Happy First Date Anniversary!

Twenty years ago tonight, Tom and I went on our first date. You know how he woke me up this morning? By giving me a kiss and telling me happy anniversary. How lucky am I to be married to someone who still remembers the date of the first time we went out?

Interview tonight

I have an interview tonight (Monday, December 5th) to fill an opening in my child care. Please pray that if it is God's will that this work out.

Thank you!

Have you liked my friend's Facebook page?

Have you liked my friend's Facebook page?

When she reaches 500 likes, she'll be giving away one of her new books Jungle Friends: Mack the Missing Monkey and a copy of her first book Jungle Friends: Leo the Lion and the Big Bug Dilemma plus a set of finger puppets!

Our Dreams & God's Dreams for Us

You know what I love about Women of Faith? The speakers are all real women who sin and aren't afraid to admit it and talk about what they've learned from it.

Anyway, Sandi Patty spoke about her dream. As a child, she dreamed of singing at Disney Land. She auditioned there as a teen and felt like it went really well. But when she called back a few week's later, they told her that while her voice was beautiful, she was too heavy and couldn't dance well enough. She was devastated. Little did she know the plans and dreams that God had for her.

What dreams of yours have been crushed only to find out later that God had a better plan? When I lost my job at Taco Bueno, I was heartbroken, especially since I was unfairly fired. The manager that fired me got fired herself just a few days later and I probably could have got my job back, but I decided not to even try. It's a long story, but the short version is that I got fired after reporting the manager to the business abuse line for stealing. When the district manager found out, he fired the manager.

Anyway, little did I know that God would lead me into child care. I've been doing it for 18 years now. I love working at home, I was able to be here for my kids everyday when they came home from school. I've seen lots of kids grow up over the years and some of them even have kids of their own. It may be sign that I'm getting old when a former child calls and asks me if I have openings for their child. LOL!

I don't know what God has next for me, but I'm trying to listen and follow His lead.

Ask yourself good questions

Andy Andrews was one of the speakers during the pre-conference on Friday and on Friday night. Now I had never heard of him, but I am a big fan now. Although he was a little hyper on the stage. LOL.

Now I've heard versions of this before and it just makes sense. But it's one of those things that I always think, okay yeah that sounds great.Then I don't follow through with it.

Anyway, one of his points was that we need to ask ourselves good questions. What does this mean?

Well, instead of asking myself something like "Why am I so fat or why can't I control my eating?", I should ask myself something like "How can I improve my energy level?"

So this has me thinking about different areas of my life:

Instead of "Why can't we get ahead or why can't we get out of debt?". How about "What can we do to improve our financial situation?".

Instead of "Why isn't my daycare full?", I could ask myself: "What can I do to get the word out?".

Obviously, I'm not very good at this yet. But another thing I try to keep in mind when I"m getting frustrated at things like this is that God does know what HE is doing. I can't tell you how many times I've looked back on a situation and realized that God's hand was there all along. So that helps me through a lot of things.

Next, we'll talk about our dreams (not sleepy-time dreams but life dreams)

Women of Faith

Over the next few days, I want to share my Women of Faith experiences and some things I remember from the speakers.

The worst thing about the weekend was having to come home and tell Tom he was right. LOL. I had not wanted to go to Women of Faith this year. I don't know why, I always love it. He kept telling me that the fact that I didn't want to go probably meant that I needed it all that much more. Then I decided I would go, but I wouldn't go until Friday evening. Well, I had forgot that I was going to pick up a lady here in Pond Creek on Friday morning to take her to meet the bus. So I went Friday morning. I was so glad I did, because the speakers really spoke straight to me on Friday.

A favorite quote from a speaker:
"Life isn't fair, but God is good". I think it was Brenda Warner who said that. I started out trying to take notes but it was dark and I couldn't see what I was writing and it didn't make much sense later. LOL.

But isn't that the truth? Is it fair that Tom and I can't seem to get ahead no matter what we do? Well, maybe not. But God is still in control and God is good. He always seems to pull us through each crisis (or maybe He pushes me, LOL).

Tomorrow I'm going to talk about asking ourselves good questions.

Is God listening?

Sometimes I wonder if God is listening to me. Do you ever wonder that? I had a reality check last Friday. It had been one of those days. Heck, it had been one of those weeks. LOL. Among other things, I had a parent unable to pay me the full amount which left me in a bind. Then Friday at lunchtime, my sink clogged up. Now there's something about this kitchen sink, whenever it gets clogged, I can never get it undone,I always have to call a plumber. It clogs so far down in the line that I can't get it through normal methods. Anyway, because our emergency fund is non-existent and I hadn't got all the income I planned on, I was freaking out! I needed to unplug this myself because I didn't have the $'s to call a plumber. I prayed about it. I asked God to unclog my sink. I figured, He's a big guy, He can do it, right? I was even specific in my prayers, I asked him to unplug it by 2:00 or i was going to have to call a plumber. I didn't want to go into the weekend with no kitchen sink. So anyway, 2:00 came and it was still just as clogged. I was mad. Why couldn't God have unplugged my sink? Where was I going to get the money to pay a plumber? I called our normal plumbers, they were busy and couldn't come. I called another one, it was going to be A WEEK before he could come. Then I remember a friend's husband does some plumbing jobs and got ahold of her. He came over and got it undone and to top it off, they wanted to trade for child care! So, God was listening, just not in the way that I thought He was. My sink was unclogged and I had enough money to go get groceries.

So to answer myself, yes God is listening.