Dandelions and Daydreams

Welcome to the November 1, 2007 edition of carnival of christian women. This is a short carnival because I posted a lot of my entries in this post. Enjoy the read, and make sure to add your submissions for the November 15 edition.

Angela Williams Duea presents Dreams like reaching for the moon posted at angelawd, saying, “It’s sometimes hard to see God’s plan in the long struggles of our lives - but sometimes we’re blessed to see the overall pattern.”

Tea Party Girl presents Tea Party Girl’s Fight and Fright posted at Tea Party Girl. Tea Party Girl’s fear is a loss of beauty and a mediocre life. I can relate.

Theresa Twogood presents The Parable of ‘The Two Teams’ $posted at OLIN e-Book e-Publishing. As Christians we cannot and should not root for the other team.

Doris Chua presents Acts of God posted at Life..Passion..Travel & More…. Not Everything is in our control. In fact, very little is.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the November 15 edition of
carnival of christian women
using our
carnival submission form.
Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

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How much does it cost to live rich?

That depends on what living rich means to you.

Anybody can afford to live rich, but you have to know what your target is first. We are told that living rich is having a huge house and driving a new BMW, but the key to living richly is to stop trying to keep up with the Joneses. Stop listening to what ‘they’ tell you need to be happy and listen to yourself.

What would your life look like if you were living richly?

I would have a few good friends and a wonderful husband who loves me. I would live in a house in the country surrounded by blue skies and lots of fresh air. I would end each day with a cup of hot tea and a snuggle with that wonderful husband. I would invite guests over to my house. My house would feel as peaceful as a bed and breakfast–a reatreat from the world. I would go camping and hiking more. I would have fresh flowers on my table.

My rich life is a lot different than a huge house and a BMW in the driveway. When I look at the things I value, the size of my house or the make of my car, don’t even register on the scale.

What is important to you? What do you value?

Once you have defined what you really value, you should start spending your money and your life on the things you value. It sounds so simple, but putting your energy towards what you value is the key to living rich.

We all have things we have to do, whether we want to or not. Most people have to go to work to earn a pay check, but do you have to work all those overtime hours? You have to buy clothes, but most people in America have way more clothes than they need. You probably have to do some cleaning around the house, but you could also involve your family so that it is bonding time rather than cleaning drudgery.

The philosophy of living richly is to think outside the box. Stop pursuing someone else’s dream, stop living someone else’s life, and reach out to grab your own happiness.

You may have to make sacrifices, to get to your rich life. I don’t have my house in the country. Right now, I am living right in the middle of town, but I am renting the smallest, cheapest apartment I can find so that I can buy that house in the country soon. That one sacrifice doesn’t keep me from pursuing a rich life. I have dear friends and a wonderful husband. I can go camping and backpacking in my free time. I can reach out and grab my rich life, and I can sacrifice for it.

What is keeping you from a rich life? Are you willing to sacrifice to live the life you dream of?

photo: Marc van der Chijs under CC-BY-ND

Popularity: 17% [?]

Are you steady? When you put your mind to doing something do you keep on doing it until you get it done? If you decide to do something daily, how long before your resolutions fall to the side?

What are the habits you want to develop? Dieting? Exercising regularly? Keeping your house clean? Maybe you want to stop complaining and start praising others (Yes, complaining is a habit too)? Gossiping is a nasty, ugly, vicious habit.

Bad habits are like chains around your neck, that keep you from achieving God’s best. When you accept those habits as “just who I am,” you are accepting defeat. You are letting bad habits keep you from God’s best for your life. Those bad habits are holding you into a mediocre life.

For me, I can be consistent for about 2 weeks, and then everything falls apart. With every failure, I have to fight myself yet again. I have to decide, against what is easy, to keep fighting, clawing tooth and nail, towards what I know is good.

Developing a habit, instituting a new habit, is only 20% head knowledge, and 80% action. Diet books are so successful, not because we don’t know how to eat but because we need an action plan.

Success, living out good habits consistently, requires overcoming yourself, your bad habits, and feeding the good habits that lead you towards excellence.

Can God use me if I cannot keep my house clean? Certainly! And I know that He is using me while I am learning to be organized. At the same time, I know that being organized will free me up to pursue ministry in other areas.

God can continue to use you while you struggle with overcoming these bad habits, but these habits hold you back from living the best life that God has for you.

Bad habits are easy to develop, but hard to live with. Good habits are difficult to develop, but easy to live with. Anything worthwhile, is worth struggling over. Anything worthwhile is worth continuing on until you have achieved success.

Popularity: 18% [?]

