Read Her Story…

{Our girl}

I have read and re-read each post of Ann’s, one of the Compassion bloggers who traveled to Guatemala over the past week. I have wept and wept more as she’s chronicled the poverty of Guatemala, the hope that Compassion brings in Jesus’ name, the serendipitous journey of finding her own sponsored “daughter,” the questions she asks that I think any of us would ask, should ask, after experiencing sickening poverty: What next? What do I do? Who are the poor among us? Among you? Among me?

Be blessed as you read her stories. Please, please read them. Stories of suffering, yes, but recounts that drip with mesmerizing joy, hope, and inspiration. God is there, in the midst of the unspeakable and amid the voices of the unheard. Read the stories and you will see that He is there.

The faces, places, experiences shared by one whom I’ve never met in real life and yet…

My mind can’t stop swirling. My heart won’t stop breaking.

For months I have tried to smother the thoughts, daily tasks taking precedence over existential wondering. Yet this tug persists, questions about Kingdom living and what should I do now and what does it mean to really give and live sacrificially. I asked my husband Saturday, What does it look like for us and why can’t I stop thinking about it? Crying over it?

I feel hypocritical as I make small talk about our busy fall schedule and our dryer that needs replacing and how life is hard. Because hard is so very relative, isn’t it?

I’m reluctant to write this…fear of indulgence I guess, but each month our family ekes out a portion from our coffers and I think it’s enough. For several years we’ve served up a direct-deposited slice that provides education, medical care, and other essentials for a precious 9-year-old girl in Liberia and I think to myself, We don’t have much but at least this is something, right? I am wrong on so many levels.

We don’t have much. Really? Every time I step on a Lego, bemoan cluttered cabinets, or swerve through mounds of unfolded laundry, I am literally tripping over abundance. I curse the mess and the clutter and in so doing I’m actually complaining because we have too much and yet I live as though I’ll never have enough.

Say things like, We really need a new rug because mine is flipped over and the binding has come off and I frown at frayed edges. Joking that we are poor because our TV is from a prior century. We work and labor and stress, thoughts occupied by how we can be better situated, not worry so much, maybe one day get this or that.

The stuff isn’t necessarily wrong. Wanting security isn’t so bad. Consumerism is part of life. My economist husband reminds me that stuff provides jobs, feeds families. Technology cures disease, improves our quality of life exponentially. Financial success holds inestimable power to give back. Just ask Bill Gates or Oprah.

Reconciling personal security and stewardship with sacrifice and radical Jesus love…this is complicated stuff. And I’m afraid this post asks more questions than it provides answers. And that this is probably three posts all smooshed into one rambling entry.

But this I know…

When I have all that I need, more than I need, I tend to not need the One who supplies all my needs.

Ann asks here,

Why is the world hungry when God’s people have bread? Are bread? …

… This, all this, all this we ever give, this is in remembrance of Him. To be bread like Him. Because the Last Supper is the supper that never ends, His Love Body, his people, being broken and offered again and again and this is the testament to the power of resurrection.

And I ask myself, Why am I ever hungry when I have Bread, when I can eat the Word and be full, when I can “taste and see that the Lord is good”…yet in any given moment choose starvation, choose to pant after morsels that neither nourish nor satisfy?

By emptying ourselves, in a way that only Grace can implore, we become full. Only the needy can truly walk in the mire with the needy. In the words of Brennan Manning, we’re wounded healers. Or at least we should be.

I don’t know what that will look like for me or for you but God does. Don Miller recently wrote a book that talks about life as story. He says God writes stories with our lives, that what we really want is a story that’s worth something when it’s all said and done. I know I do.

Monday night I sent a link to Ann’s posts about Guatemala to a dear friend of mine. She responded with lavish Jesus love immediately…picked two kids to sponsor and she’s going to let her own children pick two more. Don’t you love that? It doesn’t surprise me really. My friend was adopted. She knows brokenness and healing and hope, knows what it’s like to be needy, knows how to live a life of gratitude and generosity because someone gave her life and so did Jesus. She wants to be emptied and made full all at the same time. I told her that now she’s giving life…

Is there anything better?

But we can’t do it by sheer will or emotion or heartfelt motivation to save the world or even wanting to live a better story. Giving of ourselves eventually runs out unless we keep running back to the Source.

The only way we can give life is for life to be breathed into us first. Perhaps living Spirit-led lives is nothing more than opening ourselves up to be breathed into each and every moment until His breath and our steps are harmonious.

