All the lonely people, where do they all belong?

I have been putting off writing here for several months. It isn't that I haven't had plenty of interesting things to write about, it just seems that what I have been struggling with has been all consuming. Most of my life I have struggled with one major constant feeling. Loneliness. I was sick often growing up, and especially through my teen years, and I remember feeling very lonely. Fast forward to present day, and I am still struggling with the same loneliness. I have a very melancholy side, which I am beginning to realize only adds to my feelings of loneliness. I often feel like Eleanor Rigby from the Beatles song. This is totally depressing, I know! But I have finally come face to face with how I really feel and I can perfectly see that what I am lacking is contentment. Contentment is that inner genuine peace of the soul that no matter what trials God is allowing in your life, you are at peace with what He is doing. I need that, I want that. I desperately desire to have that inward peace that isn't just a passing feeling, but instead the attitude of my heart. My husband is a great example of contentment. I have never met someone who seems so naturally content, and yet I struggle and struggle! One man who truly mastered the divine art of contentment was Paul the Apostle. He was beaten, imprisoned, stoned, shipwrecked, imprisoned, with health problems, and yet he was able to say "I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content" (Philippians 4:11). Wow! I find the attitude of his heart to be amazing. I have been slowly reading the book, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment. I really do believe that as I read about contentment, and with the help of Jesus, apply it to my life that He will teach me what true contentment is, and then I will at peace. I appreciate your prayers

Oh, Yum!!

If you have never had dulce de leche before, I seriously suggest you give it a try! Mark and I were craving caramel apples last night, and after a quick google search, I came across this amazingly easy idea! As a little girl, I remember listening to my mom's stories of growing up in Bolivia and having dulce de leche and how good it tasted. Well, she was right, it is awesome! Here is the link to the recipe: http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2008/03/dulce-de-leche-crockpot-recipe.html We indulged in it for breakfast with red delicious apples and it was amazing! I like the idea of using my crockpot to slowly cook the can of sweetened condensed milk to avoid any kind of explosion, but if you are turned off by the idea of boiling a can, quite a few people used small canning jelly jars and had the same result!

This little can has so many possibilities, I think it would be delicious to put a plunk of it in my french press coffee, maybe melt a little and drizzled over a spice muffin, or as an awesome pie...put it in a graham cracker crust with whip cream on top and some chopped nuts....yum

Remembering Bekah King

I would like to dedicate this post to Bekah King, a childhood friend whose life was cut short on August 2nd by a drunk driver. I have so many fond memories of growing up with Bekah! Some of my favorite childhood memories are of my time spent with Bekah and her two older sisters, Hannah and Sarah. Bekah was three years younger than me, and I always thought of her as a little sister. When we were in our teens I moved to a different city and lost touch with the three until a year ago when we reconnected online. I met with them at a Barnes and Noble a year ago for coffee and we laughed and reminisced about some of those fun times. I remembering hugging each one of them and promising to get in touch with them again next time I was in town. Never even thinking that it would be the last time I would ever see Bekah on this earth. She was a beautiful person inside and out, and I regret not being able to tell her how awesome she was while she was still alive.

When I heard the horrible news, I couldn't wrap my head around it, she was only 20 years old and had her whole life ahead of her. In this week of remembering Bekah, with many tears and prayers for her family, I have learned some very important things about life now, and I feel compelled to share them, in honor of her life.

1 - Every morning I now wake up thankful just to be alive

2- Life is too short to complain and fight about things on earth that will never matter in the end

3- I want the people in my life to know how special they are and how much I appreciate them now. Not when its too late.

4 - To live life well, "a life lived well is more precious than a life lived long "

