Paris prayer letter

For those interested in it I have put my prayer letter up here (where I will also be uploading my pictures) and you can read it or save it and print it out. There's also information on how to donate money towards my plane ticket if you feel so led. I'm very excited about how quickly it's coming up!!!

In Your Arms

In Your Arms
from the album "As Long As it Takes"
by Meredith Andrews

I’m turning the world off
Embracing the silence
Walking away from all the voices
That are screaming in my ear
I’ve been too caught up
I’ve been so stressed out
And all of the noise replaced the Whisper
That used to be so clear
So I close every door
And put my face back on the floor

And I’m in Your arms
Where I belong
There’s no other place for me
Than right where You are
Some things just don’t change
When I call Your name
You never hesitate
To wrap me in endless grace
When I’m in Your arms

I’m letting my fears go
Giving You control
For You are the One who holds me closer
In my soul’s darkest night
Everything I see
Is so temporary
So help me to run the race
Before me with eternity in sight

Now I close every door
And put my face back on the floor

And I’m in Your arms
Where I belong
There’s no other place for me
Than right where You are
Some things just don’t change
When I call Your name
You never hesitate
To wrap me in endless grace
When I’m in Your arms

To sit at Your feet at Your table of mercy
To gaze on Your beauty my Lord
To drink from Your well and be changed by Your glory
How could I ask for more?
Jesus, how could I ask for more?

Than to be in Your arms
Where I belong
There’s no other place for me
Than right where You are
Some things just don’t change
When I call Your name
You never hesitate
To wrap me in endless grace
When I’m in Your arms

Where I belong
There’s no other place for me
Than right where You are
Some things just don’t change
When I call Your name
You never hesitate
To wrap me in endless grace
When I’m in Your arms

You never hesitate
To wrap me in endless grace
When I’m in Your arms

Things learned first week of diet

So I went to the doctor and she says I have a little problem with candida. What does this mean? She wants me to take a prescription to kill it and go on a diet of only meat, veggies, fruit and beans. Yes many of my friends who have done this have told me you aren't supposed to have fruit but she told me I could and it's my lifeline right now okay? The medicine or maybe the dying yeast I'm not sure which causes me to have multiple annoying side effects--most people describe it as flu-like symptoms, a crazy bad headache, body aches, and slight nausea off and on. I'm also very tired and have next to no energy. Because of the nausea this makes me NOT want to eat the things I should (like meat and fresh veggies) and the only thing I can make myself want to eat when I'm nauseous is fruit. I'm assuming she knows what she's doing for now since I'm not her first patient and the lady at the health foods store recognized her name and said she was a good doctor.

When I first went to the grocery store on Saturday I really had no idea what I wanted or needed to survive this diet. I came home with some random fresh veggies for one or two recipes I'd found, fajita seasoned chicken, apples and almond butter. What I have found is that I really liked Rasta Pasta with a few minor tweaks and no pasta, and rotisserie chicken with mock potatoes (cauliflower mashed up). I put most of the fajita chicken in the freezer, it will be handy for Sunday lunches I think because I can just grab a baggy of that and some salad. So strategy for next week? I think I'm going to buy a whole chicken and do it myself in the oven and get like three huge bags of cauliflower. :P If it's possible to be sick of it I will be I'm sure because for now it's the only thing I really want that I can have.

Surprisingly I haven't found myself really craving or longing for any desserts or things I'd typically eat. I miss having coffee in the morning but only because it's a comfort thing to me not because my mouth really wants it. Mostly I just want to stop thinking so hard about what I can have and trying to come up with something that sounds good from that list and just eat whatever the family is eating.

Some new things to try this week--I think I'd like to try doing some fish (tilapia maybe?) but the fact that I come home so late every night from work makes me want fast and easy things to make. Other things to get and try, spaghetti squash and I think I have all the ingredients to make some ratatouille. Since I'm currently eating fruit I'm thinking of making some smoothies with frozen fruit and soy milk. Fingers crossed it turns out good. :P I'm really craving creamy things but can't have anything creamy. I want cheese too. I want alfredo and creamy chicken dishes. And did I mention cheese? Stink.

