#wifestylin Winner!

Good morning lovely readers!

I'm sure you're all curious about who won this helpful little book... yes?

Give your best congratulations to Beverly Steele! Yay! Email me your address and I will ship a copy of this book to you for free!! I know that you have taught me so many wonderful tips on how to be a good wife and mother, so this book will likely be a refresher on what you already know :)

Thank you to everyone who read my review and entered the giveaway. If you're local and would like to borrow this book, just let me know! I'm happy to share the love. I have another few books in mind that I'd like to giveaway as well, so make sure you check back here in April. 

My prayer for all of you this week is that you'd look at your life, your marriage, your tasks, and your job, and instead of seeing duty, obligation, responsibility, or plain hard work, you would see the opportunity to give away God's love. I pray that responding in kindness, gentleness, self-control, and love would be on the front of your mind and the intention of your heart. May you see the beautiful and life-giving fruit it brings to your week and be changed day by day by God's working in your life! 

Thanks again to The Blythe Daniel Agency, BlogAbout, and Leafwood Publishers for making this giveaway possible!

#wifestylin and a Book Giveaway

After a short hiatus for our move, I signed up to read and review another book! Thank you to The Blythe Daniel Agency, BlogAbout, and Leafwood Publishers for providing me with this book to read, and an extra copy to give away! There are affiliate links included in this post.

A Wife's Secret to Happiness.

I'm not exactly sure what answer I would have given if someone had asked me exactly what that secret is. I'm sure it would revolve around scheduling more time for reading the bible, prayer, serving others (definitely the husband, right?) and those sorts of things. I can't say I was surprised by what the author Jen Weaver says, but somehow it all still caught me off guard. If you are a newly-wed, or getting married soon, I think this book will spare you LOTS of heartache, miscommunication mishaps, and frustration. It would make a great wedding gift!

The format of her book is very practical. Each chapter is a blessing we receive from the way we act toward our husbands and our marriage, and not just the things we do, but really the way we treat our spouses and our relationship with them.

I'm in a weird phase of life these days. Our lives have had so much upheaval, strain, and demands, marriage investment has not exactly been our top priority. We have been more intentional with date nights lately, and while I know (and probably anyone who interacts with me knows) that I've been less than my best self, I attribute most of it to lack of sleep and the high demands of homeschooling while pursuing so many other endeavors. However, after reading just a couple chapters of this book, I see how my treatment of my spouse really does kill my own joy and make everyone's lives more difficult.

At the end of each chapter there is a little quiz to take in order to help you analyze what your "wifestyle" is, such as Frayed or Braided, Duel or Dance, and MVP or Dream Team. While I could easily tell you the things we should aim for in living with our husbands, I was kind of in denial about how many of these I "failed" or how often the keywords she suggest described me, such as Combative, Entitled, Weary, Frustrated, and Indifferent.

Overall, this book was a gentle wake-up for me. It's incredibly hard to swap out my self-preserving habits for offering the best of myself to my husband. I want to say I don't know why, but I'm confident it is a combination of the attacks of the enemy and my own selfish desires. But the daily choosing to serve myself first? Goodness. Ladies, we cannot keep choosing to invest primarily in our own self-serving desires and expect our husbands to enjoy loving us too. We think we know what we need, and we are convinced God cannot fulfill us while following and serving our flawed men. Big. Fat. Lie.

So today, I would say that the biggest secret to a happy marriage is surrender to God's ways. Yes, that includes submission, and allowing your husband to be in charge. But here is a great quote by Jen near the end of the book. "Being in charge means stewarding resources, receiving counsel, and taking care of the people you lead." Letting our husbands be in charge is for our benefit. Not because we are incapable, but because a team needs one leader. It doesn't mean he controls you, or dictates your every more. Your husband is capable of being a leader, but you need to be willing to wait, support, pray, love, and serve as God grows your husband into his role and shapes your family along the way. Jen is quick to draw lines between abuse and neglect, so don't fear being told to basically sit down and shut up - you won't be hearing that from her!

