Top 3 Kids Books… I own

Posted in Life, Love, Top 10 by Em

Day 11: Share a book you love

I love kids books, I don’t know why I just do. In fact, for the last couple years I have been collecting them, so that all my favourites will be there when Dave and I start a family. The idea of sharing just one book that I love is really really hard, because I love them all, so instead I thought I would share my ‘Top 3 Kids books you need in your collection’. Now I am sure that this list isn’t exhaustive, because if I could have more I would, in fact there is already one book which I don’t own… but if I did, would make it on to the list in a heart beat… ‘Guess How Much I Love You’ by Sam McBratney, and I am sure there are many more… but these are the top 3 that I own…

1. Don’t let the Pigeon Drive the Bus – Mo Williams
A little different but quite entertaining

2. You are my I love you – Maryann Cusimano
Very sweet… in fact so sweet I brought it for Dave but had to add some of my own lines because some didn’t apply.

3. The Story of the Little Mole who knew It was None of His Business
– Werner Holzwarth & Wolf Erlbruch
Who doesn’t like a story about poo… seriously it’s great.

10Feb2012

Nothing of so much importance

Posted in Faith, God, Life, Love by Em

Day 10: Love doing nothing

It’s not that often that I get to do nothing… I am used to being busy, running around at 100km an hour just to get things done, but this year I have made an effort to make more time, mostly in preparation for heading back to study (which is still a couple of weeks away). It has been hard giving up good things and saying no to things that I would love to do, but I know that I have made the right choice.

Anyway, through my new found power of saying no, and while I wait for the year to come at me in full swing… which I am pretty sure is not too far off, I have found that I have had time to just sit and do things that I enjoy, like read or watch a movie, or even cross things of my list. And I have really enjoyed it. So tonight when I was asked to ‘love doing nothing’ Dave and I did just that, we ordered fish and chips and spent time reading and watching movies on TV. It was exactly what I needed after a particularly hectic day at work. It made me realise just how important it is to stop… a little like at church last Sunday or at the young adults retreat a couple of weeks ago. There is definitely a time for stopping and enjoying. I know we can’t do it all the time, but I think it helps us to put things into perspective. Gives us a chance to enjoy what we have rather than continuing to burn ourselves out trying to get more. It also gives me a chance to recharge and refresh so that I can do what I need to do with all I am, rather than the little bit that I still have left. I think as my life starts to get busy again I am going to need to book in some time for myself to do nothing, to stop and focus and most importantly recharge.

9Feb2012

Day 9: Celebrate your love

Posted in Faith, God, Life, Love by Em

Day 9: Celebrate your love

Sometimes I forget how lucky I am, seriously despite all the things that I whinge about, the things that make me cry and the bumps that I talked about on Monday, I am super super super blessed. Today I have been challenged to ‘celebrate my love’, and I think that could potentially mean a lot of things, because over the years… I have given out a lot of love, some serious, some naive, some in the form of silly crushes and not so silly crushes… some has been wasted, but lots has been embraces and even given back… but that’s not what I want to celebrate today. No, today I want to celebrate the fact that I am loved by two people in particular… my parents.

When I look around at families of all kinds, it doesn’t take me long to realise how blessed I am, I have a mum and a dad that love me to bits, they support me, they discipline me, they encourage me to try anything and everything that I want, they trust me, they challenge me, they have provided for me and they have shaped me into the person I am today. I am so thankful for each of them and impact on my life they have had and will continue to have, so I just thought I would take a minute to say thanks and to celebrate the love I receive from them and the love that I have for them.

So… Mum and Dad… I love you stacks… always have and always will!

8Feb2012

Wordless Wednesday – Day 8: Catch up with friends you love

Posted in Faith, Friendship, God, Love by Em

7Feb2012

Turns out… I’m a Trekky

Posted in Family, Life, Love, Top 10 by Em

Day 7: Say how much you love

I have a confession to make… it’s about an interest of mine that is often shunned by the ‘cool’ people of the world, but I feel like ‘say how much you love’ is an invitation to just bare it all and let it out… haters come at me because… I don’t really care. Ok are you ready… here it is…

I love Star Trek… a lot.

