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It’s Monday. I have a mug of warm coffee, my fluffy robe, a quilt, and my laptop. Fall made a lovely debut this morning in Houston but I don’t trust her to stay very long. Fall is sneaky that way. I am snuggled in though and I’m not moving until I knock out this post.

I missed a day yesterday. Today is Day 19 of the Write 31 Days challenge and I missed my second post of the commitment yesterday. The first time I missed a post I beat myself up. Today I’m offering myself far more grace. Writing for 31 days straight is a lot. I’m so glad I’m doing it because it’s growing my passion and my skill but it is exhausting. Totally exhausting. It’s a lot to put my heart and my thoughts out there every day. I’m kind of over myself so I know you must be as well….assuming you are still reading.

I get emails from Jon Acuff. Not because we’re friends. I get emails from him because I signed up to get emails from him. Apparently I had a shortage of emails one day and decided I needed to ask people to send me more. It’s why I also get emails from Michael Hyatt, Chalene Johnson, and Lysa TerKeurst. Seriously though, these are people who inspire me, encourage me, and push me forward to follow my dreams and do the things God has gifted me for doing.

This morning my email from Jon (I’ll call him that like we are friends) said all the things I’ve been thinking lately. He voiced the exact things I have wrestled in my head every single day since I started this challenge.

“And last, but not least, is the fear of ‘who cares?’ As in ‘who cares’ what I think or what I know. Who am I to write a book about life? I’m only 40 and what do I really know about life. I’m really unqualified. Everything I’ve written has already been said by someone smarter. I need to address that issue with the content inside the book. I also don’t want to write a book that I look back on 10 years from now and disagree with.”
(Read more at Acuff.me: Writers are crazy. Here’s proof I am. http://acuff.me/2015/10/writers-are-crazy-heres-proof-i-am/) 

So I’m not yet 40 (almost) and I’m writing a blog, not a book, but these are my thoughts. These are my fears. Who the heck is going to care? Why am I even bothering? But here’s the thing….Mr. Potato Head. Yesterday I stood in a room full of kids. I stood before them and talked to them about Paul and Timothy reaching out to the Corinthians to offer encouragement. I told them about how Paul taught what it means to be the Body of Christ. I asked a sweet little girl to be my assistant and we worked to put Mr. Potato Head together. We talked about how silly Mr. Potato Head looks when you put his arms in the leg holes. We laughed at the silliness of a nose trying to fit into an ear hole or eyes being placed in the place where lips belong. I told the kids, very passionately, that God has given each and every one of them special and unique gifts and talents. He has made some of them fast runners, others high jumpers. Some of them are super stars and math and others are science whiz kids. I told them to never be afraid to be the best version of who God created them to be because when we all  use our gifts together we make the world a better place and reflect the love and light of God.

(photo courtesy of Hasbro.com)

 

I meant it. I meant the things I said to them. I believe it to be true.

So why do I keep trying to put my arms in the leg holes and compare my nose to my ears? Why do I act like God gifted all the people with all the things and left me high and dry with no skills?

I could do all sorts of research into past therapy sessions and pull out old notes and make some sense of why I act like a crazy Mr. Potato Head most days. That would be a lot though and I’m really trying to no longer dwell in my past. No, instead I am challenging myself to kinder self-talk. I am striving to speak words of life to myself. I am going to be working hard to take my thoughts captive and think about whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable…I will think about such things. (Philippians 4:8)

I’m not expecting fast results. I imagine my results will be similar to when I give up carbs and expect to drop 40 pounds in the first day. It never works that fast. I do feel better though, manage my A1C levels, and have less mood swings when I follow a lower carb, less processed food diet. I have a sneaky suspicion that capturing my negative thoughts will also result in a few positive changes in multiple areas of life.

So have a happy Monday, my friends.Watch your carbs, watch your words, manage your thoughts. and be the best you God created you to be.

I broke down and bought it today. I keep hearing about this book and how it is supposed to change your life. I have several friends who have purchased in, read it, and actually started practicing the principles and swear it’s a real thing.

We shall see.

I don’t think of myself as a cluttery person. But because I just made up the word cluttery I very well may be just that. Cluttery.