The 30 Day Husband Encouragement Challenge for Wives

Hello again! Last time I wrote, I was talking about FlyLady, and my 28 days of baby steps to develop good routines and a neat and tidy home. Things have been going great, I have been following the morning, afternoon, and evening routines and it has made life so much more pleasant! The one thing that has made the most different is shining my sink...trying to keep a clean sink with all dirty dishes washed as soon as possible. It was rough for about a week to make sure the dinner dishes were done before I went to bed, but it is getting easier and I LOVE waking up to a clean kitchen and having all clean dishes when I go to make Mark breakfast! I'm about halfway through the 28 days and I couldn't be happier with the results. In fact, yesterday Mark stopped by the house with someone he works with out of the blue and I didn't freak out because I wasn't ready for company or because the house wasn't tidy, I was happy to have company and it felt great! So, in light of how great FlyLady is working, I heard about a new challenge. The 30 Day Husband Encouragement Challenge from www.reviveourhearts.com/challenge/ the rules are that for the next 30 days: - You can't say anything negative about your husband..to your husband...or to anyone else, about your husband. - Say something you admire or appreciate about your husband...to your husband..and to someone else, about your husband! In addition to those two main guidelines, everyday you receive an email with a special task for the day to encourage your husband. It makes me think of Proverbs 31:11-12 "The heart of her husband safely trusts her; so he has no lack of gain. She does him good and not evil all the days of her life." That is really my heart's desire, and I am hoping that I can use these next 30 days (and even after that) to really work on encouraging my husband! :) Wish me luck....I started today and I have 29 days left! Oh boy...

FLYlady!!!!

I do not consider myself bad housekeeper, I try to pick up and clean some everyday, but this summer I found myself chickening out of my housework. It is hot outside, I have no friends around to hang out with, and so I found myself just doing the bare minimum around the house and then spending the rest of the day on something crafty and watching Netflix. Oh how I love Netflix!! (I am currently watching Prison Break, and have to really watch myself. The show is so exciting that it sucks you in and before you know it you've already watched 5 episodes and the day is almost over! Yikes!) I have been convicted about slipping into lazy summer habits, and decided to try FLYlady. Now, a year ago it was recommended to me by two different friends who couldn't say enough good about it, and their houses spoke for themselves, always tidy and clean. I remembered their good advice this last week as I was trying to figure out how to get myself back in line. So, I got online, signed up for the emails and read about how to get started. 28 baby steps to Finally Loving Yourself (FLYing)! I am about 5 days into the 28 day challenge and I cannot believe how awesome it is! Check out the website http://www.flylady.com/ it can't hurt, and I know you will have great success if you commit to doing the challenge! 23 days left for me, I'll let you know how it goes! :)

My How Time Flies!

I cannot believe how the months have flown by! Between cooking, cleaning, working around the house and having fun doing crafty projects, time has flown by and it has been a very pleasant summer so far. It is getting quite hot here, but I am happy to hole up in the house with the a/c and do some summer reading and experiment with some new recipes for the hot weather! Here is a salad I invented that like to call: Hope's El Centro Summer Salad 1 red pepper, diced 1 can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed 1 bunch of cilantro, chopped 2 handfuls grape tomatoes cut up 1 avocado, diced the juice of 6 key limes splash or two of olive oil salt to taste 2 dashes of Tabasco (or more depending on your liking) Just mix and chill. I love to eat this for lunch when its too hot to cook outside! :) Mark loved it and thought diced shrimp would be a nice addition... I picked up a copy of Peter Pan at our little bookstore when Mark took me out on a date, and have been loving it! I grew up watching the Disney version of Peter Pan as a girl, and I am loving the book even more! I can't wait until I have a little boy or girl of my own that I can read this book to, it is truly a gem! Here are some fun quotes from as far as I have read: "You see, Wendy, when the first baby laughed for the very first time, its laugh broke into a thousand pieces, and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies." "Even Michael already half asleep, knew that she was perturbed, and he asked "Can anything harm us, mother after the night-lights are lit?" "Nothing, precious," she said; "they are the eyes a mother leaves behind her to guard her children." "Tink was not all bad: or, rather, she was all bad just now, but, on the other hand, sometimes she was all good. Fairies have to be one thing or the other because being so small they unfortunately have room for one feeling at a time." Happy 4th of July! I hope you have a great day celebrating the freedom that we are so blessed to enjoy!

Shake, Rattle and Roll!

It has been my goal this year to post at least once a month, I realize April is over and May will be over in a few short days..so to redeem myself, I will tell you about my crazy April...... Easter started out as the perfect day, Mark played his trumpet with the worship team in church, I played a duet with our church pianist, Lindsay, for the offertory. It was a beautiful day, I made a nice Easter lunch, and the birds were singing, the weather was perfect.....suddenly, a 7.2 earthquake hit and everything was turned upside down!!! I can honestly say without even the slightest amount of exaggeration, that earthquake was the scariest thing I have ever been through. Mark even admitted that the earthquake was the scariest thing he has been through while in the United States (and he lives for dangerous excitement). When the initial rolling feeling started I was in the kitchen cleaning up from lunch. Then, the rolling feeling suddenly turned to violent shaking and the noise of our house shaking, dishes rattling, and things falling was deafening. Mark ran to hold up his 1,000 pound 125 gallon fish aquarium that was shaking back and forth, I ran over to our other 40 gallon aquarium and tried to keep it from falling. The whole earthquake lasted for about 35 seconds and seemed like it would never end. Mark finally shouted at me to grab Mollie and get out. I found Mollie and ran outside until the shaking finally stopped. I could barely walk, my whole body was shaking.

