Please Pray For Stellen

I'm sure most of you have noticed the button on the right side of my blog to pray for Stellen. You can click on that button to see current updates on his situation.

Today, Stellen's little heart is having a rough time. He suffers from a heart condition known as SVT (an irregular beat).

To my knowledge he's been in SVT for 9 hours now.

Please pause for just a moment before you mop, change out another load of laundry, head to the store, and lift him up to the Lord. As I type this, they are trying to sedate him which is making him angry.

I know first hand from a mother's point of view how it feels to see your child struggle with sedation. Be sure to lift up his mother, Jennifer, as well.

Tomorrow be sure to exercise a little more patience, show a little more love, and be a little more thankful for your own healthy children.

fear

Not really being a "morning person" I normally wake when my child wakes me (normally around 7 or 7:30). The other morning I rolled over at 8:45am. "Wow, she's still asleep," I thought to myself.

Then fear started creeping in...

what if something happened

something is not right

she's started to cry, I didn't hear her

something is wrong

Very quickly a verse came to mind: Philippians 4:6-7 "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus."

I repeated this verse twice and a peace came over me and then I began to hear in the distance...

"ouuuhht, ouuuht." (out, out)

Peace.

I told God I was worried, He gave me peace.

never

Making such a mess while remaining a lady with her pinkie out.

With summer time comes....ice cream! This is one of those things, even if asked even a couple of months ago, I would have said, "I'd never!" I'd never allow my child to make such a mess. I'd never hand my child chocolate (melts) with ice cream (melts) inside. I'd never!

baby steps toward financial freedom

Debt has been weighing us down for way too long! This year we have gotten pretty intense about paying down debt. After starting FPU we've finally found a direction in which to take our finances. We have had much success with Dave Ramsey's baby steps.

Step 1: $1,000 Emergency Fund This is to help with the anxiety of cutting up credit cards. "What if there's an emergency?" Now you have cash in a savings account to cover most emergencies.

**Step 2: Eliminate Debt using the debt snowball. List your debts and pay them off from smallest to greatest.
credit card #1
credit card #2
credit card #3
credit card #4
credit card #5
vehicle loan

We are almost done with baby step two. I've been almost crazy with paying it off, but still able to live! We set aside a certain amount per month for each of us to spend on whatever we want. After that amount is gone, it's gone! With a zero balanced budget every dollar has a name. That means at the end of the month there is a balance of zero dollars. (Or at least that is the goal.) If there is a balance, that is sent to debt. Currently we should be out of debt by October of this year! Wahoo!

Step 3: 3-6 Months Expenses in Savings (will be a lot less when we are debt free!)

Step 4: Invest 15% of Income for Retirement Thankfully we have about 13% that we are investing right now. Thanks to my husband for setting that up through his job. This will get kicked up a notch when we get to this step.

Step 5: College Funding Put money into a fund for our children's college. Our children may or may not be informed of this as I think they might work harder if they have to contribute something to their education as well. (I'd love you hear your thoughts on this one.)

Step 6: Pay off Home Early This might be a little different for us. As we might be selling our house very soon, we are planning to rent for a couple of years and save as much cash to put either a large down payment or skip the loan altogether and pay cash for a home.

Step 7: Build Wealth and Give What a wonderful place to be!!

Looking at our finances with these goals ahead of us, actually makes financial freedom seem more attainable.

A goal that I would like to set now, with all three of you as my witness: to update monthly to let you all know what step we are working to get through and to create new goals often. I'm doing this in hopes to keep ourselves moving and maybe give some of you a little motivation and to show you that it is possible to live debt free!

one legged platypus

I've never been considered a "picture of grace."

Before going through the car wash the other day, I was reminded of the stroller in the bed of the truck. I thought I would pull it out of the bed and pop it into the truck with the greatest of ease.

(Did I mention there was an attendant at the car wash?)

I pulled the stroller out pretty well. The trouble came with "popping" the stroller into the cab of the truck.

Somewhere I miscalculated.

All of it is kind of a blur...

I'm pretty sure the stroller hit something and the other end hit my face. With glasses now on the side of my face, I recalculated and put the stroller into the seat beside me. Positioned myself correctly into my seat, repositioned my glasses and proceeded forward to the car wash.

To the attendant, "You didn't see anything!"

I'm dreaming of...

a new camera. This really was a gorgeous sunset. My camera really didn't capture the color. Time to start savin'! Any suggestions??

if the shirt fits...

....wear it!

it all started...

this morning we got to church a couple of minutes late. Then I was sitting in church and got a few misleading text messages from my mother, in town at the time helping some friends with the labor/delivery of their first child. Left in a hurry to go into town only to find out it was church drama and not the baby being born that was the issue.

Thankfully, the baby is just fine.*

Made it to the hospital and was able to get some fresh clothes to mom and visit for a moment. I needed to get home to cook the jambalaya I had promised for our small group, but I only had 3 or 4 diapers left. After seeing an awesome deal at C.VS, I thought I would stop there and get diapers for less than a dime per diaper. Of course I get there and the E.CBs wouldn't print. Trying to figure out how to show the manager where I saw the sale was taking up precious time only to return the package that I bought in the first place. Was I thinking of what I would do after I got through the 3 or 4 diapers? Nope! Left there and headed home. Then I receive a call from hubby with not so great news. Now he thinks he won't come home as soon as he thought. Boo! As I speak with him....'beep-beep' "Low Fuel" Shocker! We are dealing only in cash, and I didn't want to have to go inside while talking on my phone. And you with children understand, that's not always an option. Blah! Had to use the debit card. Throw off my budget a little not a big deal.

