The Power of Joy!

So I've blogged a lot of times about my love of hooping.  It's my JOY!  It makes me happy!  It's so hard to be sad when you are hula hooping!  But the fun part is taking it everywhere!!

At first, it was kinda weird- me a grown woman- taking my hoop out in public.  I thought "What if people look at me!"  Well-of course they will!  And "What if I mess up!" -- Well, of course you will!

I'm not one usually to want a lot of attention drawn to myself either.  So it was a big big step to hoop in public.

But once I did.  Just tip toed out into the abyss of the unknown....wow.  A tiny bit of freedom opened up to me.  A tiny bit of creativity opened up.  A tiny bit of  "I don't really care what people think".

Then the next time it was a little easier.  Then the next.  Then the next.  Then...I was taking it everywhere!  The freedom!!  You never know when a good hoop place will pop up.

There's a fountain! Oh great place to hoop!  There's a band! Oooh cool song to hoop to!  There's a great big open field! Perfect hooping place.

Then I started traveling with it!  On cruises, plane rides, everything.  I have a great twist up hoop that my wonderful hoop teacher and friend --Geri-- makes!  She's such an inspiration and a JOY to me! She makes me smile and I love to see the joy she spreads to others.

Joy is a powerful thing!  It can make a terrible day not so terrible.  It can bring a smile to others.  It can open your heart to new adventures. Joy can spread like wildfire!  Joy can make you young again. Joy can make your soul lighter.  Joy can heal you from within.  Yes JOY can do all that!!

Check out Geri's website here!  It's called Around JOY!

45 things you might not know about me

So my birthday is coming up!!! AGHHH!!!  I will be 45 years old!  I'm not sure how this happened..but here I am.  

So in celebration of this new year!  Here's 45 things you might not know about me!

1. I'm an introvert.
2. I love love love to travel!
3. I don't mind doing things by myself, in fact I rather enjoy it.
4. I'm working on memorizing Philippians.  I've got the first 2 chapters down!
5. I've never had an issue with weight until the last 5 years or so, but I'm working on losing it now!
6. I have opinions about stuff and it comes across sometimes as bossy, stubborn, mean.  I don't intend to be those things though.
7.  I love trivia and love to learn new things.
8.  I don't know much about pop culture though.
9. I love to listen to Christian music, hymns and new stuff, but I also like classical and 40s.
10.  I would love for 40s fashion to come back!  Hats! and Men in hats!
11. I only just recently started in the work force. (about the last 5 years) I was a stay at home mom for years and years (which I loved).
12.  Our biggest regret was not having more kids.
13. I've only worn skirts now for about 10 years.
14. I've been to a lot of places in Europe and would love to live there someday!
15. My favorite flower is the daisy.
16. My favorite day: sitting on the porch, watching a thunderstorm, reading a book and drinking coffee.
17. Or tea! I have a HUGE collection of tea!
18. I really hate wearing my heart on my sleeve.
19.  I can tend to be an Eeyore.
20. We've moved about 14 times in our 27 years of marriage and lived in 4 states!
21. I love to read!  and when I'm in the reading mood -read about a book a week.
22. Have been doing a High Fat/Low Carb diet for about 8 months now and I love it! No going back!
23.  We've been taking a cruise every year with a group of friends of ours going on about 3 years now!
24. It's hard for me to apologize because I think I'm usually right.  Working on that.
25. I'm married to my best friend and when he's gone I'm lonely.
26. I love our electric bicycles that we got!
27. Am so excited that we've downsized so much!  living in a 750 square foot apartment is one of the best things we've done.
28. I haven't been to the dentist or doctor in I can't remember how long ago.
29. I prefer to always wear flats..but occasionally I'll wear a wedge.
30. I absolutely love my relationship with my grown kids!  They are a joy!
31. I've worn glasses since I was about 18. I recently bought contacts but haven't worn them much because my glasses are my security blanket and I feel naked without them!
32. Never thought I'd switch to an e-reader for books but now it's all I read.
33. My medicine cabinet at home is mostly essential oils.
34. I've never been to Las Vegas.
35. If there's a tree that looks good to climb -you'll probably see me up in it!
36. I've read through the Bible every year for so many years now I can't remember how many!
37. Favorite color-pink! (It was my wedding color!)
38. Can read music and used to play the violin and can play some piano.
39. Clean everything in sight when I'm angry or upset.
40. Love to have the blinds closed and lights down low at home.
41. Hate cooking and grocery shopping.
42. Back before the internet, I used to cut articles out of magazines and I had a whole file cabinet with different files for different topics.
43. Never thought I'd homeschool, but ended up homeschooling for 15 years!
44. Have a hard time making friends.
45. Put my trust in the Lord Jesus Christ when I was 13 years old at my grandma's church during a revival.

Well, there you have it!  Just a few things about me! :)

What's Love got to do with it?

