Ellen show

This video cracks me up. Whenever I am kind of tired or down, I am now going to watch this. Thanks Gladys for the laughs.

Sunny San Diego

I am a San Diego girl through and through! The mostly sunny days is a big thing for me. Cloudy days tend to make me feel gloomy inside but sunshine gives me energy. I think I am really solar powered. :-) I know we need the rain especially in this drought but man do I love the sunshine.

We have a three day weekend coming up and I am really looking forward to it. I will be spending some quality time with the hubby and signing people up to join our small group. I am hoping to catch up with my brother since his life seems to have changed overnight and I know nothing.

Hopefully I will also be disciplined enough to get some exercise too. I have been doing a Tae-Bo video a few times a week and every time I feel like I am going to be sick afterwards. It is a good workout but it is hard. I love that it has uplifting gospel music in the background and you even have little kids, older people and out of shape people doing the workout in the video. I hate those videos where everyone already looks perfect! Not really all that helpful when you are having trouble breathing while doing the workout with them.

I know this is a lot of rambling but this is what was on my mind! :-P

Life is Messy!

There are times when I really wish that Jesus would have said, " If you make me your Saviour, your life will be perfect and happy." Alas, that is not what He said, He is my pillar of strength and provides for my every need but life is hard.

I have struggled with depression for the last 10-12 years. Over the last week, I have been going downhill fast - just getting really depressed. I am overweight and not able to get it together, I look at everything through tinted glasses (glass half full kind of thing), it was gray for days and Dan was out of town. All these things added up to me taking a sick day with a physical and emotional breakdown. God sure knew what He was doing when He put Dan and I together. He knows just what to say (even if he doesn't know what to say, he says the right thing) and he holds me and lets me cry on him. He is strong and firm but loving and tender all at the same time. I will be going back to counseling to work through my food issues (emotional eating). Dan is going with me to help me out and understand with me. I am truly blessed with the best husband for me. I love him so dearly.

It is hard for me to gain perspective on my life and friends and work. I view things through such a different lens. I take things so personally and worry that I am not liked etc. It certainly does not help me keep friends but it also makes it hard to get close to people. I wish I could change this part of me. Any suggestions? How do I see the truth through my own cloud of hurt and loneliness?

Sorry this is so depressing but I am basically just journaling my week.

The House

We have slowed down in our house improvements. Dan is always working, over Christmas break, he tore out our closet and painted and put up a brand new closet organizer. We don't have any doors on the closet but it is organized. I am thrilled to have my car in the garage and to have my dresser in my bedroom. Those were big things for me so thanks Dan!I don't have any updated pictures of the house, sorry about that.

Dan received a barbecue for Christmas and we used it for the first time last night. It made some really good burgers. We are really excited to have a BBQ and it will bring some variety to our current diet.

I have not written in awhile, I just can't seem to think of anything that you all might find interesting to read.

I am back at work and getting ready to put out another newsletter. I am trying to figure out a way to let everyone know of my passion to help people and the ways that we really need their help. We have about 600 families being moved in Mexico that will need homes ASAP. We need as many people as possible to pitch in by sending money and coming on trips to have homes for the poorest of the poor in Mexico. Our pastors say this is the worst they have seen so far. We are jazzed to be a big part of the life changes for these families this year. Help us provide safe housing for these families.

God bless you all!

Holidays

I love the holidays! I love the festive air and the smiling faces and the lights and the scarfs and hats. Dan and I drove up to Paso Robles to have Thanksgiving with his dad and step-mom. It was a long drive, but it was so wonderful to see everyone and enjoy a relaxing weekend with family. Dinner was delicious! I am always so well fed at their house. :-) I like that all our family is pretty much within driving distance. Holidays is such a great time to see everyone and celebrate the year together.

Yesterday we decorated our new home for Christmas. I had Christmas music on all day long while we put up stockings and lights. We will hopefully be getting our tree this coming weekend!

One of my favorite things about the holidays is the time I take to reflect on the year and be thankful. I am going to list some of those things for you.

~ I am thankful for God's persistance. They way that He desires to spend time with me no matter what mood I am in or how well or not so well behaved I have been.
~God loves me as I am and not as I should be
~I am thankful for my husband and the way that he pursues me and desires to know me better
~I am thankful for our new home
~I am thankful for our church family and that we are starting to get connected
~I am thankful for my job and all the wonderful friends that I work with
~I am thankful for family

I am thankful for so many things. I would love to hear what you are thankful for. Please let me know.

Blessings ~~~

Honesty...

Lately, I really just have not had much to say. I think about writing and then I wonder, does anyone even read this? Then I have to think, well what is the purpose of a blog? I honestly don't know. It is a way to journal online, a way for people to see more of you than you can express out loud, to let people see your heart not just what appears because of nervous habit or fear. As you probably already know, I am quite dysfunctional. I have a low to non-existent self-esteem, which makes it a challenge to make and keep friends (not much fun to hang out with I guess) which then effects my low self esteem. Such a nasty cycle. I wish I knew how to get off the roller coaster and learn how to not depend on others opinions of me. The other problem I have is interpreting things and taking things personally when that was never an intention of the other person. I can make a mess of the simplest things. I struggle, we all probably struggle with different things. You may be surprised to find that I am an introvert. My coping mechanisms are very different depending on the circumstances. I have been told that because of my fear of rejection I can appear snobby or prudish, and other times I make a total fool of myself and can't face anyone for awhile. How do you learn to get outside yourself and not worry about any of these things? Worry never helped anyone - in fact most often, worry is harmful! How do you train yourself not to worry or how do you just trust the invisible God with EVERYTHING! He is trustworthy but sometimes it is hard to trust. I admit I struggle! God says He is my all in all, I don't need anything else. Why do I struggle so much when I have the I AM in my life as my master, my Lord, and my Abba? Help me Jesus to have Your love flow from me, help me to have compassion from You to flow to those around me, make me Your vessel and use me to the glory of Your name!

A Call to Die

I don't know if I mentioned this already or not, but I am doing a daily devotion called "A Call to Die". It is pretty intense - which I like - with the challenges to die to my selfish desires and the way I live life in general. One of the things I have been reading about lately is about how often we minimize the purpose of the cross in our daily lives. Like there is some way to get deeper spiritually than the cross. I had to think about that for awhile because I get that way, where I think I need to grow deeper in my walk with cross than understanding what Jesus did on the cross. I still struggle to grasp the love and depth of sacrifice that Jesus has shown through His death on the cross. He didn't want to die! He had given up equality with God to live amongst us and then to take every sin ever committed and every sin to ever be committed in the future on Himself and died once for them all!We all have a choice to make, are we going to believe that He did that and accept Him as our Lord and Master. I have made that decision and yet I struggle daily to honor what He did on the cross. I still mess up regularly. I wish that I had the book with me right now so I could give you this quote word for word, but Charles Spurgeon said, "If you sin, sin boldly. Every time you sin, you are saying that sin is worth more to you than the cross of Jesus Christ." Ouch! I make so many choices each day - how I speak to people, the thoughts I entertain, the little white lies, the bad attitude, the selfishness, and the list goes on. I desire to think about Christ and Him crucified and have that be my perspective for each daily choice. I want to live a life filled with gratitude and thanksgiving, full of love and compassion. I want to rejoice when God rejoices and I want to weep when God weeps. To live with such passion and zeal and remembrance for why I am allowed to live eternally with God!