Emotions... hope... delight

Emotions...
As a female I at times get blown away by my emotions.

I've been trying to take time to try and take every thought and make it obedient to God. That means my emotions too... This week I was so burdened with some prayer requests and with my own life expectations that have not happened before the century closed I sat praying and journaling about how to deal with these emotions. God gave me freedom to verbalize the emotions on paper and leave them before Him and I felt his direction to seek scripture to replace my thoughts and emotions with truth. I felt like he showed me to focus on the word Delight I searched scriptures and focused in Psalms. The thing that struck me as I searched it in biblegateway.com was that many times David spoke of taking delight in scriptures. (Psalms 1:2 But his delight is in the law of the Lord and in his law does he meditate day and night) Do I delight in following God's requests and truths? I enjoy knowing truth, but it's work to follow His commands, and at times demands sacrifice. Am I ready to delight in sacrifice? I hope to one day to be mature in my faith to be able to say that with truth and emotion....

Until then, I focused on
Psalms 147 -- Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit... the Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love


Psalms 18:19 He brought me out into a spacious place he rescued me because he delighted in me.

Psalms 37 Do not fret...Trust in the Lord and do good...Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart...Commit your way to the Lord .... be still before the Lord (this chapter put together many truths that friends have been sharing with me -- it's interesting how God repeats himself until we hear him) If the Lord delights in a man's way he makes his steps firm.

I've been rereading these for the last three days...storing them in my memory

Today I went to bible study... what did I hear? ...
Isaiah 62:1-5
3 You will be a crown of splendor in the LORD's hand,
a royal diadem in the hand of your God.

4 No longer will they call you Deserted,
or name your land Desolate.
But you will be called Hephzibah, [Means my delight is in her]
and your land Beulah [ means married] ;
for the LORD will take delight in you,
and your land will be married.

5 As a young man marries a maiden,
so will your sons [c] marry you;
as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride,
so will your God rejoice over you.

So there's His emotion for us.... he takes delight in us when we follow his ways, repent, and allow him to mold us to follow his commands and guidance -- he delights in us and will be married to us - he will commit to loving us for life. He does delight in us -- he wants us to follow him.
Wow -- I bring delight to the Creator, Designer of the universe, Master of time and space, the Beginning and the End the Creator of love -- this Being delights in me when I follow Him.... now that's some emotion I need to focus my hope on...

Life changes

So things have rapidly changed in the last few months. I have found a church to get plugged into and have made many new friends and gotten involved in a singles ministry at church. We've had so much fun making new memories from fun out eating to going downtown to watch a movie on the big screen in the park. I've really been blessed with some great Christian friends.
Fun times

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I have also been offered a position in a family practice office as a PA so I will be leaving Shriners Hospital next Friday to start in the Powdersville family practice -Crossroads site.

And I can't believe how quickly my nephews and nieces here locally are growing up. Adrian is now 2 months, Madelyn is 18 months and Jayden will be three in a few weeks. Wow how time flies and how blessed I have been to have been a part of their lives as Janelle and Josie raise them up into great kids. Pictures

And I can't forget to mention I got a chance to go with Sonya and watch a Clemson game. Starting to feel like one of the locals after watching the game and having a blast cheering them on (despite the 2nd half of the game being a downpour of rain). Go Tigers....

My sister's in the house

So life is spinning by these days. My youngest sister, Kristin is in town with her baby Bryce (4 months old already)to spend some time with my younger sister Janelle and her three children. Adrian is now 1 month old and its the first time for the cousins to meet each other. I picked her up from the airport and we had dinner with the
Wilder family. The kids got to interact a little then got bath and bed time and got Kristin and Bryce settled in and time to chat.
I'll fill in more later as the week goes on.

More pictures

What was your focus today...?

So I have to admit. I've spent the last four days reading the first three books in the Twilight series...what can I say... I'm a romantic with a love of sci-fi why wouldn't I end up reading it? But I gotta say these books are big and I was letting it consume all my time while dishes sat in dishwasher, laundry sat in the hamper, and mail piled up. Its just a few days I thought and with an eye infection I should't go out until I've been on antibiotics for 24 hours. I had fun but I realized I had lost focus and spent some time cleaning and restoring order to my place and getting back in touch with my priorities and time with God and was checking some email and this came up... I modified it a little

Work as if it was your first day.
Live as if it was your last day.
Forgive as soon as possible.
Accept God's love beyond our understanding.
Love without boundaries.
Laugh without control.
Dance without end
and never stop smiling

the kids are soo cute

 
 
 
 


Kids are sooo cute.... a few pics of the week

a few more pictures from today...