My house is a cluttered mess. Not in the places you can see, mind you. No, I work very hard to keep public spaces free of clutter. My family is another story. To say I live with hoarders would be putting it mildly. My people really like to save things. All things. Receipts, ticket stubs, tags from pants, shoe boxes, carnival wrist bands….I could go on and on and on. The funny thing (if you call me pulling my hair out and screaming funny) is that the most common place for all this clutter would be the kitchen counter to the right of the sink and the first four steps on the stairwell. They walk in the house and lay things down and say, “I’ll put that away later.”

Later is generally the night before our cleaning crew comes and I’m running through the house like a mad woman screaming,”These ladies work so hard to clean our house and we owe it to them to put our stuff away so they can do their job!” The night before they come is always fun.

Every day I do a sweep through of the house, handing things to my people, asking them to put it where it belongs. Sometimes I don’t ask and I just pitch. I pitch things like Scholastic Reader sales fliers. I pitch Wendy’s receipts. I pitch folded up Band-aids. I find the strangest things in the strangest of places. That’s the stuff that can be swept away quickly if friends are coming over.  That is not the clutter to which I truly speak.

The clutter which I deny, the stuff that makes me cluttery when I don’t want to be cluttery is in the closets. Our closets and our pantries and our attic spaces are a mess. I mean a total mess. The junk, the garbage, the storage of who-knows-what is about to make me go insane. We moved into this house almost eleven years ago. There are boxes in the attic that we moved in and never opened.  We have a closet in our upstairs guest room that was truly a selling point to me when we bought this house. It’s a closet people dream about owning.

I. Can’t. Step. Inside.

Oh my word. It made my chest clench to just type those words. There is shame in messes hiding. I had a counselor tell me,  years ago, that the secret messes we keep (in closets or in desks) are indicative of our heart and mind. If that is truly the case then my heart and mind are cluttered with 14 boxes of baseball cards and one thousand pictures in black and white from my family. Pictures I couldn’t even begin to tell you anything about or who the faces belong to. It means my heart and mind are cluttered with half empty rolls of old Christmas wrap and 502 plastic Easter eggs.  It means old Halloween costumes and dollhouse furniture are looming in my deepest places.

Or maybe it’s what those things represent. I don’t know.

I’m going to attempt to tackle this book though and see if I can’t make some sense of the nooks and crannies of my house. And maybe if that happens my heart and mind will follow.

I’ll keep you posted.

 

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(This is my 17th post in a 31 day writing challenge that started way back here. The community of Write 31 Days is an amazing place to find support for writing; as are the Clumsy Bloggers who have joined me in this journey.)

Today is just for fun. I’ve made it to Day 16 of  the Write31Days Challenge. As one of my new writer friends recently said, “I’ve never kept anything up for 31 days that wasn’t bad for me.”  So this is new.

While the daily writing and sharing and heart pouring have been exhausting and draining it has also been beautiful. My heart is full, I’m making new friends, I’m learning new techniques, and I’m growing. The growing is not as fun as the making of new friends but it’s real so I’m rolling with it.

So thank you, dear readers, for hanging on. In appreciation for your loyalty I want to share a special offer from DaySpring.

DaySpring.com is celebrating all of the amazing Write 31 Days readers who are supporting nearly 2,000 writers this October! To enter to win a $500 DaySpring shopping spree, just click on this link & follow the giveaway widget instructions. Good luck, and thanks for reading!

I’ve been wallowing a bit lately. Life has been really big and a lot to carry and there have been things. Lots of things.

Then a friend (who I sometimes want to punch in the face) reminded me that there are people in the world who’d love to live my worst day.

It’s true. I know it’s true. My life is pretty posh. I have amazing friends. My husband is smoking hot and a great provider and makes me laugh until my eyes leak. My kids are funny and smart and healthy…Dear God, my kids are healthy! I have a house with a roof and air conditioning which, frankly, I’m super thankful for because October is supposed to be fall but it’s not. Not yet. Not in Houston. 93. That’s what the thermometer read yesterday. 93. But I’m grateful. I am alive and I have a voice and I have freedom of speech to announce that 93 is too freaking hot for October.

