New changes are a comin!

Just wanted you guys to know what is going on with me and my family. Right now we are trying to move back to Oklahoma City from the country around Chickasha area. We love love love it out here, but we are really struggling to survive out here between the extremely high gas prices and the higher rent and utility prices. My husband drives 45 minutes each way to work 5 days a week and sometimes we go up there on the weekends also. This means that we are spending 30 % of our income on fuel. We have found an apartment complex up in the city that is in our prices range and is all bills included. They are also kid and dog friendly. They even have a small dog park. It isn't in the best area but it is decent and I believe that this is where we are meant to be for awhile. We are in limbo though, because we don't have the money to put down a deposit and they don't have an apartment available. We have been approved though and that is a relief. John's boss has given us a brand new Sharp 55 inch LED television to sell . It retails for 1600 and we are asking 1000 that will pay our deposit. But it is a large TV and 1000 dollars is a lot to come up with. So we haven't had any luck. But I am confident that we will sell it and that we will move when God wants it to happen.
I am gearing up to finally start working on my first goal after we move. I have been extremely busy getting ready for a garage sale and packing at the same time. So I know that starting my plan right now would not be good for me. I have talked about The 6 week body makeover diet before. Last time I went on this diet it changed my metabolism, so that when I lost 20 pounds I did not gain it back when I got off the diet. Well I am planning on following the basics of this diet again but I am going to make it a lifestyle. Meaning that I am going to change from eating 3 times a day to six, probably for the rest of my life. I also am going to follow the tools it had for my specific body type. Noodles and breads aren't good carbs for my life. But Rice and Potatoes are. Eating lots and lots of fruits and vegetables with my meals to provide good vitamins for my body. keeping my portions small; knowing that my next meal is only hours away. But the most important rule is to watch my sodium and not eat anything processed. This means that I must make all the food that I eat. Any canned boxed or prepackaged item is off limits. Now that doesn't mean that Joslyn and I wont go out for ice cream once and awhile. But I think that it means more often that I will be making our ice cream and desserts so that I can control what goes into our food.
The biggest change about this weight loss goal is that I am going to blog about it. I will have Weight Loss Wednesdays. Posting my successes and failures for the week. My weight loss or gain and what I have eaten and how often I have exercised that week. You see I have learned a lot in this last year and I really feel ready to change my life. But I know that I can't do it alone. First of all God is in control! If I give him the burden of this change and pray when I am tempted to give up I believe that He will give me the strength to continue. Secondly I will need accountability partners to steer me back on the right track. Thirdly, I think that knowing that I will have to blog about my successes and failures may make me want to have more successes.

I will still blog about other things to. Eventually I would like to blog about a different goal each day. But we are going to start small and God will help me develop the blog into what it needs to be to mirror His image. Thanks for all of the support you have given me by reading my blog and commenting. This blog has helped shaped me into a better person. I love reading all of the blogs that I follow and I can't wait to see how we grow together even more!
PS the picture is of me when John and I were dating over 12 years ago!

Friends!

It is very hard for me to believe that it has almost been a year since we moved out to the country, Chickasha, OK! Boy time does fly when you are having fun. I have discovered so much in this year that it is almost immeasurable. God has taught me many lessons this year through the help of friends and I want to take this time to thank those people that have been monumental in this year.
First I have grown many steps in my quest to enjoy "quiet time". I am not referring to quiet moments, which are only possible in this house if the toddler and all the dogs are sleeping. I am referring to being alone. You see, one of my constant struggles as a codependent is being alone. My inner being detests alone time. The devil knows this and uses every opportunity to bring me down, tell me lies and drudge up the past. But luckily God has used certain wonderful people in Chickasha to help me through these struggles and to teach me how to use this time to grow closer to God and learn more about myself.
Megan. She is a fellow blogger and Stay at home mom. I don't think she knows how much she has enriched my life. When I was searching for friends she befriended me at church and always had a friendly smile to offer. She is one of those people that I want to flock to because her heart for God is so available. Megan had invited us for lunch one day after church, no notice just an invite and I was and am still very grateful for that. It meant a lot that she cared enough about us to invite us over without fussing about details. It was one of the most wonderful moments I have had here in Chickasha. It seems silly but, so many people including me never show you their house without plenty of warning. Although, we are truthful in our want to enjoy and be enjoyable, there are parts of ourselves that we feel we need to hide. Messy houses, untidy places that we feel we can't expose. Now her house clean and welcoming, but it was lived in, so I felt completely comfortable to be me in her house and with her family. The experience was beautiful.  I don't know how i stumbled on to her blog, but I was amazed when I did find it. It was just what I needed. I was a new blogger and I looked to her site as a guidebook to blogging.  Her spirit is uplifting and her blogs are thought provoking and wonderfully written. I have also met many other wonderful Christian bloggers through her blog; that draw me closer to God. Please check out her blog Sorta Crunchy if you can, you won't be disappointed. I am very thankful for her.

