Showing Up on a Friday

Since I sometimes jump on the bandwagon of “Things I’m Loving” on Fridays, I thought it’d be fun to make it fit with this month’s theme.

5 Places I Love Showing Up

1. Home–I love love love coming home.  I love when my little man greets me with a big smile and all sorts of his crazy jumping up and down.  Boaz goes crazy (though, let’s be honest, he loves when anyone comes to the house).  The husband’s there ready with a hug.  My bed is ready for me to crawl into and get cozy.  Home is pretty much one of the best places ever. 

2. Dirt roads–running and walking on dirt roads have been my favorite.  I love showing up there with my shoes on and my phone ready to play music or a podcast.  Showing up to pray and talk to God.  Showing up to take care of my body and push myself to keep running or to listen and slow down to walk

3. A good book–I love setting aside time to read a good book.  Clearly, I’ve been trying to pass on my love for reading to Asher…

4. My journal–I have almost a full shelf of old journals now.  I was given one by someone because they said that good writers often have a journal.  So I started and now I’ve got a lot of them!  They have a mixture of sermon notes, prayers, scripture verses, pictures, and all sorts of random parts about life.  I show up in my rawest form with some intense emotions and write it all out.  I couldn’t find a picture of my journal offhand, but here’s one of my grandma’s journal. 

5. At the airport–I LOVE to travel and showing up at the airport is one of my favorite things.  Take me somewhere new or somewhere old and I’m just happy to board the plane.  I am super excited about our upcoming trip to Africa and to get on that plane (well…a little nervous about the actual flying with a toddler, but the being in Africa as a family–yes, please!).  Here’s a fun picture from my time in Rome!

Money Money Money

My husband the other day was talking about how he had read a devotional about the four money languages.  I had heard about these before, but couldn’t remember them so I promptly looked them up on google and found this fun video.  We both could identify our money languages and could see traces of our secondary languages as well.

Here’s the line that I identified with most:

“We can take that trip. We can buy pizza!”

Amiable it is!  Pretty sure I’ve been known to say, “Hey! We have unallocated funds [funds not put in the budget yet]….let’s go buy something fun!” Not to mention that the last time we had unallocated cash on hand, I ended up going and buying all sorts of food for people.  Hello, money means love =) Plus, gifts is one of my top love languages.

Ryan on the other hand…well, he’s an analytic and…”Money means security.”  He’s been known to have thousands and thousands of dollars just sitting in the bank. Handy, though, when it comes time that he wants to do something with it like buy a wedding ring or go to Sri Lanka or head to Norway for a few months.

Thankfully, I have some analytic in me too and he’s willing to spend on experiences, which helps us be on the same page money wise and we’re Dave Ramsey fans.

How about you? Are you a driver, amiable, analytic, or expressive?

3 months and counting

3 super happy months of being married! woot! in celebration, I went through our wedding pictures and honeymoon pictures to finally post them on facebook.  if we’re friends, you can look at them here. made me totally want to do the whole day over again and to run off to the mountains and the beach like now. but instead, i’ll make a list of all the fun things i love about life right where i’m at! in no particular order here are 12 things for the 12th.

1. being married

2. my awesome husband

3. my adorable dog Boaz who loves me

4. my church family.

5. a wonderful place to live that is warm even though it’s still cold outside

6. traveling to look forward to in the future

7. friends’ super cute babies

8. being able to e-mail and text best friends

9. being able to cook all sorts of deliciousness

10.  pinterest boards of lovely things

11. books to read and time to read them

12. mornings spent with god reading the bible and doing the breaking free bible study

What are you loving about your life right now?

home.

Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking. er…write for as long and however your heart needs =)

home

i hide from this word sometimes because oh how it haunts me in a heartbreakingly raw way.  before i know it, i’m playing around with google looking up for ways to get myself home. checking flights and seeing prices. looking at pictures and wondering if when i get there if it’ll still be home.  will she still be the home i have in my heart?  i’ve changed so much since my feet last hit her ground.  my heart has traveled all over since then. i’ve found myself at the feet of fountains in rome and on the beaches of greece. i’ve walked the streets of london and sat in her theaters.  i’ve sat in staff meetings with staff i love.  i’ve careened around the streets of sri lanka.  i’ve zip lined through mexico.  i’ve laughed and loved my way through VBS and kids camps.  i’ve held the babes in rwanda.  i’ve found a man who holds my heart and is my other kind of home…the strong, steady, safe.  god’s brought me all the places i never thought i’d go. but then again i never thought i’d find myself in south africa in the first place. and i don’t know where He’ll bring me us next. maybe germany. maybe guatemala. maybe china. maybe back home to south africa (pretty please?).  maybe some country i’ve never even thought about.

3 Lovely Things

I challenged myself yesterday to find 3 lovely things.  And here’s what I found…

Hope on the fridge…

A cozy nap…

Cherry Berry and Starbucks deliciousness…

Late night making of Chicago plans..

