If Given A Chance

On Monday my sister and I made the trip home to gather with our family and say goodbye to one of our most precious members. After 38 years of living with Cerebral Palsy , my cousin Chance, left his wheel chair to dance in the presence of God.

How awesome it was to sit shoulder to shoulder with those who were blessed to know him and celebrate his full and fun life. He did more in 38 years than most do in a lifetime. His journey, while not an easy one, was clearly blessed by God. He had family, friends and caretakers that adored him. He had opportunities and he led.

Perhaps the most beautiful thing about his life was his desire to know God. He certainly questioned.  Who wouldn’t? But he never doubted. It was as if knowing God was his life’s mission and toward the end of his life, that relationship with God was sealed and strengthened. What a beautiful thing to watch.

We sang this song at Rock City on Sunday and as we sang it, I could picture Chance, no longer confined to his cumbersome wheel chair and limited speaking ability, running, dancing and singing with Jesus.

If given a chance, wouldn’t you want that? I look forward to playing all of the games we missed out on as children when I see him again someday. My bet is he’ll be a much faster runner than me.

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Pinterest Makes Me Mean

I have always been a magazine lover. On any given day, you might find a Martha Stewart, Rachel Ray, Real Simple or Oprah magazine peeping out of my mailbox. I love to read through them, get ideas, recipes and make plans. Admittedly, I rarely, if ever actually do anything with those plans and I can probably count on one hand the times I have actually used a recipe found in one of my magazines. But it’s ok. Because magazines are just entertainment. They are produced by people who get paid to be creative and crafty. They aren’t real.

Enter Pinterest.

I was an early adopter of Pinterest. I jumped on the bandwagon fairly quickly because I loved the concept of endless creative sharing and evolution. And to my surprise, I find that I actually use quite a few of the ideas I come across on Pinterest. They seem a little more within reach. It’s a “if she can do that, I can do that,” type of thing.

But …

Pinterest also makes me mean. Or maybe it’s jealous or maybe sometimes after a perusing I feel like a big old loser.

I mean, who really has the time to wax seal monogram children’s birthday invitations or who, when at a dollar store, sees a pot scrubby and thinks: “I could make a gorgeous wreath out of that?” And then on top of that, who has the time, in between their homeschooling and making all of their own organic vegan baby food to blog about it with gorgeous layouts and pictures?

Who does that?

It’s the plight of women isn’t it. The constant comparing. The constant feeling like we’re not doing enough.

I love what Galatians 6:4 says to me about this very topic:

Make a careful exploration of who you are and the work you have been given, and then sink yourself into that. Don’t be impressed with yourself. Don’t compare yourself with others. Each of you must take responsibility for doing the creative best you can with your own life.

This hit me like a ton of bricks last night as my sister and I set out for our annual McCall Sister Christmas Cookie Baking Extravaganza. She’s a super busy ER Nurse with a little side business that is growing like a weed. You can see that HERE! I am coming off of the busiest week of my year and gearing up for another busy weekend ahead and then of course there’s Christmas.

Anyways … let’s just say we were ambitious. We had plans to make 5 or 6 kinds of cookies to share with all of our friends but after our first batch of peanut blossoms we looked at each other and said: “that’s it … we ain’t got no more to give.”

We popped our last blossom onto the cooling rack and then plopped ourselves right on the couch. And there we stayed for about two hours.

There was nothing Pinterest-worthy about it. But we had a wonderful time there on the couch and I left feeling recharged after a good long talk with my sis and lots of laughs instead of exhausted and cookie’d – out.

As we head into the Christmas homestretch, I challenge you to write out that verse in Galatians and post it somewhere where you can see it each day.  And then when your sister-in-law shows up to your family Christmas with home-made soaps wrapped in paper she pressed out of fresh pine leaves and organic wild oats, you won’t be quite as tempted to think bad thoughts about her in your pretty little head.

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Days Away

We just returned from some wonderful time off. We’ve been blessed with some days away here and there since we launched Rock City in April of last year, but this was our first “Sunday” away and our first family vacation since we launched. The girls are at the perfect “Disney” age so we headed South just as the crazy cold rain hit Columbus.

Disney is a bit overwhelming. There are so many choices … stay at Disney or not? Dining plan or not? Drive or Fly?

