God is good

God is good all the time, He put a song of praise in this heart of mine, God is good all the time, in the darkest night His light will shine, God is good, He's so good, all the time......

I am not going to go deep into it, but it has been a long couple of years, especially the last 8 months. I have been for all intents and purposes homeless since last April. And jobless since last September. Not the best of situations, but I knew without a shadow of a doubt, God had plans for me and my children. And good ones to boot. LOL

This week I have not only been blessed with a job, one that is during the hours my children are at school. That way, I can be home with them, eat dinner with them, help them with homework, and tuck them in at night. The job also has benefits even for those working part time, as I will be. But I also have been blessed with a home, and in the country just like I have wanted. Praise God, and for even 50 less per month then the man originally wanted. He gave this single mama a bit of a break.

It has often been a long dark weary lonely road that I have been traveling over the last couple of years, but I have proclaimed before and will continue to proclaim forever, that GOD HAS ME AND HE WILL NEVER DROP ME....

Be Blessed and stay warm!
Hugs
Amy

Happy Birthday

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TODAY TO MY LOVEY, FUNNY, FUN, AMAZING, TALENTED, ADORABLE, SWEET, BEAUTIFUL, CREATIVE, OUTGOING, AND ONE AND ONLY DAUGHTER. I can't believe your fifteen!! Where did the time go? Just yesterday it seems like you were so tiny and cuddly all wrapped in your little pink blanket with bunnies on it. I was so happy when you were born. Just so sweet and pink!!! I am so thankful that God blessed me with you!! I love you Katelynn!!

A time for celebration

This morning I was having a bit of a bad day. Got a text 5 min before I needed to be up. That always frustrates me.... 5 more minutes!!! LOL... I ran behind getting out the door.... I prefer to be at church 30 min early... I just like to sit in the sanctuary, unwind and focus on being ready to worship.

Well, today I did not leave the house until almost the time I like to be there... SIGH..... So after the text, then being late, things just weren't going well. Not all of my children, who are still staying with their dad, were going to be ready to go to church with me. I prefer to have all my precious kiddos with me, and that made me even more frustrated.

So, I am driving down the road and thought okay I need music... I adore music, I sing all the time... My favorite way to get rid of stress is get in the car drive, and turn the music up loud and sing along... : ) I thought YES, music, so I turned on K-Love... and after about 30 seconds I was smiling, singing and saying you know what it does not matter... I still have no solution for a house, I still need some things fixed on my car, I still need a job, I still do not have my kids living with me due to the house, I still have a back that is iffy, my Grandmother is still gone, and I am still divorced, but so what....

Yeah all these things hurt, terribly, I would give about anything to have my Grandmother alive, to hear her voice, see her face, I want a home for my kids and myself and that job. I need to get the car fixed, waiting on tax return, and I would not mind someday being married again. I like having someone else around... Share concerns with, keep my feet warm, LOL. ; )

But what I REALLY mean is this.... I am ALIVE, I can see GODS beautiful creations, I was driving down a street that was lined with trees and had snow filled yards, it was lovely, I have come out of the last 2 years stronger, more alive, more in touch with God, in a better church, with more amazing friends who support me, then I have ever had. I have not given up, I am not going to. I have not fallen apart, I know that sometimes you get so far and you need help for anxiety or depression and I am not knocking that. But I DO NOT need these things, I am better now and have a better relationship with God than I have ever had before in my life.

So this is a time to celebrate!!! I am alive, and GOD lives in me and will carry me through anything that the world can toss at me.

Celebrating
Hugs
Amy

Mr and Mrs Peacock

You know I always used to feel sorry for the peahen. So somber in her coloring, browns, whites, a bit of black, she does have a touch of green around her neck. But she really is quite a sweet little thing.

But honestly she does not have to be a show off. She can sit gracefully watching and waiting, not having apply makeup, have expensive haircuts or designer clothes, LOL, and it is the male who must catch her eye.

With all his bright flashy colors he is quite gorgeous, all those blues and greens. Did you know they shed them? This fella a number of months back had no tail feathers at all. I wonder if he felt naked, exposed or ugly, kinda like we women can tend to do if we must go with out doing our hair or our makeup.

All in all its probably better to be the peahen instead of the peacock. She looks the same one day to the next with her lovely browns and her little crown on her head, that's what those little feathers up there remind me of. Plus she can hid in the brush better. While he has to occasionally become quite plain and with no tail feathers to show off, I wonder if he gets confused. But then I do remind myself, they probably just take it all in stride not wondering about any of it. Why, cause they are exactly what God made them to be and not too darn worried about being something else. I doubt she looks at him enviously and wishes for long green tail feathers. They are most likely happy in their little peacock world. Unlike so many of us who yearn for prettier hair, or better skin, or smaller thighs or larger bust. LOL.... Peacocks are just content, just the way God made them....