After I went back inside, Mark and I surveyed the damage..

As we picked out way through the house, there was water everywhere, our pool was making huge noisy waves and we lost about a 1,000 gallons of water. Upside? I didn't have to water the lawn that week! The only serious damage was a 20 gallon aquarium in Mark's office that fell over and broke. Shards of glass and gallons of water covered the floor. We were able to recover the fish and they are OK! The power was out for only a couple of hours, and I am so thankful for that! I spent the next couple of days with a shop vac cleaning up water and shards of glass. Our life is almost back to normal. We had over 500 small earthquakes in the first 48 hours since the initial 7.2. It is quite unnerving not being able to count on the ground to be solid. So, that was April, and although May is almost over we are still having earthquakes! It seems that everyday we have small 1 -3 earthquakes that we don't even pay attention to. Saturday morning we had a 5.3 followed by a 4.8 with only three minutes in between! It always gets my heart pounding, and I am not sure I will ever get used to the ground moving! You know you have had too many earthquakes lately when you can accurately guess how strong the quake was by the sound it makes when the shaking hits your house! When ever I get scared though, I am reminded of the old hymn "My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' and righteousness, when all around my soul gives way He then is all my hope and stay, on Christ the solid rock I stand all other ground is sinking sand"!! Nothing could be more relevant to me at this point!!

Special Events!!

This month I celebrated my 23rd birthday, and Mark and I celebrated our 3rd anniversary!!

I really am blessed to be married to such a great guy!! I am looking forward to many more years together!

Summer Planning...

Summer is fast approaching here in the Imperial Valley, and I have been working on my annual list of things to help occupy me while I swelter in the hot hot El Centro heat. Here it what I have so far: - Piano practice. I have started playing again and am really enjoying it. I hurt my wrist really bad a year ago and it is finally feeling good enough for me to play the piano daily! I am still praying and asking God to heal it completely so that I don't have to baby it so much. - Read, read, read...and read some more! ( a short book list...with more books to certainly be added on later) - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling - Beowulf by ? , I did some checking online and it looks like no one actually knows who the author was... hmm... - Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain - A Double - Barreled Detective Story by Mark Twain - The Awful German Language by Mark Twain - Learn German! I have been putting this off since I married Mark. He speaks German, and when ever we meet someone who speaks German, he rattles off something I can't even understand! I hate being left out of any kind of fun.... - Find someone to help out. I pray for so many people and look for ways to be helpful, but would like to be possibly extra helpful to one person. - Be more patient. It looks like Mark will be working longer hours this next year as he takes over a larger role in the station. I will see less of him, and he'll need all the love and support I can muster...pray for me!!! (Mark too!) Happy summer planning everyone!

What I've been up to lately!

I wasn't really sure what to write about, and then I had the thought of just sharing with you some of the things I have been enjoying lately, So...enjoy! For Valentine's Day, Mark got me two beautiful hand fed Love birds! I have been wanting a pair for a long time, and he was such a sweetheart to get them for me!! This pretty bird is Eleanor, she is a real sweetheart and has the sweetest personality!

This little rascal is Ringo. I love him so much! He doesn't like to be held, and gets very unhappy when I pick him up! I am working on building a relationship with him, he is a cutie, isn't he?

This is the cage Mark got for me, I absolutely fell in love with it when I first saw it, and it looks so pretty in my house!! I think Eleanor and Ringo like it too! :)

Eleanor and the mirror that both birds absolutely love! They fight over who can sit on the perch and stare at themselves in the mirror. Yesterday I watched Ringo push Eleanor off so he could have the mirror all to himself! What clowns!!

Here is my latest completed project! My very first counted cross stitch project. I had a great time working on them and plan to hang these pretty pictures in my dining room.

A close up of the cute girl and the apple pie!

Another recent project. I love writing in journals, and decided it would be fun to spruce up this plain composition notebook into a pretty journal. All it took was some card stock, glue and ribbon...and Abracadabra! Ready to write in!