The few things in the book that I didn't love were more just based on writing style. There are some things that seem a little trite, or more cliché than I prefer, but her points and wisdom are spot on. It's not a deep, theological, or philosophical book. She doesn't go into the depths of marital problems, but her advice is rooted in truth and she gives us SO many practical tips. Most of all, she points us to Christ, and that is where we always need to start.

Are you ready to win? Ready to swallow a bit of pride and courageously face where you can work to improve your marriage? I know you can. If I can get through it with hope and positivity, you totally can :)


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I hope that you will keep an open heart and mind about this book. I know I was a bit skeptical at first, but there are so many valuable pieces of advice here, you would be wrong to dismiss it right away.

Come back on Monday morning and I will announce the winner!

Final Winner of the Year :)

I am still in shock that 2016 is coming to an end. Honestly, how did this whole year go by already? When I look back at things that actually happened, it feels like forever ago, but at the same time I cannot believe a whole 12 months has already come and gone. I feel sad that a year is so short to me now, and I despair imagining my kids will be adults in what feels like a day. However, all of this reminds me to cherish my time with them amidst homeschooling chaos, fatigue-induced melt-downs, and accidental messes.

Alright, enough of my reminiscing and self-reminding jabber, you want to know who won, right? Of course!

Congratulations to.....


Chickie Brewer!!! I will email you, get your address and ship that giant, beautiful, bible out to you this coming week.

Thanks to all you lovely readers, to BlogAbout and The Blythe Daniel Agency.

I will have a moving update for you next week, which will mean fewer book reviews and giveaways the first couple months of the year, but I hope my blog will still contain some wonderful gems and surprises. You all have made my writing better, my blogging sweeter, and my ambitions more clear while reading and encouraging me throughout 2016. May 2017 be another year of growth despite pain, joy despite hardship, and love despite the challenges of life.

See you all next year ;)

Last Giveaway of the Year!

You guys, we are at the end of 2016! Can you believe it? I am still trying to figure out how this happened. A whole year has come and gone since I decided to blog here regularly and I feel like I am living in a different world than the one I inhabited last January. A lot has changed, and not just my circumstances (though some are very much the same), but I have changed too.

Today, I do not have a warm, inviting, Christmas or Holiday post for you. I'm much too off in the head for something as typical as that. Instead, I'm going to share some tid-bits about the fabulous bible I am giving away and save the Christmas shenanigans for another day. This post is made possible by The Blythe Daniel Agency and BlogAbout, and there are some affiliate links tucked in here too.

I used to own a really cute, pale-pink bible when I was a young girl. Later, it was upgraded by my parents to a thick, black bible with my name in gold letters printed onto the front. I still remember waiting at the book store with my dad while it was done. That black bible was my "go-to" for a long time, up until I was married and beyond actually. Pages are crumpled, highlighted, coffee-stained, and falling out from the spine. I now own a lovely red bible with a gorgeous floral print on the cover. It's a standard ESV bible, without any study-notes or space, and a concordance at the back that leaves me wanting. All this to say, I was very excited at the opportunity BlogAbout gave me to review this lovely NKJV Journal the Word Bible.

I ended up buying an ESV Study bible about the same time my Journal the Word bible came, and that made starting our church's bible study that much better! It was perfect having several different bibles and using blueletterbible.org as a reference to understand the Greek Paul originally used when writing to Titus.

First off, the beginning of this bible has several pages of explanations - the purpose of the King James scholars,  format of the bible, the old and new testaments texts, stuff like that. Then, it jumps right into the actual bible - just the bible, with lots of room on the side for notes. My bible is large text, which made making notes even easier. There are lines in the margins so it's easy to make your notes clean and orderly (as long as you have a steady hand - gulp). At the very end of the bible, there are several lined pages for notes, and that's it! So simple!

Here are a few pictures of what I've written in my bible from my time studying Titus.

I just love seeing those margins start to get filled in and words highlighted in vibrant colors!

Taking the time to look at what these words are in Greek was so helpful for increasing my understanding of what Paul truly meant when he was writing to Titus. It was pretty mind-blowing, actually. 