Luckily, I had the assistance of an amazing travel agent who literally helped me plan every detail of our trip. She booked our dinner reservations, and even planned which days we should go to which parks to avoid the crowds. It was awesome and right up my “detail obsessed” alley.

If you are looking to head to Disney in the near future, I’d definitely give Amanda from Mouseketrips a call. Her services are free and she rocks.

Here are a few of my favs from our trip. The girls had an absolute, over the top, blast (as you can see). And Chad and I loved every minute of watching their little imaginations explode.

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9 Things To Help Your Marriage Now! – Pt 3

Here are the final three of the 9 Things That Will Help Your Marriage Now.

You can read the first three HERE!

And the second three HERE!

7. We affirm each other publicly and privately. There’s nothing like hearing my husband was bragging on me to someone else. Husbands and wives want to know that their spouse is proud of them. What they do. What they’ve accomplished. The type of person that they are. Along those lines, Chad and I are both the type of people that desire honest and constructive feedback. There’s not a week that goes by that Chad doesn’t walk up to me after preaching a message to get my feedback. And I give it to him. Honestly and openly. But the tone in that moment must always be affirming. Even while pointing out some things that he could tweak to make it better, he needs my affirmation. He does the same for me.

8. We pray sneaky prayers. (This isn’t as weird as it sounds) I’m not the deepest sleeper. In fact, I normally wake up 2 or 3 times a night. This used to frustrate me to no end but several years ago, God really started to show me how much my husband needed me to pray for him. So, I started using those late night interruptions to do just that. Even if it’s just for several minutes each night. He has no idea I’m doing it, but I just quietly pray for him. Sometimes they are simple prayers, sometimes they are bold and crazy God’s-gonna-do-it prayers.  Rather than just laying there frustrated that he is sleeping like a bear in hibernation next to me and I’m wide awake, I make the most of my time and get some work done with God.

9. We just say no. I’ll never forget our first Christmas as a married couple. The thought had never occurred to me that I would no longer be waking up at my parents house on Christmas morning. When I mentioned this to Chad, I thought his eyes were going to pop out of his head. “Katie, we need to begin our own family traditions.” He was right, our lives had changed. It didn’t mean we didn’t see our families on the holidays, of course we did. But it meant that we had to start disciplining ourselves to ensure our family (and especially once we had kids) had the time and space to connect and be strong. This means that sometimes we have to say no. Even to our families. It means we don’t hop to 7 houses on Christmas Day and drag our kids to 6 Thanksgiving Dinners. It means our kids actually enjoy the holidays and aren’t beyond exhausted by the end of them. I’m thankful to Chad for making this a priority for our family. I never could have imagined the difference it would make and how good it would feel to just say no!

That’s a wrap. Obviously, this is not an exhaustive list. Marriage is much more than these 9 simple things, but perhaps you are at a place in your life, like I often find myself in, where you just need to start somewhere. Take some step forward. Start today. Start something simple toward making your marriage what you want it to be. I’d love to hear how it goes!

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9 Things To Help Your Marriage Now! – Pt. 2

Yesterday I shared with you three simple things that Chad and I have found help prevent us from throwing the remote at one another (come on don’t act like you’ve never done that!). You can see them HERE.

And here’s three more that work for us:

4. We let each other sleep in. I know many women who have the “well…if I have to be up at 5:30am with the kids, my husband’s going to be up with me.” attitude. Why? This has never made sense to me. Perhaps their husbands are pleasant and polite when they get up at 5:30, but mine is not. 9 out of 10 days, I get up early with the kids. And I am ok with this. When I need sleep, he let’s me sleep. I don’t assume he knows when I need sleep. I tell him. “Chad – I need sleep or something really bad is going to happen.” Then he rolls out of bed  (albeit grumbly) and entertains the kids. It’s great. There is absolutely no sense in us both being exhausted. So we let each other sleep when we need it.

5. We put our phones away. Once our kids are in bed (and often right when we get home from work), we put our phones away. And by away I mean on silent and out of sight. Our type-A, overachiever, workaholic tendencies go into overdrive when we hear our little phone dinging away with retweets, new emails and texts. We are busy. So that means our time at home has to count.

