A New Perspective

This past Saturday, I went over to a friend's house and watched the Thrive Moms Retreat. The theme was "Warrior" based on Ephesians 6. 

I was excited about some girl time away from my toddler but, I hadn't really had time to prepare my heart and mind for anything more than a casual conversation. 

The week prior had been kind of tough on the home-front. I had been struggling with letting the little things get under my skin and then I would get angry with my sweet boy. I was finding myself getting very upset with him for stepping on my foot and causing me a small amount of pain or getting upset when he would stand near me and say, "Mommy, mommy...etc". I started to realize that I was being very unrealistic and ungrateful with an almost 2 year old. This made me very sad and concerned about my heart. I prayed that God would help me to have the self control that I needed so that I could handle these miniscule frustrations.

This retreat came at a fantastic time....

Heidi Weimer spoke about the "battle" we as moms face. The question she asked was "What is the battle?" She gave a few answers but the one that I knew the Lord wanted me to hear was, "the battle that we face is the one against our sanity (as moms)" She went on to say that "if Satan can get us to blow up and get very angry, he has won the battle." 

DING! DING! DING!  

The light bulb went off and I knew that God was telling me that I need to listen up to what else this awesome woman has to say because, the answer I was praying for just a few days prior was about to be revealed in the next few sentences... Heidi said, "We must choose to let the little things go," because, if we "are wasting our time dealing with and getting frustrated about those small things, we can't deal with and learn through the big things." 

Wow! I needed that. I needed to hear it put so plainly. 

She then went on to give a few examples in her own life about some of the bigger things she was referring to. She has 11, yes ELEVEN, kids. If she focused on all the little things and got irritated because it took 30 minutes to get shoes on one kid, she would go crazy by hour two of her day. Instead, she suggests that we focus on the important battles that have deeper roots, possibly even spiritual ones. 

She went on to say that God is our peace. In rough times, in easy times, He is the only One who can comfort us and give us a peace that passes all understanding. He is in control of our lives and knows the plans He has for us (Jer 29:11)

Heidi also said "God is not calling you to be a perfect mom, He is calling you to point your kids to a perfect Christ." 

Towards the end of her speech, we re-read Ephesians 6:12-13. She then pointed out that God calls us to continually put on the whole armor of God, throughout the day. Pray, repeat scripture and worship so that when you are attacked with the little things, you have the armor to fight it off.

I left my friend's house with a new perspective. I'm not going to tell you that I will NEVER get upset with the little things again but, I can tell you that I am going to try my best to show my child(ren) the love of Christ and that He is the only way I can get through anything. I want them to see Christ in my life. Praise God that He is in control and not me!

Change

Wow! A lot has changed since I last posted on here. In the year and a half since my last post, we have bought a foreclosure and renovated it to be liveable, I have lost all of my baby weight plus some and there have been some fantastic spiritual changes in my life as well.

First off, if you're reading this and wondering whether we decided to go with the paleo lifestyle, I am happy to report that we did not. However, we have changed our eating habits to include a real food diet based on the Weston A Price Foundation studies. We aren't anywhere near where I'd like our family to be but, to be successful, you have to take baby steps and we are for sure doing that!

As far as the spiritual changes I mentioned above, I have begun reading my Bible everyday and being faithful with that. I also have been praying on a daily basis. That is a huge accomplishment for me because a year ago, I was rarely reading and only praying when I needed something. God has brought some amazing people in my life to learn from and be blessed by. He has been teaching me some amazing things about motherhood and choosing friends wisely.

Our house is an entire post/topic in itself. Short story, God certainly showed up and blessed us more than we could've ever imagined. Before we bought the house, it was a occupied by reckless teenagers who never took care of it. We patched 18 fist size holes and puttied MANY knife holes (knife throwing contests surrounding a stick figure). Thinking on it, our house reminds me of our lives before Christ and what Christ can do with our lives once we start living for Him. Our lives could be a complete disaster and He looks at us with love and sees us for our real beauty and potential. He sees our future and the awesome ending He has in store for us and longs for us to come to Him and surrender all to Him.

I will post more on these individual topics one day but for now, I felt God calling me to revive this blog, AGAIN. But this time, all for His glory and not for my own gain.

To Him be the glory.

New Diet?

In the last post, I talked a little bit about doing the Paleo diet. Let me tell you a little bit about where this idea is coming from. My husband has been the same weight for a couple of years. He has been very frustrated because no matter what he did he never fluctuated more than 2-3 lbs. I have been gaining weight since I graduated high school in 2008. About 1 month ago my husband did a detox for 10 days. He lost about 10lbs. Since then we decided to change our eating habits. We are moving towards a paleo type diet. We are limiting the number of starchy foods and fast foods we eat. We also eat vegetables with EVERY dinner and lunch. I have tried to limit our sweets intake and we have limited the amount of hot tea we drink. So far since starting this lifestyle change, my husband has lost a total of 15 lbs and I have lost 11(not including baby weight). My husband doesn't really enjoy wheat flour so for now we have just limited our white flour intake. I am hoping that we can continue with this lifestyle and NEVER go back to our old ways. I would like to see our kids really enjoy fruits and vegetables more than sweets.

Do you have any suggestions for our family? How about favorite recipes?