February 20, 2015

break the fast | recipe




There are a few non spiritual things that I think are very important, and breakfast is one of them. Ask any of my friends, and they'll tell you. Especially ask the friends of mine who don't eat it - they've all heard me berating them for it!

I'm not going to explain it because I'm not an expert and that's not my job, but I do encourage you to do some research and I definitely encourage you to break the fast every morning!

I'll be the first to admit I am NOT, by any stretch of the biggest imagination, a morning person. I don't love mornings or anything that goes with them - breakfast included. I used to skip it all the time - my mom making me eat a piece of toast or a muffin when I was younger was torture. When I was a 95 pound 15 year old that was ok, but not so much the older I get!

A year or two ago when I read up on the importance of breakfast I made a genuine effort to eat it every single morning, and let me tell you - it was not easy at all. I really, really did not enjoy breakfast! A piece of fruit, a granola bar, a muffin, a small bowl of cereal - and only one of those things was all I could force down. 

I did finally realize that I just don't like bread first thing in the morning. I wake up with a dry mouth, brush my teeth, come down and bread just isn't appealing to me. We eat biscuits every Saturday morning, and I like them covered in gravy. I love pancakes if I have plenty of blueberry syrup. I will smother a muffin in butter. I wanted to find something I actually enjoy having those first few hours of my day. I did realize that drinking a lot of water first thing helps as well. That, and then just sipping on it while I'm getting ready makes breakfast much more tolerable.

Starting small and recognizing my picky breakfast tendencies, I have found a few things I really like. I love smoothies. In the summer, I could drink one every single morning. Still though, I'm picky about them. I don't like yogurt in them, they can't be too citrus-y, and I have to make them myself. I finally learned to like eggs. Until last year, even the smell of a scrambled egg made my nose wrinkle, but now I love them - just not with cheese or peppers or ham. I like oatmeal now, too - a certain flavor, a certain way, but I like it.

If you don't like breakfast - start small! Make it a habit to eat even the smallest thing every single morning. If you're picky - make it yourself, your way! My mom and sister absolutely love breakfast, and I'm convinced they love every breakfast food ever invented. They've made more varieties of muffins than I can count, and we've reached a point where they don't mind if I don't eat one and I only feel  a little bit guilty now when I don't.

This morning I woke up hungry and decided to try a couple of new recipes. I now have a new favorite breakfast, and I hope you'll try it out if you can!


This smoothie recipe is one I saw on Pinterest and just adapted to my tastes and what I knew I would like. It's supposed to help with energy, but I'm not sure if it actually did or not.

From the bottom of the glass up I have: frozen banana chunks, canned pineapple chunks, and frozen strawberries. The liquid is a little bit of orange juice and the rest is milk. I should have added a little bit of vanilla or maybe some honey because it was a little tart for me. My mom, on the other hand, would have added some vanilla yogurt and no milk just orange juice because she likes the citrus flavor and creamy texture. I like mine sweeter but with and icy texture. If you use fresh fruit, just add some ice to thicken it up, it's really your preference. If you want an exact recipe, here's the one I kind of sort of but actually didn't really use: Energy Boost Fruit Smoothie


This avocado and egg toast combination is really, really good. I love avocados, but they're so expensive around here. My mom found them on sale recently and got several so we've been eating them on everything. 

All you have to do for this one is toast a piece of bread, mash half of a ripe avocado, and scramble your egg. Assemble it, and then add salt and pepper to taste - because of the blandness of the toast, avocado, and egg, you could use a variety of spices. I was just trying it out this morning, but some garlic pepper, or creole, or anything else with a little spice would be amazing. If you use wheat bread, it's also pretty healthy!

I hope this post was helpful, and I hope you're eating breakfast faithfully! Please let me know if you're able to try these recipes, or how you adapt them - I'd love to hear about it!

  
Have a happy morning!








February 19, 2015

gritty details




"The reality is that often the radical abandonment Christ calls us to is not some glamorous sacrifice, but simple obedience in the gritty details of everyday life." 
  
I don’t know where this quote came from other than it was in an email from a friend several years ago. If they came up with it themselves, bravo, because it’s been my “life quote” for some time now.

As I struggled with what to do on this blog a few months ago, I tried going back to the beginning to see why I started it in the first place. I was traveling to Germany with my friends, and it was a way to document and keep our families informed about our journey. I was also one year out of high school, had recently confirmed in my heart that I was not going to go to college, and I guess I thought that that trip was setting some sort of travel themed precedent for the rest of my single life or something.

