A Scarlet Letter

Recently, I spent the evening with a group of my most favorite ladies. Collectively, these strong ladies have experienced the highest of highs, the lowest of lows and everything in between. Lots of wisdom and faith to move mountains...I just sit and listen.

I've been pondering some things shared that night...some real and raw things.

One friend felt she had a big "C" plastered across her head when she was given a C diagnosis. At first, she felt like all people saw was the BIG C. Not her. 

Another felt she wore a scarlet letter of shame because of a terrible accident involving her son that led to jail time for him. 

Carol Kent, an author/speaker/mom whose words have inspired many of us, speaks of feeling like she had "Mother of Murderer" branded across her forehead.

So, this is what has been rolling around inside of me...

Our circumstance does not equal our identity.

Two completely different things. 

Satan knows where we are vulnerable. Where our cracks, our weak spots are. He throws darts. Lies. He'll do anything to try to separate us from the Body of Christ. He'll do anything to try to keep us from living an abundant life apart from our circumstance.

I have a son with learning struggles...dyslexia, dysgraphia. Certain school work is agonizingly hard for him. Since I am not just his mother but also his teacher, I sometimes feel branded with an F. Failure.

Flaming dart.

And what about my sweet boy? Is he forever branded with a D?  ABSOLUTELY NOT.

We all have a choice. We can choose to wear that scarlet letter...the lie sent from Satan. We can choose to give in and wallow around in that mud hole, worrying what people must think or how alone we feel...

Or


Lift our eyes heavenward.

Rise above the circumstances...to where Jesus dwells. And freedom.

The place where we realize our identities are in Christ as His new creation.

Graham Cooke puts it this way: "We are not in our circumstances....We are in Jesus." 


I choose a life of freedom from whatever my "circumstances" may be. I may have to remind myself of my TRUE identity 57 times in a day. It's hard...and I haven't even experienced the hardest. But I choose it.

My friends I mentioned and the others who were there that night....they have all chosen to walk not in circumstances....but in their true identities found only in Christ.

A life tucked away in Christ.

Satan can fire his darts. The world can even brand with letters. But the darts miss and the letters fall off.

Because that's not who we are.

Remember:

Your circumstance...whatever that looks like right now...does NOT equal your identity. It is not who you are.


This precious children's book, You Are Special by Max Lucado illustrates this perfectly.

08/03/91 is where Our Story begins.....

The happy couple...

On Saturday, August 3, 1991, I married the love of my life. 

My hero.

My best friend.

My protector.

My encourager.

My sweetheart.

Fast forward TWENTY YEARS. I wouldn't change a thing and I'd do it all over again.

We wanted to do something special to commemorate this 20 year marriage milestone. 

Our dear friends generously shared their beach home so we kissed the kids goodbye and took off for the week. 

Special dinner...gift from friends

He knows his steak's coming...

This beach house is special to us. Our friends have owned it for about a decade and they've shared it with us since day 1. Hero actually helped move the furniture into the house when it was brand new.

My favorite spot in the house is way up on the third floor balcony in the wicker swing. So, at 3:00 p.m. on August 3, 2011 - the exact time we got married twenty years before - we made our way to the swing. We had written letters to each other to read in this moment. With a warm gentle breeze and swing quietly rocking, we shared our words with each other. This moment was a holy one...just as it was 20 years before.  We then began reminiscing and remembering and wow, the memories began to flow. One long-forgotten memory led to another. We laughed. We cried. We loved.

We renewed our vows to each other after a great celebration dinner at Tommy Bahama's. We made our way to the same balcony, same swing. Between the Father and the two of us, we pledged our lives to each other once more.

We were both so grateful for this time together. It was a time of refreshing, renewing, and strengthening of an already beautiful relationship.

His own words say it best:

Twenty years later, I see real Love in our midst,

a fairy tale love story only The Divine could put together.

I love you, I love you, and I love you.

I not only say it, but we are living it.

A Divine Love Story.

July Did Fly....

So...continuing my whole Catch Up On the Summer blog fest... July was great! Here's a smidgen of what happened!

The Boy turned 12!!! 

Pirate teeth!

Rayray went to Worldview Academy for the 2nd summer.

What else is there to do but use up eyeliner in July?

I kept my 3 plus BeachMama's 6 at the beach for the week
while BeachMama and BeachDaddy went on a great trip.

FOUR twelve year old boys....
that was a LOT of twelve-ness.

Bodysurfing in the rough, red-flag water...
This day took approximately 2.5 years off my life.

Where did June go?

I love to blog. I really really do. But I apparently have regularly scheduled stretches of days...or months...when we are living life so much that I don't have (or don't take) the time to chronicle the happenings. So, here's my attempt at catching up.

June

Grimy and sweaty, but happy!

Love Your Neighbor Campaign 2011

• Girls spent the week at the grand's stables. First time Doodlebug's been away for that long but she had her sissy and grandparents...and horses. She didn't miss me at all!
• The teen took an intensive week of Driver's Ed at a local college.
• Family ministry project with some neighbors. We were blessed to be a part of this. 
• I painted. But I already blogged that here. 

