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Have you ever wondered why a sunset or sunrise strikes awe in us when we see it?  How about a lake or the ocean waves?  Or the quiet beauty of the forest?  Or maybe a flower?  What causes that deep sense of awe and well-being as we stop to enjoy the beauty of creation; the kind of thing that you never get tired of looking at.

I believe that’s the way God designed it.  The things we see or the sounds we hear cause us to lean in a bit closer, listen a little more intently, close our eyes for a moment and breathe deep.  I believe it is because we have that space in our hearts that only God can fill.  He wants to give it back to us so we are reminded of what is around us.  But we can get so caught up in the daily regime, that we forget to take those moments to see it.  We get so busy that we miss out on the call.  Its like we could have a front row seat at God’s theatre if we but took the time.  Instead, we end up in the back, with a lack luster seat, or we don’t even make it to the theatre!  What a shame!  We miss out on what God wants to show us.  I know I have shared about this before, but it just seems that I am supposed to share it again. 

Here is an example of how God wants to blow us away if we are looking and expecting Him to.  I was in the local grocery store yesterday and as I put my groceries up on the belt, the lady in front of me says, “Oh, let me move this out of the way.”  We both looked up at each other, and I couldn’t believe it!  We both said each other’s name at the same time!  This lady was my choral and ensemble director when I was in Junior High School.  I loved her class, loved her directing, and we had so much fun singing under her directing.  Unfortunately, she resigned and as I went through Junior High School and High School, we kept in touch.  Even though she moved away, we wrote letters, which I still have by the way, and then lost touch for several years with all of their moves and mine.  I tried finding her over the years on Facebook and other ways, but to no avail.  Then, someone I know saw her several years ago and then gave me her phone number.  I called and we talked like we never lost touch.  However, once again, we lost touch with all of my moving.  But God was about to do a great thing that day; a divine God connection.  You see, I wasn’t wanting to go to the store that day.  I wanted to go home.  But for some reason I didn’t quite understand, I felt I was supposed to stop.  I listened.  God cared enough about my desire to find her, that He placed her right in front of me in the grocery line!  Isn’t that just like God?  I loved it!  I went home and found her on Facebook and have had a couple short visits since then.  What a TOTAL blessing!

This is the deal…we need to live expecting God to do great things on a daily basis in our lives.  He wants to, if we will just watch for it.  He speaks to us throughout our day in amazing ways.  So, today, as I will be out of commission for a while with some surgery, I want to leave you with this message:  Expect Him to move in miraculous ways, and watch for what He will do.  Pray for it. Be bold in asking for it.  BUT…watch for His answers!  You never know what He will do!  I’m asking and I’m expecting!  I’m leaning in REAL close so I don’t miss a thing!

Walking the journey with you…

I was out planting some calla lilies yesterday and saw this view as I walked by the back porch. It made me once again stop to enjoy how happy these plants are in this spot, AND, in this pot! I have talked about this before but today it hit home again, so I will share the thought with you.

These plants love to be in a crowded environment. The more crowded, the better. They like close proximity. They actually flourish in these circumstances. I believe that we all need a bit more of this in our lives. We need to be with others, to sharpen each other, remember good times, laugh, and maybe cry a little with each other. It helps us in ways we can’t always put our finger on, but we walk away from the time together, and our heart says, “That was GOOD!”

When I was younger, it was the Sunday activity for families to gather together for an afternoon visit after church and may even share an evening meal together. We would stop, when our folks could afford to treat us, and have an ice cream on the way to the relative’s/friend’s house. It would be way into the evening before the day would end and we would go home. Today, that doesn’t happen in many families. We are single units doing life. Sunday becomes another day to get something done. I think we could benefit from having more fellowship with each other on a Sunday afternoon. Just like these plants grow better close to each other, we can gather together, support each other, listen to each other, lean on each other, and be better off for it. Facebook, texting and email can be a great venue to do some of that, but there is nothing like a face to face chat. It becomes a time for sharing, laughter, expressions, eye to eye contact, and a hug or two over coffee or a meal. In this day and age, it takes some real effort to make this happen, but I believe it is worth it.

What are YOU doing Sunday afternoon? Call family and/or friends and step out into a fun time of fellowship. You may not have another chance to do it. We aren’t promised a tomorrow. Remember the picture of how healthy these cats and kittens are as they grow close to each other. Each leaf is holding up the one next to it. They don’t stifle each other; they grow even better, and stronger. I think fellowship with each other is just like that! It’s a great way to live! Swing wide your home gates and invite someone in! YOU will be the one blessed!

