Insecurity

Idols.

 In this day and age, the first thought in our minds is celebrity's, someone we admire. Not so much the idols of old, where people would make something from wood, gold, silver to bow down and worship it-actually there are still people that do that today. In the Bible, many made idols and expected this man made thing to bring them rain, food, whatever their "need" was, they asked this..object for. I read it and think, that is so stupid. I don't buy something from Pottery Barn, bow down to it, and expect it to fulfill me. Except-if I was to dig deep in my soul, I actually have more idols than I realize. 

I'm working through a study at church called Stuck. It caught my attention because I know there are areas in my life I get stuck-many areas. One that was brought up recently is  insecurity and fear of people. At the risk of looking like a fool  here, it is a problem I deal with. To be bluntly honest-I worry about what others think of me. Growing up I used to look at everyone's freckle free face and wonder what was wrong with me, thinking that everyone thought I was ugly because of it. I have a hard time meeting new people for fear they won't like my appearance or personality, to the point that I stay in my shell and don't meet any new people. When I do branch out, I will go home and stress over saying-or not saying-the right things, did I dress well enough... did they accept me? This plagues me to the point that I'm unsure of how to act around others the next time I see them and usually wait for some cue I'm good or "in".

 I have made this an idol in my life.

 The author of Stuck gave the visual of a sit 'n spin. I'm on this sit 'n spin  thinking about what I looked like, said, didn't say, whether I was accepted-for what? What can come from any of this that will add a day to my life?

 In reality its taking away.

 My focus should always be vertical. My first and foremost thoughts should rest on God alone. My worry over this insecurity..this fear.. has given it more value than the God of the universe. I can't live for my selfish vanity of being "okay" with people, I am here for a purpose. To live a life of worship to the Most High God, to share His love with others, I cannot waste another moment of my time with this idol.
 Galatians 1:10 If I were still trying to please man,I would not be a servant of Christ. 
I can't do both. I am not perfect but today-I chose to go vertical, forget my made up thoughts of others of me and who I am. I know whose I am-I am His and He loved me so much, He sent His son to die for me.
I want my life to be all out, not held in by fears. Time to get uncomfortable.

Growing Up

It's about time we grew up, guess now is as good a time as any!  Jaden just ditched the crib for a race car toddler bed-for almost 10 years we've had a crib in this house with one child in it-about to be kicked out for the newest sibling to occupy it. The crib is ready to leave our family -and its so weird to be out of that phase of life-forever.

Age is just a number, I really don't care what's young/old by anyone's standards. I'm just living life-then life says hey-remember when you were in your 20's and had one baby after another and used that crib to hold your sweet sleeping baby, night after night? Yea, you aren't going to be doing that anymore, but never fear! The next hurdle is on its way-its called-the Tween years! I didn't even think about this "tween" thing until I was searching out birthday party ideas for Aubrey, who is about to be 10 in 2 weeks, and Google let me know what the best party was for my "tween"

Um. 

Huh?

I only had to pause for a minute to think about this-tween, in be"tween" child and teenager, and the attitude, mouth and emotional roller coaster my "tween" has displayed the past month. 

Yup.

Fits like a glove.

Just as I remember getting out of sleepless nights from Aubrey, along came Kaylyn and when Kaylyn was potty trained, here came Ella..then Jaden. 

So basically its time to batten down the hatches folks, there's a lot of growing up about to happen in this house-as one turns into a tween, the next and the next.. we will then be swept like a hurricane into full blown teen years. I don't know whether its a sign we are doing a good job as parents or a complete failure, when your kid tells you they want to run away? Although with the week we've had I could *almost* pack her bags for her and send her on her way. It hurts to hear she is that upset with us as parents, but I remind her how much we love her and remind myself its the tough days in life that we have the most opportunity to grow. I encourage her to rise above the difficulty of wanting to go her own way and get to the other side where maturity and strong, moral character awaits.

Halfway There!

Yes-I'm (over by 3lbs) halfway to my goal weight!