Coins

 
Do you have pennies all over the place like we do? I find them EVERYWHERE. Normal and strange places.  In the sofa. On the floor. In the jewelry box. In the napkin basket. On a shelf. In the bottom of my purse. Under the bed. Wherever toys are. In anything cup-shaped on my dresser.  In the cup holder in the car. In the freezer. (The Boy freezes everything to see what might happen.)

Don't forget the Winn-Dixie parking lot.

We were looking up the value of one of our silver dollars last night and found some interesting information.

A 1943 copper penny is so rare, it is worth anywhere from $10,000 to $100,000 dollars! (Read this.)

Our silver dollar from the 1800s is only worth $60! Some old silver dollars are worth thousands...

Years ago, someone told me to never throw away a penny or walk by one on the ground. The words "In God We Trust" are on the pennies and they are a small but powerful reminder of Who is in control of our lives. Through the years, I've been amused at the Lord for His timely reminders for me when I find a penny here and there. I always stop to pick it up and smile at the reminder...to trust Him.

Anyway, all that to say....don't ignore the lowly penny!!!

Going now to show the kids how to check pennies!! I'll let you know if we find one from 1943!

(More coins to look out for found here.)

School Room Redo - The Painting

The painting and the painting and the painting.

I spent part of our first week of summer break painting our porch french doors RED.. Whose idea was that??? It took FOUR coats of paint and four mornings of painting to FINALLY be finished. It took our idiotic kitty Punkin all of FOUR seconds of being shut on the porch to scratch a patch of said red paint from my beautiful door. Why must we have claws, again?

ANYWAY, last week, The Boy and I dismantled the school room while one sister was at VBS and one sister was at Driver's Ed. We gave our "soft fern" green school walls a little fresh boost with "celery stick" green to better match the dining area.

Then, I tackled the tired wooden desk and shelves in the room. The desk belonged to little boy Hero. It is wood except for the desktop...which is wood-looking laminate. This is why I held off painting the desk these last 20 years. Finally, I had had ENOUGH of the pitiful sad desk. I found an "expert" at Lowe's who assured me it could be done and that's all I needed to hear to breathe new life into this little desk.  After deciding on a beautiful shade of teal called Caribe by Behr, I got busy and (((drum roll please))) here it is before and after:

Before. In need of some tlc.

After....happyhappyjoyjoy!

Same thing with two twin bookshelves that our neighbor made from scrap wood for us years ago. They needed some personality.....to the tune of Caribe by Behr and Grape Juice purple by Valspar. Here they are:

Before...not bad, just blah.

After....fun fun fun!!!

What To Do With All That Zucchini Squash, Part Two

Our Favorite Top Ten Things To Do

 With Summertime Squash

1. Shred zucchini with a cheese grater and add to spaghetti sauce.

2. Zucchini Bread. A quick search on my favorite recipe website yielded 94 zucchini bread recipes.

3. Chop into chunks, dust with seasoned bread crumbs and saute in olive oil with onions, bell peppers, corn (or any other garden veggies you have), add chopped garden tomatoes when other veggies are just about done. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese. Serve with rice.

4. Chop into chunks, spread on a baking pan, drizzle with evoo, toss with salt and seasonings. We love Weber Grinder - roasted Garlic and Herbs. Roast in oven at 350 until tender.

5. Freeze for later use (all sorts of squash-freezing advice found online).

6. Slice and eat raw with ranch dressing,  hummus, or spinach dip.

7. Slice long ways, coat with meal, salt/pepper, and pan fry.

8. Slice long ways, drizzle with evoo, season to taste and grill alongside your chicken or steak!

9. Squash Casserole - tons of recipe variations.

10. Then, there's Mema's, southern Georgia way...stewed..which is normally made with yellow squash. You chop squash and onions (sweet Vidalia, of course, grown in Georgia), put in a cast iron skillet with a little water and butter, salt and pepper. You cook it and cook it until it's mush. You can substitute bacon drippings for the butter. Serve with thin, pan-fried hoecake cornbread, sliced garden tomatoes, a bowl of pink eyed purple hull peas...cooked with salt pork,  a couple of pieces of fried chicken, a glass of sweet iced Lipton tea, and a heaping slice of lemon meringue pie for dessert. Sunday Dinner, southern style.

Zucchini and yellow squash are so pretty and colorful cooked together, which is what we usually do. All of the above ideas can be made with either type of squash or both.

I told my friend Tutu that I think I'm a little squash-obsessed. Last year, we didn't have much yellow squash or zucchini and I missed it. Yes, I could have bought some, but in the summertime of south Georgia, it's almost criminal to have to actually BUY squash or tomatoes at the grocery store!!! That's one of the the joys of living in a small, southern town. That's a whole-nother blog post, right there.....

For the record, the yellow squash in the picture above is not the same yellow squash we have in the south of Georgia. Our yellow squash is fondly referred to as "crooked neck squash" because...well, it has a crooked neck.