6. We don’t talk about anything serious after 9:00pm. This includes money, a fight that’s been brewing, major work stuff or major family stuff. We find that if we do, we end up saying things we don’t mean because of our exhaustion. This is hard for me to do because I have “deal with it now” tendencies. But nothing discussed after 9:00pm ever ends well for us. So we try not to do it.

Thanks for all the feedback. Keep it coming! I’d love to hear what works for you! And check back tomorrow for the final three.

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9 Things To Help Your Marriage Now!

I am in the middle of reading pretty good book on marriage. It focuses on the motivations of men and women and how much tension and conflict is caused when we we don’t recognize what motivates us and our spouse. It’s good stuff … really good stuff. But for some reason, I am struggling to connect the dots. It’s not that I don’t think the advice that it is providing is good and that it’s not written from a perspective I agree with … it’s just that right now, we are in a phase of life where if we don’t focus on some super practicals, we just might lose it.

Let me explain. We are in the …

“I can’t find any clean socks – Dear!”
“Is that poop, I smell? Who pooped? Fess up! One of you girls definitely pooped.”
“Did you get that graphic to the printer by noon today? Crap! They needed it by NOON!”
“See you tonight at 6. For What? Morgan’s School Play. Crap! I didn’t know she had a play tonight. Really … because I’ve told you 20 times!”
“Is that peanut butter on the couch? Who smeared peanut butter on the couch!?”
“Ewww…what’s that in your cup holder? That is disgusting.”

Phase.

If the authors of the book I am reading saw our family in action, they would think we were nuts. And you know what? … They would be right. We are nuts. Our life is nuts right now. But here’s the kicker … most days I still really like my husband. 

Over the next couple days, I’m going to share some things that Chad and I have committed to in our life that keep us from going over the edge. These are really, ridiculously practical things and I think they are attainable for those of you who are in the “crazies” phase of life. They aren’t going to solve your deepest marital problems. But for us, they help ease the tension of life and get us to common ground.

Ready. Set. Go.

1. We go to bed at the same time. - This means when one of us is ready to go to bed, we both go. I know this seems weird but it honestly has made a world of difference in our marriage. Sometimes that 10 minutes before we nod off is all we have that day.

2. We send our kids away. A few years back I read a book by a prominent pastor in the U.S. that advised that couples in ministry needed to “go away” for at least one night every other month. I totally got where he was going with that but our careers, past and present, have allowed us to travel all over the U.S. and beyond. We have the Sky Miles to prove it. Most of the time we don’t need to get away. We need to STAY. This means about every other month (sometimes more), we pack our kids up and send them to Grandma’s. Not for one night but for two or three. This may seem strange but it allows us to really relax without the pressures and expense of travel. We veg. We order pizza. We go out to a new restaurant we haven’t tried before. We make breakfast together. We are together, just the two of us, to recharge and our kids have a blast. It’s a win – win.

3. We sit by each other on the couch. Again, kind of silly but can you imagine when you first started dating your husband or wife sitting on the opposite end of the couch as them? Heck no! You wanted to be as close to them as possible. It’s so strange that as our marriages progress, we lose that little excitement that comes from sitting next to the one you love on the couch. Now, I’m not going to tell you that you ever really get that feeling back. Because you don’t. But there’s really no reason to sit on opposite ends of the couch. We try to sit together or at least near one another as we are unwinding from our day. Sometimes we are reading or watching tv. But we are together.

Tomorrow, I’ll share three more things that work for us. Stay tuned!

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Bad, Bad Blogger

Well hello friends. I am clocking in for my monthly summer blog post. I’m not going to lie. I am consciously choosing summer over blogging. I have always loved summer and I loathe snow. I choose 105 degrees over 15 degrees all day long. It is summer that I love and I don’t care who knows it.

My blogs in the summer are sparse to non-existant. And you know what? It’s ok.

Maybe for you it’s not blogging but something else. Something you normally love doing but somehow in the summer you just can’t bring yourself to do. Let it be.

Summer is short. Enjoy it. Leave that dish in the sink. That bed unmade. That email unanswered.

Go outside. Play with your kids. Spend a record number of days at the pool.

Summer is short and this blog is already too long.

See you in the Fall. If you need me I’ll be at the pool

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Places To Go – Funk-EE-Town

It’s been a pretty hot May … literally. Most of our down time has been spent at the pool or in the back yard running through the sprinkler. The girls love going to the park, but the nicer ones near our house have been super busy and don’t offer much shade. Today, after picking up Morgan from preschool and making a stop at the Rock City offices in Victorian Village we decided to stop for a quick lunch and take it to one of our favorite parks .. Funk-EE-Town.