I know it’s not the coolest thing in the world to be passionate about, but I can’t help it, in fact for a long time I shunned my own brothers (who I just told you how much I love) for liking such a ridiculous show… but I am hooked… And let’s face it… I was never going to be the coolest person in the world. The thing is I feel like confessing this is like confirming what I already know in my heart… and what I have tried to keep from the world for so long… I am a full on nerd… but you know what… now that it’s out there… it turns out I am ok with it… and this love of all things Star Trek is just something else to add to my random and somewhat eclectic list of interests. I mean there probably aren’t that many other people in the world that can say they their interests include:

Country music,
Anything Disney,
Watching the V8 supercars
Zumba
Big Brother
Star Trek and
Trying new breakfast places

And that’s just a few… It’s a pretty random collection, but it’s just another thing that makes me who I am, slightly odd, but easy to get along with (secondary to a versatile range of interests), girl… And even though it’s weird… I love it all, and i’m sure this is just the beginning of a whole list of random interests still to come.

Live long and prosper.

6Feb2012

The Bumpy Bumpy Road

Posted in Faith, Family, God, Life, Love by Em

Day 6: Love Your Bump

Love my bump ey? Well while I do have a bit of a gut… I don’t have a bump because as I mentioned earlier… I am not pregnant… but thinking outside the box a little and determined to use as much of this love list as I can, I decided that while I don’t have a physical bump, I certainly have had, and still have some metaphorical bumps in that crazy journey that I am currently calling life. So I thought that I would post about something I have been thinking about for a while… Embracing these bumps and moving on, and learning to love the person that they have made me become… which I guess by default is… ‘loving the bump’. Some of you would know that over the last couple of years… Well maybe more than a couple, my life has been a bit topsy turvey, there have been some really crap parts and some awesome parts, and I think for the I have slowly been getting better at dealing with events such as these.

This year, yes I know it’s only the second week of Feb, has unfortunately been no different, the bumps they keep on coming. Each time I deal with one and I am just starting to get my confidence back, it seems like there is another just sitting there, ready and waiting to pounce. I have spent a lot of time thinking about the purpose for these bumps and I know for one, they are making me stronger, in fact I often catch my self thinking surely I am strong enough… but apparently not, coz they just keep coming.

In my most recent bump I was reminded of something very important the way I respond both immediately and ongoing in a choice… I can either choose faith or fear…. Now despite the fact that I love and serve the king of kings, saviour of the world, all powerful, all knowing, omnipotent God, and I know that faith is the better response… my first reaction is usually not god, but fear.

Fear is something I have struggled with for a long time… Most of you probably already know this, in fact, in the middle of last year I preached about it, but once again it’s back and… once again I have had enough of living by it. The thing is, most of the time fear seems like the easiest option, but more often than not, it just makes things worse. So, in order to get on top of this fear and faith thing I have found my self seeking god in completely different ways than I normally would, I have been reading different books, listening to different songs and trying for the first time podcasts from churches around the world. I have now listened to three podcasts from Bethel church in the states and surprise, surprise I have been learning… I know I shouldn’t really be surprised, coz in the bible it talks about the fact that if we seek, we will find and if we press into god, He will press into us, but I still am, just a little bit. Anyway, in the first sermon I was reminded that we are called to be warriors of hope, and that it’s by our faith that we inherit the promises of god… Pretty cool ey? And then in the third one I heard something that I don’t think I had thought about before… That when you believe the lie, you empower a dis-empowered devil. I know that the devil is defeated, but when I let the bumps get me down and cripple me with fear I actually just give the devil a stronger hold on my life.

So once again, I am taking a stand and making some decisions…

1. The worry box is back… I will hand it over and let it go
Mark 5:36 – ‘Jesus told him, “Don’t be afraid; just believe’
Philippians 4:6 – ‘Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God’

2. I will be thankful for the bumps because they have made me who I am but I will not let them bump me off the track…
2 Timothy 1:7-9 – ‘⁷ For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline. ⁸ So do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner. Rather, join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God. ⁹ He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time’

3. I will choose faith. I will choose trust and I will not empower a die-empowered devil.
Romans 8:28 – ‘And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.’
John 19:30(b) – ‘Jesus said, “It is finished.”’