 

I couldn't find a good before picture, I had one, but I put it in some obscure folder and now I can't find it-ha!
Since February 2012 I have now lost a total of 38 pounds!
That may be slow to some, but for me, its pretty darn good. I haven't lost this much at one time ever, unless you count that baby weight that hangs on for 6 weeks postpartum before you start to be able to button your pants again.
I think what I'm most proud of is that I'm still doing it, still working on it, and weight keeps coming off. Despite having 4 kids, school activities, summer, work, and all those other things in life that are easy excuses to put off exercising or taking time to make a healthy meal. I'm still not perfect at this new lifestyle, but every day I have a choice to make. If I fail, I pick back up and start again the next meal, if I succeed, I anxiously await those numbers to fall on the scale.
I can't tell you how many times I've tried on old jeans, you know, the one that fit me 8 years ago? The ones that I could totally button up today-YES! Victory!! Well almost, until I realized they were flared and not just tiny flare, I mean, they almost could have been bell bottoms.
sigh.
So long Silvertab jeans,I really thought we were going to be friends again, but you've gone out of style and I have to move on-or be made fun of.
I have that anxious energy to go buy new things-go shopping period is something I hated to do before and now I am loving it, have so many more options and yet I'm such a jeans and t-shirt kinda girl, I get sort of dazed when I approach the clothing section. I'll give myself time to acclimate back into the world of shopping-when I get even closer to my goal weight ;)
Josh has been training me a few nights a week at QC Barbell and still doing the Take Shape for Life program with the Medifast foods.
More updates to follow :)

Weightloss Journey

It's now July and I have been working intentionally on losing weight for 5 months now.
In the beginning it was a struggle to make the changes, but I got it going and saw fast results. I'm just about halfway(1 pound away!) from my goal weight and while I feel I have done well, I can still get down when I think about how much further I need to go. I can easily focus on all my problem areas, feel self-conscious about myself and how I look-and I need to constantly remind myself-that's not ALL its about.

My goal isn't to be skinny, my goal is to be healthy.

I am human though and I will admit that my horrible self-esteem has kept me from public pools. I'm not saying I don't have a slight panic attack before we head out to a pool, but I do have to get my mind in check and realize I didn't go to the pool for any other reason than to have fun with my family, my kids don't care what I look like-just that I'm there-playing with them.
I was out jogging (yes-still attempting the jogging-ha!) and was really about ready to quit, I mean so ready to be done I about called Josh to come pick me up. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a car slow and window roll down and thought..great, this person must think I'm dying and need assistance...when I heard her shout-"Yeah! Looking good! Keep going!"I recognized her as a parent from our kids school, I smiled, shouted a thanks and pressed on. The Lord knew I needed a push that morning and I was so surprised she would cheer me on, and I am SO thankful  for her encouragement, I finished well that day and she probably doesn't even know how much she helped me that day.
When you change your heart, you get a complete, long lasting change, when you only work on the surface, its temporal. I know I need to constantly keep myself in check, the way I do that is through prayer. I used to think that God wasn't interested in my weight. I don't think he cares about a size, but I do believe He cares about what I'm putting into and doing to my body. I've ruined mine with food and laziness, and with His mercy and strength,  I'm on the road to long lasting, healthy changes. Daily I have to ask for His strength regarding my food choices, to keep my mind in check, remembering this is a process and its not going to happen over night. Knowing that He will be with me every step of the way.

Divine Intervention

I've been working through a study by Priscilla Shirer on Jonah: Navigating a Life Interrupted. I didn't think about the title too much until the first week of study where we watched the video and I started to think about all the ways I'm interrupted: phone calls, work, kids, flat tires, etc. Nothing major, right? I got that uneasy feeling by the end of the night, I'm in this study for a reason, does that mean a bigger interruption is heading my way? I prayed that would not be the case and yet dug in to see what God wanted to teach me-whether interruption was coming or not.

I keep referring to it as interruptions, but what I'm currently focusing on is taking..whatever the circumstance is.. and attributing it to a Divine Intervention. Whether big or small, if I look at whatever the task at hand is, as from the Lord, my attitude will *hopefully* navigate towards the positive. Life needs balance and when a tiny kink, a medium sized wrench, or a giant boulder is thrown into my day, I get thrown off kilter. There is no balance or peace that can be compared to that which comes from the Lord.