But still; life has been full lately. Not full of the joyful, abundance kind of things. It’s been a little high on the stress side. The side where you don’t know what’s coming next and if you’re going to be able to handle it or not. The side where you start to beat yourself up for not having more faith. I don’t know. You may not know that side. You may live on the, “Yeah, I’m stressed but I always have faith in God’s sovereignty” side. I’m not as familiar with that side.

So I beat myself up and I wallow. I start to drop grace and live in deficit. I read the bible to look for proof that this whole life thing is probably not going to work out for me. I look deeply between the lines for reasons to believe I am the one failure that Jesus did not come to save.

What if, though? What if I relied on the truth of The Word? What if, for just a moment, I could get outside myself and see the love of my Father. What would I believe about myself if I believed that every stinking word in the Bible was true and written as a love letter to me?

I might just shut down my pity part and believe myself to be . . .

• Justified and redeemed (Romans 3:24)
• Accepted by Christ (Romans 15:7)
• Chosen, holy, and blameless before God (Ephesians 1:4)
• Forgiven (Ephesians 1:7)
• Righteous and holy (Ephesians 4:24)
• Made complete in Christ (Colossians 2:10)

(I totally stole that list of verses from Holly Crawshaw over at ParentCue.)

Every one of those things are true. Every last one.

I am redeemed.

I am accepted.

I am blameless.

Forgiven.

Complete.

I am this. These. Those.

All of it.

Because Jesus.

So it’s time to put my big girl panties on and put away my crying towel. It’s time for me to read The Word and BELIEVE. It’s time for me to practice what I preach and start proclaiming His truth in my life. Consider this my war cry. Because no matter what feels I’m having…Jesus. No matter what life throws at me…Jesus. No matter what falls apart or breaks or cracks or changes…Jesus.

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(This is Day 15 of a writing challenge I joined for the month of October. For a list of all the posts I have entered this month you can click here. To join a fabulous family of Clumsy Bloggers like me you can find more information here.)

Did the dust know?

Did it feel what was happening?

Did the dust know it was dust but was being transformed into something new?

Did it hurt?

When we walk through difficult days, days that stretch us to the limit, people often remind us of growth. That’s what people like to call trying times…growth. They say it like it’s supposed to bring hope. As if the mere mention of a new thing should make the old thing easy to turn loose.

Growing is painful though. When I read the words of Genesis 2:7 I have to ask, “Did the dust know?”

I suppose it’s a silly question. Just like my hair doesn’t know it’s being cut and my grass doesn’t try to escape me when I start up my mower, the dust couldn’t possibly know.

Could it?

If the Gungor song is right and hope really is springing up from this old ground of my life and God truly is making beautiful things out of me, why does it hurt so much?  Will life be found from this chaos?

Did the dust know it was becoming a man? I think that’s where the pain is sitting. When I can only see dust and have no idea when or where the beauty will arrive it is painful. I can’t see the final product when I am the modeling compound.

I guess that’s what faith is. It’s knowing that I am dust and trusting that God can grow a garden.

It still hurts. I think the dust knew.

I know.

I sat with a sweet friend/coworker today discussing Christmas matters. I know that makes some people cringe but when you work for the church Christmas is kind of a big deal. We talk about it a lot. Christmas and Easter both. And VBS. Those are the big three.

Anyway, this woman has gone before me on the path of life in so many ways. She is wise and kind and good. Her words have been a salve to me in time of need. I am thankful for her. And also for so many others like her.

There are a great number of women in my life for whom I have much admiration. Women who are strong and full of grace. Women who have walked long and windy roads ahead of me and called back to show me the easiest route. None of them have taken the same path but they all forged ahead with the best scouting skills they could muster. I am forever in their debt because none of them have kept their skills a secret. Some of them left crumbs, that I might find my way. Others called back over their shoulders. There are a few, however, who back-tracked, took my hand, looked into my eyes, and breathed words of grace before walking back down the road beside me.

I have always been drawn to the verse from Proverbs 16:24 that reads, “Gracious words are honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.” I believe this in part to be because honey is one of my love languages but also because words. I love words of all kinds, but especially the ones that bring healing.