It’s located in Harrison West between West First and West Second Avenues and was built just a year ago as part of the Harrison Park project. This is one of those areas of Columbus that is quickly becoming a hot spot for young professionals and families who are looking to move closer to the city.

The park was named in memory of Mary Funk, a long-time Harrison West resident and advocate. Late last summer, we had the privilege of meeting her son, who spoke of Mary’s life-long love for that neighborhood and how proud she would have been to see where it is today.

It’s a great spot to head to after grabbing a yummy lunch from one of the many food trucks on 5th (today the girls talked me into Happy Meals). There’s plenty of picnic tables, an adorable play area for the little ones, a walking trail and a fabulous gazebo (My girls prefer to spend most of their time there pretending they are on stage).

The best part is that during the week, it is nearly vacant. Today, we literally had the park to ourselves for 2 hours.

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The Mondays: The Final Guardrail

Yesterday was the last message in our series: Guardrails. For the majority of the series we have been talking about Guardrails that will help us avoid life’s biggest regrets. Yesterday, Chad focused on Guardrails that we can place in our life to help us live INTENTIONALLY. Not to keep us from going to a place we don’t want to go, but to help us get to the place we DO want to go.

Ephesians 5: 15-18 makes a strong suggestion that we live as the wise and not as the unwise making the most of every opportunity.

Chad shared three super practical guardrails that we can place in our life to get us where we want to go.

1. Make WORSHIP a priority in my life.
This seems easy enough, but I’m always amazed how much more difficult my life is when I don’t take the time I need … to reflect on God … to thank him and to study his word. I also think that the discipline of worshiping together with other believers each week should be a priority as well.

2. Make COMMUNITY a priority in my life.
The enemy loves to get us alone doesn’t He? He loves to whisper in our ear and tell us that no one values us and we don’t fit in. The reality is that it is so much more difficult to get off track in community. Remember when you were little and you would go on field trips? There is a reason “The Buddy System” worked. It’s harder to get lost … to get into trouble when you have someone or lots of someone’s walking with you. If you aren’t in a LifeGroup … get in one. It will change your life.

3. Make SACRIFICE a priority in my life.
The first two are relatively easy, but this one is where the rubber meets the road. It requires living beyond yourself and living out your faith in really practical ways. I remember in my early 20′s how difficult this was for me. After all, I was all about me. What am I going to do with my life? Who am I going to marry? Where should I live? Should I rent or buy? And on and on it went. It was pretty obnoxious. The reality is that when we live a life of service and sacrifice, all of those things fall into place on their own.

I wish someone would have told my 21 year-old self this. Although I probably wouldn’t have listened.

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Summer Dreams … At Sam’s Club

On the way home from picking up Morgan from Preschool this morning, I had a little breakdown. I didn’t run the car off of the road or anything but I just could not bear the thought of going home. My kids have kind of been at each others throats this week and despite having a super fun playroom, every kid movie ever made and a semi-creative mom (ok marginally creative), they are bored.

As we neared our neighborhood I was desperately thinking of some place we could go. We had already eaten lunch so that was out, I didn’t have our Library books that needed returned with us so that was out and we only had a few hours before nap time so that ruled out any other fun Columbus play type of activity.

Then I remembered: WE NEED APPLES!!! Hallelujah, we need apples. A BIG bag of them.

So, I turned the old Odyssey around and headed toward Sam’s Club. A good decision. Where else can you give your kids free sampless, allow friendly elderly sample sales people to oogle over them, treat them to an inexpensive treats at the snack stand and scan new cameras, coats, books, grills, lawn furniture and incredibly large quantities of green beans? No where on the planet! … except maybe Costco.

We spent the bulk of our time there in the garden and pool area. We looked at beach towels, wagons, incredibly large rafts and super comfy beach chairs. We talked about Summer and how good it will feel to go to the pool and run in the sprinkler.

$12.56 later we emerged the store with two 5lb bags of apples, full tummies and smiles on our faces.

I am grateful for this incredibly mild winter, but winter is winter friends.

Summer and sunshine are only a few months away…just hold on.

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