I don’t know what step is next but I know that when we are moved to the core, it is because He is moving.

So, read Ann’s stories…

And be moved.

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{Start here and read forward.}

No Fool Back to School Meals: A Linky Party

{Photo borrowed from Vintage Victuals. Her Salsa Chicken recipe looks delish!}

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Happy Labor Day y’all! I hope this day finds you all not laboring too much…which brings us to this post.

As much as I love food and actually enjoying cooking, it’s the repetition that gets me. I wish I could just cook when I felt like it. And I wish I could leisurely sauté and sashay around my kitchen, serving up romantic meals like they feature on the cover of Food & Wine.

But when real life comes calling about 6:00 every evening, I am faced with the task of feeding a family of 5 for the third time that day…and I am seriously uninspired.

So let’s inspire each other with some easy meals that we can throw together in the crock-pot each morning or effortlessly assemble later in the day.

For the back-story of this post, click here.

I’ll go first.

Salsa Chicken has been my go-to meal for years now. If you have a baby and need a meal, I’ll probably bring you this with all the fixins. If you come to my house for dinner, I’ll probably serve this meal. My kids love it and it’s so easy they can actually make it. And once you add all the yummy toppings, it’s tasty and interesting enough for refined grown-up palettes.

Here’s the “recipe”:

* Desired amount of boneless, skinless chicken breasts or tenderloins
* Desired amount of jarred salsa
* Optional: canned diced tomatoes and/or black beans to supplement salsa

(Example ratio: I use a 2.5 – 3.0 lb bag of breasts or tenderloins, combined with 2 jars of salsa, 24 oz. or so, a can of diced tomatoes, & a can of black beans.) Dump ingredients in a crock pot or just a large saucepan on the stove. Cook chicken until done. Shred chicken.

Serve chicken mixture over rice with toppings of choice: cheese, sour cream, cilantro, avocado. You can also roll it up in a burrito or serve it over tortilla chips.

Definitely make plenty of this! It’s great leftover and you can even make two totally new meals from it. It’s fantastic as quesadilla filling. Or, if you’re in the mood for a yummy Mexican soup, try this: Take leftover chicken mixture, add some chicken broth or part broth / water depending on how much you have. Sprinkle in fresh cilantro, avocado, lime juice {if you have it} and a big scoop of leftover rice. You will have an amazing soup identical to the one my favorite local Mexican restaurant serves. Top soup with crunched up tortilla chips, shredded cheese, a dollop of sour cream, etc.

And there you have it: One ridiculously easy dish served four different ways!

This is the first time I’ve done a linky party. If you have a blog and want to link us to a recipe post or you want to do a post for this occasion, great! Link up. Just click on that little blue Cookie Monster looking icon at the bottom of the post and it will walk you through the steps. It takes 5 seconds. Make sure you link to the complete url address of your post, not to your general blog address.

If you don’t have a blog, just leave your recipe for us in the comment section. And if you’ve never commented, now’s your chance to de-lurk and introduce yourself {and your recipe.} It’s easy. Just set up an account with blogger. All you need is a username and password.

My hope is that we can all get a few new tried and true recipes from real families that we can work into our own rotation of meals.

Here’s a couple of recent resources I’ve found that are worth checking into:

Free downloadable e-book from Money-Saving Mom: Smart School Time Recipes {breakfast, snacks, etc.} that are healthy and frugal.
$3 downloadable e-book from The Grocery Shrink: Slow & Savory Suppers {36 slow cooker recipes that are tasty, easy, healthy, and affordable.} I love this little recipe book!

Bon Appétit!

All Systems Go {A Series}: So What’s For Dinner?

If you missed Part I of the series, click here. If you want to know about the nonsense that started this whole series, click here.

This is Part 2 of the series in which I tell you how to be an underachiever. I’m kidding. But it does sort of feel like that.

Oh, the systems I have tried {and abandoned} regarding grocery-shopping and meal-planning. There are many brilliant and frugal meal-planning gurus out there. As much as I love being inspired by new and fresh ideas, I am a guru of real life. It’s important to balance inspiration with reality.

I know that no matter how well you plan, there will be those nights when you hit the Wendy’s 99-cents menu on the way home from soccer or pull out a frozen pizza and call it dinner. I have those nights. You probably have them too. We just don’t like to admit it. I do try to avoid feeding my kids over-processed junk but sometimes, garbage happens. It’s okay. Give yourself some credit for feeding your family.