Secondly, God has been teaching me to serve only for Him. When I started going to Celebrate Recovery at the wonderful Baptist Church here in Chickasha; I was being told by God to go a whole year without making commitments to serve in the church. This was very hard for me to do, because I had used service in the church to fill up my calendar, fill my need to be needed, and to build my self esteem. All of these things should have been lead by God, but instead I was doing them for my own selfish reasons. Celebrate Recovery helped me see why and when I was doing this, but God told me that I needed to break the habit. Yes you can get addicted to serving. Or more point in fact people. I needed them as much as they needed me and therefore I was not being God's hands and feet. I was relying on my own power, although I did it with the best intentions.  Many people have been very influential in this aspect of my growing process. Some of them are:

Cindy is (how do I say it) the most wonderful bundle of positive energy I have ever met. She has been a mentor, a friend and a provider for me this year. She is always so positive, even when times are tough. God has used her to help me get through the tough moments and help me move past my conflicts with being dependent on people. She is very wise and she guided me through writing and sharing my testimony for the first time. For this I will be eternally grateful. She is helping me to enjoy life more. It is easy for me to write about adventures but doing them is not as simple. Being in Cindy's presence is always an adventure. I will forever be grateful for her.
Jennifer is a wonderful soul and my neighbor. It was a couple of months before I got the nerves to talk to her. Meeting new neighbors has always been hard for me, since I moved a lot growing up. Once I did I was kicking myself for waiting so long. We are kindred spirits. We get each other. We have a lot in common and are both moms, Christians and wives of truck drivers. When we talk together we never want to end the conversation. God lead me to her because I needed a friend that I could see almost everyday. He knows my fears and being able to talk to someone, who isn't my husband, allows me to feel better. She also needed me to watch her daughter after school and on days when school is out. I enjoy having an older child around and Joslyn gets the interaction she needs too. I am learning so much from being in their lives and I enjoy their company very much.
Thirdly, God is teaching me that I don't have to have money to have fun or reach others for him. He has given me many ideas on how I can use what I have. I have learned so much about money in this phase of my life and I know that I am not done growing on this issue. I have talked before about our lessons through Financial Peace but I don't think I said that it would have been possible without my friend Heather.
Heather. How do I describe her? Joyous, amazing, successful, loving, generous, etc... The list could go on and on. When she joined my CR group I had no idea how influential she would be in my life. John and I started talking seriously about going to FPU but had no idea how we were going to afford the 100 enrollment fee. We figured that we would be able to raise the money some how. Well, after mentioning that in CR one night, Heather walked up to me and said that she wanted to sponsor us. She didn't even know me that well and definately didn't know John. Well, I was floored! I knew that she was obeying God by doing this. Well of course I told her that we would accept only if she would hold me accountable for going. She did and we have been great friends and accountability partners ever since. I love her dearly and feel so lucky to get to be a part of her life.
Sharon. Sharon is a woman in my Sunday School class that I was intrigued about right away. I noticed her humble attitude and serving heart right away. It took me awhile to get to talk to her because she was always surrounded by people who she was serving. Since the moment Megan had invited us to her house on a whim, I had wanted to do that for someone else. I knew that Sharon was that person. When I invited her she accepted and I was thrilled. As we ate our sausage and french fries (glamorous isn't it) , we got to talk and get to know each other. We were like two peas in a pod. Feeling the same way about so many things. We talked about our enjoyment of playing games and how it invokes wonderful feelings for both of us. A couple of months later we had our first Friday night game night. I made tons of food and expected many people but it ended up just being my sister, Sharon and I. We had so much fun. We have had many other Friday night game nights and it has always been just the two of us, well 3 Joslyn included. I have loved every one of them, getting to know this kindred spirit a little better.
There are so many people that have been influential in my life and I can't name them all. But these people have been valuable since I moved to Chickasha. I had left so many of my friends behind in the city that I felt abandoned. I pleaded with God to bring people in my life that would help me during this time of struggle.
I don't like asking people for help but God has shown me that I am not doing his will if I don't trust Him in providing for me through His people. The desires I had to help others wasn't wrong it just had to be God lead, then it could work the way it was supposed to. And it had to go both ways. I had to be humble enough to ask for help as much as I liked helping others. These people have allowed me to be who I really am and loved me for it. I couldn't be luckier.
As we look forward to a future move and the exciting new plan that God has for our lives, I can't help but be nostalgic as I look at who we are leaving behind. I will miss each of them so much! Thank you God for the people you have put in my life. May our friendships always be healthy and pleasing to you Lord. May we grow together, lifting each other up in times of need and drawing each other to your will.

