Sunday Perspective & DR Raffle Push

If you read yesterday’s post, you will know that I have been struggling with a few things.  I wanted to thank you for your prayers and your support, and I will have to say I have the best bloggy friends ever! 

I got the sweetest e-mail this morning.  My e-mails are sent to my cell phone and  I got to church a few minutes early and as I was turning off my cell for church, I checked my e-mail first.  Thanks Robin, I love your “unsolicited thoughts”, and for y’all to know, Robin has e-mailed me before and she is such a sweet lady, and as she puts it “sticking in her opinions” is exactly what I needed to hear this morning.  This was the the sentence that has stuck with me through-out most of the day….

”It has been my experience that when I am in preparation for something that will glorify the Lord, you know who always tries to throw something in my path to distract me from my purpose.” 

Robin, thanks for getting me back on track, and for the record, whenever you feel the need to slip in your opinion or offer unsolicited advice, please do not hesitate!  I know without a shadow of a doubt, the Lord threw you right into my path this morning and you breathed into me a fresh breath of “perspective”!  Thanks!

As many know, last year right before leaving for our mission trip to the DR I had a very difficult situation thrown in my path, one that almost kept me from going,  Literally, I canceled my trip less than 24 hours before leaving, but at the last minute refused to let the devil get the victory.  Again this year, something is thrown into our lives where we were left questioning, should we go, and I know the answer…YES!    Something wonderful is waiting for us on our mission trip.  We are meant to go and to witness to those who do not know our Lord and nothing is going to get in our way of glorify and praising Him with every step, not matter what is thrown in our paths!  Thank you so much my “opinionated bloggy friend” (again her words) for opening my eyes.  I think that sometimes it’s hard to see out of the valley for the huge mountains, but I have the perspective to see the sunrise over those hills! 

With that being said, just when I am writing this post here comes another e-mail with an attachment to a devotion…God is so good!

2 Corinthians 6:3-10 (New International Version)
Paul's Hardships

3 We put no stumbling block in anyone's path, so that our ministry will not be discredited. 4 Rather, as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance; in troubles, hardships and distresses; 5 in beatings, imprisonments and riots; in hard work, sleepless nights and hunger; 6 in purity, understanding, patience and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; 7 in truthful speech and in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness in the right hand and in the left; 8 through glory and dishonor, bad report and good report; genuine, yet regarded as impostors; 9 known, yet regarded as unknown; dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed; 10 sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.

Thanks for your prayers and please continue to pray for us over the next month as we prepare to leave for our trip, please pray for strength and wisdom and discernment as we face the trials that we will face preparing for our trip! 

OKAY, raffle time!!  Don’t miss out on this great opportunity to get some good loot!!  If you have just stumbled upon my blog, go here to this post and check it out!  Also grab this button and help me get the word out!!

<a href="http://blessingsamidchaos.blogspot.com/2009/05/dominican-republic-mission-raffle.html" target="_blank"><img alt="Dominican" src="http://i392.photobucket.com/albums/pp4/jpdbj/Small-DR-Raffle.jpg" /></a>

 

Thanks!

I Am Struggling

I have a lot going on in my mind right now, struggles in my heart. I guess it's safe to say that I am struggling right now and for some reason I am overwhelmed with my feelings, my thoughts, with reality of those that say things or do things that are hurtful, maybe not intentionally, but hurtful just the same.

I am struggling right now with everyday tasks, my mind running with thoughts of the unknown, running wild with the worries of why and the thoughts of if it were different what would the outcome be. I ran across a saying today, can't remember where I read it, but it said why worry about tomorrow, you did that yesterday. So fitting. I am reminded of the verse in Matthew, "Don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Matt 6:34, I really need to trust in the Lord and put my worries aside. But I am struggling.

I struggle with wanting to say things to those that have hurt me. I want to say something to those that feel they are right, when in fact, they are wrong, but how do I do that? I want to confront those who actions have hurt ones they claim to love, but is it even right to say anything at all? Again, it is a struggle of the heart, or maybe it is more a struggle of the mind.

