Marriage Tip For The Day...........

The daily wife tip I get each morning was actually passed on from her husbands web site this time. Something really good to think about. I mean would I want to be married to me? Sometimes I guess but other times not so much. ;) Something good to think about in the way we respond to our spouses and the way we serve them and build them up on a daily basis.


Would you want to be married to you?
I found this question in a post on Simple Marriage (Corey's blog is my current painful introspective obsession).
So, would you want to be married to you? How would you feel about being on the receiving end of your peculiarities, your selfishness, your obsessions, your limitations, and the things you won't let go of even though you know you should? Would you feel blessed or cheated if you received from your bride what she receives from you? Do you offer enough love, concern, support, understanding and space? Are you too critical, too distant, or too avoidant? Do you make your needs, desire and wants far bigger than you see her needs, desire and wants?
If you don't like what you see when you answer these questions honestly, it's time to pick one thing and start working on it; then another thing and another.
If you like what you see when you answer these questions, there is a very good chance you are not being completely honest.
.....

Firefighters Conference

Hume Lake March 2010Dan and I attended the annual Firefighters for Christ conference this weekend up at Hume Lake. If you have been following my blog for any length of time you know we go every spring and have gone every year for I think 11 years. We also go up to Hume in the summer for 1-2 weeks and volunteer while the kids go to camp. This particular conference is for adults only though. Every year we battle to get up there. Work schedules, school schedules, sick kids, bad weather, etc. Every year we say,"this is it no more, it's just to far away to expensive and to much trouble to get to." Then every year we pray over our drive and make the 5 hour long journey up to camp. You know the funny the thing is that the minute we get there and we reconnect with our friends who have basically become family over the years all of my anxiety about the kids, the money, the drive all of it just melts away and I realize God has me there for a purpose.

This weekend was no different. The speaker was good and challenged us on a few things in our marriage and in our child rearing. One thing God really spoke to my heart about during one of the lessons was to let go. Release so God is in control. I 'know" that in my heart but how often do we say it our heads on a daily basis? I was really convicted to let things go that Dan and I had already talked about and dealt with. To allow God to work in his heart and not be "naggy" about anything but to lift him up and build Dan up. That also applies to my girls. They know what I expect and they certainly don't need me to harp on them. They need to breath so they can hear the Lord too. God also laid on my heart something that each of the girls have been talking to me about lately and he gently reminded me to help foster those things that are important to the girls in them. Morgan is passionate about praying for her future spouse and allowing God to pick that life mate for her. Ryanne is passionate about praying for people we know that are sick physically. If you need faithful consistent prayer call Ryanne I'm not kidding that kid prays without ceasing. :) I just want to be a faithful steward of what God has loaned me.

So I guess I could have made this shorter but the point is that I love getting away with my husband the couple times a year we sneak away cause God always refreshes me and he honors our time. Thank you Marianne and Andrea for helping us out with the girls, they loved it! :)

A Solution, A Quick Update & A Few Random Pictures.....

"Mooooommmmm, can we watch cartoons?" (followed by fighting over who's turn it was to pick the show) Moooommmmmmmmm, Morgan won't let me hear the T.V!!"" "Mooooommmmmmmmmmmm.......Ryanne took the remote!!"

The girls were getting into a bad habit of watching cartoons while they were eating breakfast which isn't a bad thing except I would be ready to start school and they would be like,"Oh I haven't brushed my teeth wait!" So with that said the T.V. went black and I started a ticket system. The only way to earn a ticket is to have eaten breakfast, have your chores done and be dressed and cleaned up and in the classroom ready for school by 9am. Then if you do all those things you get a ticket. Each ticket is worth 30 min. Now the catch is whoever spends their ticket to watch 30 min. of TV is in charge of the remote AND the show they watch. It's freakin' amazing how they carefully choose their mindless TV time now AND work together to pick shows and use their time so much wiser. Whew-Hew!!

