Over the next few weeks I will cover most of my favorite beauty products.
I have chosen to do separate it into 4 sections - Face, body, make up and hair. Skin care (face)
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Friday favorites.
Charities. I love discovering new charities and seeing what amazing work they are doing in people's lives, but I have a few I just keep going back to giving to. 1. St. Jude's children's hospitals. Because.. children.. as a mom I cry every time I even think of my baby being sick. So supporting them is something very near and dear to my heart. 2 .Voice of the martyrs. Helping prosecuted Christians around the world. Helping people imprisoned for their faith and helping their families. This charity always amazes me with their hard and dedicated work. They do and share so much. 3.Juvenile diabetes research foundation Not a cause that has been super important to me in the past, but since my husband is diabetic and has been since he was very young, I have learned a lot about this disease, and even though it's a disease you can manage, it's hard and it's hard to have a spouse with it and it posses several challenges for us as a family. I can't imagine what it's like to have a little one with it. 4.Samaritans purse. I have mainly donated to them around Christmas time, when they do their shoe box - operation Christmas child and I love it. We have both done filling our own shoe box and filling out shoe boxes online. When our kids are older I really want to focus more on doing the shoe boxes ourselves and teaching our kids to help others. But this past Christmas when time got away from us it was super nice to have the "create online option". Faithbox isn't something I'm going to call my favorite charity since I have only donated and tried it once. But I think it's a neat idea, so I do want to mention them. It's a monthly subscription that sends you some different faith based items. I got a devotion that I still like to look in. Not only do you get a few things to help your walk with Jesus.. but each purchase feeds a child 3 meals. What are your favorite charities? Hi all.
After months and months of planning I finally got around to update and revamp my site. I have added new sections and deleted a lot of the old. Over the next few weeks I hope to add several more links and updates to my new set up. I also have several blog posts and other stuff I am getting ready to share. I can't wait to share it with you all. I would love to hear feed back or any wishes what to feature on the blog. Lilly The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; They are new every morning; Great is your faithfulness - Lamentations 3:22-23 I guess it could have been called parenthood without parents as I don't have either of my parents. This post is kind of divided in 2, with focus on both the longing for a physical parents, but also growing up without a parent who modeled how to follow God. These are two very different sides, but I feel as a new parent they can sometimes leave the same voids. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. - Philippians 4:6 When I got pregnant with my first I started googling (for some reason that's my go -to source of information). And I would read about all these women sharing all of these precious moments with their mother, and having lost my mother several years ago that really hurt. But after a few tears I brushed it of and moved on. But through my pregnancy and the first months of parenthood I kept coming back to this. Women talking about a girl needs her mom for this journey, and sometimes I couldn't help feeling sorry for myself in these situations. Looking back I see how the Lord provided for me through my first pregnancy and sometimes I didn't even notice it. He gave me an extremely patient OB, who was never surprised with my craziness. He provided an amazing church family that was there through so much more than I could ever ask for, he gave me an amazing doula who loves Him too, who was there through a very rough labor, I have loving family and very patient and supportive husband. But most of all. I have Him. All of Him. But when my daughter was crying I still couldn't help yearning for a physical parent to come and comfort both of us. It's only now looking back I understand he did comfort me. He helped me through every rough spot, he thought me to cry out to Him for help, and he answers. Through the first few weeks of my second pregnancy, I feel I have been better and faster to turn to Him. Honestly I have been struggling with keeping up with reading my devotional, with keeping a journal and being any kind of good student of His words. Between chasing a 9 months old, and morning sickness I didn't have much left in me, but he has still answered my feeble cries. He is the one giving me strength to get up every time my daughter needs me and he is the one blessing me with patience I do not posses. This morning me and my daughter (and our little miracle in my womb) sit and listen to worship music and we feel how much we need Him and how much He loves us. God didn't take my parents from me. He didn't punish me. God gave me the best parent. The parent with the perfect love. He gave me Himself. Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, The fruit of the womb a reward. - psalms127:3 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. - Deuteronomy 6:6-7 My mother was an amazing mother, she loved me, she put me ahead of herself and she tried her best to keep me safe and happy. But my mother didn't raise me to follow the Lord. I don't doubt she believed he existed, but she didn't seek Him as I want my children and myself to do. And she didn't always understand the people who did. This has on some aspects been harder on me than loosing her. There was a sense of me betraying her with my choices, as I knew many of them she wouldn't approve of, a free with or understand. This has also taken months if not years of praying, and seeking God to come to terms with. How could I honour my parents and still go against what they believed and how they lived. I have been blessed enough that God provided a set of spiritual parents who also took the role of physical parents. , my aunt was there when I picked out my wedding dress. My uncle taught me to trust a father figure. They both did a lot to make me feel good and that was amazing, but the most important thing they both did was make me seem God and not people. People are never perfect, Christian or not. So we need to look to God for guidance not each other. And once again I learned God gave me Him. That being sad, I wish and pray to live a long life seeing our children grow into Godly people. But I hope to teach them that in the end it's not about me and their dad or their siblings. It's about looking to God. "Only give heed to yourself and keep your soul diligently, so that you do not forget the things which your eyes have seen and they do not depart from your heart all the days of your life; but make them known to your sons and your grandsons. - Deuteronomy 4:9d A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” - John 13:34-35 After reading my Dear Elisabets blog (read it HERE) it dawned on me that I have thought a lot less about the Orlando tragedy than others that have happened in recent months.. She phrases that she feels a sort of detachment and I have the same feeling. I do not feel that the lives that were loss were of less value than of others tragedies.. I just feel like my mind can't cope very well with more tragedy, with more sorrow.. Like my heart in brief moments hardens as a coping mechanism. A part of me just longs for this perfect world that God has created for us.. This beautiful place our Father has for his children.. A place so wonderful that our minds cant even imagen what awaits us.. But a big part of me is still so very earthbound.. I have my beautiful baby girl here and my husband. So I still very much want to be part of this world that holds these things I hold so dear.. But there is so much hurt. So much suffering that my heart breaks just by looking at Facebook, Instagram and other media platforms. Someday I can't even watch the news. I feel like sometimes there is so much evil and horror in the world that I can not take it.. I just turn it of and listen to worship music until I feel peace in my heart. Today I looked at my baby girl and thought about her future siblings, hoping that they will be long life friends, and then.... I thought about how much God must hurt. He daily, hourly sees his beloved children, kill, torture and hurt each other. Our father just want his children to love each other as he loves them, yet we fight over small and big things.. Like children. Suddenly my heart ache over this days horror seems smaller. This still makes me sad, but it also makes me want to love my brother and sister even more, because this is what my father wants. This is what he wishes for all his children. So even when the world seems so ever dark and each day brings more bleak headlines, I want to focus on love! Each day is another chance to bring a brother or sister to Christ, to show the love of God in a sea of human hatred. We should cherish these chances whilst we wait for the day he calls his children home. Let us not let this world harden our hearts, but let our fathers love make them overflow. Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. - Matthew 22:37-39 Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. - Romans 12:10 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. - John 3:16 Late nights and early mornings often leaves me a tad more tired than I am use to being. But each step of motherhood draws me closer and closer to God. The beauty of this journey is beyond what I can understand. Each time Grace cries I tell her 'mamma is here'. Each time she gets a shoot and it hurts I tell her 'I'm sorry baby, it's for your own good' Each time I have to give her medication I ask of her to 'trust me, I'm doing this to help you' Even the daily things like making her food, and she has to wait.. I rock her and ask her to be patient, but food is coming.. Mommy would never let you go hungry.. But of course.. Grace is a baby so she does not understand my words.. And she does get impatient, and she doesn't always trust me when I have to give her the medication. These situations I just wish she knew.. I will do anything to keep her safe.. I am her mother. And after a long night it slowly hit me.. Is this not what God asks of me? But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. - Psalm 86:15 God is my father.. He asks that I put my burdens on him and trust him. He asks that I know that he wants only what is good for me. And He asks me for patience. Just as Grace might not get her bottle the second she wants it, but it is indeed being made. Just as that does God hear my prayers.. But I need patience. And greatest of all.. He loves me.. and he just wants me to know that he is my father and he will never abandon me. This is much easier to remember in all the tough situations in life, and putting all my burdens on God, and not to worry about things seems to be one of my biggest challenges I face daily. But oh what an amazing feeling it is to know and understand a little bit of the love God has for me. For us! And every time I look at my daughter I can't help be in awe that he trusted me with one of his beloved daughters. To raise her, to teach her about her heavenly Father... His Grace truly is amazing. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ— by grace you have been saved - Ephesians 2:4-5 On a completely different note.. I did receive my faithbox really fast..... I just have not yet gotten to know all the items of it. I hope to have a review of it finished next week. I can do all this through him who gives me strength. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
September 2018
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