Then I struggle with even putting my thoughts into words, putting them here on this blog for the world to see if they so happened to land on this page. Putting them out there to make myself more volunable to those that think I am talking about them. I am struggling.

I know He promises to walk beside me and comfort me along the way, and that brings me great comfort, and still right now I am struggling.

Right now I feel alone when I shouldn't. I count my blessings each day and I know, without a shadow of a doubt I am blessed, but tonight I struggle.

I know there are some out there reading this and they understand where I am right now, they know the struggles and might be struggling right now as well, and right now I pray that they will find peace with their struggles as I will find peace with mine. I will trust in the Lord tonight, with all my heart, knowing that He knows that me seeking His will, He will lead me down that path that is right for me. Even though I am struggling, I know through Him, I will find peace.

For those that read this, I am okay, just struggling. I know tomorrow I will wake up with a renewed strength. I know that there are those out there that will be praying for me and those who are struggling, I am praying for you also.

Dominican Republic Mission Raffle

 

First, I want to thank everyone that donated to our Dominican Republic Raffle.  If it were not for your generosity this raffle would not be possible!!

Here is what is up for grabs….

Melissa Ell from Melissa's Thoughts donated:

From Avon,

Iron Man Cologne & Bond Girl 007 Perfume

If you win, you will receive both of these.  Check out her website to see what else Avon Has to offer. 

April from To Live is to Love donated:

A canvas of your choice

Pick from one of these canvas’s or have her create one from a favorite verse that you have.  She is very talented and full of inspiration and great ideas!

Meredith from Simplicity Simplified Donated:

A $50.00 Mark Kay Gift Certificate

Check out her website for more information.

Jill from Live, Laugh, Blog has donated:

A $100.00 Uppercase Living Gift Certificate

Check out her website for great ideas for your walls!

I am donating a Blog Design Worth $75

Check my blog to see some of my recent designs.  If you are the winner, the only thing you are responsible for purchasing is a digital kit, usually between $3-$8. 

Greg from Greg's General Store is donating:

5 Large Yellow Lilies, 5 Chevron Yellow Star Lilies

2 Crinim, 5 Old Style Orange

10 Pink Rain Lilies, 5 Spider Lilies

There are pictures of each bulb and underneath it the name of the bulb.  Here is another recap of what you will receive:

5 Chevron Yellow Star (worth 25.00)
5 Large Yellow (worth 25.00)
5 Old style Orange (worth 25.00)

5 Spider Lily bulbs (worth 25.00)
2 Crinum bulbs (worth 40.00)
10 Pink Rain Lilly bulbs (worth 10.00)

A $150.00 Flower package!

So what do you have to do to get a raffle ticket?  It’s simple…each raffle ticket is $5 and you can donate that by clicking the PayPal link at the top of my right sidebar.  For each raffle ticket that you purchase, leave a comment so you will be registered for each ticket.  Example:  If you donate $15, make sure you leave three comments…easy peezy! 

If you would like an additional entry above and beyond from purchasing a raffle ticket, take this button:

<a href="http://blessingsamidchaos.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img alt="Dominican" src="http://i392.photobucket.com/albums/pp4/jpdbj/Small-DR-Raffle.jpg" /></a>

Put it on your blog and post an entry about my raffle.  Come back leave another comment and you will have another chance of winning!

Again, Thanks so much to those who have help to make this raffle possible and if you have something that you would like to add, let me know, it’s not to late!

The raffle will run for one week, ending on June 3rd.  I will announce the winners on June 4th.  Thanks and good luck!

Pure Happiness & DR Raffle

Sometimes it’s the little things that bring me pure happiness!

This morning, Bradley calls me and says, you are not going to believe where I found your Chi-we-we at. Yes we call the ever MAN-tastic Handsome Higgins a Chi-we-we! He e-mails me this picture….

I tell ya, this dog is taking over my side of the bed, HA! If you didn't see yesterday's post scroll down....(Sorry BFF, 2 days in a row of Higgins pictures, I promise to do better next time!!)