This is Luke next door climbing back into his yard the other day; I got to wondering how long before Dan puts a stop to cute boys climbing into our yard to see our girls???? The other day Dan sent Ryanne to her room for a time out and he heard Ryanne talking to Luke through her bedroom window telling him her sob story. Bars on the windows as well I guess. ;)
Here is Morgan with her friends from a few doors over. The twins are the BEST! Super sweet and easy to be around. Morgan has been friends with them since she was three. I love watching all the kids in the neighborhood grow up together and turn into such sweet big kids. :) Morgan LOVES these girls!!

We have been so busy lately we have not had our weekly dinner with our friends and their daughter Taylor in a while so last night they came over and the guys grilled and the girls loved on the babe. Morgan cannot wait to babysit someday. I love the sweet look on Taylor's face here. She is getting so big and animated.

On a side note it was also a great week to catch up with old friends. Last Monday I got to meet with my friend Janette for lunch and catch up and then Friday the girls and I drove out to Nuevo and had a picnic lunch with our friend Jolene who also just happened to start selling MaryKay so we got treated to a facial and the girls got lots of play make up. :) If you are in need of any make up contact her at www.MaryKay.com/JoleneFlores She really is the best and very helpful. :) OK then Saturday our friend Crystal was in visiting from Dallas and we got to have lunch together so she could see the girls, so fun and good to love on her. It doesn't end there today we are meeting Jessica at the park to play and catch up. Can't wait! You know what all these girls have in common? Dan & I were youth leaders when we first got married & they were ALL in our youth group. Now they are all married and such sweet women after God's own heart. Seriously could I get more lucky this week? My cup runith over girls. :)

Circus Fun

The girls use these blocks for some of their circus classes and so I paid the dad who makes them to make the girls a set. We got right down to making them have some character.Allot of the kids have their own and bring them to class each week. It was fun to get them all painted and cute. You would be amazed at what strength it takes to use these.

It may look easy but the kids hold themselves up for great lengths of time.........

in lots of different positions..............................

and with some spotting they just keep doing new things and getting stronger and stronger.

Morgan went last night to get back with her club swim team. She is excited to swim again and compete. We are having snow flurries right now so I am glad Dan is taking her tonight to sit at practice cause I don't do 35 degrees sitting on pool decks. Well I do but I would prefer not if he is home. :) Between circus and swim team these girls are gonna be built like rocks. Ryanne's flying fish team starts in May. She doesn't compete but just learns the proper swim strokes to be a good strong swimmer. No doggie paddling here. They make them learn in 12' feet of water so they never learn to rely on standing on the bottom, not that Ryanne could reach. ;)

Answering A Question.....

After my last post more than a few people have asked me why dairy is bad for you and why as a family we don't consume dairy products. I wanted to give you a web site to thumb through when you have a minute. Not only can this web site explain it better than I can it also has a full page of all kinds of health issues you can click on and it will explain how dairy either is the cause or makes it worse. http://www.notmilk.com/

Now obviously this web site is one sided but they provide concrete facts and studies done on all kinds of topics that you can further research and read up on. One thing people always say to me is,"but where do you get your calcium?" If you go to this web site and scroll down on the bottom left side down to calcium and calcium II it will explain how it's not even true that milk protects against bone loss and osteoporosis. Very interesting. Another interesting find is the research on prostate cancer. This is a major issue for men and is linked to dairy consumption. Obviously I am not going to live forever and it's no guarantee that I won't get some life threatening disease but having all the tools to live the very healthiest I can for my girls and keep them at the lowest risk possible for health problems in the future is my main goal and why I am so nutty about this topic.

As I get older and do more research I am discovering that just because we have been told something our entire lives does not make it accurate and thinking for myself has been key as far as getting us all healthy. Maybe I should write up a little something on how and where we shop, what it costs us and include recipes and links we use. Although that may push some of you over the edge and make you stop reading. :) I promise as soon as Ryanne says something earth shattering we are back to that. :)

Does Food Matter? Rant #2 For The Week.......

