So much to be thankful for!

Well I hosted my first Thanksgiving! I def never pictured it without hubby, but I realize that I have SO much to be thankful for... whether he is home or not! Wednesday night Britt and Em came over and the cooking of the feast began & we started to tackle the turkey! Britt and I were quite horrified in the beginning and weren't even sure which holes in the turkey we were supposed to clean out ;)  

I won't lie...This was a proud moment ;) We prepared our first TURKEY!

Looks pretty yummy...Stuffed with carrots and onions!

One full oven! :)

An awesome pic of our table setting from Britt's camera! 

Cheers! Thanksgiving lunch in our PJ's!

And of course, Sophie joined us! She even got her own plate because she sat patiently while we ate ;) 

I felt so incredibly blessed to be able to have a Thanksgiving meal like this & I am just so thankful for the people God has hand placed in my life. I am also so thankful that my husband continues to provide for me even when he is serving overseas and made it possible for me to host this meal for such sweet friends. What a great 24 hours of thanking God for our husbands, family, friendships, and even getting a bit of girl time (shopping) in ;)

Trevor decided since he wasn't here to experience my first Thanksgiving feast, that we will be having Thanksgiving Part II in April :) Can't wait! Who wouldn't want to celebrate Thanksgiving twice in one year?!?!

"Just stay busy, it'll make this time pass"

Sound familiar? It def does to me... It's the advice that I'm given the most often as a military wife whose husband is deployed.

About 2 weeks ago, a friend of mine and roomie who lived with us for 5 months moved out to prepare for her soldier coming home from Iraq. I had all sorts of emotions that week. What I quickly realized is that I really can cherish this alone time. I never thought I would actually enjoy being alone, but I feel refreshed and as if God has just been waiting for me to  experience what it's like to be "recharged" by Him and Him alone. I love coming home from work now and just hanging out with Sophie and reading, doing a craft, or catching up on Hulu. It is such a gift from God to embrace this alone time since I would not consider this my favorite season of life (mainly b/c my hubby is 5,000 miles away from me!)

If you would have asked me over the past 10 years what my biggest fear was, I would quickly blurt out "being alone." This has been a deep rooted fear of mine for a long time.
Going back to the first time my mama was diagnosed with breast cancer... I was 8 years old and I remember thinking "What would happen to me? Where would I go? Who would take care of me if something happened to my mom?" The underlying question was always "Will I be alone?"

As my fear moved from childhood fear of not having parents into adulthood it became a fear of lonliness in general. I never liked to be alone. It got to the point where I naturally made myself busy without even realizing it. I used to think that I was the type of person who simply was "recharged" by being around lots of people. I have recently realized that I don't think that is necessarily the case, instead I was filling my gap by being surrounded by other people or by being busy.

I could go on and on about how fruitful this time has been, but I'm going to save that for another post. It has been a sweet two weeks for the Lord and I and I'm thankful that He has been faithful to show me this. It just makes me sad because I know so many wives who love the Lord and think that staying "busy" will help the time go by as if they can race through this year of their life. If you think about just wanting this season to pass, it's as if you're holding a stop sign in front of God saying "I'm sorry, I cannot be used by you until my husband is home with me" or even "I cannot sit in your presence still because I have to stay busy to make this time go by..."Do we really make deals like this with our Creator? We try to...but they don't work, when we try to "bargain" with God, we never win. We may feel as if we are winning, but can not really experience true fruitfulness and restoration until we surrender the thought that we deserve something from Him. I feel like I need to distinguish between "busying yourself" and having special things to look forward to during deployment...the first one is a way of trying to make this time go by without thinking about our purpose in it or even being thankful for it. Yes I said it, thankful for deployment. I would never wish deployment on anyone, but my husband and I have both said that our marriage has already grown in incredible ways in less than 2 months of him being gone, so yes, we are thankful for that. I think every wife should have special things to look forward to during deployment and that is something very different than mindlessly busying yourself! God is challenging me to sit still in his presence and embrace this season of my life...if you are a military wife of a deployed servicemember, it's my challenge to you as well!

A sweet moment

I'm sitting on my couch writing with Sophie cuddled up next to me with my Gatorade and Chicken Noodle soup because I have the stomach flu...ugh. Let me just say that I have NEVER missed my husband more than I have this week. Being sick and alone is one of the most vulnerable and frustrating feelings. Thankfully, this sickness came on AFTER our garage sale that morning. We had a great garage sale and sold a ton of stuff but the best part was getting to go through more boxes in our garage and consolidate/get rid of things!


As I was plowing through a box, I found this picture of my mama and I. I don't even remember this picture being taken and honestly don't even remember where we were, but it was my favorite part of the day for sure. It is so so sweet. My mama is wearing one of her colorful chemo hats that she wore so well and I just love the image that is captured here. Thank you God for this sweet reminder of my lovely mother, it was like a breath of fresh air to find!