Full tank, back on the road...home to make jambalaya.*

Half Pint fell asleep just as we were pulling into town.

Thankfully, taking her out of the car and putting her right into bed for a nap was successful.*

Now to get started cooking. "Mom got a new food processor, that will help save time," I thought. "This is silly, I can't get it to work.....this is really frustrating, I still can't get this to work....alright, this is tickin' me off....dumb machine!" Out with the processor, in with the old fashioned knife. And when I say old fashioned, I mean old fashioned. I might as well have let my daughter cut the veggies with her rubber coated spoons. In my failed attempt to make a super dull 90 year old kitchen knife work like Rachael Ray's santoku knife, I ended up hitting my head on the above hanging cast iron skillet too many times. And then of course in my vigorous chopping, ended up knocking the bowl for the food processor off of the counter...and now it's in at least 10 more pieces than it started out today.

Fortunately, the crash/bang and the "oh bother s*^@!" didn't wake the baby.*

I burned some of the rice and ended up kicking up a scoop full of rice onto the stove as I tried to give it all a stir.

I did get the jambalaya cooked and edible.*

We were about 15 minutes late for with dinner.

The night ended well with a great dinner with wonderful friends!*

*All of the things from my day that I've decided to focus on.

stepping out a little more

During our (mom, sis, nephews & myself) haircuts the other day I kept asking God to give me an opportunity to talk with our hairdresser (we'll call her Suzi) about Him. At 3:16pm all three of our cell phone alarms went off.

**In a sermon a few weeks ago, the preacher told us to set our alarms for (John) 3:16 everyday. When your alarms goes off, stop and pray for those that don't have a close relationship with the Father.**

Perfect opportunity!

Of course she asks why all of our phones are going off at once. My sis tells her that at 3:16 our
preacher said to pray for someone.

(The following is a conversation I am having in my head with my sister.)

"Someone? Someone?! Not just someone! The lost...those that don't know the Lord." This carries on for a few moments and away goes my opportunity, the conversation had moved on to something else. After every last strand was chopped, we began to walk out the door.

Suzi says she has no idea what to do now as she finished with us very early. Then she goes on to say that we should pray for her at 3:16 every day this week as she would be going through many tests. Suzi has gone through several bouts with cancer and her tumor markers have gone up; they have to find out why this week. Immediately I think, "pray with her. Right now, pull her aside and pray with her for her week ahead."

All the while, I keep walking. With every step thinking:

Stop.

Pray.

With.

Her.

You asked for an opportunity, here it is. Pray with her.

Unfortunately I didn't not listen and just kept walking. "Kicking" myself all the while. Well, we get to the street corner and mom's phone rings...it's Suzi.

"Who has a red phone?"

Me.

I'm the one with the red phone that I never leave because that's the only way that I can receive calls from my husband many miles away.

I never leave it and that day I did.

I went back and explained to her what all was going on in my head throughout the appointment and the few moments afterward. I cried with her, prayed for her week and for peace for her through it all. If only I had listened the first time, what blessing it was!

If you could pause for a moment when you read this and send up a prayer for Suzi as she goes through all of this testing. Amazing how God works, don't you think?

Not Me! Monday

Now for the only reason most of you check my blog:


If you haven't done so already, check out the blog that started it all.

My little girl has a pretty good appetite and will eat just about anything. It was not me that allowed her to eat a piece of dog food. That would just be icky. There's no way I'd expect my child not to like it and spit it out. I guess we now know that she will eat anything.

I went running the other day. It was not only the third or fourth time since the baby was born. Nope, I have run every day since the day I ran a half marathon at one month pregnant. It's not me that you saw huffing and puffing after having run 3 blocks, nope, wasn't me!

That person you saw huffing and puffing was the one that stopped off at her mom's house and ate a donut just after her run, not me. I always eat very healthy, especially after a good run. I would never ruin that run by such an unhealthy breakfast.

There might be some out there that would consider me graceful. As far as mobility goes, that might be a stretch! While sitting down stairs with my mom the phone rang. I "jumped" up to answer the phone. There is no way that my feet were trapped in my pants. Therefore, I did not fall flat on my face with my foot still in my hand trying to free my foot from my pants. Not me! Graceful I tell you, graceful! And just a note, the phone only rang once....

With watching our spending, I know how much we pay for just about everything. I've gotten (name brand) diapers for around $0.22 per diaper. The other day I was 30 minutes from putting A in the bath, and her diaper was soiled. I went downstairs and got a new diaper and put it on her for that half hour before her bath. There's no way I'd let my child run around outside without a diaper on for that long. I'm not that cheap, not me!

My poor child has some b.owel issues. If I don't pay close attention to what my child eats, she has rather large b.owel m.ovements. Unfortunately, with being away from the house all day for the last couple of days, her diet has not been the best. There is no way that I told my brother-in-law to "look 'fore I flush it." That's just.....redneck! Never, not me! (maybe it was the dog food.) Blech!

Now that I totally put my relationship with my child on the line (for a few reasons), maybe you should share something from your week. You know, that something that made you think, "No one's ever done this before and there's no way I could tell anyone that just happened." I'm proof that chances are it has happened to me. Or no matter how bad you think your story is, I've got something gross-er or more embarrassing. Please share! I won't tell!