If you know me or have read my blog for any amount of time you know by now that I am nutty about food. It took getting very, very sick for me to realize that there were other ways to treat the body other than medication. Even for severe immune diseases like cancer and rheumatoid. Our family has been dairy free for years and I'm also wheat free. Dan and the girls still eat some whole grains but I try to buy gluten free cereals and things. We also only eat meat about three times a week and the rest of the time we sub tofu for meat and eat vegetarian. I also buy only organic, hormone free, pesticide free products. No high fructose corn syrup or dyes in anything. I know maybe at first it sounds all nobel and great but it is hard and we do have to constantly adjust things. Eating out is the worst so we have a few places like Chipotle that we frequent when we are out because I know the meat is hormone free and I can get veggie bowels.

A few weeks ago I was feeling defeated. I just felt yuck, the weather was yuck, I hurt all over and all I could think of was how much easier it would be to pop a pill and eat whatever I want. Then Dan ordered Food Matters from NetFlix and it boosted me back into the right state of mind. If you get a chance go to their web site and see what it is about and maybe rent it.
www.foodmatters.tv/com (you may have to click on home when you get there) It's a great documentary all about food and how it is entirely possible to heal your body from everything from immune disease to sleep disorders to skin problems etc. It just reinforced allot of things I knew and encouraged me to continue to do what I know is best for my family. People always want to say that it's so expensive to eat organic and healthy but honestly its really not. We live on a strict food budget every month and we stick to it faithfully. It doesn't always have to be fresh, I often buy frozen organic fruits for smoothies and frozen organic veggies that aren't in season. It's super cheap at Trader Joe's to shop this way. Once I quit buying any junk and processed packaged foods it freed up our money to buy healthier whole foods. Trust me it's hard but it's something I am passionate about. I don't want my girls getting hormones and antibiotics in their foods. I don't want to be in a wheelchair in 5 or 10 years cause I have ruined my body with junk and allowed the Dr.'s to ruin my organs with chemo. It's a scary fact that the diabetes rate in kids is turning into an epidemic because of the amount of sugars in our foods. So scary. Anyways, if your nutty enough to watch the documentary and you think you will die without more there is another one called Food Inc. that is very informative about our farming practices in the states. I know, I know I need therapy. Sorry can't afford it after buying all organic. ;)

Venting

OK I make it a point to NOT watch the news. I mean think about it; its sad. They only highlight the negative about people, places and things. The weather is going to come and go whether I know 7 days ahead or not. Plus if you log onto a computer every morning anything "news worthy" that has happened around the world will appear front and center on your home page. The news just gives me anxiety. It makes me worry about things I have no control over and things I wouldn't want control over anyway.

With that said, I was watching some show the other night and a blip from the news came up. It was saying they were looking for a San-Diego teenager who had gone running and not returned. The were filming in front of a restaurant that I used to live close to and Dan and I would frequent when he came down.

I turned it off and went to bed praying they found that girl alive and returned her to her family. I pleaded and begged God that this would not end like everyone suspected it might. I refused to watch the news the next day because I didn't want to know. I got up this morning and on my home web page there it was; "Body of teenage girl found in shallow grave. Candle light vigil held by thousands."

It said the man they arrested was arrested back in 1990 for molestation and beating a young girl who got away. He also attacked a Colorado women who was here visiting and went for a jog. She also escaped. The man only served 5 out of possible 11 years. They made a plea bargain and got it down to 6 and he still didn't serve his entire time. 5 years, 6 it really wouldn't have mattered I guess. Once they let him out he was going to eventually kill someone. I am just sick sitting here trying to understand why we keep letting these guys out who stalk young girls and we know, we know its just a matter of time before they kill one of them. Now this family had to pay the ultimate price to have him finally locked up for good. Really? I am just broken for them. I am so angry. I am not stupid I know this happens everyday all over the world. I know. I get there is evil. I get it. I have been praying since my girls were born that nobody would EVER have there hands on them that is out to hurt them or take them away from their family.

Pray for this family. Pray they know Gods grace. Pray for all of these teenagers who loved this girl who are scared, hurting, lost. Pray for a revival in that high school and neighborhood. Pray.
I don't have to watch the news to know what this world really is made of. Pray for your kids.