Merry Christmas!

SIL, son, and myself!

How gorgeous is this place?  Looks like a calendar pic!

Snow!

My handsome boys!

Christmas greetings from the beautiful and sunny CA!  It's been AMAZING weather here, with temps approaching 70 during the day; fabulous :)  Despite the warm days, the nights have been very crisp and cold, so it definitely feels like Winter, no worries!

We are hosting my fabulous sister in law this week.  SO Happy to have her here!  We're not travelling as much this time as we did when she came back in October, but we're spending plenty of quality time together and just enjoying her presence.

I didn't ride last week due to my office Christmas party in the middle of the day; it was Cheesecake Factory, so I HAD to take advantage of a quality lunch AND cheesecake ;)  Since the restaurant is attached to one of the big malls, I used the opportunity to finish up the son's shopping.  Didn't find everything I was looking for, but did find a few things for him.

Planning to ride tomorrow, and SIL is coming with me to watch and take pics!  Hope Miss Jade is good, S has ridden her a few times and said that she was alternately "good", and "interesting", haha :)  The Waterford bit came in, so I'm going to try her in that with a regular cavesson tomorrow and see what she thinks.

We went to Yosemite Tuesday (Christmas Eve), and had a BLAST.  There was snow on the ground, ice on the ground, and the temps ranged from 62-32!  It was our second time, SIL's first time ... good times.  I have a TON of pics, but it takes time to upload all that, so y'all will just have to have patience ;)

We went to church last night (Christmas day).  SIL enjoyed it!  She totally gets why we like Pastor Jimenez so much.  He went over Matthew Ch 2 and went over the REAL Christmas story.  I learn something every single day I step foot in that church, LOVE it.  I'm about half way through Leviticus right now, making slow progress, but definitely making progress.  I'm trying to dedicate a little less time to the computer, and more time in prayer and Bible reading.  I've gotten pretty good with cooking good, healthy food and keeping my house clean vs. being on the computer every single second of my free time.  It's been good for me.  We only have an antennae hooked up for TV, so David and I watch barely any TV together anymore, down from about an average of 3 hours per night, about 8 hours a day on the weekends.

My exercise has been interrupted by the arrival of the sis due to her bed being in the middle of my living room, but I won't magically gain back 10 lbs in a week.  I took the dogs for my nice little 3 mile circle; the dog park, then the human park.  Tomorrow I'll ride.  I've done pretty well food wise, so hopefully it won't be too hard to get back on track Monday.

I'll leave y'all with this synopsis for now, and elaborate more a little later.  It's 11:30, and everyone has ditched me for bed, so I guess I need to follow!  Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, and wishing you a continued peaceful holiday as we approach the New Year.  God bless!

Your weekly dose of scripture and motivation

Going healthy :)

Hello!  I am VERY pleased to report I did not cheat myself out of any exercise time this week and did my Insanity every single day like a good girl :)  Lunch has been an adventure!  Carrots, a "salad" of black beans/chick peas/mini corn/red onion/cucumber/italian dressing, yogurt, Kashi bar, string cheese, and a piece of fruit.  It's lots of "munchy" food and I get my crunch desire satisfied, but by the time dinner comes around I'm ready to eat, so not stuffing myself with too many calories.  I've traded in my wheat containing Cheerios for gluten free Rice Chex, and dinner is just whatever.  I wish I could cut out the wheat 100%, but I had to "go cheap" at the grocery store :(  I spent $75 at Bel Air last week on all my "healthy food" that didn't make a single 'dinner' meal, but did last me for lunch.  Spent $79 today at Winco foods and got 9 nights worth of dinner plus a few lunch items.  Sad, I know.  Also rode 3 times this week, so definitely got in some good moving around!

This morning was one of those days where I wondered where the message was heading.  We always begin service (after singing) with reading a full chapter of the Bible.  Today it was 2Kings Ch 7.  It's a slightly confusing story of men robbing a tent, people locked inside a city being offered a chance to buy flour, and a lord getting trampled at the end.  I thought it was going to be a sermon on the evils of Black Friday, lol!  No seriously, this just goes to show how good and focused Pastor Jimenez is.  He was able to develop the sermon, referring back often the Ch 7, and I got the point of the whole thing.  I think I told y'all that sometimes at the end of a church service, I would leave feeling somewhat confused.  Or even feeling as though I was just too stupid to get the point of the sermon.  So far, I've never felt that way at Verity, I always leave feeling like I learned something.

Basically, 2Kings7 is a story of a starving Israel locked inside the walls of a city.  In Deut28:52-57, God tells the Israelites they will be punished by a famine so severe, they will begin to eat their own children.  In 2Kings, this prophesy comes to pass.  It was because of their sins that they brought upon them this horrible, horrible famine.  In 2Kings6:26, a woman talks of how she actually killed and ate her son!  The people were desperate, and utterly hopeless.

The story relates to our modern life; how many of us have felt like our situation was completely hopeless?  You were totally desperate, unable to see a way out, maybe even contemplating suicide?  2 things to keep in mind; 1.  We don't know HOW God works.  2.  We don't know WHEN God works.  When life seems worthless and hopeless, God is always working on the other side.  He uses people that are in our lives, SINNERS, to help us through.  He uses the ordinary to do the extraordinary.  He brings us through our hard times in unexpected ways, and always in His own time.  We need to walk by FAITH, and NOT by sight.