All Things Lovely

When things seem like winter or when you’re going through a season wandering in the desert, finding lovely things seems a far stretch let alone even possible.  At times, I’d rather just curl up under the covers and hide from the world.  Other seasons, though, seem to burst at the seams with all things lovely and that’s when I fight to not expect the bottom to fall out.  Being intentional about taking a moment to simply enjoy the lovely things while they’re here and to not anticipate the next season of drought becomes so necessary.  So, today, in the midst of the busy parts of life, I’m going to find three lovely things and report back tomorrow about what I found.  Maybe I’ll see the sunset or find a butterfly or make a craft or eat delicious food or take a nap or sit with someone I love or laugh until it hurts or dress up pretty or write a letter or paint something wonderful or browse pinterest….I don’t know yet, but I’m excited to see how this day goes!

What has been lovely in your day?

31 Days

There’s this little thing that I jumped on board last year with and enjoyed quite thoroughly!  Since I’ve been quite absent from the blogging world, I thought why not tackle something fun like this again…so welcome to…

31 Days of filling my life with all things lovely, beautiful, and happy…

I wanted something fun, easy, happy, and with enough different topics that I wouldn’t get so stuck on one topic or theme.  I’m pretty excited about this and I think it will fit right in with my word for the year: Celebrate.  Plus, I think we can all use a bit more of these three things in our lives.

So, let’s do this thing.

Are you participating in the 31 days and if so what’s your theme??

p.s. I updated my blog theme and I’m kind of in love with the balloons!

a dream

I had a dream that I posted a blog with all sorts of bullet points and prayers.  I don’t remember what they were but it reminded me of this little space that I’ve left dormant while I’ve been off living out adventures that haven’t been put onto paper.  I keep waiting for time to slow but I know better than that.  So, I figured, I’d take a minute or two to say hi.

Lately, I’ve been perusing pinterest and there’s a board that I’ve deemed “to fill my home with all things happy and beautiful.”  This little one has accumulated almost the most pins out of my boards–quoateable beats it by a bit.  But as I think about those fun ladies over at Squee who wrote a whole eBook on figuring out your what pinterest says about you…and no, I haven’t yet gone through it all! On my list and sitting open in my browser!  But I can’t help but be struck by how that’s so long been a core value and a priority and a longing and a desire and just part of my heart.  As I’ve said before, “I just want a home…is that too much to ask for?”  Now, I don’t mean a literal building, though that’d be nice, but it runs far deeper than that.  Home is all things safe and cozy and protected and loved and accepted and beautiful and happy.  In many ways, there’s that understated longing for heaven that we all have which plays into this; yet, too, I am ever thankful to God for the places and people in my here and now that I call home.

On that note, I think I’ll get back to all the other things I should be doing….graduate classes did start yesterday..ep!

p.s. what is one of your favorite pinterest boards?

Beyond

Hey everybody! Welcome to Friday!  Time for a little write out your heart in 5 minutes with no editing, no stressing–just lots of fast typing, fun.  Today’s word prompt: Beyond

Beyond the ocean’s there are worlds to discover, sights to see, places to visit, people to meet.  Send me on a plane across the pond and I’ll jump with my feet first.  I’ll flounder around trying to get my barrings and wonder why did I come when I only have a few weeks.  My heart will want to stay forever.  Beyond the hello’s loom the good-bye’s that break my heart all over again.  I’d pack up all of my people in a neat little caravan and take them along on my journey if only that were so.  Instead, I’ll keep looking beyond the good-bye to the next hello.  Whenever that may come.  To love deeply and to experience the world and to know God, I’ve learned that I have to squish my eyes tight shut and jump into the unknown–the place beyond the comfortable and the safe.

—

I always want a couple more minutes but I’ll leave it at that and keep you wondering what else I would say.  Until then…your turn!

p.s. this is the picture I had in my head while I was writing…and let me tell you, it was absolutely terrifying to jump off that cliff but absolutely worth it!

iMiss

I’ve loved being in Greece.  I’ve loved the people God placed in my path and the journey we’ve been on together.  But, like most overseas adventures, there are a few things I miss in no particular order:

• An actual shower head that I don’t have to hold!
• My adorable little puppy
• A comfy bed
• The rest of my clothes…I’m tired of these…
• Eating my own food and cooking for myself
• Church family
• That boy of my mine
• Being able to run alone
• Thick milkshakes
• Driving a car
• A full length mirror
• Playing my music loud whenever
• A phone that works
• Free water
• My electric tooth brush

Though, as always there are many things I’ll miss about being here too:

• Community and my people
• Sandy beaches
• Gorgeous mountains
• Blue water
• Feta cheese pastries
• Pistachio everything…ice cream, desserts, gelato, etc.
• Nutella croissants
• Time to relax
• My amazing professors
• Helen and her wonderful tour guide-ness
• Hearing stories
• Tons of laughing and smiling and enjoying life
• Walking all over and hiking up hills and mountains
• Heart challenges
• Processing time
• Learning to trust the process

So much to be said on both ends and there’s much more I could add.  Mostly, I’m thankful for a God who knew what I needed and gave it to me when I needed it and is with me wherever I am.  You better believe He’s going to be holding my hand as I jump on a few planes tomorrow to head home.

Have you traveled overseas? What are some things you missed about home and what are some things you miss?