Now that we’ve gotten that unpleasantry out of the way, let’s move on.

Regarding meals, I like having some meals planned out. I have tried to plan them out a month at a time and that didn’t work for us. Because sometimes I just didn’t feel like what was planned or The Man would unknowingly eat all of the mozzarella cheese I needed for lasagna…and then I would resent him and his cheese-loving ways for crashing my whole system.

So, here’s my fancy way of doing things now.

Most of the time I make a short list of 5 meals, buy the stuff, and proceed accordingly. It’s not on a pretty calendar or written in grids. It’s on a post-it note and stuck to the side of my fridge, usually on the back-side of the grocery list.

If I’m out of meals and haven’t gotten back to the store, I just survey the remnants of the pantry, fridge, and freezer and breathe a prayer for inspiration. Usually a meal finds its way out of the chaos.

And if those two options fail, it may be because the day has eaten me alive and I have a meal planned or even part of it prepared but am simply without the energy to make it happen. On those nights, we resort to cereal or the aforementioned frozen pizza. Or if we’re feeling splurgey we call 1-800-PAPA-JOHN.

{I don’t know if this is motivational how-to stuff or true confessions. It feels a little like both.}

So even though I’ve sworn off systems, I do have a couple of goals in mind for our busy fall. Since we’ll be at the soccer field or tennis court 2 – 3 nights a week until October, I’m thinking that my crock-pot should be my best friend. I’m trying to use it more. I’ve become a big fan of making dinner right after breakfast.

I’m also thinking that on the occasion when I make a lasagna or casserole something or other, I should make two and freeze one. It’s just as easy to make two while you’re already cooking and messing up the kitchen.

So those are my two {very loose} goals. And because they are loose and doable, they are actually working quite well. Oh my, this is starting to sound like a system.

In light of those goals, I thought it may be fun to have a linky party next Monday, September 6th. I’m giving you time to prepare and maybe write a recipe post of your own so come back on Monday and we’ll dish. {Get it?} If you don’t have a blog, no worries. Just write your recipe in the comments when we meet back here next Monday.

I’ll do a post between now and then to remind you.

Here’s what I’m looking for: No Fool Back to School Meals.

What is your easy, family-friendly meal that you can always count on? {That meal that you possibly make too often and then get sick of but it always finds its way back into the rotation because you don’t know what else to make.} I figure if enough of us link up then we can all find a few new favorites to put into our own rotation, thereby decreasing the repetition.

I know we all have different preferences, food aversions, and priorities with our meals. I’m sort of looking for those meals that are reasonably healthy {“real” ingredients, not overly processed}, reasonably affordable, reasonably well-balanced, and reasonably normal. Because while I totally love weird food and will eat ethnic anything, my husband and children will not.

And I will love you forever if it can be made in a crock-pot.

Wow, I am getting bossier by the sentence.

So those are the rules. Now go get yourself a cookbook and let’s see what we can make! I can’t wait to see what you all cook up for me when we have our party.

I’m curious. Do you have a “system” for planning meals?

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{What’s for dinner tonight? Chalupas, pictured above, made in the crock pot. Recipe from Slow and Savory Suppers, a $3 e-book that you can purchase at www.thegroceryshrink.com. My family has enjoyed quite a few slow-cooked meals from this book.}

All Systems Go {A Series}: To Clean or Pay Someone to Clean? That is the Question.

Remember when I told you that I’d sworn off systems? Remember when I said I’d be providing a few tips of my own, tips that are very non-system like?

Well, the wait is over.

Here is where I reveal never-before-seen secrets on how to easily and effortlessly keep your house cleanish while homeschooling three young children, working part-time and living in a small space. {I may even turn this into an e-book.}

Hire someone.

In the words of a dear friend and fellow homeschooling mom, keeping your own house is highly overrated.

My kids help with daily tasks like the dishwasher and laundry but the rest tends to fall upon me and I was feeling increasingly loaded down and overwhelmed. The Man and I discussed this issue and came to the same conclusion: I needed help.

I had our house cleaned the first week of August. Because the house is smallish, it took 3 hours. From here on out, it will take 2 hours once a month which comes out to roughly $1 a day. I have a jar on my counter where we dump loose change and dollars. Sometimes I fine my kids if they’re naughty or don’t pick up their stuff. It all adds up. Don’t worry, I won’t hand the jar to my cleaning friend. But I will take the jar to the bank when it’s full and feel a little better about money I never missed paying for something that blesses our family. And by family, I mean me.

