Adventures in La La Land

I'm not sure I have much to share today. 1. Thanks for all the great feedback on my reviews of A Woman After God's Own Heart . It was heartening that most of you agreed with me. Although I'm worried that some of my more conservative friends were holding their tongues. Feel free to message me if you want to avoid facebook debates. :-) I want to hear perspectives from all sides. 2. One of the comments a friend made on one of my review entries seemed to resonate with a lot of people: "I always knew Jesus loved me, but I didn't think He liked me." This is something I've struggled with for much of my life. As a result, I've underlined a few verses in my Bible through the years that assure me that God not only loves me, he delights in me. I'm going to share them with you today. Zephaniah 3:17 "The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejo...

Affiliate Link This book received rave reviews on Amazon/Goodreads. It's a historical novel about two French sisters during World War II - right up my alley. It was a great book. Interesting storyline, a side of the war I didn't know much about (France during the German occupation), and multi-layered relationships. It was heart-wrenching and beautiful and well-written. I spent five straight hours reading it today. Haha. When I finished the book, though, I wondered why it was so  well-received. I've read Christian fiction that's just as good. Just as well researched and well written, with compelling characters and storylines. Christian fiction just doesn't get the audience secular fiction does. There's my profound thought of the day. Two thumbs up from me.

After the disastrous marriage chapters, George gets to parenting. Again, she's a little over the top, but I appreciated a lot of what she had to say. Here's the part that I have questions about: She talks about how important it is to pray for our children. Agreed. But then she says this: Each morning when I woke up, I knew I would be asking God during my prayer time to touch my girls' hearts and open them to Jesus. I also knew that God's Word says, "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear" (Psalm 66:18). I didn't want my sin and shortcomings to keep God from "hearing" my request for my daughters. No sin was worth its momentary pleasure when laid beside the eternal salvation of my children (109). I'm not sure I agree with that.  I know I said in my last entry that I wasn't looking to tweak God's word, but this verse was written by David in the Old Testament before Jesus' death. Do you think it still applies t...

Affiliate Link Oh this book. I loved it and I hated it. It was convicting and challenging and helpful and daunting. I thought its main focus was going to be on nurturing a relationship with God. Of course, that's the core of the book, but it also highlights marriage and mothering and home-making. Throughout the book, George gave me an important perspective: spiritual discipleship is just that - a discipline. She says, "Only through regular exposure to God's Word can you and I draw out the nutrition needed to grow a heart of faith" (29). The first four chapters are along those lines. I underlined a lot and felt convicted to change. And then came the chapters about marriage . . . dun dun dun . . . Marriage I read these chapters then made Justin read them and tell me honestly if that's really what he wants/expects from me because I was so shocked. Haha. (For the record, he said no. I'll get to that later.) This book was written in 1997 (at least the ...

1. Last Saturday was one of those perfect summer nights. All of my siblings and nephews spontaneously came over. We had pizza, played Bocce and Spades, and had a bonfire. We laughed and talked and puked - well Lucy puked. But that's what she gets for eating 4 pieces of pizza and half a bag of marshmallows. Ha. Poor kid. 2. As promised, I got serious about potty training with Lena this week. It was a disaster. The first day she cried every time I put her on the potty chair and had 8 accidents. She did have 2 successes despite her aversion to the potty chair. Day 2, she was feeling more cooperative, but didn't have any more success. By day 3, she was done. She was holding it longer and longer, refusing to go on the potty chair, and having accidents minutes after I took her to the bathroom. We powered through most of day 4, but I finally gave up by 6:30 that night. I stopped counting on day 4, but between days 1 and 3, she had a mess to success ratio of 21:4. Not cool. I guess...

1. If you get my blog emailed to you or happened to look it up this week, you may have noticed I wrote a one sentence entry this week. Haha. I often jot down notes to include in my Saturday 7 and save it in an unpublished entry. But I accidentally hit publish on my note this week. Haha. Anyway, the note was that I actually made some money off my Amazon affiliate links this week!! I was linking to something for my 30 Before 30 and noticed that it said my earnings were $6. I was shocked, so I looked it up. Someone clicked on one of my links, then went on to order 3 infant baptism/confirmation dresses. Thanks, whoever you are! Made my day! :-) 2. Justin had Monday through Wednesday off this week. We can't afford to take a real vacation, so we just took one day to have a little "staycation." We splurged and went to the zoo. (It's expensive now that Lena is 2 and we have to pay for 4 of us!) It was a gorgeous 75* day and we went in the late afternoon, just a couple hour...