What were you doing this Sunday again? Walking the journey with you…

Today I came across a picture of my grandson Ethan when he was just a baby and what a sweet picture it is!  But as I look at it, I am reminded of how quickly time has passed.  He has grown up so much and is now 8 years old; he will be 9 years old in December.  Where did the time go?  That is probably about 2,565 days that have passed!  Wow!  Ethan and I have done a lot of things in that amount of days in whatever amount of time we had together.  But what about me during those same days?  What about you?  What have you done with your days of 24 hours?  

If I take my 24 hours that I am given and I rest for at least 8 of those hours, what am I about doing for the remaining 16 or so hours in my day?  Am I productive?  Am I working towards my goals?  Spending time with loves one?  Or ENOUGH time with loved ones?  Do I make time to be alone with God?  Do I breathe in the air and then think how blessed I am that I can breathe without trouble?  Do I enjoy the flowers that I have, and feel God’s blessings that I can walk over to them, as well as, bend over to smell them or look closer?  What occupies my mind during my 24 hours? Where is my heart for each 24 hours I have been given?  I have made some changes in my life that have made such a huge difference, that I want to encourage you in this area too.  I have FELT the difference in my life since being mindful of how I spend my time, who I spend it with, and what I focus on.  It is now a lot easier to say no to things which would set the spin cycle into motion.

First, after your rest, I think God wants to be first in your day.  Wake up and then thank God for at least five things before your feet even hit the floor.  He wants to speak to you, give you some encouragement, and a boost, to handle all the things that come into your upcoming day.  You might find you handle your situations a lot better if you start that way.  I know, you think you don’t have time in the mornings.  But that’s not a good excuse.  It’s too important for you to skip.  Be in the Word.  It can’t help you if you don’t have it IN you.  Remember, you are in a battle each day!  Wield the sword!  But we need to be in the Word so that we know to speak it out!

Secondly, re-think how involved your kids AND you are in outside activities.  If you are running from dawn to dusk, I don’t think that is necessarily the way God wants your day to go.  Yes, it’s important for kids to be involved.  Yes, it’s important for you to be involved in activities too.  But, not at the expense of never having some quality time to sit down together to dream, love and cuddle!  Another factor is that your family needs to see a secure relationship between husband and wife.  Your marriage needs alone time too!

The world today is on spin cycle!  It is like when you were kids and you got on the merry-go-round and got going faster and faster and you had to hang on for dear life so you wouldn’t fall off.  That is what we sometimes make our life and family life look like.  You can’t see anything when you are spinning so fast.  It all becomes a blur.  Not much to enjoy when it is just whizzing by!  I chose to get off.

Why?  

• I want to look at pictures like I did today, or talk with my grown kids who remember times we did things together as a family, and feel at peace with the legacy I am leaving.
• I want to have time to encourage another in our journey of life.  You never know when God is going to use something you do or say to help another.
• I want to feel that I am exactly where God wants me to be.
• I am using my time better and better for His purposes.  

Some of you who know me, may see me online a lot during the day.  That is because my computer IS up most of the day, but I’m not sitting here most of the day.  I am about my life and sharing it with others in ways I hope encourages you to breathe easier, slow down, appreciate what God has given you, and be grateful for the fact that you are alive!  I keep very busy myself,  but I look for the balance in my day.  And…I find it.  

I have been reading a book about the idea of living in such as way for God that it looks “weird” to other people.  I guess many may say that of me; that’s ok.  I am glad I’m weird, if that is what it takes to live my life as God is revealing it to me to live.  God has shown me that being a bit weird, is a good thing.  I love the fact that I am learning to live simply, taking Him at His word, and that I enjoy each day for what He gives me.  In that process, I am ultimately drawn closer to Him and isn’t that what we want for ourselves?  I know it’s what I want.

So what do you do?

• Begin asking yourself as you look over your list of activities, if doing this activity or getting involved here, will enhance your goals of family time and family activities, and time with the Lord?
• Have a family meeting where you discuss as a family what is most important to each member.  Make some hard choices and limit where you say, “Yes”.  Remember no is a complete sentence.
• Realize that you may have to say, “No”, to something another family is doing, just so you can truly have the things which are important to YOUR family.  Don’t compare apples to oranges.  Be a bit weird.
• Guard your quiet time.  It is important for children and grandchildren to see you in the Word, and seeing you make choices based on the Word.  
• We sometimes feel competitive to what others are doing around us.  RESIST!
• Go into this Fall Season with a renewed sense of direction for your 24 hours each day.  Reevaluate! 