If any body has done this before and has some good recipes they want to share please pass them along! What are some things you made to try to imitate other foods we can't have (like the mashed cauliflower or using spaghetti squash as spaghetti noodles)?

this and that

Time continues to fly by and plans are becoming more concrete for my trip to Paris! If I think about it too much I get so giddy and excited I can hardly stand it. I try to not give it too much thought for that reason beyond logistics. I've been accepted by Mission Nannys as a part of their team and go with the full backing of their mission board. They are printing up prayer cards for me and everything. :) If you would like one just let me know and when they come in I'll get one to you.

It feels more real because I'm going to actively be putting aside the money for my plane ticket now. I have a goal amount and a date to have it saved by, and it's awfully close! I work best under pressure though as far as saving money goes. With no deadline or specific goal I tend to just waffle around with money. I need to be better about following a budget although I've found I don't work as well with Dave Ramsey's plan. Or maybe I just didn't try hard enough long enough? Anyhow I decided my own little thing was working out well enough, maybe just using his principles and sticking to my plan (which is better than NO plan!) was the best way to go.

I've been having fun cooking lately, trying new things and expanding my horizons in the area of food. I made the most amazing dinner tonight if I say so myself!! I made Pioneer Woman's Linguine with Shrimp, the Food Network's Garlic Sauteed Spinach, and creamed corn. Oh my goodness. I have to say though, Pioneer Woman talks about how fun it is to put the linguine & shrimp in the foil and how cute it is and all that--I don't know what she's talking about because that wasn't very fun, it seemed like more trouble than it was worth. Seems like it would be easier to just leave it in the pot and cover the top with foil. Same difference yeah? I will try that next time. Oh and it makes A TON so I probably won't double it. Also the spinach was a bit salty so I'd probably double everything but the salt next time. It still made for an epic dinner and everyone else agreed it was amazing. Score for me. :) Next time I get brave I'm going to try asparagus. :D

Donard the Lamb

Donard the Lamb

exciting possibilities

:: "Now unto Him that is able to do EXCEEDING abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us" ~Ephesians 4:20 ::

A few weeks ago I started having this funny little feeling that I wanted to do something. I didn't know exactly what but I wanted it to be something kind of off the wall crazy and out of the ordinary. I didn't really expect it needed to be anything huge, in fact the first time it hit I just painted my toenails blue and that helped. It made me smile anyway and I shrugged the feeling off as too much caffeine and went back on my merry little way.

It kept niggling away though in my subconscious, and a week or so later I randomly said "I want to go to London!! Wouldn't that be awesome??" It was a completely random, far out (in my mind) thing to do although something I would really and it made me feel better just saying it out loud. One time I mentioned it to Sarah and being the ever wonderful encourager she is her reply was "You should TOTALLY take Anna and go!!" This made me happy to think about and I think I said to Anna "Let's go to London on Spring Break". Riiiight. :)

Not very long after this Savanna told us that a friend from Champion Forest had told her a missionary family in Paris we knew of wanted a nanny for 6-8 weeks this summer while they were having a new baby. Savanna of course said "No way!" but something inside of me jumped. I asked her if she thought they might be interested in letting me come help. She put me in contact with the friend on Facebook so I could ask her myself and I sent her a message explaining who I was and that I was interested in hearing about the opportunity in Paris. She said she would talk to them and find out how to get us in contact with each other. I really wanted to do it but was trying to not get too worked up about it until I heard if they were even interested in having me. I am normally very much a homebody and I would rather be at home than anywhere else but there was just something about this trip that made me want to go.