If you want some great stuff to listen to online, Check out Ravi Zacharias’s Podcasts. I first heard Ravi Zacharias speak at a chapel session in college. He is a very hard hitting Christian Apologist. I love the idea of Christian Apologetics. If I ever went to seminary, I would study apologetics–Finding God through logic and reason.

Subscribe to his podcasts and prepare to think

Popularity: 22% [?]

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Kathryn at The Peculiar Club presents Ode to the Proverbs 31 Woman. She really touches at the heart of the message behind The Wife of Noble Character Chapter: Proverbs 31:30b (KJV) “a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised.”

As a nice compliment to Kathryn’s post, Kathie M. Thomas posted Doing it alone?over at Proverbs31-Woman. Kathie’s article discusses the everyday logistics of managing the home as a Proverbs 31 woman.

Kathie also submitted an article from her blog Worth More Than Rubies. There’s No Work Like Home presents her reason for working from home.

supermom_in_ny wrote Could You Be as Strong as Mary? posted at Miracles Still Happen to encourage us through hard times. Walking with Jesus doesn’t always mean taking the easy road, it isn’t even usually the easy road. The key to finishing the race is to continually seek the face of God. Make sure you watch the YouTube video at the end of this post–the images and music is haunting.

Linsey B. Knerl presents My Little Person…. posted at Facipiers and Stinky Toes. This article explores the times when a child’s unique personality really shows through.

Tea Party Girl at Tea Party Girl wanders through motherhood, simplicity and tea in ‘Tis a Gift to be Simple–Wednesday’s Heart of Tea Reflection.

“If you are cold, tea will warm you. If you are too heated, it will cool you. If you are depressed, it will cheer you. If you are excited, it will calm you.” ~William Gladstone, British Prime Minister, 1865

Doris Chua at Life, Travel, Passion & More offers her spontaneous praise for God’s healing in I’m well - Thank God!.

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Every two weeks, the paycheck comes in and I sit down to pay the bills for that pay period. With so much money getting sent out at one time, sometimes I start to feel sorry for myself. My all time favorite bill to write each month is for $65 that gets sent to World Vision to sponsor 2 children.

Albadalkedar lives in Jerusalem. He is four years old now. We started sponsoring him two years ago. I can’t imagine what his life must be like–to live in poverty surrounded by war. Several times we have received letters from World Vision ensuring us that Abadalkeder and his family are okay ins pite of the violence in the area.

Yerimia lives in Malawi–it’s in Africa. She is a hope child, she lives in an area of the world that has been ravaged by AIDs. She is 6 years old and wants to be a teacher some day.

For $30 ($35 for a Hope Child) per month, we could buy a couple of pizzas, a tank of gas, or rent a couple of movies. We take that money and sponsor a child. We are changing the lives of Yerimia and Abadalkedar. We are making the difference between a child starving or growing up, getting medical treatment, going to college, and breaking the cycle of poverty.

World Vision is a Christian organization. Part of their purpose is to bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ into remote areas of the world. At the same time, they do not require a family to be Christians in order to get assistance. They work in 100 countries providing assistance to anyone who needs it. They demonstrate the love of God through relationships while helping the poorest children int he world reach their full potential.

I spend more on groceries for one week than I do to support a World Vision kid for one more month of hope. And the best thing is that Abadalkedar and Yeremia aren’t the only ones who are benefiting from our sponsorships. World Vision works with the whole family to improve their situation. World Vision moves into communities and uses part of the sponsorship money to provide clean water, schools, medical centers, and so many other things that I take for granted every day.

Everybody says they want to make a difference in the world, but it always seems like a dream that is so far off or too expensive. Changing the world doesn’t usually happen by making a world wide difference. Generosity encourages generosity. We started supporting just one child, but then I couldn’t face myself in the mirror to see my own abundant wealth and not do as much as I can. Changing the world happens one person, one child, one family, one community at a time. Sponsor a child and the life you may see changed is our own.

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How often do you revisit your mission statement and make new goals? For some people goal setting is just something to do on New Years Day, others never set goals. January 24 has been calculated (by psychologists) as the most depressing day of the year. The holiday hype is over and the reality of broken resolutions stares at you in the face. Reaching your goals is about more than just setting the final goal and plugging away until you get there. Achieving your goals is about making constant small adjustments towards the final goal.

I use every excuse I can find to set and reaffirm my goals: New Years, birthday, anniversary, first day of the month, Monday… Since it’s the beginning of October and my birthday is coming up soon, now is a good time to revisit my goals in life.