My insightful thoughts for today, LOL
Hugs
Amy

My love affair with sunsets....

I adore sunsets. I love the gold ones. The purple and orange and pink ones. I take nearly as many photos of sunsets as I do of chickens and of my children making goofy faces, LOL.
I love the uniqueness of each and every one. The way the light shines through trees.
They are like witnessing a miracle every day. I draw and would love to learn to paint, but I know I could never create such gloriousness as I witness all the time.
God has created so many wonderful things for us to enjoy. That even when I am hurrying home from somewhere if I see a beautiful sunset, I will stop take pictures enjoy it for a few minutes.
I just cant seem to help myself. They seem to be for me a moment to think wow look what God can do. It is such a show of Gods glory and the miraculous, some people may not see it that way, but seriously could you create something that happens every day and make it different and glorious unto its self every day. I don't think I could in fact I know I can't. I drew pictures on the white boards at my previous job, as the seasons changed, and while the residents and the staff at the nursing home enjoyed my pictures, there is no possible way I could have come up with a new totally original design each and every day. God you are just so amazing, to take something that could be mundane in the way that it is an everyday thing and make it special and unique and beautiful.

Be Blessed today and enjoy your sunset.
Hugs
Amy

Winter 2011 has struck...

Winter has finally struck here in our area of Kansas. I had kinda hoped that we might miss it.
This is my Joeybug he was not too thrilled. He wanted to be out and play in it, but not excited about the cold and wet. I think he gets that from mom...
My Elijah... he was enjoying it quite a bit came inside and warmed up for a couple of minutes and then was ready to go again.
Elijah and Chloe, a friend, were in the process of building a castle...
Tossing a snowball...
Filling up the trash can, a clean unused one, again to build another part of the castle. They were ambitious.
I wonder if his little squirrely feet are cold...
I love squirrels as you can probably tell.
Look at his fluffy little self.
Wonder if he found what he was digging for out there....
Obviously no train has been by here today...
Pretty evergreen coated in snow... I love the look of snow on the trees and the landscape. I just don't like having to drive, walk, or work in the snow.
Frozen circle pond. My kiddos thought the water was all gone, but nope it's just frozen and the snow is sitting on top.
I always feel so bad for the ducks, swans and geese this time of the year... I mean their toes have got to be cold right???
Snowy bridge over the frozen pond......Yeah I am sure everyone could have guessed that one. ROFL
A look at the bridge from across the street.

The snow always makes everything so nice and clean looking. Well at least until it all starts to melt and gets dirty... But it covers up all the gunk and brown grass and any trash lying around and makes it look beautiful and perfect. Kinda like Jesus covering our sins... He died for us and that sacrifice covered over all of our junk to make us spotless before God... Not a big revelation I know, but I can see it.. And appreciate the snow... So cool...

Chickens

Okay anyone besides me have a big fascination with chickens? ROFL...... I have recently discovered that I have this fascination... I mean I have always known that I liked chickens..

They are kinda soothing to watch as they wander around quietly looking for things to eat. They are cute and feathery.

They make sweet little clucking sounds. They lay eggs, and well heck even taste good.

They come in so many colors and varieties and sizes... It just amazes me sometimes what God has made.

Chickens are relatively secure in their place in the world I think sometimes, I mean not that they can't be scared but these particular chickens hang out with a pair of gorgeous peacocks.... Shame we can't all be as secure in who we are, ROFL...

And chickens such as this hen are good mothers. This momma has to chicks if you pay close attention. This picture was taken a couple of days ago. She is doing a fantastic job of keeping them safe and warm especially as these chickens roam free on the property. They have no locked up chicken house. What a good momma...

What got me thinking that I really have a big fascination with them is the fact that over the last 8 months I have taken hundreds of pictures of chickens.... Now to be fair if there were herds of horses in the places I hang out I would be taking pictures of them as well... But my subjects have been chickens.

Hope

You know we all struggle from time to time and mostly we can say tomorrow will be better. One day at a time and I can make it. I have been a glass is half full kind of gal most of my life, although I will admit that the last 18 months or so, I have sometimes sounded more like a glass is really empty sort of person. I stopped posting very often, because I did not like how I sounded and that I could not seem to manage to find things to be positive about.

I have often wondered how people can get to a point of just giving up. A couple of years ago, a man I knew to be, at least in my dealings, a kind, generous, smiling man. One who always stopped to say hello if he saw me. One who worked on my truck after I bought it without expecting anything, one who gave me the cattle guard for the front for free 2 weeks later. He had even had a higher offer for it, but had already given his word and a hand shake. That kind of man, who when facing a divorce and loss of his family, did the unthinkable... I was so filled with sorrow, that perhaps he had never known our heavenly Father... Is this why he lost all hope?