We are not rich. But The Man and I both know that the time and energy I spend homeschooling, working, and keeping up with the daily demands of home and family is time and energy I do not have for other things, like cleaning. And when you break it down to $1 a day, well, that’s just a no-brainer.

Some of you may be thinking that if I managed my time better or gave my children more responsibility, I could save that money each month. And you would be right. But this is about knowing myself, knowing our family’s schedule, and accepting what is realistic for us during this season.

You don’t need a systems guru to tell you how to manage daily life, you just need a bit of common sense and a hefty dose of freedom to embrace what works for you.

Having the house all clean at once makes it way easier for me to maintain during the rest of the month, not to mention that my floor will actually get mopped every. single. month. Bliss. Once The Man saw how insanely happy the all-at-once clean house made me, he knew without a doubt that this was a good decision for us.

So, this is my system and I’m sticking to it…instead of sticking to my juice-and-lint smeared floor.

More to come.

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I’d love to know what you think. Do you have a system that you consistently stick to or do you {gulp} actually pay someone to clean? If you have older kids, did you gradually transition the cleaning responsibilities to them?

What’s Inside the Box…

As I laboriously removed the desk hutch from the excessive cardboard packaging, I thought to myself, What on earth am I going to do with this ridiculously huge box? I snipped the tape, folded it up, and abandoned it to the garage, hoping it wouldn’t sit there too long.

It didn’t.

They had big plans for the box.

It has been a spaceship, a drive-through car wash, and a McDonald’s, complete with a very bossy toddler employee who serves all customers a hamburger and orders them to eat it before they drive off.

I saw a useless, oversized box.

But they saw a whole world just waiting to be imagined.

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It’s Tuesday so you know where to find me…at Emily’s of course.

The Slate of Expectation

It feels like yesterday when I made the decision to keep her at home. You know, just for a year.

This week we began year four of this school around the kitchen table thing. It’s been nothing like I imagined three years ago. It’s been far better and far worse, a series of ironies that play out daily in this crazy life of mine.

I am the teacher as well as the student.

I am learning that years of formal education pale in comparison to the school of hard knocks.

I am learning the most; this is certain.

I am learning to work with what I’ve got and to work with who I’ve got.

Three years ago I imagined a homeschool room: bookcases lining walls, beanbags for reading, neatly organized everything…the {still} unfinished bonus room as our own personal schoolroom, a sacred space devoted to learning together.

Three years ago I imagined hands-on, creative everything: Egyptian pyramids baking in the oven and child drawings to accompany her phonics instruction.

Enter perfectionist daughter frustrated by her 1st-grade motor skills, crying buckets as she tried to draw the perfect cat that sat on the mat and how it didn’t look how she pictured it in her mind.

Enter exasperation over the Egyptian pyramid project turned nondescript lump of crumbly mess.

Enter frustration and perfectionism that precluded much of reading, math, and history that year.

Enter tears. Again. Hers and mine.

The glossy curriculum magazine advertised a creative, gentle, hands-on approach. I read not one disclaimer regarding perfectionistic, frustrated children.

Somewhere along the way we settled on the classical model in its rich simplicity, a non-trendy, no bells and whistles approach. We learn in much the same way our great-grandparents did in their one-room schoolhouse…which is convenient, since a one-room schoolhouse {with one giant, oval-shaped desk} is exactly what I have.

And so I work with who I’ve got and what seems to work for us all:

Creative, inquisitive, perfectionist, not-loving-to-read daughter. She needs a streamlined, efficient, traditional way of learning so that she can have the rest of the day to be who she is: creative. Extra time in the day also means extra time to {sigh} practice reading…and more time for her book-loving mama to read to her.

Bright, compliant, book-loving, golf-playing son. He needs a streamlined, efficient, traditional way of learning so that he can have the rest of the day to read some more, to practice golf in the backyard…and to let his book-loving mama read to him.

Non-compliant, attention-hoarding, toddler. He needs his siblings to finish school quickly so that he can have everyone’s attention…and let his book-loving mama read to him.

Somewhat introverted, contemplative mother who is not naturally gifted in the art of nurturing. She needs her children to finish school efficiently and collaboratively so that she can finally stop talking and hide from said children and have just a few moments of quiet to write…or to let her book-loving self read a bit…or to take a nap.

So that’s who I’ve got, a little bit of every personality living and learning together, a family of 5 in our smallish home, doing school in the space where we do everything else: the eating, the crafting, the writing, the wiping up spills…

The wiping up tears.