Then after work, I had to run by Krogers. As I was walking in, there was this lady wearing the same exact outfit as I was….I went up to her and said “hey, you have great taste in clothing!” She got a big kick out me asking if I could take her picture for my blog!! It was such a blog worthy moment!!

I have been doing the Biggest Loser at church with a group of 11 ladies and at last week’s weigh-in I was 5th place on the leader board with losing 2.8% of body weight for the week! Of course, that made me smile! Anyhoo, let me show you two things I have found that are absolutely yummy!

T

Trust me, I never thought I would like any kind of hamburger that was “meat free”, but these are quite the yummy treat!

These are just a few of the things that made me smile today!! Sometimes, it’s the little things in life!

Tomorrow begins my Dominican Republic Raffle, please come back and check out all the exciting things that will be up for grabs! See you then!

Memorial Day & Catch Up

First I wanted to thank those who serve, have served, and those who gave their lives serving so that I may enjoy my freedom.  Thank you for your service!!

As you know, My computer had major issues and I did get it back on Friday, but the busy weekend and today being a holiday with Hubby home & the kids all in full swing, I am still in catch up mode!  I should be settling back into my normal routine this week, if my routine was all that normal to begin with!  Ha!

I wanted to share with you a few picture from today.  Today I was taking a shower and getting ready to go to Annette’s for lunch.  When I opened my the bathroom door to my bedroom, this is what laid before my eyes.  Of course, I sent Jeremy off to get the camera….such a blog worthy moment…..

Yep, that is my Higgins, sacked out, covered up in my bed with my personal fan and his squeaky cat!  That dog brings me such joy, because you never know what he will do next.  Trust me that dog is completely out!  My ceiling fan broke two weeks ago, so i have been using a small fan that blows on my face and Higgins is absolutely in love with this fan!!

Here are some pictures from today, the first is Bradley & Lee, Annette’s hubby.

Here is one of Lee & BreeAnne, the new high school graduate.

  

Bradley trying to smile for the camera…

Today, Chicken was on the menu and DJ was the master chef….

Yummo, was it ever so yummy!

Don’t forget, I am getting ready for a big ‘ol raffle this week on my blog with all proceeds going to our DR Mission trip, so please check back!

Hope you have a great weekend!

Bloggers Anonymous

I got me an award…Yay!! It’s from my sis-n-law Jenny from Flutterye Chronicles.

I am guessing she is trying to tell me I need BA, yeah, ummm, I suppose….she may…just be a teeny weensy tiny bit…..okay she is right!

If you are wondering if you may need Bloggers Anonymous, here are a few key point that should let you know…granted there are a lot more than I am listing, but of course these few hit me to the “T”!!

1) You start referring to your blogging buddies in conversations with your RL friends and assume they know who you are talking about “Oh, let me tell you what Tena said today” “kim did the funniest thing”

2) You tweet, kirtsy, stumble upon, digg, plurk, myspace, ning, and facebook all day long….and still have time to set your posts

3) You stalk your stats more then once a day

4) You get excited when 2 people comment on a post and if more then 5 do, you start to hyperventilate

5) You play more then one MEME a week

6) You have more then 3 blogs…one for reviews, one for family, and one to talk about your family (and they don’t know about it)

7) You have ever talked to a blogger on the phone-that you have never met

8) You are secretly happy when something dramatic happens during the day so you can blog it

9) You know where all the major graphic sites are online (istockphoto)

10) You have figured out enough HTML to add a blog banner to your page and wow, are you proud

11) You have given advice to ANOTHER blogger on how to blog

12) When one of your kids has broken into your makeup/fridge/cabinet/underwear drawer, instead of removing them from the situation, you grab the camera to document it for your blog

13) You get excited when someone links your blog on their blogroll

Now in order to claim this award I must do a post and link back to momdot.com and then pick 5 bloggers and award them…you know who your addicted buddies are! Lets make the BA Group huge.

The hardest part is picking just five!! HA! Just joking, I know y’all are not addicted to blogging……..