5Feb2012

Soak it up

Posted in Faith, God, Life, Love by Em

Day 5: Do something you love

Tonight was the second night service for the year, and I am really glad that it was because it was most definitely my ‘do something you love’. I love being there. When there is no night service through January, while I enjoy the decrease in responsibility, there is a bit of a hole in my life. I know that church isn’t the be all and end all of my faith, but I also know that it is a super important part, gathering together, sharing, learning and growing together. It’s not perfect, but that’s because it made of imperfect people… but there is a lot of love and it’s good.

Tonight I was really encouraged by the honesty of the worship and in fact the whole service, it was real, not a show, or a routine, but passionate, honest and simple… it’s moments like that that I wish I could just stop time and soak it up. I don’t think I stop often enough to just sit and be still in the presence of God. But I know it’s something that I need to do more often… because it’s good… really really good.

This year our church, in particular this service and the youth and young adults bit, is going through yet another transition time but I am really excited about what’s about to happen, and hopefully the lives that will be changed with it and through it, including my own as I continue to grow and become closer and closer to the person that God wants me to be. I am glad to be a part of the army, and to call this place my spiritual home, I know it is where I am meant to be and am glad that it will continue to be my ‘do something you love’ for a long long time to come.

3Feb2012

Being a Big Sister

Posted in Family, Life, Love by Em

Day 3: Be someone you love

When I first read my job for today… be someone you love… I have to admit I was a little confused by the concept. I don’t really want to be any one but myself, because it has taken me a long time to be comfortable with that idea, so after a little bit of thinking, I realised that even though I am me, there are lots of parts to who I am… There is:

Emma the Daughter,
Emma the Wife,
Emma the Friend,
Emma the Dietitan,
Emma the chore-avoider,
Emma the Zumba tri hard,
Emma the Disney princess (she exists… even if it’s only in my brain),
Emma the Dog owner, and
Emma the sister.

Now I am not saying that being a sister is last on the list of what makes me, me, in fact it’s actually shaped who I am, but I put there because that’s what I got to focus on today, being a sister. I am lucky enough to be the big sister to two brothers, one only 14months younger than me and one 5 years younger, and today I had the privilege of hanging out with my youngest brother Jake. In fact you can read about what we did on his blog… as it was quite a tale and seeing has he has already written it so eloquently, I won’t do the same (but I will mention that I made meringues which was number 16 on the list!).

But I did want to say that I really love being a big sister. I know as I get older, my brothers seem to be catching up to me in a lot of ways, they are both taller than me, although that’s not that difficult and in many areas they already are or soon will be wiser and better than me (although I will always stand by the fact that I am the smartest). I can’t look at figures and business stuff and get excited the way that Dust does. I can’t do a high ropes course let alone supervise one the way Jake has. I can’t ride a bike or wear Lycra quite the way that Dusty can and I can’t wear a mullet as proudly as Jake can. There are lots of things that I can do, but there are so many more things that the boys can do that I just wouldn’t dream of, or couldn’t even if I tried. I am so proud of both of them and the things that they have already accomplished as well as the things that I know they are still to do. But more importantly I am proud of who they are and the young men they have become. I am also glad that I get to laugh with them, cry with ~~them~~… cry with Jake, hug ~~them~~… hug Jake, except on my birthday and Christmas when I get to hug dust too and just generally share my life with them. I am glad I can be there to support them, encourage them and to blame them when need be. In fact I can’t think of things that I am not thankful for about them and I am very much looking forward to sharing many more years, life experiences and Monty Python movies with them.

2Feb2012

Who else but Dave

Posted in Family, Life, Love, Top 10 by Em

Day 2: Show someone you love

Just to keep this interesting and a little less like the bold and the beautiful… I thought I would ‘show’ my top three faces… ok top 10 faces of Dave… because I love him, and all the strange faces he can make….

1. His ‘Your an idiot’ face