The week our Divine Intervention came into our family she started the lesson with John 16:33

"I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart, I have overcome the world"

I love that my Bible has the red lettering for words that Jesus spoke, because especially that night, in that moment, reading those words was complete joy for my soul. Jesus spoke these words.. not that we might have tribulation.. that we WILL... and that He already had it covered. He has our back. He will give us peace.
She then took oranges, limes and a lemon and squeezed the juice out into a glass while speaking about Jonah getting a second chance, that God spoke to him a second time and she said..." only after we've been squeezed, can we be poured out and be a blessing to others"
Now I don't know what the blessing to others looks like in my life, but I do know.. I'm being squeezed, I hope and pray that somewhere in my life I will do as God asks and that my obedience will bless another and glorify Him.
I sat there that night just in awe of our God. How great and awesome He is, to speak to me. The Creator of the world would reach down, in my unworthiness, and speak..to me? He did, and He does-to all of us. He loves us so much and that love is amazing and I felt it that night and have tried to just seek Him out daily to get filled with the love that can only come from Him.  I don't enjoy being squeezed right now, being pushed to my limits emotionally, having my faith tested and tried, but another thing Priscilla said that gave me hope is that "the enemy will never push you into a place where you need God more" Oh how true that is-the enemy only wants to make my life turn from the Lord and into myself. This Divine Intervention has turned Josh and I to Him more and even though we could be in turmoil and fear-we have peace. Actually we even have joy. We are having fun, laughing, all the while being realistic about our situation, we know God has moved us to this place for a reason. 

The test is to be patient, be willing, and trust. 

While I know I've been vague on our Divine Intervention, I cannot share yet what that is. Soon I will be able to, and in the meantime, prayers are appreciated, mostly that Josh and I will be steadfast, listening to the Lord and have discernment over all of this.
Our journey of 2012 started with our health and we are still fervently working on this area, excited about the changes that are happening within this area of our lives and continuing on daily. I am almost to my halfway point to my goal weight, and the journey will continue for the rest of our lives as this isn't a one time deal, this is forever change. The rest of 2012 is a mystery, but we are leaving it in the capable hands of our Creator and will end with this, specifically for this situation,
2 Samuel 22:50 "For this I will praise you, o Lord, among the nations, and sing praises to your name"

WIC Peer Counseling

As many of you know I work for Women, Infants, Children(WIC) as a Breastfeeding Peer Counselor. I got hired in December of 2009 and have been working to support women in their breastfeeding(BF) goals ever since.
My job doesn't seem like much, making phone calls, teaching some classes, hosting support groups, etc, but I feel it actually is a very important job.  If you've never had any trouble BF, or never even had the inclination to breastfeed, you may wonder why its such a big deal, but if you are a mom, or know a mom that struggled with BF or never knew anything about it but wanted to know how to do it, maybe even had help from a peer counselor-you may know what I'm speaking about.
This isn't about making someone BF, or making them feel bad about not BF, or how long they did, this is about every mom that wanted to, struggled to and didn't know where to turn to.
When I start hearing in the news that our government wants to completely cut the funding of the WIC Peer Counseling program I don't feel upset about that for my own job, but for all those moms, who possibly won't have the opportunity to FREE help from their local WIC offices. Sure, there are Lactation Consultants(IBCLC) at local hospital's, private practice IBCLC's, La Leche League leaders, etc. who are MORE than capable, to help a mom with BF, I refer my clients to them often and believe they are SO important to moms as well. You know the difference though? As a peer counselor, my job is to seek YOU out. As a peer counselor I have my clients in a binder, a call list and my job is to consistently check in with prenatal and postpartum mom's. I have my phone with me 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, no really.. I do. A mom that is on WIC can reach me at anytime if she has a question or a BF issue, sometimes mom's want help, sometimes they don't-the most important thing? I and hundreds of other peer counselor's in the United States are ready, willing and available to help a mom through one of the most crucial start's of a baby's life.
What am I asking of you?
If you feel that BF support is important, whether for yourself or you can understand what other mom's in our community, our state, our country need this type of support, please click this link and fill out the form to let your representative know that you want this put back into the funding.

Legislative Action
Tell your representative

Camping(picture heavy)

We went camping this weekend, just one night, but for me-it was enough. I'm just not an outdoorsy person., I haven't ever really cared for it, but I go and do my best not to complain and really, Josh loves to camp and I want the kids to have the opportunity to love-or hate it-for themselves!
We went after church on Sunday to Wildcat Den(after watching the movie, The Grey, I wasn't thrilled with our camping spot).
The kids help set up the tent:

 and then we basically let the kids play and we relaxed until it was time to start the fire which the girls were fascinated by the flint:

Josh thought those huge campfire marshmallows would be good for smores but we found they were a pain to cook,the kids didn't care!

It took Kaylyn 10 minutes to get through this!
Here are my 4(..well 5 though he didn't want his picture taken) reasons for going camping!