It’s not a picture of that beautiful sacred space, gilt-framed in my mind. It’s a picture of a messy space with tattered edges…

And it is very much sacred, a hallowed ground of sopped-up juice, Cheerios, and eraser dust.

Funny how that out-of-reach, idyllic schoolroom stands symbolic for the rest of this unpredictable journey called home-education. As we traverse the overlapping trails of living and learning, I, the teacher mama, am figuring out that I don’t know much of anything…and that what I thought I knew doesn’t count for much.

Day in and day out, I am learning to unlearn, to humbly wipe the slate of expectation clean and allow Someone Else to write the story on it.

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A parenting post linked up with the lovely

Ann Voskamp at A Holy Experience.

Ancient History

Blondie pulled out my old scrapbooks over the weekend. She loves reading the story of how her daddy and I met, even though she’s completely weirded out by all of the mushy love stuff. My college days fascinate her. She seems to have a strange admiration for that wilder, younger version of her mother.

She does not, however, admire my back-then style. Mommy, she asked, would you be offended if I told you that your clothes looked bad?

No, I replied. I agree that my clothes looked bad too. But that was just the style back then.

Back then? {I thought to myself.} Really?

It’s funny how this history still feels rather recent to me, like it was just a few years ago when I donned acid-wash jeans with zippers on the side and wore baggy sweatshirts over leggings.

And all of the fun trips and adventures her daddy and I enjoyed during the 5 years of marriage before she was born? It seems like just a few years ago.

But as she and her brothers gazed at those albums, I had a flashback of looking at my own parents’ high school and college yearbooks, of sprawling out on the blue carpet in our living room and studying their old photographs. And I remember trying to imagine them as young, thinking that all the girls in my mom’s high school already looked like moms with their Donna Reed dresses and short, bouffant hair styles.

And now, to Blondie and her brothers, that’s me.

It’s come full circle I guess and I don’t know where the time went.

I didn’t dress like Donna Reed and my bouffant hair style was a giant mess of spiral-curled, hair-sprayed goodness, but it might as well be ancient history to her, that time when I lived and fell in love and had a rich, full life, yet she was still years away from being conceived.

Watching them look at ancient us felt both crazy and okay. I sort of liked it actually.

Because there’s something about coming full circle that feels complete.

Unwrapped with Emily {Chatting at the Sky}

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On a different note, I just want to thank all of you for the lovely comments and most gracious welcome as I shared my most recent post. I was scared. I woke up that morning with butterflies and fear, but y’all made it so much less scary. It was such a beautiful day for me. Thank you for letting me share my life with you: the good, the trivial, the ugly. In the writing, I have found expression and healing; in the sharing, I have found community and joy.

And thank you, sweet Emily, for the opportunity to write at the place where I’ve found such inspiration and resonance over the last two years.

Oh and if you read the All Systems Go post, I’ve worked up a few very “non-system-like” posts that are coming your way this week. : )

Marriage, Mess and Mercy

This is my first-ever guest post. I am honored beyond measure to share my words and story with Emily {Chatting at the Sky} and her gracious readers who have become my Tuesday sisterhood.

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I prayed for months that I wouldn’t throw up or cry as I floated down the aisle to meet him. I didn’t want mascara dripping down my face or nausea ruining my dress. I didn’t want to be a mess. I wanted to be perfect. Looking back, I probably saw God’s answer to my superficial prayers as a good sign that life would be a lovely storybook…just like that day.

Continue reading…

All Systems Go

It’s that time of year when mamas and school-kids are gearing up. I always have mixed feelings. Several trips to Staples, going through our school stuff, organizing binders, anticipating a busier fall schedule…and I am feeling the all-too-familiar tug toward systems.

But this year I’ve decided it’s going to be different. I’ve sworn off systems.

I’ve always been a fan of systems, methods that allow me to do life more efficiently and productively. I have a strong-willed tendency to equate efficiency and productivity with success. In theory, systems often seem like the answer. In practice, well, I wouldn’t know. I’ve never stuck with one long enough.

When inefficiency and chaos reign, I feel unsuccessful, which no one ever actually aspires to. Prone to distraction, escape, fussing at children, and downright tiredness, I look to a system as savior, wrongly assuming that the right method will eliminate the madness.

