My BFF's



The ladies...Lynn, Lisa, Me, Laurie, Cindi, Shana

This weekend we had our annual family ladies collectibles get together. We get together the first Saturday of December and having exchanged names, all the ladies on my mom's side of the family exchange gifts...things we collect for our Christmas decorating. This time of the year is so fun! We all look forward to it and have such a wonderful time together. We eat delicious food, exchange beautiful gifts, and fellowship together.

It is a wonderful gift to have family who are also your closest friends. Of course my husband is my best friend in the whole world but these women who I spent Saturday with are my best lady friends. Every girl needs girl friends and I only have a small circle of women who I consider my closest friends and most of them are my family. It is a blessing in life to know you have people who have a vested interest in your life regardless of what is going on because they love you because you are family. As I ponder the important things in life, the really important things, I can't think of one more important than family except my relationship with God. They are glue to my life helping me hold things together when things get loose. They are sure footing when everything else gets unstable. They are comic relief, safe places to tell secrets, constant prayer partners, truth tellers, encouragers, honest challengers...they are friends in the truest sense of the word.

Abby & Kate

Laurie (my mom) and Lynn (my aunt) are sisters and daughters of Roger and Lucy (my grandparents); with the home going of Lucy, they are the matriarchs of our family. Aunt Lynn has two girls, Shana and Lisa. My mom...has me:) and my uncle Larry gave us Cindi. We even have all our daughters, nieces, granddaughters, and cousins involved. I have Lauren and Abby, Lisa has Kate, and my brother gave us Madilyn and Emma. In all 3 generations are represented and before my grandma went home to the Lord, we had 4. How often does this happen I wonder as I sit in a room with some of my most favorite people in the world? How often do people set apart time with their family, focus on their family, make traditions that include generations? I hope it happens often, I hope more people than not get to experience the beauty of being in comfortable peace with family who are also your best friends.

But I don't think it happens nearly as often as it could. So many families are apart, either by physical distance or by emotional distance. So many are hurt and out of that hurt they hurt others. So many are broken, wounded, damaged, grieving, lost, or too busy. The attack on family is intense and has been for so long that the institution of family itself has been forced to reframe itself. Now books and TV movies are sold to show what the modern family looks like; one mommy or one daddy, two mommies or two daddies, step-moms, and step-dads, grandparents who are mommy and daddy, or foster parents, or adoptive parents, or aunts, or uncles, or older siblings, the list goes on and on. And while every single one of us deserves the white picket fence with a dog in the yard, dinner on the table, and homework done in the den...it just doesn't happen for everyone...for nearly anyone. So we hold on to the family system we have, we make it work with one mommy or one daddy, or however it looks and we make it work. And while we may deserve better, what we have can be incredible too and with a whole lot of work, prayer, and love what is built is a beautiful family.

Silly Cousins...Lisa, Cindi, Leanna, Shana

Lisa, Cindi, Leanna, Shana

In my family we don't have the perfect family stories either, we have all walked through hard things, fought for our families, some have lost the fight and we have divorce and heartaches in our pasts. We have hurts, redemptions, restorations, healings, and hard fought battles represented in our family. We have married folks, single folks, aunts, uncles, cousins, second & third cousins, great aunts, great uncles, grandparents, kids, grandkids, nieces, nephews, mentors, confidants, we have it all. And in all the jumble of people that God has lovingly placed together in this family we have every type of personality represented, every opportunity to forgive, every reason to get upset, but we work hard to keep peace, to forgive, to not be offended, to love each other with extraordinary love. As I sat at Lisa's house the first Saturday of December in 2011 I realized again how incredibly blessed I really am...my favorite people are my family, they are my dearest friends, the people I want to spend my time with, and invest into. I am equally blessed to have friendships outside my family but these women are my family, my best friends. How exceedingly blessed am I to be apart of this family!




Abby and Cindi



Lisa and Kate & Leanna and Abby



Lynn and Laurie

Me and my sweet Abby

Me and my sweet girls: Abby and Lauren

Me and my nieces: Madilyn and Emma



Me and my mom, Laurie

Me and my mom



My mom and my girls

My mom and my nieces

Abby and Lauren

All the little girls: Kate, Abby, Emma & Madilyn

3rd Generation: Abby, Madilyn, Lauren, Emma & Kate

Lynn, Lisa and Kate

Shana, Lynn & Lisa

Kate and Shana

Living An Attitude of Gratitude

We all have much to be grateful for in our lives. Even those with hardships can be grateful in the midst of the storm if we choose to be so.

This weekend at church Pastor Paul Daugherty taught on letting Heaven Invade Our Praise. He had several amazing thoughts on this subject and I have reflected on what he taught throughout the weekend and throughout this morning.

To me, allowing God to invade my praise is always remembering I don't know where the person I am looking at is coming from: is her marriage falling apart, has he just lost his job, did she just get an argument with her parents, is he planning to run away, does she have a huge family party she is planning and she is running late, is he headed to an interview, is she packing for college, does she have 30 minutes before the baby wakes up and she is rushing to get home? We all are in different parts of our days when we encounter each other at the bank, in the grocery store aisle, at a stop light, or ordering lunch. What I am choosing to do each day is to remember that what you are going through is just as important as what I am going through and I determine in that moment to make what you are going through better, even if only for a minute. This is my gratitude for all He is in my life changing my attitude.

You know please and thank you are still important words. I work in a high school office and this year I have been working with the students who come to my office to sign in, sign out, call a parent, use a pencil, drop off a note, make a copy, etc. to use pleases and thank yous. You would be amazed how many times they don't, or maybe you wouldn't be surprised! I don't do what they need until they ask me nicely...isn't this something we all learned in Kindergarten but how quickly we all forget the person on the other end of what we have to do in that moment. They want the pencil, the copy, the phone call, the sign out sheet, they forget I am the one attached to making that happen for them and they skip over being polite to get what they need. I am determined NOT to do that in my life. I want to say please and thank you every time, even the times when they don't "deserve" it because that is clearly when they need it most. I have started making eye contact when I say thank you, so the person handing me my receipt, or my drink, or my groceries knows I recognize them and I am thankful for what they have done.

This time of the year is so magical. It is full of people being their best, giving their best but everyday is our opportunity to live a life full of gratitude for all we are blessed with. Even in the storms we are to praise God, in Psalms 34:1 (NLT) it says, " I will praise the Lord at all times. I will constantly speak his praises." All times is all times, there isn't a day off, a situation that exempts us from praising Him and from that gratitude of what He has done, is doing, and is going to do from impacting all areas of our lives.