Here’s my pick:

1. Jeannett @ Our crazy kids... I mean life!

2. Annette @ MeMe's Ink

3. Mellissa @ Melissa's Thoughts

4. April @ To Live is to Love

5. Meredith @ Simplicity Simplified

Sorry girls, sometimes the truth hurts!!! Love ya!! Now of course, I am not leaving this open to just five, you know who you are…..if you need to join the allusive Bloggers Anonymous, feel free to grab the above button and post away!!

Computer Woes

My computer is dead…..literally it died, and it’s still being resurrected, by my all time hero, Wes!!  He’s the tech guy here at work, and is, my all new time hero!!

Friday night, I was going to get some blog work done, blog and of course, and my farm on Farm Town needed harvesting.  I went to my blog, my e-mail and Facebook.  Walked away from my computer for about an hour, and when I came back, I was slammed with hundreds of pages of wonderful pornographic web sites on my computer.  Great, pure panic mode, as we are trying to click them off and when you click then off, 50 come back in it’s place…..it was a bad thing!!

Finally, we turned it off, and basically, the rest is history!  The computer is toast.  Never fear, Wes appeared!!  Yep, here is where the hero part comes in, he has been working on my computer since Monday, he ordered some more RAM for my ‘puter and I should have it back on Friday!!  Yay!!

We do have another computer at home, but sharing it with the three boys, is not cutting it!  Plus, it’s just not my computer, my computer conforms to my fingers and I just like it better!!  You know what I mean??

Just wanted to let everyone know that I did not fall off the face of this earth, and to be honest, i have missed blogging so much!!

I should be back this weekend with lots of stuff that has been going on!  can’t wait!!

Enjoying God’s Beauty, Fall Creek Falls

Yesterday our family took a much need mental health day and went to Fall Creek Falls, a state park not to far away from us.  We always try to go once a year and at the last minute, rain or shine, we decided nothing was holding us back! 

The amount of rain that we have received the last couple of weeks made our visit an absolute beautiful one.  The day started off rainy, but turned out to me a beautiful day. 

We started out at the Cascades, which is a cascading waterfall that folks enjoy swimming at the bottom of.   Not today, the rains made it where the water was running at an all time high.  The price of not swimming was the pure beauty of the rush of water.  It was so loud that we could not hear much over the water.

Our favorite place is the actual Fall Creek Falls.  Here are three stunning pictures from the over look.  There are trails where you can hike down and swim at the bottom of this fall also, but again, with the amount of water, not much swimming.

We stopped for a much need break and enjoyed grilled hamburgers and hotdogs.  Usually we take sandwiches, but today we lived on the wild side and grilled out instead!

There are several falls that we never visit, usually due to time constraints and lack of planning, but today we visited Piney Falls and Millikan’s Overlook. 

This is the scene over looking Millikan’s overlook.

It was such a awe inspiring day.  Everywhere we looked you could see God’s handy work. 

Coming Soon!!!!!

Coming very soon I will be having an exciting raffle on my blog to benefit our Dominican Republic trip. There will many chances to win some every exciting things, everything from gift certificates, Uppercase Living, Handmade goodies!! If you or someone you know may have something that they would like to include in this raffle please have them contact me, I would love to include them!! Stay tuned to my blog for further information on this exciting raffle!!

2 Months, The Offical Countdown Has Begun!

If you have been a faithful reader to my blog, you know of my mission trip to the Dominican Republic last year. If you are new to my blog, me and my oldest son went on our first international mission trip last year, and I can honestly say that it was a life changing event in our lives. This year, me and my hubby will be returning to the DR on July 11th. All I can say, is I am super excited that God has allowed me to share this experience with my son, but now, I am blessed to be returning with my husband!

God has laid this ministry in my lap, and trust me last year, I went kicking and screaming the whole way. I could not fathom why God was sending me, ME, in a plane to a place that I was certainly fearful of going. I questioned Him for 7 1/2 months on why me Lord??

For those of you that do not know, first and foremost I am PETRIFIED of flying. So scared of planes that I start having panic attacks at the airport. I do not rough it, nope my idea of a roughing it, is sleeping with the ceiling fan off. I am terrified of bugs. Spiders, roaches and anything with legs that remotely belong in the bug family, yep, scared to death of bugs. I am afraid of the dark, yep, I am, it's true and God is sending me to a place with out electricity???

