Love of Love

Welcome February! The month dedicated to all things love and roses. I can’t help but laugh at peoples reactions to Valentines Day. From the deep love of it ( I drove by a house with a sparkly heart wreath on their door today), to the passionate way people hate it and demonize the “money hungry corporations” who created this holiday.

I land somewhere in the middle of the two opinions. I don’t really care about it. But I can easily get on board with the excuse to love one another. Especially in the world today. What is going on with this world?!?! We all need Jesus!

My husband and I don’t actually celebrate though. We don’t buy each other gifts. He doesn’t buy me flowers. Thats not a poor me statement either. I don’t like flowers. Sorry, I think they are beautiful and I understand that there’s a sweet sentiment behind the gesture but every time Pat or anyone has bought me flowers its one day of them being pretty then they die. They sit dead on my counter for a long time before being thrown away. Pat learned early on if he didn’t want to take care of them, he shouldn’t buy them. So he doesn’t.

I do like the idea of Valentines Day though. A day dedicated to love. *insert cheesy romance song*. People say its a corporate holiday made to make people spend money. Sure, it probably is. But I much prefer to think of it as a day when people can be as cheesy as they want and get away with it.

Nana used to buy things for every single holiday. She’d always have some kind of treat/gift for everyone. Even Valentines day. I bought Rylan a Valentines outfit because I know Nana would have. Now that I think about it I need to get a little something for the kiddos in our family. Her traditions are extremely hard to keep up on. She had so many amazing things she used to and it was just second nature to her. Thanks Nana for the giant shoes to fill. One thing my friend and I are doing is trying to put something on our grandmas headstones for each holiday. Roses obviously for Valentines. I’m thinking of doing a bunch of rose petals all over. We’ll clean it up so it looks nice. Always classy things though.

This year Rylan will not be in school on Valentines Day so I’m thinking we’ll celebrate as a family. Not sure what we’ll do yet but we will make cheesy valentines cookies. I’m still not pressuring myself into reading anything but I always love a good romance novel so I’ll probably pick up a few of those through out the month.

This podcast Reading Through Life gave me a lot of good romance recommendations and I added a few to my TBR list. A lot I have already read and agree with their recommendation to read in the month of love.

It Feels Like Goodbye

I deleted my Instagram. Well lets not get carried away. I deleted my Instagram App on my phone.

Have you ever seen a post and had strong feelings about it? Then continued to read other peoples comments on it and get even more heated? I’ve read both posts and responses and felt myself getting angry and wanting to reply with my own thoughts and opinions. Then before I hit send I got slapped with a reality check. These people are nobody’s.

I’m sure they are someone special to the people in their lives but they have no significance in my life what so ever. Want proof? I deleted the app and now they no longer exist to me at all. In a few selections on my phone I made them vanish from my life and you know what? It felt good.

There was a post the other day on Instagram from the Food Network where a mom made homemade pasta with her kids. It was adorable. I read the comments and people were BASHING her for the way she did it. Using a certain kind of flour and that she used eggs when she shouldn’t. Are you kidding me people? What is wrong with us that we feel we need to leave mean comments everywhere? You don’t like the way she did it? DON’T DO IT THAT WAY. But guess what? No one else cares!

I understand commenting on some stuff but can’t we just keep it positive? so you don’t like the way a mom does something, it is possible to think your thought and move on with your day. You don’t have to post it. Shocking I know.

Why are we so worried about what every one else is doing? Isn’t it exhausting? Isn’t being a woman, mom, friend, wife, even just being a human enough? Why are we making it more difficult?

Why are we trying to one up each other? Why are we trying to prove we are the best mom? Or cook? Or athlete?

We should be trying to prove that we are kind. That we care about people as humans. I want to raise Rylan to love everyone. I want her to be kind to everyone. Even those that aren’t kind to her. Chances are those are the ones who need a hug the most. She doesn’t have to hug everyone because lets be real… day care germs. But I’d like the sentiment to be there.

So yes I deleted Instagram. I want to live this summer like a kid from the 80’s. I want to spend my time at the lake and the pool and hiking around the most beautiful places in California (I say California cause I live there and while I want to travel, I’m realistic about hiking and traveling with at 4 year old. I’m not crazy). We live an hour from Yosemite. I should be there every day off. I want to do all these things with out worrying about an Instagram photo or stopping to see who liked it.

Rylan and I are doing things this summer that we want to do.  Things that make us happy not add more stress to our lives. I’m not going to put us in situations that cause us stress anymore.

This also means I’m deleting this website. Its a great outlet for me and I’ve enjoyed putting my thoughts online but I have a journal at home that basically gets the same number of views. *laughing out loud!* not a pity party at all! I have not invested a ton of time or energy into this so I haven’t expected to be making money from it. It started out as fun and its ending on a good note.

Best wishes to everyone! I hope you enjoy your summer as much as we plan to!

Oh and remember if you can’t say anything nice, take a look in the mirror and figure out why you’re being negative. The only thing you can change is your attitude not someone else’s opinion.

 

 

Jesus Culture

Pat: “sorry I just think its weird to drive that far for church”

Me: I get it you think its weird but we wanna go and the bible study girls swear its worth the drive. Its not like we are doing this every Sunday.

Pat: Alright see you around 12.

That was when he thought we were just going to Modesto for church. The Jesus Culture we went to is in Folsom. So instead of driving 45 min (which he thought was ridiculous) I was in fact, driving an hour an half.

The bible study girls were absolutely right. It was well worth the drive. Its not something I can afford to do every Sunday but its worth planning in advance to go to.

I hadn’t been to church in a really long time and this was exactly what I needed.

I fell in love with the worship. I’m not a huge live music person. So much so that if we are at a bar and they start setting up live music I start sweating and pay the tab and get the heck out of there. I don’t like it. BUT I like a legit concert with good music and that’s what worship felt like. A great concert environment with great music and great energy.

The message was even better if that’s possible. Love people. Ground breaking, mind blown, gooesbumps type of message. I loved that overall the message was not to be apart of a church but how to live better and love people better. It went right along with all my Tony Robbins things.

Its positive thinking and being kind and having faith in God. They are now doing a “Church I See” series in their sermons and I love that too. The church they see and that I want to be apart of is full of hope. It looks to the future and asks what we can do for our church not what the church can do for me. In that message alone it does a great deal for me. It switches my focus away from myself and thats extremely freeing and powerful.

Tony Robbins talks about saving your relationship. Suggesting that we do what we did in the beginning of the relationship and there won’t be an end. So I asked myself what was different in the start of my relationship? How as I different towards my husband. Well things were about him. Everything wasn’t constantly about me. Bringing it back to the start and seeing how you can make others happy will essentially make you happier.

After having gone to the church and having a hard time making it back there, I started listening to their podcast and continue to be inspired and motivated. I think the best quote that hit home for me was “Jesus didn’t rise from the tomb for us to be better at church, he rose for us to live a better life”.

I continue to listen to the podcast every week and feel pretty connected to this Church that even though I can’t make it every week I feel better after listening. So if anyone is up for a road trip to Church let me know!