Here are few more pics with captions

My close up shots with Adrian

 
 
 


I love taking pictures and kids change so much in the first few days. Today Adrian had his professional baby shots so we did some pics after they were done. Here are a few and some more with the siblings and family. Click here for more shots

The kids introduced to the new baby

Here are a few pictures of the kids first introduction to their baby brother. They did a great job. Jayden was enjoying hold Adrian with some mild assistance. He and Mady were great being gentle and enthusiastically interested in their little brother





Here are a few more pics

Adrian Judah - my nephew has arrived

So Adrian Judah arrived this am at 8:08 weighing 8 lbs even and 20 in long with 14.5cm head.

Here are a few pictures below











Here are a few more pics

A day in the park

Saturday I got to spend a day in the park with the Wilder family.

 

Here is Jayden being brave standing on the bridge alone posing for a picture of him with the waterfall behind him. He is growing up so fast and is still so sweet...

 

A few cute shots of Jayden, Mady and Janelle walking on the path
a standing on the bridge.

 

 

A moment the kids with their daddy -- ahhh


Its so much fun spending a few moments with the family and the weather was unbelievably beautiful...
Here are a few more pics

A summer of weddings and births

This summer seems to be a summer of weddings and births.
I have had the opportunity to attend my cousin Marissa & Nick's wedding in Dallas Texas and take tons of pics

 

I also had a chance to go to Pittsburg PA to be at David & Karen's wedding.

 

Here is the link to more pictures of Marissa and Nicks wedding
Here is the link to pics from Dave & Karen's wedding

and a pic of my nephew Bryce... can't wait to meet my final nephew due in two and a half weeks

Time with the niece and nephews.

So I spent the week with my nephew Bryce and flew back today. I just had special time with my niece and nephew this evening also. But had to laugh at the moments of caos that develop within the house that contains two toddlers. I thought I would share a few moments with the two older ones as well as a few pics of the youngest. Wish I also had time with the oldest three. Miss them too..

Doting on my new nephew.

 

So we all survived the heat in Dallas at Marissa's & Nick's beautiful wedding ceremony and had a great time seeing the family. I'll post pictures later from that.

I just had to post a cute picture that Kristin took of Bryce and I on the way home to her place.

Memorial day weekend

I got to go hang out with Janelle and the kids on Saturday and then Sunday and Monday I spent the day up at the lake. It was a humid day with intermittant rain but so beautiful.


I love sitting by the lake and watching people. Its a beautiful sight empty too. This weekend it was all about the clouds. Beautiful... but I had to take my Northern raised self inside to take breaks in the air conditioning to cool off from the humidity. And its not even August yet (yikes)



I love looking at honeysuckle. Its beautiful in its strength and details but who doesn't love that smell... (Lilacs and honeysuckle bring lots of spring/summer childhood memories to mind)



I enjoyed checking out the nature around the place while Robert worked during the days.


the mountain laurel out did itself this year



...but I was still drawn back to the lake and its views. The color contrasts seem to sparkle after the rain.

Camping....

The vital parts to camping consists of...
good preparation...
good attitudes...
good food...
a dry place to sleep...
and the best trips are the perfect weather...

Ahh yeeeaaaah we were blessed with all the above.


This weekend, the Wilder family, my self and another couple with two under the age of three Alissa, Justin and their two sons came to camp at Lake Jocassee. The weekend was fun to get out and enjoy nature.



The sunrise over the lake was a beautiful moment to soak it in... These are the moments worth breathing for.





The guys decided to take some time for bonding... and why not try some fishing.
Jayden and Josie both enjoyed it.... especially when the bob on the line disappeared.




The men defeated nature... and caught fish.


We had fun at the beach. We built a sand castle and squirted some water guns and waded into the cool to cold refreshing water...



And the two youngest had fun playing with these stool ... if they only had more skills with balance..... but check out that great attitude..




But it was good to get showered and back to my routine too.

Here are a few more pics