Let me leave you with this thought:  Don’t willingly go to the spin cycle lifestyle.  You can’t even see what’s going on around you when you are spinning so fast on a merry-go-round.  So slow it down.  Enjoy going around and having fun, but slow down so you can enjoy the ride, and experience it.  You are the only one that can control how fast your life spins.  Don’t be someone that sits and looks at a picture years from now and says, “I wish I had done things differently.  I wish I spent more time with my family. I wish we played in the water more.  Or like me MANY years ago, when I was working 3 jobs when the kids were young to make ends meet, say I wish I had stayed home…I wish…I wish…I wish…  Not anymore.  I knew better then, but felt I had no choice, and kept going for many years.  We ALWAYS have a choice.  It is just what we are willing to do.  However, God has brought me to a new place in the last 12 years and I am VERY thankful for it!  I look to the future with hope!  What about you?  What part of this story resonates with you?  Are you willing to do the work to get off the spinning wheel?  

I say, step off.  In fact jump off!  It feels wonderful!!!  Walking the journey with you…

 

The Traveling Cottage is at home and getting prepared for her maiden voyage!  I can’t wait!!!  In fact, this week, I made some ice tea and went out to enjoy it in my little place.  I closed the door of the trailer so I wouldn’t be reminded that I was REALLY sitting in my own back yard, and I pretended like I was somewhere overlooking the water!  Ah…the life!

Do you ever have the need to just get away?  Ever felt lonely when all you would have to do is call someone by phone, but you don’t?  You don’t think you are “down”, but still feel unsettled? How about, you feel something and you don’t even know why you feel that way, or WHAT you ARE feeling?  Oh, ok guys…no laughing!  I am at home with a more relaxed schedule because I don’t work outside the home, so you would think that it wouldn’t hit me as much.  BUT, I find that I still need to get away from the familiar and set myself apart!  And sometimes, He has to remind me.  He’s creative like that.

Just this morning, I started again reading the book of Mark.  During the first three chapters, I am reminded of how each of the those men just left what they were doing and WENT.  They didn’t think about it, they didn’t have second thoughts about their life; Jesus called and they went!  So it made me think that I may need to do that very thing!  This feeling I have is God calling me to a quiet place, where ever that may be, to spend time with Him.  I don’t have to be lonely because He is there.  I have Someone to talk to…Him.  I can find a place to get a way for a while…my favorite spot in my home, my deck, a drive in the car, a park, where every it may be.  I CAN do that.  I NEED to do that.  What happens?  

• He fills me up.
• Gives me insight.
• I am refreshed just like sitting with my glass of ice tea in my Traveling Cottage.  
• He will meet me there!

Oh the lessons and insights we can learn if we are open to His leading in our everyday existence!  I WANT to be, and I want to notice when He is whispering in the soft breeze for me to come and share an ice tea with Him.  Will you go?  Will you drop everything and walk or sit with Him a spell?  I did that yesterday in my Traveling Cottage in my own back yard, and again today, in my office.  It was a good time of refreshing and refocusing.

So, I leave you with this question:  Have you ever felt this way?  Tell me about it.  I would love to hear your comments.  Walking the journey with you…

Well….drum roll please!!!!!  I can now officially announce that the Shiley’s have a little traveling cottage!  Yep!!  You guessed it!  We are proud owners of a cute little camp trailer that I will lovingly refer to as our traveling cottage!  My mom and dad would be so happy and proud!

What’s up with getting a trailer you may ask?  I grew up in one!  As a child, and even into teen years, we went every where and camped in our little Canned Ham Style Trailer, as they are lovingly referred to.  I loved it!  We went to the lakes, the ocean, parks and various places and enjoyed the ability to travel, see things we hadn’t seen before and bring our home with us.  Our first trailer was VERY small and not self-contained, but we didn’t mind running to the camp site bathrooms.  I always slept in the hammock above the couch (that folded down into a bed) and would wake up to the smell of coffee every morning as dad, or sometimes mom, would be making coffee.  Not much chance of sleeping in when you are right on top of the kitchen.  But I wouldn’t trade those days for anything!  We got up and going and were out all day making our own fun and exploring the area where we stayed.  We ran the beaches, dug for clams, raked smelt and fried them up that night.  We had campfires and roasted hot dogs.  We would have s’mores for dessert!  Ah… the life!  From the open windows at night, you could smell the outdoors, listen to the sound of the running river or the waves of the ocean, and of course, I often was itching from mosquitoes!  I remember so well!  Many times, I brought a friend along with us on a camping trip!