Back to 2Kings7 ... 4 lepers decided to enter into the city after coming across a camp of Syrian soldiers and pilfering all their food.  The offer to sell flour and meat for a reasonable rate, just as God had said.  He used LEPERS, who were the blight of civilization back in biblical times to bring hope to the people of Israel.  The lepers took a risk, it worked out.  When YOU take a risk, when YOU take the first step, God will meet you there.  If you go to church and enjoy it, good for you.  Your life will not be fully blessed because you lack the faith to take it a step further.  You MUST grow in your journey as a Christian; share the gospel, invite people to church, give offering, tithe, get baptized, THEN you will begin to see your life be truly blessed.  Walk by Faith.

I've always loved "Walk by Faith" by Jeremy Camp.  That song was running through my head as the pastor went through the sermon today.  I'm so thankful that God is allowing me to open up and FINALLY grow in my own journey ... I'm 34 years old, and I rarely have ever openly talked about God, the Bible, or anything related to religion.  While I'm still not ready yet to go door to door and minister that way to people, I do bring it here to the blog.  I do give offering.  In January, we will begin to tithe even though it's going to hurt!  I have invited several co-workers to church even though they haven't come yet. I'm going to be faithful in my giving, faithful in my volunteering, and faithful in my faith and see where I'm at this time next year.  Looking forward to continuing to grow spiritually and always remembering that when things seem unmanageable, God is always working in unseen, unexpected ways.

Recharging!

3/4 of my loves!  Getting in a little exercise and Vitamin D!

I think we all need a little re-charge now and then.  That's what I feel like is going on with me right now.  I feel SO good being here in CA, but it's still LIFE.  It's still WORK.  It's not some big, giant vacation.  My life, OUR life, finally got on track after finding and getting involved with a church.  I definitely feel like in a big way I've been born again spiritually.  Last year, I was reborn in the body.  This year, I was reborn in the spirit.  Now?  I need to be reborn in both at the same time, lol!  I started over ... AGAIN ... this morning, Insanity.  It took me a few false starts the first time I did it too, to really get in the habit of doing it, so hopefully this time it sticks with me.  I went to the grocery store after work (when I was quite hungry, incidentally) and tried to buy some good, fresh, food.  Got some big, sweet apples, yogurt, Kashi granola bars, popcorn, and some veggies.  Had grilled shrimp and quinoa/brown rice mixture for dinner tonight.  Going to throw together a cold bean salad tonight for my protein source for lunch the rest of the week.  Last year, I ate cold cut ham held together with Laughing Cow soft cheese, but cold cuts aren't the healthiest of foods.  I'm not looking to go LOW CALORIE, I'm looking to go healthy.  Going to try and enjoy more veggies, less fruit ... a typical lunch last year would be a banana, a container of melons, another container of grapes, the cold cut/laughing cow cheese combo, and a serving size of tortilla chips.  Good food, but probably too much sugar.  I want to try and cut out wheat as much as possible from my life, because I have come to the conclusion that I am pretty addicted to it.

Honestly, it is nice to read that many of my peers have also "fallen off the wagon" a little bit.  Comfort in numbers, I suppose.  I allowed myself to pig out at TG, now I've recharged my will, recharged my zeal for health, and recharged my desire to challenge myself to rise above junk food.  Got to recharge my soul a little bit when I got to see my Honorary Little Sis Nicole!  She is a wonderful friend, a wonderful person, and I've missed seeing her!  Seeing as how we're not quite on our feet enough yet to buy plane tickets back to the good 'ol east coast, I jumped at the opportunity to make a little 2 1/2 hour drive southwest to the little bay town of San Jose to go see my soul sister.  He husband was born and raised in Cali, so it was natural they'd have to come out this way SOME time, and it's quite fortunate they're in the bay area, and not way down by LA :)  It was so nice to have some good conversation with someone I know ; though I'm branching out and making an actual effort to get to know people here, I've always been a loner.  Even loners get lonely sometimes, though!  It's nice not to have to work so hard at the conversation :)

I've also recharged a bit in my equine life.  I've had a nice 5 month break, now I'm beginning to miss it (as I knew I would), and fortunately, I've found some opportunity to ride!  I rode for the first time this past week, and while my seat bones are super sore, my soul is super satisfied ;)  Though my wallet will feel the pain, it was great to have a week off at Thanksgiving, and though my wallet will feel the pain AGAIN, I'll have a week off at Christmas too.  I have faith that God will see us through it, and just try to relax and enjoy!  Extra riding time, woo hoo!  It also makes me happy that my husband is so happy.  He's a quiet guy, and I knew when he talked about how much of a rut he was in, he was unhappy.  Vacations are the BEST!  Ever since moving out here, it's like this huge weight has been lifted off his shoulders, certainly thankful for that too.

Love y'all, thanks for reading my blog.  I try to be uplifting, informative without TMI, and motivational even when I'm failing to a degree.  I'm definitely not anywhere close to being perfect, but I enjoy inspiring people :)  Keep on keepin' on, and enjoy this holiday season!  Remember to be thankful for everything you have, and don't worry about anything you don't have.