Here comes the whale!

As I'm looking back over the past year, my eyes have been opened to the gentle guidance of my Father. I was questioned many times on my families decision to move to Chickasha and leave my church family and friends. Sometimes I would cry and think I have done the wrong thing. But, I know that God is leading us through a drought and teaching us valuable lessons of his grace and providance along the way.

I was being a Jonah. Thinking that a move to the country would solve all of our problems. I was insecure about being a mother, struggling from financial burden, and mourning the loss of control I had on everything. My world was crashing. So what do you do when you have lost all control? I decided it was time to move. I was sure that Chickasha held the answer!

You can never run farther than God. You can run away from God, but he is always there. Waiting for you to open up to Him and knock down those barriers you build between you and Him. Turns out, I didn't run away from my problems like I thought.

My pre baby life consisted of staying busy enough to not have to deal with my insecurities and codependency. I had just learned through Celebrate Recovery that I was a codependent. I knew that I was dependent on my ministry. But I didn't have the courage to stand up for myself and just quit. I was afraid that if I quit my ministry and stayed in the church that I might be looked down upon or be judged. I also felt that I wouldn't be able to quit fully and would drag myself back into the same predicament when I started feeling out of control. Please don't think that my church would have looked down on me. I love that church, and all my problems were because of my codependence. Codependence is an addiction to people and the reactions of them. I wanted so bad to get better and I knew that taking a break from ministry was the only way for me to seek God for my acceptance and not people. When I moved to Chickasha, the first thing I did was get involved in a church and start serving. I thought, it won't be like it was in Moore. Well, God brought a whale to devour me and make me stop. It didn't feel right. God was telling me that I wasn't supposed to be at this church and here I was back at the confrontation again. I couldn't run away this time. I had to face my fear of confrontation and tell this lovely church that I had made a commitment and couldn't keep it. The old me would have stayed and suffered. So I prayed and sought council and then wandered in with the heaviest heart. And just like God did with Jonah, when he repented, God was merciful. I went in there and told them that I wouldn't be able to fill my commitments and the pastors said we know. I was like what do you mean "you know"? God had prepared their hearts too. He had told them that I would leave and that eventually they would find someone to fulfill those commitments. I was in shock and was humbled. Sometimes I forget how Big God is! He had it all worked out. So I ended up at another great church and had to do the right thing and tell them I couldn't get involved in ministry for a year. And although it has been hard, I am actually learning to get my acceptance from God.

