If you're a bird, I'm a bird

As I get older I'm noticing I do not anticipate Christmas quite like I did as a child, or even a few years ago.  In my opinion, that's not necessarily a bad thing. To me there are so many other priorities that trump decorating the house and sending out Christmas cards. Those things seem trivial compared to salvation and eternity. My mind is thinking about my Chinese friends that are still living in oppression on the other side of the world.   I'm thinking about family members that grew up in the church and know about Jesus, but do not really  know  Him. ...by their fruit you will recognize them.  Matthew 7:20 My heart is filled with compassion for the 18 girls in my class and their families. Praying that I can be "a witness in the silences when words aren't enough".    I'm thinking about the Christians who go to church every week, but go just to see people or chat in the foyer. The people that walk in and out each week witho...

On my way to school this morning I noticed a decal on the car's window in front of me. It caught my attention. I like arrows.  There is pallet art hanging in our hallway bathroom. We were recently given some arrow art from Joseph's friends, David and Stephen. Joseph and I both have arrow tattoos on our arms. Joseph got his arrows first after he told me what he wanted and the backstory behind them.  His arrows are identical in design, but one arrow is drawn further down his forearm than the other.   For my 37th birthday (2016), I made an appointment to get a tattoo after I took off a half day. I didn't even tell Joseph about it. I showed him when we went to bed that night. There were so many arrow images I liked so I chose two different ones- one masculine and one feminine.  “Children are a heritage from the LORD, offspring a reward from him. Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are children born in one’s youth. Bl...

When I feel like I need to write something, I have to get it out of my head.  You may have noticed me being more vocal about my faith and spirituality. "Geez, what has gotten into her?" you may have thought. You've noticed all the scripture memes and worship songs and church promotionals. I'm aware that I've been more up-in-your-face about the Great Commission and missions too.   I've read my Bible several times a day consistently for 25 days in a row. I have reading plans on my You Version app that I am committed to reading daily. I'm actually excited about them and it's typically the first thing I open on my phone when I wake up. Oh, I'm devouring every scripture I can read. I'm ravenously meditating on them. I have another teacher devotional, Morning Meetings with Jesus, that I read when I get to school. Sometimes I share scriptures with others in hopes they will be encouraged by God's words as well.  As for prayer, sometimes...

I know this post is going to be lengthy and I have been wanting to write it, but the task seems daunting because I don't want to leave anything out and want to express myself fully. I'm trying to remember when I started feeling moved to try out the minimalism philosophy. I think we were living in our December-May rental. Prior to that rental we were in a 1,315 square foot house next door. Our neighbors moved and we moved into their two-story 2,081 square foot house. We actually made an offer on the house, but the whole process fell through, which ended up being a good thing. So instead of buying the house, we got to try it out and I found (and Joseph probably did too), that it was not the house for us. The house was sooo spread out, which I thought was a good thing at first. A l l  t h a t  r o o m. Our 2 & 4 year shared a room like they had in the previous house. Our 16-year old exchange student had his own room upstairs, who we never saw. Laundry room was upstairs...