how bad things get may we always know that we have a Heavenly Father who is carrying us just like that father carried his son.

Lessons From My Mother

     "The wind doesn't blow at night" this is a statement that my mom has tried to convince us is true for a very long time. My mom's grandmother told her this as a child and to this day my mom still "says" she believes it. I however have been to Chicago enough times to know that this statement is completely false.

    "Your dad is my best friend." My mom has said this thousands of times in my life and I've always believed it but last fall when my dad got sick I got to see these words in action. The sacrifices that my mom made, the love my mom showed could only be made and shown to a best friend.


"When you can't sleep at night it is because God is wanting you to talk to Him." I have never been a great sleeper and there was a period in the 8th grade where I really struggled with sleep. During this period my mom would tell me to talk to God and I found that in the middle of the night when the rest of the world slept I was able to pour my heart out to God in a way that I would've never done had it not been for my mom.

   I am a little older now and I can see just how smart my mom is (except for the wind blowing at night part). I now have a best friend in Brian and I have made a commitment to him to love him, to make sacrifices for him and to be the very best that I can be with him. The example that was set before me has made this task a little easier.

   I am also pregnant now so the whole lack of sleep thing has returned. I fall asleep fine but I find myself waking up at 2a.m. with my mind full of all sorts of things. It is during these late night hours that I find myself talking to God, pouring out my anxieties, excitments, and thoughts. How exciting that we serve a God who is open for communication 24/7?!

   I am thankful for the wisdom that my mom has shared with me and I am thankful for a God that listens to me and wants me talk to Him ANYTIME!!

Lessons from Complete Strangers

    This past weekend we had the pleasure to go to a fancy resturaunt. It was full of atmosphere, deliciousness, and great friends! One of the most entertaining parts of the night was the two elderly women that sat behind Brian. Everytime he ordered anything they would look over his shoulder to see what he had ordered and then call the waiter over to ask what he had just gotten. This became really funny to everyone at our table. These women were both decked out in their best pumpkin sweaters and biggest pumpkin earrings. They were real characters! When they got up to leave they walked right beside me and I asked how they liked their meal. They proceeded to tell us how much they loved the restaraunt, this was their first time to come to Memphis they were on a senior citizen trip and they had been told they could go wherever they wanted for the night. I am so thankful they chose to come to the same restaraunt as us because the life experiences that they talked about made me want to be a better, wife, friend and person. 

   As they stood at our table and talked they told us that they had been life long friends and they lost their husbands within two months of each other. They told us that losing their husbands was the worst thing they could've imagined but they came together and became each others rocks. They told us not to ever take our marriages for granted, to always appreciate our partner because they miss their husbands every single day. They also told us to hold your friends close to be good to each other because one day you will need them more than you can imagine. They told us they had to get back to their hotel to watch the rest of the world series and with that they were gone.

   Our entire table, including the guys, was in awe. We were in awe of the strength these women had, the loss they had experienced made us all sad, the friendship that they had made us all so happy! Who would have thought that two complete strangers from Buffalo, NY could make our entire table want to be a better spouse, a better friend, and a better person.
 
    Thanks to those women I squeezed Brian's hand a little tighter, I enjoyed the company of my friends a little more and I said a prayer that I may be as transparent as those women. I pray that God uses me as a vessel just like he used those women to change us for the better.