Healing words can be funny when I have tears, sweet when I have doubts, or loving when my soul is aching. These are the words of grace. These are the pieces passed along from women who have also needed the sticky goodness for their own hearts. They have filled their cups and turned to me to pour. These women in my life know how to pour because someone once poured words over them. The passing and the pouring are learned skills, similar to the scouting, and I am all the better for having been a receiver.

Dear Christopher Columbus,

In honor of your day today I did a little research on you. It turns out you were not quite the hero I learned of as a girl. In fact, I am wondering why we, as a nation, celebrate you at all. You had very poor map skills and a stubborn personality. You did not treat people well and, if reports are correct, you were a little smelly.

Regardless, you are credited with letting the Europeans know this beautiful land exists, and here we are today. My ancestors came across the ocean, in part, because of your reporting.

And we get the day off from school and work.

So…win for you. Actually, win for me.

I needed a day off. My kids needed a day off. My husband really needs a day but he’s at work. His company is not American and it turns out the world outside of the US cares little about what you may or may not have discovered.

I needed a day to catch up on laundry and bake brownies with my girl. I needed a day for my son to try to explain Minecraft to me one more time. (I still don’t get it.)

I needed a day with no make-up, comfy clothes, and tennis shoes.

So, Christopher Columbus, I thank you for being you. And for allowing me a catch-up Monday.

Sincerely,

Tamara

I bought grapes from the grocery store this week that were quite possibly the largest grapes I’ve ever seen in my whole entire life. Yes, I tend to lean towards exaggeration but this is true. They were gigantic. It was in one of those last minute trips to the store because I had nothing to pack in lunches the next day that I saw them. I’m the lady who preaches meal planning and shopping in advance and yet there I was, racing through the produce department like a mad woman before car pool line.

I wrote earlier this week about the wake up call fall. I’m not sure how it happened but life got too big and too full really fast. We’ve had decisions to make that are life changing and changes in life that are out of our control. We’ve been paddling like ducks for so long now, smooth as silk above the water but fast as hell beneath. We’ve been trying so hard to keep the waters calm but it’s exhausting. We’ve been filling all the minutes of all the days with so much busy to keep our hearts distracted and our minds from landing in one place for too long.  I’m sure that as I was laid out on the floor Tuesday God was saying, “Slow yourself, Child.”

I stood up and ran to the grocery store.

I’ve been thinking about those grapes all week. They were juicy and sweet and a perfect side dish to our packed lunches. I was amazed at how so few it took to fill my hands. Kind of like life right now. My life is full of good things. So many good things. But even if things are good I can’t hold on to them all. Grapes drop and get wasted.

I missed a day yesterday on my writing challenge. I actually cried about it this afternoon. That’s when I knew I’ve been trying to hold too many good things. Writing is so important to me at this point in my life. I want it to be a daily thing, an every day occurrence. I would love to have writing and speaking to come to the forefront of my career. I don’t know if that’s in God’s plan or not but I felt so called to participate in this challenge that I jumped at it faster than I’ve jumped at anything in a really long while. My day was filled with all good things yesterday…really big grapes. But I dropped a handful of things that I would have told you are priorities.

“Slow yourself, Child.”

The words keep ringing in my ears.

I know that pruning is painful. When you prune a bush that is growing out of control you must sometimes cut off beautiful flowers and branches that seem strong and healthy. Lack of pruning can lead to crazy, unsightly hedges. I feel like I’m on the verge of unsightly.

So now I have to go to God and ask some hard questions. I have to ask which grapes to keep and which ones to put aside. And I have to listen. The listening is the hardest part. But I don’t want any grapes to be wasted. I don’t want to waste blessings. He’s given me so much and he continues to give and give and give. It’s so tempting to take it all for myself and hold it all tightly and not share the bounty with others but that’s not what God is calling me to do. I have to hand some blessing over.

When Shelby was little she had a huge fascination with acorns. Acorns and leaves, really.  The fall before she turned three she collected the fallen acorns like it was her job. She would pick them up from the playground at her preschool and stuff her pockets to over flowing. She would gather them from our backyard and stuff boxes and bags full of them. When she couldn’t manage to hold any more on her own she would stuff them in her brother’s pockets.

