Here's To You

Today is a pretty special day. 

Six years ago today I married the love of my life.  Little did I know that December 17^th, 2005 would be the start of an amazing, challenging, eye-opening, challenging, encouraging, and yep you guessed it…challenging piece in the puzzle of my God-given life.  It hasn’t been easy.  It hasn’t been perfect.  It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done.  A question from a book that I read on marriage has stuck with me since the day I read it: “What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy?”  **Cue “deer in the headlights” facial expression.**

Once in awhile, Nate and I realize the situation we got ourselves into and recognize the craziness of it all.  Six years of marriage, three years of dating, and one stinkin cute kiddo later, we never had any inkling of this happening 15 years ago.  We knew each other long before we started dating.  We were awkward 7^th graders when we first met.  Both of us would say if we had dated each other in high school, there’s no way in heck we would've lasted.  So we usually thank God for his grace that allowed us to not let our hormones get the best of us ;-) Although, that would’ve been a sight to see…a punky, I’m-too-cool-for-school guy and an insecure, so-what-if-I-pretend-to-be-someone-I’m-not girl.  Um yeah, if you’d like a visual of this description you should see the pictures from our junior year prom that we apathetically attended together.   

**You might want to get your barf bags ready, because I’m gonna get pretty mushy in a second.**

I am grateful that 10 years ago, Nate started to boldly pursue me.  I’m grateful that he kept pursuing me after I shot him down when he first asked me out.

I’m grateful that Nate is the optimistic one in the relationship.  He’s usually the one to put my Debbie-downer attitude in check.

I’m grateful that through major life changes, Nate has led with a love that screams “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.”

I’m grateful that in my post-partum manic depressive emotional state, Nate continued to love and care for me, despite my ugliness. 

I love this man that God has given me.  We are perfect for each other.  My weaknesses are usually his strengths, and my strengths are usually his weaknesses.  Through Nate, God has shown me so much of myself…the good parts and the ugly parts.  The parts of myself that I’d rather not see, but God chooses to use it to make me more like Him.  I love that over the years we have learned to communicate better, love each other better, and challenge each other more.  I am thankful for Nate’s hard-working nature that provides for me and Livi.

So, everybody raise your glasses…

Here’s to you my one and only love of my life, Nate Miller.  Until death do us part!

And now for a few choice photos from our wedding day six years ago:

Soups On!

So since my blogging has been a little scant lately, I gave myself the goal this week to post two blog entries by the end of the week.  After being on such a hiatus, two blog entries in one week is quite the challenge for me.  I decided I’m going to start working toward my goal by posting the “easier” of the two entries, because, let’s be honest here…I’d much rather spend some time on Facebook or Pinterest.

Speaking of Pinterest…

Pinterest is good for a lot of things (and not good for a lot of other things…such as, it’s a major time waster and I have to really guard myself from getting into major comparison mode).  I’ve gleaned some choice nuggets from many a pin, and it rouses my creativity juices big time.  Since being active on Pinterest, I have found it to be so helpful with my meal planning!  There is a wealth of foodie ideas that motivate me to get out of my same-old-same-old dinnertime rut.

We’re headed into the deep, dark, cold months of winter, and I have been on a soup kick lately.  I love soups!  They’re WAY easy to make, and generally they have a majority of the food groups in them so that means less dinner prep for me!  WOO HOO! 

I’ve been in the market to find a White Chicken Chili recipe that is both easy and flavorful.  I found this soupalicious gem the other week during my Pinterest perusal.    

Now that I have your mouth watering, here’s the recipe.  Props to the original poster can be found by clicking HERE.  Enjoy!

White Chicken Chili

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 2 cups cooked chicken (I usually use an oven-baked rotisserie chicken from the grocery store to save on time), shredded
• 2 cans Great Northern Beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 can corn, drained
• 1 can (4 ounces) green chilies
• 1/2 teaspoon cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon oregano
• 1 box (32 ounces) chicken broth
• Kosher salt (to taste)
• Pepper (to taste)
• 1 lime, juice

Directions:

1. In a large pot, sauté the onion and cook until it starts to become translucent.
2. Once the onion is done, add shreds of chicken, Great Northern Beans, corn, green chilies (with juice from can), cumin and oregano to the large pot. Stir to combine all of the ingredients and then add the chicken broth.
3. Bring to a boil and simmer for 20-30 minutes to allow the broth to reduce. Add salt and pepper (to taste) and juice from one whole lime. (You can add 1/2 cup of chopped cilantro if you desire. I personally don't like cilantro so I serve it as a side.)
4. Leave simmering on stove until ready to serve.
5. Serve with sour cream, chopped cilantro, shredded Pepper Jack cheese, avocado, or tortilla chips.