And then there are those who's lives keep going wrong, they lose their jobs, their homes, their spouses leave, a child may die, nothing goes right and they too may reach that end of the rope.. I had always figured well they must not have had a church family and a relationship with God. Not that I was pointing a finger mind you and saying SHAME on you... I just could never quite fathom I guess how one can get so low as to lose all their hope.

However, within the past 18 months of my life, my darling Grandmother passed away without any warning really. I lost my husband of 18 years, I lost my time with my children having to enroll them in school and no longer home school and for them being gone to spend time with the NEW family. I lost my home and have been for all intents and purposes, been homeless since April of 2010. In September I was put on leave from my job that I loved and enjoyed, because I could not do the job to the "WRITTEN DESCRIPTION". Although I had never needed to do anything the "WRITTEN DESCRIPTION" said. I eventually had to give a letter of resignation to my work as I could not be cleared by a doctor with my back issues to do said "WRITTEN DESCRIPTION".

I had to move my children out of a town and schools they loved where the teachers were amazing and the principles, awesome Godly men..... People spread lies about me far and wide. I then had to move some of my children in with their dad and his new family, which is so NOT what I wanted, as I still have no home. I am living in a friends basement. And she is moving out at the end of the month. I will shortly have no home........ I still have not found a job that I can do......

I am here to say I now understand how someone can, through no fault of their own end up homeless, helpless and HOPEless...... I have touched upon that awful sense of HOPElessness, and I do have a fantastic amazing church family. I do have a relationship with my Heavenly Father.... And so now my heart breaks that much more for those who have fallen into despair, defeat, doom, and HOPElessness.

Job 30:25-27 25 Have I not wept for those in trouble? Has not my soul grieved for the poor? 26 Yet when I hoped for good, evil came; when I looked for light, then came darkness. 27 The churning inside me never stops; days of suffering confront me.

You know the funny yet not so funny thing about the above verse is, that for awhile when I was struggling, I was trying to keep laughing and I said to someone just call me Amy-Job..... I felt so beat down. Sometimes you need to read more of what you need to be reminded of instead of just where you should be from your devotionals for such and such date.. During some of this my devotionals were in Revelations. And I know it is NOT all doom and gloom for everyone, I am saved, but sometimes reading it was just so hard and way to heavy. So Psalms it is...

Psalm 43 1 Vindicate me, my God, and plead my cause against an unfaithful nation. Rescue me from those who are deceitful and wicked. 2 You are God my stronghold. Why have you rejected me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy? 3 Send me your light and your faithful care, let them lead me; let them bring me to your holy mountain, to the place where you dwell. 4 Then I will go to the altar of God, to God, my joy and my delight. I will praise you with the lyre, O God, my God. 5 Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.

As well as

Psalm 12 1 Help, LORD, for no one is faithful anymore; those who are loyal have vanished from the human race. 2 Everyone lies to their neighbor; they flatter with their lips but harbor deception in their hearts. 3 May the LORD silence all flattering lips and every boastful tongue— those who say, “By our tongues we will prevail; our own lips will defend us—who is lord over us?” 5 “Because the poor are plundered and the needy groan, I will now arise,” says the LORD. “I will protect them from those who malign them.” 6 And the words of the LORD are flawless, like silver purified in a crucible, like gold refined seven times. 7 You, LORD, will keep the needy safe and will protect us forever from the wicked, 8 who freely strut about when what is vile is honored by the human race.

Now, nothing in here says that my life is going to be grand and easy. But it does say the Lord will protect us, vindicate us. I have witnessed a number of times things in the last year where the situation has turned around someone who had help spread lies, apologized and we smoothed things over. Eventually God rights the wrongs, we just can't lose site of what is MOST important our relationship with our Heavenly Father. Yes, all these things have been huge blows. I will proclaim that loudly. I have hurt, cried, wanted to just not be. But every time, I got off of my face and knees, I looked back toward HIM

Now, I am still facing having no where to be in less than a month. Nothing has changed about my situation, except that again today, I put my eyes on HIM on my Heavenly Father, the one who offers HOPE, who I knows wants the best for me, HIS child, HIS princess and for my children. Why wouldn't HE, what FATHER doesn't want the best for HIS child. But like every parent knows sometimes children have to go through things to grow, to become strong, to be able to be the best they can be. If we never let them fall the could hardly learn to walk much less run...

Be Blessed and remember don't lose hope... We must weather storms to grow strong roots so that we can stand.... The sunny days will come just keep looking up toward our FATHER. He's there just waiting for us to take HIS hand, that's what good daddies do..