Systems seem to enjoy their annual heyday each fall. There is an endless array from which to choose, particularly if you homeschool. {And I do.} Homeschoolers have a love affair with systems. How else can they milk cows, stitch quilts, grind millet, read The Lord of the Rings, and conjugate Latin verbs all before sitting down to a hand-hewn table of organically-grown-in-the-backyard fare? How else can they do all of this while being so well-mannered, so musical, so National Merit-ish?

Systems.

I have dabbled in many over the years, always looking for the one that will finally make me a domestic goddess and make our home a beacon of order and tranquility. I’d think to myself, “If I can just cook a month’s worth of meals and freeze them, if I can just divide my house into zones and set the timer, if I can just find the perfect chore charts for my children, if I can just find the right expert or book to make me perfect, make my house perfect, make my kids and family-life perfect, we’ll all just be…perfect.”

Ugh. How perfectly nauseating.

Of course I don’t actually think I’m aspiring to perfection. No one ever admits to that. Yet on any given day that’s exactly what I do. I erect perfection and order as a shiny, golden idol and I bow down to it, resenting anyone and anything that gets in the way, myself included.

I’m learning, however, that my failure to adhere to any given system is not actually failure. There is no one-size-fits-all system. I should not equate a system with salvation and neither should you. The best system in the world will not cure my lack of discipline in certain areas or tackle the ugly issues in my heart.

Don’t get me wrong…a system is not bad in and of itself. In fact, I have been helped and taught by many a good system, taking with me the elements that worked and leaving behind those that didn’t. But I’ve found that it’s better for me to know myself, know my husband, know our kids, know our lifestyle, understand our values, and then create our own realistic ways of doing life.

The funny thing is, now that I’ve broken free from idolizing other people’s systems, I’ve found a great deal of freedom and confidence to create and embrace my own. I don’t need a book or an expert, just common sense.

I’ve got a lot to say about this, so stay tuned. I’ll be writing more from a real mom’s perspective on home and school and thwarting perfection. I’ll even be sharing some {gulp…dare I say it?} “tips” about what’s working for us right now. And I promise, such tips are in no way, shape, or form system-related.

So what about you? Are you a fan of systems?

Benevolent Blogosphere

I have, without a doubt, “met” some of the coolest girls since I began this adventure of recording life in word and picture, girls who love to write and look at photos and overthink things as much as I do. That’s a gift in and of itself, but the bloggy world has been exceptionally sweet to me lately.

About a year and a half ago, I went on a scrap-booking weekend with a couple of girls I knew and dozens that I didn’t. As we all chatted it up about life and nonsense and family, it turned out that one of the girls knew about my friend Lily and the Padalily {she’d seen a write-up about her from The Nester.} I told her Lily was my BFF and we all had a big laugh about what a small world it is {as well as some dish about the marvelousness of Amy Butler fabric.}

And then she learned that I had a little blog and I told her the name of it and sure enough, she had visited. Then we had an even bigger laugh and I started signing autographs.

Seriously though, ever since that day Lynne has been one of my most faithful readers, rivaling Lily, my mom, and my mother-in-law. Every time I see her name and the ladybug icon that accompanies, I smile and unwrap the comment love.

Well, I got a package in the mail Friday, a real present to unwrap, and guess who it was from…

Lynne.

The girl has got some mad sewing skillz and she makes up little totes and keychains just for fun and she made one just for me.

Isn’t she lovely? I told her that I never met a toile I didn’t like. This way I’ll still look classy even when I’m wearing black Converse sneakers and holey jeans. It’s reversible and has awesome little pockets and pouches.

I cleaned out my old purse and junked this one up on the spot.

And if that wasn’t enough, about a week before that I got this in the mail from the one and only Richella. She was doing a giveaway and I have totally been wanting this book.

I guess the giveaway gods smiled upon me because I won!

The book is hilarious and spot on. I knew it would be. I read Jon Acuff’s blog and I have the laugh lines to prove it. Run, do not walk, to Amazon and buy it. It makes a great gift for all of the Christian culture junkies in your life.

And right after you do that go visit Richella at Imparting Grace. She is precious in so many ways: a gifted writer, grammar guru, thrifty decorator and beautiful woman of God. I got to meet her in real life a year ago at the Nester’s swap-meet.

I know you all probably hate me for the great loot I scored and the swell girls I know but I just had to gush. And thank you, Lynne and Richella, for the great gifts!

There’s just something about getting a package in the mail that makes a girl’s day.

And speaking of presents, I’m unwrapping this one with Emily today. {Chatting at the Sky}