Leaves were brought in the house and they were traced around and painted and glittered until they fell into tiny crumbles of dust in her hands. And all over the floors. She would run to me with handfuls of acorns and leaves and sticks, as if she had just stumbled across a pirates bounty of rubies, emeralds, and diamonds. Her eyes would twinkle and her chubby, rosy cheeks would be all aglow with exciting from her hunt.

I pulled acorns out of the washer and dryer by the box fulls that fall. As much as I tried to empty all of her little pockets, lone acorns would manage to hide. I could hear their tumbling and banging in the dryer as it tossed and would know I’d missed one.

One day she found a particularly large acorn at school. She was
so proud and couldn’t wait to show her daddy. We stopped by the grocery store after school to buy a few more ingredients for dinner and she was singing a little made up song about her acorn as we crossed the parking lot. Suddenly she screamed a scream like a child who’d had a limb cut off. Her sweaty hand broke free from mine and she was running after something. Cars were pulling in and backing out (this is a mother of toddlers worst nightmare) and I’m chasing her as I balance her brother on my hip.

She had dropped her acorn. Her prized acorn. The biggest one she’d ever found had rolled from  her hand while she was serenading it and went straight under the tire of a car. It was crushed. She was crushed. She sobbed like she’d lost her best friend.

Shelby gave up acorn collecting later that fall. When she opened one of her treasure boxes (which I believe was an empty Velveeta box) and saw tiny worms crawling around her gems she was done. Her fall potpourri all went to the back yard and the trash.

I remember that story, that phase of life, every time I sweep our back porch. The acorns and leaves and twigs, that can be such a nuisance to the pool were so precious to my girl at one point in time. I spend so much time working to rid my yard of the very thing she sought after with all her heart. They remind me that seasons change. Life moves quickly. New life, new experience, new lessons are always evolving around me. Things that are a pain one day can be a blessing the next. Things I cherish today just might be tomorrow’s trash.

So every time I see an acorn, whether I’m tossing it over the fence or admiring it’s charm, I am reminded of all the blessings in my life. The little blessings. The big ones. The ones I collect and the ones I sweep away.

 

My friend Karen wrote a beautiful piece on her blog today about gumbo. It’s not really about the gumbo but mostly about trying and not being afraid to fail. The fact that she’s even writing is so awe inspiring to me. Karen is an amazing woman and we used to be neighbors. She moved far, far away and then moved back closer and we actually reconnected when we both signed up for this crazy blog workshop. We both had this calling on our hearts. We both knew we were supposed to be writing. We were both terrified. I’m so glad she forged on because the world is better with her words.

You know what else makes the world better? Zucchini bread. (Did you see how smooth that transition went?) Fall is the time when my heart starts yearning for cozy things. My mind begins to wander towards baked goods and comfort. My mom made the best zucchini bread and I do believe I’m going to bake up a couple loaves this weekend. Here’s the recipe I’ll use:

Elaine’s Zucchini Bread

• 3 eggs – beaten
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 cups zucchini, peeled and grated
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 3 cups flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon

You will start by beating the eggs. Beat them, and then beat them one more time. Whisk in the oil and vanilla. Then fold in the sugar and zucchini.

In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Stir in the cinnamon last.

Mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, stirring just until mixed. Don’t over think this or over stir this. Too much of either will make your bread less enjoyable.

Pour the batter into two small, greased bread pans or one large, greased bread pan. Bake in an oven that has been preheated to 325 ° for 45 minutes or until a knife inserted in the middle of the bread comes out clean. Your oven make bake hotter or cooler than mine so that timing may be off a bit. Just watch it and smell it.

Let it cool for an hour or so before cutting into it. I recommend slicing it and spreading a little butter on it, but that’s just how I was raised. You are free to enjoy your zucchini bread however you wish. But not with margarine or fake spray butter. That’s wrong.

But mostly, just bake it and enjoy it. So many people are afraid to bake. This is an easy entry into baking. And as you can learn from my friend Karen, good things happen when you aren’t afraid to fail. Like gumbo. Or zucchini bread. Or life.