Adventures in La La Land

1. She can sing her alphabet, but only identifies three letters: L, M (for mommy!), and O. 2. She counts perfectly to 12, then mumbles some random teen numbers until she hits 20 and then she can do 21, 22, 23, etc. 3. She knows triangle, square, rectangle, moon (crescent), oval, circle, star, and heart. 4. The reason she knows her shapes is because of the book Pa Grape's Shapes . She insists that I read it to her at naptime and bedtime, and has it completely memorized. It is amazing  to hear her quote it. I wish she'd let me videotape her . . . 5. She knows her colors, although she still struggles with red and green - especially green. She's getting better at red. 6. She's still completely obsessed with her Binky and Ellies. 7. She generally sleeps from 8:30pm to anywhere between 6 and 7 am. And she takes one, two hour nap every day. 8. She loves Lucy and calls her "my sister." The girls usually play really well together, although they definitely...

Something very sad and strange is happening . . . blogging is losing its allure. Hopefully I'm just going through a phase, but lately I feel like I just don't have anything to say. 1. This week was VBS at our church. I taught the preschool class because Lena cannot be away from me. The first day I only had 4 kids! It was a breeze! We eventually doubled our class size, but the kids were good and I had great helpers. I was given a curriculum this year instead of making my own. But it was still a lot of work to choose which crafts/activities to do and then collect/organize all the supplies, and make sure everything was prepped and ready. Lucy actually went to her class without me 4 out of the 5 days. There's hope for kindergarten after all!! 2. I made a new meal last week that was pretty good. I'm obsessed with bacon in pasta lately. Chicken Carbonara is my new fave at Olive Garden (even though it's like $18!). Anyway, this recipe is from the Plain Chicken blog: Ch...

You'd think I'd have a lot to share since I haven't done one of these in ages, but I've been fighting through a lot of depression and don't have anything real enlightening to say. 1. I've been watching Friends on Netflix. It's so weird to see shots of the World Trade center in their "skyline fly-overs." And it's weird to think these people are in their 20s. In the episode I just watched, Monica said she's 27. Were they really that age when they filmed the show? They seem older to me, but probably just because I know them as older now. 2. Books I read the past two weeks:   Love Finds You in Nazareth, Pennsylvania (Melanie Dobson), Tidewater Inn (Colleen Coble),  The Bride Backfire (Kelly Eileen Hake), Rosemary Cottage  (Colleen Coble), and The Wonder of You (Susan May Warren). The Pennsylvania one had some interesting history. It was about a sect of Christians in the 1700s called Moravians. They were incredibly mission oriented. They...

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 ...