The second thing I was running from was my insecurity about being a mother. I had always wanted to be a mom, and when it finally happened I was scared out of my mind. Seeing how big of a mess I made with my life, I was sure that I would screw up Joslyn. I was so insecure that when I would take her out around people, anything they would say would knock down my security. "She sure spits up alot, is she colicky? She is kicking her legs a lot, she might be constipated." I was able to take little remote concerns and blow them out of preportion. Instead of trusting my instincts. I actually got to the point that I didn't want to take her around people because of the way I would feel for days after. Well, since I had moved too far from the people I knew, now I had to deal with my insecurities alone. Well that has not been easy. God brings in another whale. This whale is actually a person. She is a person in all honesty that I can't stand. It seemed like everywhere I went in this new town, she was there. Why can't I stand her? Because she personifies my insecurities. She is a struggling mom, I have this fear that people will see me as a struggling mom. When I see her I am drawn to the fact that she doesn't always put her child first, and I am so afraid that people will see my selfish side, that I won't always do the best for my child. She is an outsider, I am so afraid of being away from the crowd. I need that acceptance. So much so that I struggled with making sure that Joslyn always looked proper and when something would go wrong, Like a blow-out diaper, I would be disappointed in myself. She is sloppy, I am a closet slob. Only those who really know me know my mess. I will wear myself out making sure the place looks decent for visitors and not be able to enjoy their company. ETC...ETC. So slowly but surely I am facing these flaws of mine and having to learn compassion for her and me. We are not perfect and when we hide our flaws we give up that opportunity to have God fix them. Sometimes He shows us that our FLAWS are actually connections to others. When other people see our vulnerability, they let down their guard and God can come in. I think its better to be flawed and reach others for Christ than to pretend to be perfect and reach no one!

So the last Ninnevah in my life ( thing I was running from) was my finances. Or should I say my inability to control them. John and I have been running from our financial burdens since the moment we said I do. We fell into every pitfall that you can fall into finacially. Credit cards, home mortgages, refinance, loans, and finally bancruptcy. I thought that if we moved to Chickasha that we would actually be making a better change. Our rent went down substancially, but our fuel and wear on the cars went up. It didn't matter how much John worked, we never had money at the end of our month. Suddenly, we had diapers we had to buy, formula, baby food, and doctors expenses. Although I knew that money didn't grow on trees, I was used to a habit of spending money when we had it and not saving for the future. So God's whale for us was poverty. I don't mean true poverty, because even at our lowest moments we were still richer than most of the world. But I mean, not knowing where the money was coming from to pay the electricity bill, how we would buy baby food, and eating rice and beans. I had to learn how to make bread, because we didn't have any money to buy any. We accepted food from church and family, and I had to tell people that I couldn't go anywhere because we had to save the gas for John to get back and forth to work. PLEASE dont feel sorry for us! I am not telling you this to make you feel sorry for us. Everytime, we had to ask for help, or turn down going somewhere, God was humbling us. For the first time in my life I had to look fear of rejection in the eye and say it doesn't matter what people think of me. the love of money had always controlled me. I am so grateful!! The biggest thing is that my husband is right there with me. We rarely communicated about money, unless it was to fight about it. Most of the time, we didn't even fight about it, we just conceeded to each others wishes so that we wouldn't have to be the bad guy. So finally after 10 1/2 years marriage we are communicating about money. We also have a plan to learn how to handle money. I recomend Financial Peace University to everyone. We are learning how to make a budget, how to save and plan for the future. We also have both agreed that Joslyn will grow up knowning all that we have learned so that her future is not full of money mistakes. I will forever be grateful for the lessons that God has taught us during this time.

SO like Jonah, I ran away from the task that God had set before me. And I encountered hardship along the way that I probably would have avoided had I made the changes God's way. But because of God's grace and mercy he brought Jonah and me out of the whale and taught us valuable lessons. I know though that had Jonah not run from God, his story wouldn't have been in the Bible. God can use us, runners or not. Some of us have to encounter a few whales along the way, but it does make for a better story!