Categories
- BLAT (2)
- Book Reviews (9)
- brothels (1)
- Creativity (4)
- decluttering (5)
- goals (4)
- home birth (3)
- Life (136)
- Maker's Diet (5)
- Missions (7)
- Money (1)
- Natural Living (2)
- Neighbours (2)
- NFP (1)
- Nicaragua 2014 (14)
- Parenthood (8)
- poetry (3)
- Prayer (10)
- pregnancy (18)
- Project 333 (1)
- psalm 40 (3)
- Reviews (2)
- Scripture (22)
- suffering (6)
- Thoughts (97)
- Three Things Thursday (16)
- Torre (1)
- Uncategorized (44)
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: Book Reviews
In Unglued, Lysa TerKerst uses grace, humour and examples from her own life to understand our reactions to raw emotions and to make wise choices in the midst of them. This book explores 4 types of unglued reactions that cover the whole range of how emotions are processed and acted out. Some of this I already knew about myself, but I realized that like most people I deal differently with different people (meaning Matt sees a different side of unglued me than a stranger at the grocery store). Lysa gives practical advice for each reaction type and goes on to explore root issues and triggers for raw emotions. Managing these feelings sure gets easier if you can figure out where they are coming from! Like the pain that causes us to reflexively pull our hand back from a hot stove, strong emotions can be a warning of danger to our emotional health. Finding the roots can help us address identity issues, unspoken fears and areas of brokenness we didn’t realize need fixing.
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: Life
Marriage is more than four bare legs in a bed. ~Hoshang N. Akhtar
I'm thinking about marriage today, grateful for the husband I have and the life we are building together, and reflecting on how I've changed and am changing as a wife. All in all it's for the better! But like rocks being polished in a tumbler, married life feels gritty sometimes. I worry about aspects of myself that I'm losing or things I know Matt has sacrificed for us, and I freak out that it's too much to ask.
My friend Brett wrote a great little rant on how our culture treats marriage (Marriage Sucks). He searched the internets for an inspirational quote to include in a love letter for his wife and got mostly one-liners about marriage that are thinly veiled put-downs. He says,
"Marriage does not have the greatest track record at the moment. It is in desperate need of people who will champion it, who will speak life into it and cheer it on from the sides [as other married couples and as single or dating people] – we need all the help we can get."
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: Life
This morning got off to a terrible start. Terrible. It was a rough night and early start to the day, and all in all I could not imagine feeling any worse.
I texted a friend, wallowed in self-pity, then cooked myself the most delicious breakfast possible.
Torre's favourite thing lately is to pull himself up to stand against a chair or a table and then call me to help him down or help him walk to somewhere. As bacon sizzled in the kitchen, I tried to explain to him that he had used up all of me during the night, that it was just a sad shell of me lying on the carpet unable to help him. He mostly just stood there yelling. At one point he crawled over and bit me on the leg.
Finally breakfast was ready, and Torre warmed my heart by eating some banana and some egg. Feeding him is an area that I feel almost as helpless in as getting him to sleep. Like, babies come with no skills at all, and I just don't know how to teach the basic necessities of life. Part of me knows it will all work out, but a tiny, panicky part of my brain insists after every wakeful night and every rejected meal that I will still be waking up in the night to nurse my 12 year old because all he ever eats is rice crackers. So with some real food in both our bellies, my dejection began to ease, and I grabbed my Bible to read a bit while Torre played on the floor.
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: Life
How much sleep does an eight month old baby need? Apparently the average is 16 hours, which only means the range is 12-20 hours per day. New babies get all the sleep they need because they simply take it, brains shutting down to rest whenever and wherever. As babies get older, however, they gain the ability to keep themselves awake. If they are in unfamiliar surroundings, or if it seems like lots of fun is happening, babies can opt to resist their own tiredness and stay alert to the world, taking in all the information they can.
This is a good thing, but as with all developmental milestones it is hitting me as a parent as a mixed blessing. Growing up isn't sad, after all, and I would never wish my child to be narcoleptic, but now that his body won't simply take whatever sleep it needs, my responsibility as a parent has expanded. And it's stressful.
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: Thoughts
It is Thanksgiving weekend here in Canada. I woke up this morning with the same anticipation I feel about Christmas: one more sleep until our big family meal! But it is not just the calendar that has me thinking about gratitude - I have been a little bit haunted by the topic for the last month or so, ever since the blessing for a meal knocked my socks off.