A few days later Amy Cross messaged me. She said they thought they had found someone to help but she was interested in hearing a bit more about me. I was a little bummed that maybe this wasn't going to work out after all but sent her a paragraph or two about myself. Amy replied that she'd like to have me fill out a little questionnaire and told me about the general timeframe she would want someone to come. I filled it out and told her I would check with my boss to see what she thought about my taking off that time. Amy said she was very interested to hear the outcome. So I emailed my boss and tried desperately to push it all to the back of my mind.

The next day my boss called me and said "So let's talk about summer!" I kind of held my breath to hear what was next. "I talked it over with some of my family and stuff and I think this is a fabulous opportunity I definitely want you to go do! I think we can make this work." This was all the encouragement I needed. Right away I let Amy know that it was all clear on my end that she should just let me know if they decided to have the other girl come and help or if they'd like me to.

A week later I heard from Amy and she told me what her ideal plan was for having someone come and help and gave me three sets of dates with an extra set to possibly add on to one of them. By this time the church had announced this year's graduation date and Mom reminded me Micah was going to be participating--and the day was about two weeks into the best set of dates I saw. I really wanted to consider the second set but it would cover the week of this year's IBLP seminars and I really wanted to still be available to help with that. I was just a bit disappointed because I just didn't have a peace about either of the sets and emailed Amy. After discussing these things she offered July 26 - September 26. I couldn't think of any reason why those wouldn't work. It would be leaving the Monday following CI (and unfortunately meant missing the CMT conference) to be there in time to go to Poland for their missions conference, and include a week in August for sightseeing. It was way too amazing to take in. Just like that it all turned back around again...I really could go, this could really happen!!

Even now plans are continuing to take shape. I am so thrilled that God has opened the doors for me to do this since it combines two things close to my heart (children and missions). I've signed up for a 12 week beginner course in French online in hopes I might can learn a few useful phrases. :) Throughout this whole time Ephesians 4:20 kept coming back to my mind and how awesome God is to create these sorts of opportunities for us. It's truly far surpassed anything I could ever have dreamed or hoped for. While on the one hand July 26 seems so far away on the other it seems amazingly close like I could never get everything together and accomplished that I need to before then. I cannot wait to see how the rest of this unfolds. God is so good!!!

Post-Wilds wrap up

Friday we slept in and took our time getting dressed for the day. There was much deliberation over what to do with ourselves since it was so cold and we had a whole day but in the end we just decided to go to Taco Bell for lunch and figure everything else out as we went. We were thinking of going to the James' house for the night but on our way back we saw just how bad the ice and decided we really didn't want to chance it since we knew we could safely get to the highway from the Tysons'. We were very sorry to not get to see the James again before heading home!!! :( So we opted for a quiet afternoon/evening in complete with Rockband and a few movies. It was nice to relax and just hang out with Joey.

Bright and early Saturday morning (7 AM Eastern time) we set off for home. There was a lot of ice and snow in Georgia but once we made it to Alabama it began to disappear. I drove us as far as the Mississippi border where Erin took over. I tried to nap a bit and while I was asleep Erin found more ice starting around Meridian on towards Jackson but after that it seemed to clear up again. We were very grateful that God kept us safe and we were able to avoid all the big ice patches by keeping to the center lanes.

We made a brief stop in Lufkin to have dinner with the wonderful Slanny!! :) I don't get to see this girl nearly enough. :( Everyone was anxious to be home so we kept our visit short and hopped back in the car to go again, finally arriving at my house around 9:30. Would you believe I almost felt TOO warm when I got inside my house??? I was sooooo glad because I feel like I've been freezing to death the last week. There was of course a wonderful reception by the kids complete with a welcome home banner and my room being very carefully cleaned and vacuumed. I have of course now trashed it again with all my luggage from my trip but it was nice to see it clean to start with!! I'm beginning to feel somewhat human again after giving my face a good scrub, brushing my teeth and putting on some warm, clean pajamas. Now the tricky part after a week away...what is clean that I can wear to church tomorrow!