The familiar smell of coffee delighted my senses as I stepped into my favorite local coffee shop. I examined the shelves. This could be perfect! Each item seemed unique enough to be personal and general enough to please anyone who drinks a morning cup of coffee. I picked out and purchased two great Christmas gifts. I small-talked with the cashier, placed my items in a bag, and stepped out into the crisp beginnings of winter weather… … Continue reading
Do you remember your first loose tooth? Wiggly, staring, pressing your tongue to push it outward in hopes it would fall out. Eating apples in hopes it would show up attached somewhere on the core. Waiting. Staring. Waiting some more.. It’s quite a monumental event. Losing teeth, growing up it is a right of passage – baby teeth move out while grown up teeth move in. I remember I would freak out every time I’d… … Continue reading
My husband and I made a big mistake last fall. Huge. We neglected to apply an autumn round of lawn fertilizer. The lawn looked fabulous then, but once the frost broke we had a yard full of dandelions. I’m not talking about a couple here and a few there. I’m talking a bumper crop of the vile weed. So off I went to the hardware store to buy the biggest bag of weed and feed… … Continue reading
There are no words in any language that adequately express the emotion felt when hearing the phrase: “There’s a large mass”, no way to express the feelings that wash over the heart and mind when these words are spoken over the body of a two-year-old boy. But, I know I’m not the only one who has heard words like this and Chase isn’t the only one to carry cancer like this. How many times have… … Continue reading
One day, I was telling a woman named Ashley how my daughter always wanted to borrow my clothes, which many see as a form of flattery. I do, too, unless I have to dig through the laundry on her bedroom floor when I want to wear them. That story led to a conversation on entitlement. “Oh, I know what you’re talking about,” she said. I wondered what she could possibly be referring to since her… … Continue reading
“But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” Matthew 5:44 My husband and I sat down the other day to read the Bible to our kids before bedtime. He opened our time together by saying “Hey kids, you want to know something really weird and difficult that God asks us to do? He asks us to ‘love our enemies’ – isn’t that weird? Do you feel like loving your enemies… … Continue reading
Jade has cancer. But she’s fighting back with joy! We’ve been friends with Jade for a while and she’s amazing. She knows firsthand how big of a deal it is to receive a JoyJar. Her mom, Becky, told us her story. Check it out. For every $100 single gift during our year-end-pledge drive, we’re sending a JoyJar to a child fighting cancer. You’re bringing hope to your community by keeping WAY-FM on-the-air and… … Continue reading
Here’s the thing. Kids will make their own mistakes. They will falter and flounder through this painful thing called growing up. The best we can do for them, after all the teaching and preaching is done, is to continue to be a listening ear, an encouraging coach…and yes, of course at times that will involve doling out some consequences. But there is one thing I have learned through parenting the five teenagers I have had… … Continue reading
I Corinthians 12:26 – “If one part [of God’s body] suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.” (NIV) Jase and I learned many years ago that having a child born with a cleft lip/palate was going to be a challenging journey. This was not something that could be easily fixed; it was going to have to be managed for the rest of her childhood and quite… … Continue reading
Inadequacy. We all struggle with it. We all come to parenting with our own baggage, our own challenges, our own character flaws and because we love our children so desperately, we try as hard as we can to help them avoid all those same mistakes. I felt inadequate when I had one child. I felt completely incapable when I had two children. By the time I learned that Bliss was on the way due just… … Continue reading