My life goals consistently revolve around a handful of themes:

• Writing
• Photography
• Nature

For as long as I can remember I have dreamed of being a writer. Anne of Green Gables was the book that first inspired me. I blog because I have to write. This past year I have taken on several writing projects. In November I joined the writing frenzy National Novel Writing Month, and I was a NaNo winner. I took on several blog writing projects, and I hope to seem them really propel my dreams forward. This year, I would like to actually attempt some articles. I also plan on doing NaNoWriMo again. Any aspiring authors want to join me?

Photography is probably my art of choice. I have taken loads of pictures over the past few years. They are languishing in my hard drive right now. I am a failure at printing most of them. Brenton has taken a few to his work and hung them in his cubicle. My pictures always get compliments, I need to start putting them out-there for the world to see. Expect to see photos featured on this blog more in the next year.

Nature. I can never get enough time in God’s creation. We actually went camping a few times this year, but it isn’t enough. Brenton keeps talking about going snow camping. I’m not sure I’m up for that. He also wants me to take up ice fishing. Notice I said he wants ME to do it, not him. I think I’ll be happy making some snowshoes and taking snowshoeing up. Sandpoint has lots of trails around that we could hike if we could stay on top of the snow. I’m still looking for an outlet for my desire to go into camping ministries. My big dream for the next year is to move out of town onto a piece of our own land out in paradise.

The hardest part about dreaming is waiting for the dreams to come true.

But these things I plan won’t happen right away. Slowly, steadily, surely the time approaches when the vision will be fulfilled. If it seems slow, do not despair, for these things will surely come to pass. Just be patient! They will not be overdue a single day
Habakkuk 2:3

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Does anybody else get irritated when you delete like 500 spam messages from g-mail and then get the “hooray! No spam here!” message?

I try to check my spam box at least once a week. Things sometimes get routed there that shouldn’t be. I scan the senders and then usually delete everything on the page. I think the gmail default is 50 items per page, and I usually have 200-500 spam mails. Even if it only takes 10 seconds per page, that’s a minute of my life wasted so I can see the “Hooray! No spam here!” message.

I suppose I could just let them sit there for 30 days until they delete automatically. If anything important gets routed there I’m sure the person will e-mail me again. Just the same, I like the clean sweep of my inbox. I think Google should change the message to say, “Death to Spam!”

Popularity: 20% [?]

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Welcome to the October 1, 2007 edition of carnival of christian women.

Dana presents Finding Purpose posted at Principled Discovery.

Christian Women at Home

Stephanie presents What Christmas Already? posted at Stop the Ride!.

Life as a Christian Woman

Leticia Velasquez presents The Time I saw Blessed Mother Teresa posted at causa nostrae laetitiae.

Leticia Velasquez presents Tales from the The Pro-life Table at the Fair posted at causa nostrae laetitiae.

Heather Cotten presents Are you in a box? | Live.Awake posted at .: The SoapBox :., saying, “It makes people feel safe when they can tell what is to be expected and not feel that something will change on them unexpectedly. The problem is that we hurt the people that we are closest to by not allowing them to be the people that they were created to be.”

Ministering to your Husband children and

Dianne M. Buxton presents Wahm Homeschooling Internet Marketing Course posted at manifestingsuccess, saying, “This article focuses on a homeschooling economic course for kids, involving real income. If you’re not able to stay at home now due to finances, this is for you too. It will change your family life. Free, I’m not selling it.”

Other

Sagar Satapathy presents Top 50 Christian Business and Finance Blogs posted at Bootstrapper.

Arlene Mei Pinpin presents The Samaritan Woman. A Character Analysis posted at Mind, Heart, and Mysteries, saying, “The Samaritan Woman appears and can be located only in the Fourth Gospel, specifically chapter 4 verses 4 to 42 (Jn 4, 4-42 NAB). Obviously of a female gender, though concretely unnamed, aside from ‘Samaritan woman’ [v. 9 (2x)] she is given titles like ‘woman of Samaria’ (v. 7) and simply ‘woman’ (vv. 11, 15, 17, 19, 21, 25, 27-28, 39, 42). She lives in Sychar, Samaria “near the plot of land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph” (v. 5). She has no husband but had five husbands and is presently living with a man not her husband (vv. 17-18). No particular and close relatives living are mentioned but only the legacy of Jacob as her ancestor (v. 12). Information about her age and occupation are not provided.”

Joy Miller presents College credit for life experience posted at Online College Blog, saying, “Many colleges and universities allow you to earn credit for life experience. How this credit is awarded and assigned varies widely by university.”

Seeing God in Everyday Life

Joysoriano.com presents
A FEAST JUST LIKE HEAVEN’s posted at www.joysoriano.com.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of
carnival of Christian women
using our
carnival submission form.
Past posts and future hosts can be found on our

blog carnival index page.

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