"God Made You Special And He Loves You Very Much!"

"I Had A Beth Moore Hair Day" I Wish!

If you know Beth Moore, then you know she prides herself in her big southern hairdo. She believes in teasing and hairspray. I find her hairstyle very cute, but as I was fixing my hair today I knew it would be one of those days. I must back up and confess the real problem to you. I cut my boys hair, even Matt's. We do this to save money. After all it is not hard to cut boys hair. I had this bright idea that to save money I would start cutting my own hair. Yes, I know, but I did it anyway. The problem was the back. I could never seem to get it even. I tried getting in the shower and flipping my head over and cutting a straight line. It did not turn out to be such a straight line when I flipped back up. So I did what any intelligent, rational woman would do and I said, "Matt, can you come cut my hair!" Yes, I put scissors in the hands of my husband and I turned around. Anyone can cut a straight line right? He did cut a straight line, but what he did not realize was that when you pull down on wet hair and cut, it springs back shorter. He pulls down on the back of my hair, cuts and then I hear, "Whoops!" Not what you want to hear when your husband is holding scissors to the back of your head. "What happened?" I asked. "Nothing, I think it is just shorter than you had wanted, but it is straight." He did great, but I did have to cut a couple more inches off the sides to even it up. Is anyone horrified yet? The cut actually turned out o.k. if I would sit with my head tilted forward and to the side. This happened in August the week before I was to leave for a conference I had been planning on for over a year. A conference with 600 other women who I did not know. There was nothing left to do but tilt my head and smile. Well, let's get back to today. As my hair has been growing back it is not quite as forgiving as it once was and I am beginning to have what some might call "mullet like" symptoms. The sides seem to be a little shorter than the back. I have tried the flat-iron, I have tried flipping it up, curling it under and even scrunching. (Which I believe was popular in the 80's.) Today I decided that hot rollers would do the trick. You know add that body and shine and put that bounce back into my head. As I removed each roller I began to see an increasing problem. Medusa was staring back at me from the mirror. My hair was so big even Beth Moore would have called an intervention. My day was too busy to spend fussing over hair so I flipped my head over, sprayed a large hole in the ozone layer and went about my day. As the day went on my hair fell into place and now looks like a brown football helmet with short bangs. I need to visit what I think they call a "Hair Salon" and have a professional work their magic, but alas I shall wait until it makes its way into the budget. Each time I passed a mirror or saw my reflection in a window I thought about ALL the hairs on my head. It was definitely a bad hair day for me, but it brought me great comfort because I was reminded of the scripture that says,  "Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows." Luke 12:7 I know that my Jesus cares enough about me that He has every hair of my head numbered. Let me just say that today that was a lot of hair. What a great comfort to know the truth of this verse... "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart." 1 Samuel 16:7  He loves me even when I have Medusa hair. He still cares and He sees my heart, not my hair. I have made a vow that I will never cry over a bad hair cut or a bad hair day. It is just hair. I confess I was frustrated this morning, but oh what joy and comfort my savior brought to me today through a silly thing like having a hairstyle like Medusa.  Does anyone know who does Beth Moore's hair. I need to make an appointment?

"Sleep in Perfect Peace"

We believe in rocking babies at our house. I don't care what the books say, I am not able to lay my children down and let them cry. I love to hold them and rock them to sleep. I love to have them cuddled up on my chest and sing them to sleep. It is a precious, treasured time in the midst of a hectic day. We believe in rocking so much so that we usually quit rocking one child when another one comes along that requires rocking. We have been known to rock two children at a time or Matt rock one while I rock the other. Since Jacob in our last, I guess we will rock until he is old enough to rock us. :) Matt rewrote the words to the song "You are my sunshine." It goes something like this..."You are my sunshine my "4th" (Jacob) sunshine, you make me happy when skies are grey. You'll never know "boy" how much I love you. You have been my sunshine today." He changes the number to correspond with the son he is rocking. The other night Jacob was curled up on Matt's chest and they were rocking. I could hear Matt singing, but I also heard this tiny little voice singing along. He sang every word of this treasured song that his daddy sings to him every night. He was cradled in the arms of his daddy, he was safe, he was secure, he was loved and he mimicked the words his daddy sang to him. My friend that is how our heavenly Father wants us to sleep each night. Falling asleep in our "daddy's arms" safe, secure, loved and mimicking the words he whispers in our ears. Oh the comfort of the Father's voice. There is nothing quite like it. I use to pray myself to sleep at night and then I started feeling guilty that I fell asleep while talking to God, but then I realized as long as that was not my only conversation with Him during the day, it was the perfect way to go to sleep, in the safe and secure presence of my Father. I don't fall asleep worrying about the day to come or the one that just passed, but I fall asleep mimicking His Word and singing his praise. When I rest in Him and in His peace that passes all understanding, I can "sleep in perfect peace."

Zephaniah 3:17, “The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing.” (NIV)

"I Was Celebrated Today!"

Joshua came home from kindergarten yesterday and said, "Guess what mommy, I was celebrated today!" He was so excited! He had that big goofy smile across his face and he was beaming! I asked him what it meant to be celebrated and he said, "I wrote words in my journal that my teacher could understand and I could read them back to her and so they celebrated me." I was so excited for my little man! He deserved to be celebrated. Isn't that what we all long for...someone to celebrate us. We enjoy the usual celebrations like birthdays, anniversaries and Mother's day and Father's day, but I want to be celebrated "every" day! I want to know that what I am doing is really being noticed and that someone cares about it. Have you ever noticed how much children love applause? If you clap for them, they will do the same thing over and over again until it gets really old, but they love the praise. Not much changes from childhood to adulthood, except for the fact that we don't admit openly how much we want to be celebrated. I will be honest, I really struggle with this. I want my cooking to be celebrated. I want my cake decorating ability to be celebrated! I want my parenting to be celebrated! I want my marriage to be celebrated! (I want my blog to be celebrated!) We (I) put so much effort into doing things in this world so that we will be celebrated, so that we will receive a pat on the back, so that we would receive (as we said when I was young) a bozo button, all the while forgetting that our Heavenly Father celebrates us everyday! Zephaniah 3:17 "The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing." Did you ever think about the fact that the Lord our God, the creator of this universe rejoices over us with singing? We bring Him great delight! My God is celebrating me!!! I want to live each moment for Him! I want to make my Father proud! I want him to delight in me and to rejoice over me! Because Jesus Christ is who he said he is and he is, the Lord our God, then you and I have the assurance that we can wake up each morning and say..."I Was Celebrated Today!"