I kept writing and sharing because it’s something I truly enjoy, and I thought before I knew it, the next destination would be ready for me to document. But there wasn’t a next destination for quite some time, the gritty details of everyday life really aren’t that exciting, and though I’m learning things every day, the “adventurer” inside me isn’t satisfied.

I would never describe myself as an true adventurer though. I’m not a daredevil nor am I very confident. However, I have a curiosity for other places in the world, and a desire to see as much as I possibly can in this lifetime. Once again, though, “as much as I possibly can” isn’t very much at this point in my life.

One of these days, I will be able to take more missions trips. One of these days I will finally go to Ireland. I will stand on the Cliffs of Moher, I will spend the night in a castle. These are things I really and truly believe I will do one day. Maybe I’ll be 50 and have finally been married and have grown children, or maybe it’ll be a spontaneous hurry-and-pack trip or maybe I’ll finally talk some people into going with me… or maybe it won’t happen, and maybe I need to be more content in the gritty details of everyday life. But I think it’s good to have goals and ambitions and dream a little bigger on those days when the everyday is closing in.

I cannot tell you about the glamorous sacrifices God has called me to, because He hasn’t. I rarely have to sacrifice anything – and if I do, it’s really not even a sacrifice, but a simple “no” to something frivolous.  

But neither can I brag about the gritty details of my everyday life. We humans can find the tiniest things to be proud about, and I’m not here to flaunt anything. I have nothing to flaunt, because all that I have and all that I am is a gift that I didn’t earn.

I am here to encourage and uplift when I can. I want this blog to be a happy place, and I will make it that to the best of my ability. My life right now is new recipes, DIY projects, babysitting, church ministry, and quiet days filled with doing my job and reading my books. It’s a simple, happy life that I’m content with. I will forever be reaching for the next thing, trying to skip ahead to the next chapter, and asking God to give me that mountain, but for now, I will enjoy my gritty details.

So whether you're on a big adventure to a place God has called you to, whether you're traveling the globe because it's your chance, or whether you live each day knowing the next one will be similar, know that simple obedience is the calling. The rest will follow, and one is no better than the other.   Embrace the unique, nitty gritty little things that make the day yours.




I realize this post sounds very, very similar to others I've posted recently. Bear with me, I'm figuring it out! ;)



February 16, 2015

an ice world | picture post

Last night the temps dropped and we expected to wake up to a few inches of snow. School was already out for Presidents Day and I was told to just sleep in and not to expect to use the roads to get to work. We woke up to this...



No snow, just lots and lots of ice, and it just kept coming down!

our concrete pad

Finally some time after noon the snow started falling and didn't stop!







And because I was told if there weren't any pictures to prove it no one would actually believe I went out in the cold...

 I did!

I hope everyone is staying safe and warm, and if there's any snow in your area, I hope you're enjoying it as much as we are! Our tiny little town has basically shut down, and it's a quiet, icy world.


February 3, 2015

updates and changes

I definitely did not think that my first post of 2015 would be in February! I really wanted to write an upbeat, positive post welcoming in the new year but every time I sat down to write I just ended up staring at a blank screen.

For awhile now I've been wanting to re-think the way I've been blogging, so a week into the new year I stopped reading the blogs I follow - which meant staying off of Google+ as well. I knew I wanted to keep doing it, but I wanted to have a fresh new perspective on it and in order to do that, I didn't want to compare myself to anyone else.

So, after several people asking when I was going to post again, I decided to type this up fairly quickly to let you know my "new" plan!

I went back to my very first post, just to see how I'd opened up this blog. Here's that post, written almost three years ago...

Just Me

I am a nineteen-year-old girl loving her life and loving her God.

Dedicated to writing, addicted to reading, and waiting on the future.

Thank you for reading as I tell the many things that Jesus does for me...


That post gets my lack of inspiration and even excitement about writing and blogging back on track! I'm not nineteen anymore, but I am a twenty-two year old young lady that does still love her life and her God very much.

changes
I'm going to be re-dedicated to writing. I will pick back up my addiction to reading because it's one of the biggest inspirations for me to write, and I will share what comes from this sometimes-jumbled but very-much-wanting-to-share mind of mine. Those types of blogs will be more frequent than they have been lately but I won't be able to schedule them because they're so dependent upon time.

I'm only going to loosely commit to 2 posts per month for now. One will be a monthly recap, and the the other, who knows? For those of you who read this blog because you love the updates and pictures - well, stick around, because I will continue telling the many things that Jesus does for me!

update
Jacob and Christine are expecting baby #5 in July!

Hopefully as the days go on I will have actual updates (plural) to share, but I think that single update is exciting enough for now. I do hope everyone had a lovely January. I'm excited to see what February holds!