But the thing that I forgot to do is tell my folks how much fun those times were to me.  They sacrificed a lot to have that fun.  On a tight budget, they bought their first trailer.  It was gray and white on the outside.  I loved that thing!  When I had friends spend the night, we would sleep out in the trailer to have our own over night experience!  But one day, when we came home from school, as I have shared in a previous post, my mom had apparently gotten bored, and she had painted the inside of the trailer lime green and tangerine orange!!!  Oh my!  Dad couldn’t believe it when he came home to that!  She on the other hand?  She was quite pleased with herself!  

But those sacrifices to enjoy themselves and relax, were also given as a way to give us pleasure.  We had no problem helping load things up when mom or dad would tell us we were going camping!  Boom!…  Done!  So, I have always wanted to have that same opportunity for myself and the kids.  That hasn’t been something that I was able to do for them.  We were able to do some camping, but nothing like when I was a child.  I am happy to see them doing some of it themselves now, however.  But as my sweetheart and I talked, we really wanted to make a way to have a “home away from home” to enjoy the outdoors together, a camp fire, a little outdoor cooking and the view of the water when it was available (my request).  We have a Thousand Trails membership that belonged to my folks and I received that from them.  So I feel like their legacy lives on in my sweetheart and I and our little traveling cottage.  We can now build those memories and share them with friends and family.  We can give those to Ethan, our grandson and make my folks’ sacrifice a legacy that we pass on.  It took us longer to achieve it, but it’s all in God’s timing.

My advice and thoughts?  Don’t wait until you can’t tell your parents anymore how much those kind of memories are cherished by you.  I would love to tell my folks, but I can’t.  If you have yours around, be sure to share how much you loved the fun times together and share a thought or two with them about what it meant to you.  They will love to hear it!  It helps them know that how they lived out their life meant something to you, and that you cherish those memories.  It’s the heart of your family.

Next stop for us?  Thousand Trails…and by the water!!!  I will be in my happy place!  I pray that somehow mom and dad, you know… and maybe even say, “Thata girl (me)…thata boy (my sweetie)…you know how to enjoy life.  Make it count!”

Living our legacy, and walking the journey with you…

This afternoon, I had the time to walk around and enjoy the plants and trees that we have recently planted in our yard.  It brings me joy to do so!  As I checked everything out, I came to the cats and kittens that I have had for almost two years.  What was brought to my attention today was, the fact that only a few weeks ago, I thought I had lost part of my plants.  They appeared dead and dried out.  But today, there was new life coming right out of the middle of what looked liked a dead plant.  Wow!  There is a good lesson for me here.  What is it, you ask?

I may find myself in situations that seem impossible.  I may think there is no way out, or that it will never change.  But these pictures are evidence and a reminder that it can and does!  When areas of my life look impossible to change, I can choose to see hope coming through and new growth potential for me.  God wants me to live with hope that it CAN be different!  

So, I walked around with a thankful heart today, and I was lifted in my spirit by this small lesson that I believe God gave me.  I wanted to share that reminder with you.  Don’t look at the impossible, but look to the future with hope!  We can grow and change; in ourselves and/or in our circumstances.  We can have a newness in our lives that brings us joy.  I was consistent in nourishing this plant, even when it looked like it had died.  During winter months, you would think it would never come back.  But because I kept nourishing it as it needed, the plant went through its life cycle, and new life has appeared!  We, too, will make it through our hard times and can come though it with new life and perspective!  God wants to nourish us, encourage us, change us and guide us into a newness of life!

Today, I am asking you to look for where this might apply in your life.  I live with a high hope quotient!  I expect good things from God for my life!  I believe He wants me to live like that!  I can come through the fire (trials) and not even smell of smoke, God says.  Alright!!!  That is for ME!  

Let me leave you with this question:  If I were to ask you where you are on a scale of 1-10 on the hope quotient, where would you be?

Walking the journey with you…