There's a secret to marriage.

It's something we figured out in that first really messy year.

It's what Love truly is.

That first year we were married was tough.  I was only 18 and really didn't know anything about anything.  Larry was 25 and he had certain ways he thought marriage would be like.  We had a hard time meshing our lives together at first.

Until we had a conversation about what Love is.

Larry, in his typical analytical fashion, wrote out a definition for Love and it's helped us out in so many ways.

Here it is:  There's 3 kinds of "Love".

First, is the "Commitment Love".  This is the foundation of the marriage.  It's the -I will never leave you or forsake you -you are stuck with me till I die--kind of love.  Even when everything else is just the worst-- the commitment love remains.  It's what keeps us working on the marriage.  It's what keeps us reading books, going to retreats, learning from others, going to counseling.  If you don't have a commitment then the rest just crumbles.

Second is the "Friendship Love".  This is the fun part of marriage! This is the --You're my best friend kind of love!  This is the part of marriage that is going on walks, geocaching, watching the rain together, reading books together, playing games together.  We enjoy each other's company!  We love to spend time with each other.  This is the majority of the marriage.  It's the time we spend together and the friendship that grows out of that. It's the taking care of each other when we are sick, when we need gas in our cars, when we just need a shoulder to cry on.

Lastly, is the -what we like to call- the "Woozy Woozy Love".  This is the love that everyone thinks about when they are getting married. This is the love that always portrayed in the movies.  It's the butterflies in the stomach, starry eyes, fireworks and butterflies love.  Yes, this is a part of marriage but it's not something we build our foundation on.  These feelings come and go.  They are wonderful and I love that "woozy woozy" feeling!  But as our marriage grows, these feelings grow so much deeper.  It's so much more now than just a feeling.

If you are always staying in the "Woozy Woozy" Love, then when that feeling isn't there you might feel like your marriage isn't there anymore.  That's where the "Commitment Love" comes in.  That will always be there.  No matter if either of the other two kinds of love are there or not--the commitment is always there.

This is what we learned in the first year of our marriage.  We are working on year 27 now!

So thankful for you Larry.

1 Corinthians 13: 4-7 "Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; 5 does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; 6 does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things."

Stuff

Stuff.

We all have stuff.

We all need stuff.

We go to the stuff store and buy stuff.  We bring our stuff home and rearrange our other stuff to make room for our new stuff.  We decide to give some stuff to someone else.  We spend time cleaning and playing with our stuff.

Then we go to work to make more money to get more stuff.

Stuff takes over our lives!

I once heard a saying:  The more you have, the more you have to have to take care of the things you have.

True or true?

I'm so happy we downsized.  We've lived in all sizes of houses.  The biggest was 5 bedrooms-3 bathrooms-3500 square feet!  Now, thankfully, we are back down into a 1 bedroom 750 sq ft apartment.

Back when we had a big house, we really used it.  We had 3 kids at home, homeschooled, and had lots of people over all the time.

Now, with our little nest being empty, we don't need near as much room or stuff.

Downsizing is something everyone should do sometime or another.

Look through some of your closets/drawers/cabinets.  Do you really need 10 pots and pans?  Do you really need a whole garage full of tools?  Clothes or shoes?  What do you really wear?

These are the questions I ask myself as we are downsizing.  What do I really use?  And how many at a time can I really use?  Would one or two work just as fine?

Don't be afraid to get rid of some things (or a lot of things).  Downsizing is good.

It is, after all, just stuff.

Good video about being content.

Things to get rid of!

Take a Look, it's in a book!

I absolutely love to read.

When I'm in the reading groove, I can read about a book a week.  I love how reading transports you to new places.  I love getting all wrapped up in a story.  I love cuddling up under the covers and losing myself in a good book.

I have always wanted to share my love of reading with my kids.  When they were little, I would read to them all the time.  We would listen to audio books and audio stories together.  We went to the library once a week and came home with stacks and stacks of books.  I made sure my kids always saw me reading too.  My love for reading is something I really wanted to pass on to my kids.

For a while, it didn't seem like they valued reading as much as I did.  Technology, computers, and Xbox all vied for their attention.  And as they grew, books got pushed to the side.

Well, the other day, my grown son came over and we were having a conversation.  He was telling me about this new book he was reading!  He was all excited about it! He got me wanting to read it too!  He was telling me how hard it was at first for him to get into reading.  So he started listening to audio books.  The more he listened to the easier it was for him to pick up a book to read.  My heart soared!  He's caught it!  The reading bug!

My daughter also reads.  She's a researcher.  She is a sponge for information and I love it!

Now my grown kids are growing and sharing the info they've read with me!

Now my hubby is not a reader.  So to remedy that situation - I've always read books to him!  One of our favorite things is to go to the park, pull out the sleeping bags, pick a quiet corner and read. It's a great bonding time.  And he also gets to experience the power of a book.

