Birthday Blessings

Just wanted to share with you my 35th birthday. As we grow older we don't much care to celebrate aging, well I don't anyway. My 30th was extremely difficult for me, just ask Big Daddy...he can tell you a story about that day! To be honest, my birthdays haven't gotten any easier to handle, but I manage through them I suppose. This year, however I cannot explain to you how blessed I truly am! God is AMAZING! He is truly a miracle worker...

Even though I've obsessed over growing older, somehow this year...he erased it from my heart! Erased it! Girls, do you know what I'm saying? This is powerful for me...if you know me, my personality, my guts, the "soul" of me, this is a real miracle of the spirit! An epiphany...God has changed me. Through my children, my husband, and my great friends God revealed his true and perfect acceptance of me. It didn't matter that I wasn't 21, it didn't matter that I wasn't a size 2, it didn't matter that my make-up wasn't perfect, that my hair wasn't colored or my clothes were from the Goodwill. The people around me, My people loved me and celebrated with me that I was here and God created me. How awesome! How great! I know, for most of you out there...you realized this a long time ago, but for some of us...well, we're just slow learners. I think maybe I just let the world tell me different, ya know? I let myself think that I needed to always be better, be more, be different than what God made me to be. Always striving to be this perfect ageless, "young" mother of 4 who doesn't look like the mother of 4. I know...stupid, but to my demise, I strived to achieve the unattainable. Indeed, I never got any younger, only older every year (imagine that?) depressed because I could not find the magic "pill", fatter because I was depressed, and well you see the snowball effect here, right? Something so far out there, yet I was on the train, like so many other women today...trying to be something that we're not, just because the world tells us that's what we should be!

It's time to listen to the Lord our God, what is He telling us? Do you hear him? Are you taking the time to hear him? For so long I wasn't. I was so busy listening to the world that it drowned out my God's voice...I couldn't even hear him if I wanted to. The verse in the bible Proverbs 31:10 "Who can find a virtuous woman, for her price is far above rubies?" is a great way to start focusing in on God's word. The definition of virtuous: strong moral character. We definitely need that in our world today, right? So, I've decided that's where I'm going to start. Slowly and faithfully with God by my side. I visit Passionate Homemaking often, that's where I came across the Virtuous Woman study and I really feel the Lord prompting me to take another step closer to him. So this is it...I'm taking the step, are you with me?

Thank you God for awarding me a birthday I will never forget...

Here are some presents that came along with all the other wonderful birthday blessings in 2009. Early in the morning "J" 15 woke to make my favorite breakfast... waffles! I was served on the "Red, You are Special Today" plate. I was so suprised, I forgot to take pictures :( I quickly recovered and started snapping away later on in the day.

Here they are in the afternoon when these two handsome guys started decorating after they cleaned the entire house while Big Daddy took me shopping for my birthday present!

They even baked me a cake...(of course "J" 15 did most of the baking)

"J" 11 thought it would make Fabulous Mom feel even more Fabulous to think she was 25 again!

Beautiful Flowers from LeAnn...so sweet! I loved them, thank-you...

Big Daddy took me to Borders to get me this...it's been on the list for a while now :) I love it!

Lastly...the Proudfoots totally Rock! My new Marble board...we've played marbles every night since you gave it to me! Love you guys...