My Life These Days

So I recently remembered a funny video clip my sister once shared with me.  When I first saw it I gave a hearty chuckle, but I didn't fully understand the reality of it because I believe I had just had Olivia.  She was still in her fresh, newborn, squirmy, sleepy stage, and she hadn't even found her little voice yet.  Twenty months later, it's a different story.  Livi's an active, chatty, repetitive, question-filled toddler.  Throughout the day she often repeats phrases over and over, testing my patience to its core.  As much as I love my sweet Livi, the constant, broken record-esque words/phrases, sure is God's way of teaching me patience during the short span of each day I spend with her.

The clip is from the show Family Guy.  It's a "dialogue" (once you see it you'll see why I use " " for the word dialogue) between Stewie, the baby, and Lois, the mother.  It's kinda comedic how closely this reflects part of my life these days.

Thanksgiving Blogwagon

I am currently enjoying the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade as Livi busily entertains herself with her new Elmo potty book on the living room carpet.  Nate and I, still clad in our plaid jammies, relax in the sunlight streaming through our large picture window. 

A couple of my blogging friends have already posted their “what I’m thankful for” blog entry, and I thought I’d jump on that blogwagon before I enter my turkey/sweet potato/stuffing Thanksgiving coma and find it too difficult to lift a lazy finger to type.

So here it is…my Thankful on Thanksgiving list:

*Jesus – “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:6-8 

*my amazing husband

*my sweet Olivia  

*being able to live in the same town as both sides of our family

*lifetime friends

*Northridge Church

*crazy dog Annie

*the ability to be a stay at home momma

*home sweet home

*4 years with Cru

*being smacked in the face a bunch of times this past year with what God chose to teach me

*music

*good books I have recently read

These are just a few of my “thankfuls.”  Making this list is one of those things that I could work on endlessly.  The list would be insane!  So, what are you thankful for???  Share the thanks!...Leave a comment! 

A Little Sweetness

If you know me well, you know I love my sweets.  There’s an added bonus if the sweets are properly paired with a salty.  If I have a combination of the two in front of me (ex: a bowl of M&Ms and a bowl of pretzels), I could literally gorge myself silly going back and forth between the two.  DANGEROUS!

Overall, I much prefer the sweet over the salty, and in the sweet department, I prefer anything chocolate.  The chocolate obsession, I believe, is hereditary.  I still have memories of my grandma telling me how much she loved chocolate as she mischievously grinned from ear to ear, fully exposing her chocolaty gooed Milky Way teeth.  After she passed away, I even inherited her Hershey’s Chocolate Lover’s Cookbook.

In the beginning of the month I shared a meal recipe and today I’m going to share a dessert recipe with you.  Side note: I’ve just decided now that this is going to be a monthly occurrence (one meal recipe in the beginning of the month and one dessert recipe about midway through the month).

I have a little bit of a confession to make.  This recipe that I’m going to share with you…I haven’t actually made them myself.  I fully enjoyed eating them at a picnic, and my friend so graciously passed the recipe onto me.  Oatmeal Carmelitas are so amazingly delicious!  It’s chocolate…it’s caramel…it’s crunchy goodness all rolled into one!  One thing I know for sure is that I CANNOT WAIT to make them!  I’m actually currently texting away to my grocery store-bound husband the ingredients that I need so I can make them TONIGHT!  So here it is!  I hope you enjoy them as much as I do!

Oatmeal Carmelitas

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 cups uncooked quick-cooking oats

1 1/2 cups firmly packed light brown sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup butter, melted

1 (12-oz.) package semisweet chocolate morsels

1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts, toasted (optional)

1 (14-oz.) package caramels

1/3 cup half-and-half

1. Stir together first 5 ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Add butter, stirring until mixture is crumbly. Reserve half of mixture (about 2 3/4 cups). Press remaining half of mixture into bottom of a lightly greased 13- x 9-inch pan. Sprinkle evenly with chocolate morsels, and, if desired, pecans.

2. Microwave caramels and half-and-half in a microwave-safe bowl at MEDIUM (50% power) 3 minutes. Stir and microwave at MEDIUM 1 to 3 more minutes or until mixture is smooth. Let stand 1 minute. Pour evenly over chocolate morsels. Sprinkle evenly with reserved crumb mixture.

3. Bake at 350° for 30 minutes or until light golden brown. Cool in pan on a wire rack. Cut into bars.

Introverted Cinnamon Crunch Lover

It’s Nate’s Monday day off, and I decided to take some time to myself.  I’m currently sitting in one of my favorite chill places.  I have a toasty, delicious beverage, and I just absolutely scarfed down a toasted cinnamon crunch bagel with hazelnut cream cheese.  Any guesses where I am?  Anyone?  Anyone?  If you happened to guess Panara…ding ding ding!  High five!

Wanna know what else?  There’s a couple of people sitting together about 20 feet behind me over my right shoulder that I totally know.  Like I usually see them on a weekly basis.  I’m being anti-social.  As soon as I walked in I spotted them, and I did the ol’ body/head tilt away from their general direction.  After I put my order in, I grabbed a table in the corner near the window, and I strategically sat in the seat that looked out the window…thereby giving the majority of the Panarians (yep, I just made that up!) a splendid view of the back of my head. 