Books can be powerful. Reading transforms us, stretches us, makes us think, enlarges our vocabulary,

Reading does that.  It is a door to other places, other times,  other worlds.

If you're not a reader, I highly encourage you to try.  Start with audio books!  If your kids are young, try Adventures in Odyssey!  Focus on the Family radio theatre is also wonderful for the classics!

So, have fun reading to your kids!  and pick up a book yourself!  Summer time's a great time to start!

The thing about Money

So money is an interesting topic.  Most people are always wanting more and never seem to know what to do about their current situation or even how they've gotten in the situation they are in now. The Lord entrusts us with money..so what are we to do with it?

I'm thankful for my hubby who had a lot of wisdom when we first got married in this area.

First of all, we decided we'd never be in debt.  We do use a credit card but we always pay it off in full each month.  Our house is a debt -technically- but early in our marriage we were able to pay it off early and use that big chunk in investing in other houses. (More on that later)  We also consider a house an investment instead of a liability.  Most all the time you can sell your house for more than you bought it for.  I say most because the market is unpredictable and it has been known to drop.

We've never owned a new car or had college debt.  New cars are usually a liability because the depreciation on them is enormous!  And most people are still paying off their college debts way into their 30s and aren't even using their degrees!

Now, the kicker is this- most people when they are trying to get out of debt are trying to get their money to zero.  They would like to not be under water anymore but just tread water.  My hubby's great wisdom has always been this-why just be at zero when you can be way ABOVE zero!

Our thinking has never been.."Well we have $100 what can we spend it on?" or "Do we have enough to go to the movies tonight?"  If you have to think if you have enough ..then you probably shouldn't go.

So how do you get to that point? Well, we did a lot of scrimping and saving in the early days.  We rarely ate out and if we did nobody got a soda and we had a $2 per person limit on what you could get.  We tried to find all the free things we could do and rarely spent money on stuff for the kids and big outings, amusement parks etc.  They never asked us for anything either because it was just understood that mom and dad wouldn't buy them anything while we were out and about.

We also always had the mindset that we are to leave an inheritance not just for OUR kids but for our children's children!  Can you imagine!! Proverbs 13:22 says "A good man leaves an inheritance to his children’s children"

We always tried to look down the road 10-20 years not just to the next payday.

My hubby had plans upon plans and backup plans upon backup plans for when he lost his job, when big expenses came up etc.

When we first got married, I knew I would want to stay home with the kids. So I was working, but we pretended like I didn't make anything and just stashed all that money away so that when we did have kids we would be used to living on one income AND we'd have a stash to start out!

As we paid off our first house, we used that capital to start investing in other houses.  These houses we've always known to be for our kids later on.   They aren't making that much money in the short term but eventually over the long haul they will be paid off (by other people paying them!).

Now it's never too late to get started.  I highly encourage everyone to not just get to zero but go way above that!

Save, invest, think long term, don't get caught up in status symbols, think drastically--maybe getting rid of a smart phone, or cable, or going down to only one car, or moving to a lower income side of town where the housing is cheaper!  These are all really drastic things to do!

Now I'm not saying you've got to live like misers and reuse paper plates!  But just think ahead and count the cost of decisions. Luke 14:28 "28 For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it—"

And long term they could have a huge ripple effect on not only your kids but your kid's kids!

Free and super cheap date night ideas!

Going on dates with your spouse is so important!  We can get caught up in the daily monotony of life. Day in and day out the same things.  Especially when the kids are little, it's easy to slip into "crisis" mode and completely forget who you are married to!

I highly encourage you to make your marriage a priority!  Marriage is a constant act of work.  It takes a lot of effort to maintain closeness.  You must be intentional in your efforts to connect with each other.

That's why we have always tried to fit in date nights!  Even when all our kids were little we would trade babysitting with another couple so that we could have some alone time together.

Date nights don't have to cost a lot of money either!  In fact, a lot of the times it can be free!

Just a few ideas for date nights (We've done all these!!)

Go for a walk

Play a board game together

Read a book out loud to each other

Go to the book store and look through books together

Geocaching!

Take a Sunday drive though country roads

Make up a scavenger hunt and have your spouse look for stuff!

Go to a coffee shop and people watch

Work a puzzle together

Find out the free days at your local museum

Have a picnic at the park

Turn up the music and have a dance party in the living room

Memorize Scripture together

Plan a trip somewhere

Find out when the moon rise will be and pick a place to go see it

Lay out sleeping bags in an open field and watch for shooting stars
Go fly kites in the park

Go share one dessert and coffee at a fancy restaurant

These are just a few of the things we've done for dates.  I'm so glad we have cultivated our love toward each other over these last 26 years!  Especially as our kids were young.  Not only did it show our kids how to build a marriage but it's also helped us not to be strangers now as we have an empty nest!

What date nights have you all enjoyed? Would love to hear new ideas!