I had to include this super cute picture of my darling doxie! Mollie is my best friend and companion, we have so much fun together! Well, that is what I have been up to lately, now that summer is almost here in the Imperial Valley, I have to start thinking of some new projects to work on. Always fun!

Blast from the past...

Here is something I actually wrote nearly two years ago. I recently was cleaning my office/sewing room and found it lying in an ominous stack of random papers. I hope you enjoy it! I am so excited about the things God has been teaching me! I feel like a plant that after being watered is coming to life. My leaves and petals lifted towards God in praise, ready to take in the sunlight of God's instruction and divine pruning shears. How many times in the past year have I heard those divine pruning shears sniping away the leaves and branches that should not be there. Like an unfinished chair in the hand of the Almighty carpenter I have felt the grit of holy sandpaper as He has gently but firmly taken off many rough edges. One example that comes to my mind, is how I carefully laid out building plans for my life. I knew exactly the course I wanted to chart, and I prepared to step out and act on those plans. I laid a foundation, started to put the walls up......but I ran out of building material. I had no more nails, I kept accidentally hitting my thumb with the hammer, and more than once a 2x4 had dropped on me. I got frustrated! This was my dream house and why wasn't it turning out? Where were the supplies I had asked God for? That is when I began to despair. What had happened to my house of dreams? Where had I gone wrong in all my careful planning? God is faithful, and true to His work when He said, "I will never leave you, nor forsake you..". So as I sat on the uneven foundation of my fallen "dream house" with my head in my hands, God showed up. I lifted my head in excitement! Now I could continue! Surely He had brought me the supplies needed to get back on schedule...but alas! He didn't bring building supplies, He brought a bulldozer. He walked over to me as I stood there with my fist clenched, my face red with anger, my eyes stinging with tears. "Hope, I know this is not what you wanted, but it is what I want. It is the best thing for you. Do you see this foundation? It has been built out of how other people perceive you, what was popular with your peers, and what feminism thinks you should become. Your foundation is uneven and cracked and no house built on that will stand." I stood unmoved and He said all of this to me, and I watched as He unrolled a set of new plans...where was the big piano room I had planned for? Or the big living room for entertaining friends? What about the big mirror in the large closet I had carefully sketched out, where I could try on the latest trends. They were gone. He put His arm around me as He showed me the first page, tears were flowing freely now that I saw what I was to start on first. My foundation was to be made out of Jesus Christ and my personal relationship with Him. Developing faith, hope and true love that hopes all things, believes all things, love that never fails. He hugged me again before I heard the engine roar and the bulldozer slowly lurched forward towards everything I had in my own strength worked so hard to build. As the last pieces were demolished, He was suddenly there beside me with His work belt on. Holding out His hand, He asked, "Are you ready?"

1776 in 2009

It was absolutely wonderful to be able to visit some of the historical sites in Philly while we were in Pennsylvania! I was able to see quite a few of the places on my wish list. There is so much to see there, that I will have to visit again, just to see it all! Here is Independence Hall, a beautiful old building that has undergone major restoration over the years to preserve its wonderful heritage.

Me and George Washington!

Mark and I in the room where the Continental Congress met and where the Declaration of Independence was signed. It was awesome to be standing in that room...if only walls could talk!

Mark looking so handsome! It was very cold there, and because of all the snow, I was unable to visit the Todd House, or the Betsy Ross House. But since I have complained so much about not having any snow. I really enjoyed having snow for Christmas!

Walking around Independence Square...it was VERY cold!

Mark was fascinated by this old weathered crest on the front of Congress Hall, I have since recognized it in many old historic pictures....

Congress Hall

The room where George Washington and John Adams were sworn in as the first two presidents of the United States

Upstairs in Congress Hall, it was absolutely beautiful

This painting was uncovered when they were carefully stripping the walls during some restoration. I can't imagine what people were thinking when they painted over it...it was, in my mind, the best part of the room.

Me and Mark in front of the Liberty Bell... I was absolutely fascinated by it, how old and beautiful it was. I found it very awe inspiring.

Mark was my wonderful photographer and took many awesome pictures of the Liberty Bell, this was one of my favorite shots

The view of Independence Hall from the Liberty Bell...I loved how they had the Liberty Bell in direct view of Independence Hall...it was perfect!

After spending months reading up on the history of the birth of our nation, it was so exciting to visit some of those places, and to walk where great men and women have walked. Seeing them might just be the highlight of 2009!