So why did God want me there, on a mission trip??? How could I minister, help or remotely do anything that He wanted me to do, with the fears that I had? Did He need me to see that there is a world besides the one that I consume myself in? Did He need me to understand that my life's little issues, are not issues, that I need to count my blessing and quit fretting over the little things?? Did He send me there to draw me closer to Him? He sent me there for those reasons and thousands more.

All I can say is, I get it. I understand now why I need to go back. There is a need, a great need to help, to minister, just to listen to these wonderful, precious people talk about their life. The need to tell them about my Savior, to read to them scripture, to give them a Bible in Spanish that they did not have. To make a lasting friendship and know that one day in Heaven, there will be no language barrier and I will be able to talk freely without the hindrance of our language.

The village that we went to last year, La Represa, has been praying for someone to come for 13 years. Their church was very old and termites had eaten away at it, making it unsafe for them to meet there. They prayed for 13 years for us to come. 13 years, I can not remember praying for 13 years for anything, and here they sat rejoicing and thanking God for us, coming to help them build their church. Where was I 13 years ago when they began praying? I was at home, with three & one year old little boys. I was chasing after them, day after day, doing what moms do. I still have a hard time wrapping my mind around the fact that they were praying for me. Praying for the day I would show up in their village to help them build their church. The excitement they had.

Here is a picture of a lady the day we arrived to begin working. She was so excited that she was sweeping the dirt that led up to the tent where we would hold Bible School for the children. God allowed my to fall behind the group a little bit, He allowed me to she her step aside as our group walked past her to begin setting up for the children. I saw her smile to each of the people of the group that walked in the tent, and when the last person walked in she peeked in, so excited at the possibilities.

This is one of my favorite pictures and it reminds me each time I look at it that God sent me there for a reason.

As we worked building the church for this village, an older lady came to watch. She was thankful and wanted to help. Here she is carrying blocks around the building to where they were being used to build the walls. These blocks were heavy, but that did not stop her. These pictures speaks volumes to me.

The children, the women & men that touched my heart. I can not express my emotions on how God opened my eyes to the need of international missions, and the importance of why we need to go.

We are still raising funds for our trip and are currently around $1800 shy. This weekend we are holding a car wash to raise some additional funds and I am am wanting to do a big push on my blog designs to help raise the remaining funds for our trip. If you would like to help, I have also placed a PayPal button on my sidebar. I have struggled for a few weeks with doing this or even asking for help, but we are having a hard time raising funds.

Our church is also hosting a "Buy-a-Block" campaign. You can purchase a cinder block for $25. In doing so, we have pieces of parchment papers where you can write a thought, a blessing, a prayer or Bible Verse and we will take these slips of parchment with us and place them in the walls of the church that we are building. This is a way for those that can not be there physically, but to be able to be there mentally. To be able to be a part of our ministry there in the DR. If you would like to participate in this, please do. I will send you the parchment so you can write on it what you feel led to and you can mail it back to me to take along.

If you would like to donate but are not a fan of Paypal, you can mail a check made payable to Calvary Baptist Church, with Pugh/Dominican in the memo to:

Calvary Baptist Church

431 DeJarnett Lane

Murfreesboro, TN 37130

Like I said, I am way out of my comfort zone here asking for donations, but someone told me it's the devil and if I did not ask, I could be robbing someone of a blessing that may want to be a part of this trip, but can not do so physically.

I am also asking for your prayers for our trip. I am still so very terrified of flying, and this trip is a very hard one for me mentally. I ask for your prayers, for a calming of my fears, a peace and for safe travels.

Here are a few more picture from our trip last year. It was so hard to pick just a few but if I showed you every picture that sparked special memories of our trip, we would be here for hours.

Thank you so very much for reading this very long post. I just feel the need to try to tell you everything that this mission trip means to me, and to those who we will minister to. There is just no way to explain it all here.