There are just some days I want to be all alone.  Am I being selfish?  That’s a hypothetical question by the way, because I don’t want to see anyone answer that question in the comments below thank you very much.  I once took this personality test and the first personality trait it measures is whether you are an introvert or an extrovert.  So either you are energized by being alone or you are energized by being around people.  Let’s just say I scored a pretty high number for being an introvert.  Now I can definitely schmooze it up when I need to.  Schmoozing is quite an art I’ve learned throughout my life and especially after being in full-time college ministry for 4 years.  I can even, when asked enough times, speak in front of large groups of people.  This not only goes against my introverted personality, but it rips at my fear of public speaking.  There were times, and there will always be times, where I have to exercise my extrovertedness as my introvertedness is screaming within me. 

One of the greatest desires of my life is to influence people for Christ.  When it comes to my introvertedness, there’s a word in that last sentence that makes a HUGE difference.  PEOPLE.  In order to influence PEOPLE I have to be okay with stepping out of my comfort zone.  I have to rely on Someone other than myself for the strength to make that step.  When I am in the place where I have to exercise my extrovertedness instead of my introvertedness I can only run to God and ask Him to show His strength through my weakness.  Yes, I know me being introverted isn’t necessarily a weakness because that’s the way God molded my personality.  But when me being introverted causes me to be selfish?…that’s a different story! 

So I write this as a reminder to myself that there’s a nice balance between being a healthy introvert and being a selfish introvert.  Where is that middle balancing ground?  I don’t know if I’m quite sure I know the specific answer for that yet.  Any tipper-roos are welcome though J !

Coping By Cleaning

Everybody copes with stress/conflict/difficulties in one way or another.  It’s an ugly truth. 

Some people eat (GUILTY!!!).  Some people shop (GUILTY!!!).  Some people exercise (wish I could be found even an inkling guilty for this one!). 

Some people sweep it under the rug, plaster a forced smile on their face, and pretend everything’s a-ok.  Some people busy their lives with countless activities.  Some people, in their conversations with innocent bystanders, make jabs at the one they are hurt by. 

Yikes!  This is getting a little deep!  Let’s move on…

So this past week Nate and I got into a little tiff.  Yes, every couple fights, and it knocks my socks off when I hear someone in a relationship say, “Oh, we don’t really fight” or the newly dating/newly married couple that sheepishly grin and say, “We haven’t had a fight yet.”  One meaty word for you: BALOGNA!  Anyyyyywayyyyy, Nate and I were having a little conflict sesh.  Don’t ask me what it was about because I couldn’t tell you.  That’s how ridiculous it probably was.  So the way I often initially deal with conflict is I ignore it, while playing the situation/conversation in my head over and over.  I stop talking.  I shut down.  And forget about eye contact with me because there’s no way I’m giving it to you.  So, in the midst of this conflict with the hubster I began to clean the kitchen.  By this point Nate had left the room because I was ignoring him all together.  This was happening post-dinner so I had to clean the kitchen anyway.  However, after the dishes were in the dishwasher and the table and counters were wiped clean, I continued to clean.  I proceeded to clean and organize the fridge (which, hardly ever gets done), wipe down the outside of all the appliances, and use the scrubby part of the sponge along with spray bleach to re-wipe all the already clean countertops.  What in the world?!?  I had automatically turned into a mean, lean, cleaning machine in a matter of a few minutes, all the while replaying the conflict in my head.  At some point during my kitchen cleaning quest, I made the connection that I was avoiding the current situation with Nate.  I realized that the conflict I was trying so hard to keep inside of me was bubbling out through the action of cleaning.  Instead of working through the conflict with Nate in a healthy way, I chose the unhealthy route by trying to ignore it.

It’s so hard to actually make the choice to act in humility in the midst of conflict.  It’s just not natural.  It feels so against my own selfish desires.  But that’s just it…I’m selfish.  I want things to go my way.  I want to be the one to always be right.  Sometimes it just feels easier to avoid conflict and cope with it in a hundred different ways instead of the one way that it should be dealt with.  Suck it up and face it head on!  Easier said than done, right? 

The lead pastor at our church often refers to two choices in life: the choice to please God or the choice to please self.  It seems kinda simple.  It seems like the obvious choice would always be to please God.  But can I get an AMEN on the fact that it’s just sometimes easier to please self?  It’s such a constant battle of everyday life: Driving down the road and the old lady in front of me is going insanely slow?  Please God…Please self?  A friend talking trash about another mutual friend or family member?  Please God…Please self?  The babe is clearly doing something she knows she shouldn’t be doing?  Please God…please self?  The house is a complete and utter mess?  Please God…please self?  Someone says something hurtful to me?  Please God…please self.  You get the idea…the list is ENDLESS.  Every day I am faced with multiple opportunities to either please God or to please self.  

Now, I’d love to hear from you on a couple things!  What is one way you have found yourself coping with a difficult situation?  What is one practical way you can choose to please God instead of pleasing self (either in the midst of conflict or just in general)?