Matt and I were having lunch with a friend/mentor of his, and it was only a last-minute thing that I was even there, but obviously God wasn't going to let it go to waste! As we bowed our heads over takeout salad, our friend prayed, "Heavenly Father, thank you for calling us to ministry..."
I'm sure he blessed the food as well, but that is not what has echoed in my mind and heart for weeks. I was stopped cold and convicted and confused because I don't think I've ever thanked God for calling me or my family into ministry. I always figured it was one of those things where God asks you to do something and you agree, and then you're partners, and you feel good about "answering the call," and sometimes it's hard but you get through it.
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: Parenthood
Over the last week I really enjoyed two separate blog posts that relate to raising boys who don't fit 100% in the box of what our culture expects from boys. Although really, does anyone fit 100% in any cultural box? I wanted to share them both because I have enjoyed the food for thought and have the luxury of being not in the phase of parenting where Torre's choices make me uncomfortable. Well, his choices to pull my hair and kick my guts and affectionately gnaw on my shoulder make me uncomfortable, but in a different way. He wears what I dress him in, and today I opted not to buy the pink diaper cover - I am happy to put blue on any future daughters I have, but I just don't feel like putting pink on my son. If, down the road, he wants to wear sparkles or butterflies or have a princess-themed birthday party (my friend's four-year-old son's request), we will have that conversation and I'm not 100% sure how it will go. I am totally okay with him wearing pink, I just don't want to buy it now when he doesn't even care (why do I care, when he doesn't?).
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: brothels
I have shared in the past some of my thoughts on prostitution, but it is a difficult topic because the sex trade comes tangled with so many issues. A friend shared this documentary on facebook, and I believe it is worth the 45 minutes to watch in its entirety. Focused on the sex trade in Windsor, Ontario, the film includes interviews with street prostitutes, a former call girl, and a woman who worked in brothels over several years. The interviews do a great job of humanizing these women who are often written off as trash - yes many of them have drug addictions, but they are also mothers, widows, journalism students. Many of them are irreparably damaged inside and out, but their personhood is still there, and that is so easy to forget when we just think of cliches. Watch the documentary!
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: decluttering
If you remember my first experiment with Project 333, I have been living with that wardrobe for over 3 months. and to be honest it gradually grew by a few items over the summer. However, it also gave me the willpower to resist buying more than a few sundresses because I was so aware of the pretty dresses I already owned and didn't wear very often. This project was also a lifesaver back in June when I travelled to the West coast for a month - packing and unpacking was so much easier than it would have been with more choices. I learned that I have all the clothes I need, and I got a better sense of what clothes I actually like to wear, versus the clothes I like the idea of but never take out of the closet. 
With that said, many of the tank tops I wear the most are very worn and will need to be replaced for next Summer. Some of them have been around for 8 or 9 years and are faded, stretched, and some even have holes. They have served their time, and I am at peace with throwing them out. I'm excited to pick through Summer clearance racks with the purpose of replacing them (and not getting sucked into buying 10 because they're cheap!). I think doing this project helps me be a better shopper because it gives me a better sense of what I want and need, so I'm not as overwhelmed by tables and racks of clothes in stores. We'll see how it goes once I actually shop!
But first, the weather is starting to change, and I am ready for a new round of wardrobe streamlining!
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: Book Reviews
A few weeks ago I found this book on our bookshelf and decided to give it a read. Am I ever glad that I did! Jeff Lucas has created a great guide-book for Christians and churches who want to live out God's grace for lost people. Following the illustration of a piece of music, and writing through the lens of the parable of the prodigal son, this book explores the many facets that come into play when churches truly become sanctuaries for people who may have walked away or rejected God before.
- Details
- Written by: Alyssa
- Category: Scripture
A friend and I are leading a group at church called Gathering - the point is to gather together and just share how life is going, spend some time in worship and prayer, but most of all encourage one another by sharing how we have seen God moving in our lives. For the last few weeks we have also taken turns preparing a devo to get people's brains going, but then our gathering was turning into more of a Bible study than time of sharing. Isn't it funny how easy it is to slip into a default mode or go on auto-pilot: "we're meeting in a church, so we should talk about the Bible!" Not that scripture isn't foundational to our lives as Christians, but I don't think an in-depth study is necessary to validate every time we get together.
Well, with that said, I was responsible for planning the devo last week and wanted to look at the text where Jesus says, "Where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them."
That passage is Matthew 18, and the specific verse (20) comes after instructions for resolving conflicts between Christians. Awkward, since I was just looking for feel-good general niceness so we could talk about how great it is to gather in Jesus name. Instead I was stuck with taking the verse out of context (boo) or leading a study on conflict resolution.