The outside of this particular version has a black, hard-cover, is large-print, and comes with a built-in, ribbon bookmark. It also has an elastic band that wraps from the back cover and loops over the front, to keep your bible in the best shape possible. That might be my favorite part besides the large margins. Don't you think it's super handy? Well, if you don't think so now, you will if you win this bible and start using it!

So how can you win this? I'm so glad you asked :) It's super easy. Click below to see what options you have and share, share, share!


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Did you enter? I hope so. I will draw a winner on Saturday and hopefully one of you will have a great opportunity to study the bible more deeply with this beautiful version and be able to keep track of the things you are learning from God's written, Holy word.

As for my commitment to write weekly, I'm not sure if I will continue this year. I thoroughly enjoy writing, I love to speak, and I cannot help sharing what I learn, but I am finding myself torn between so many endeavors lately. I have a few book projects I'm working on, schooling my children is not only close to a full-time job, but it is mentally exhausting, and I recently started sharing my love of Essential Oils intentionally, running a business with one of my little sisters. There are many more endeavors I wish I could pursue and it's hard to constantly sift through all of them, but I do want this space to be a help, and place of encouragement, and a blog that leads people to knowing God more deeply. I want all my readers to live with courage, pursuing the things the Holy Spirit leads them into, and I'm just too unsure of what that will look like for me this year to commit to anything specific in regards to the blogging frequency I hope to maintain. Besides all of this, we FINALLY bought a house and will be moving at the end of January (I love packing and unpacking, and I am going to say that a hundred times to try and make it true). Don't worry, I will give you a nice update on all of that soon enough.

Anyway, all this to stay, I hope you keep coming back here, and I hope I can inspire you to live for God in whatever your hands find to do. I will do my best to keep you updated on all our family's shenanigans, and we'll see who our lucky winner is this Saturday! Enjoy the end of 2016, and tell me what your favorite resolution this year will be. Good luck!

Broken Winner!

Thank you to The Blythe Daniel Agency, BlogAbout, and Zondervan for making another awesome giveaway possible!

It seems a little contrary to win something about being broken. I mean, it's not fun to admit you're broken, much less being willing or even excited to work through that brokenness. But actually, our random winner is someone I know and love, someone who works hard not to hide her brokenness from me...

Congratulations Darlene Fleary!! You won a copy of Ann's The Broken Way DVD and Study Guide! I know you'll love it.

For all you other eager-beavers, I have another giveaway next week that I'm a little behind on. It's the NKJV Journal the Word Bible. It's huge, and large print, but perfect for studying God's work carefully and taking notes as you go. Stay tuned for that.

I will try to post a little update next week between my giveaway and winner post - my kids will be with Grandma and Grandpa for a bit, so I'll have some time to study, write, and even think in peace and quiet. Hallelujah, right?! Thanks again for sticking with me during this season of busyness and often silence. I hope it won't always be this way, but I am striving to be willing to live well in whatever season I find myself - broken, busy, failing, barely scraping by, thriving, whatever! Maybe not today, maybe not next year or even next week, but someday I'll live like that forever. What a relief!

Winner!

Hi again! Thanks so much for participating in my giveaway and sharing my blog with all your Facebook friends. You've made this giveaway my most successful giveaway yet!

Also, I have some more great news... In a couple weeks, I will be giving away a Study Guide and DVD for The Broken Way to another lucky winner. I'm so blessed by BlogAbout for connecting me with so many great sources and wonderful books and allowing me to be generous with them, giving away all sorts of goodness. If anyone is interested in doing a Facebook group with me while I go through the Study Guide, let me know!

Okay, so you are probably itching to see if you are the lucky winner...

Congratulations to... Heather Beissinger!

You will thoroughly enjoy this book. While it can be hard to swallow, and downright impossible to give yourself away over and over again in the face of pain and struggle, you will be reminded of God's truth and His promises toward you.

As I spend more time thinking about what it means to share my brokenness, I am reminded of the first place I should be doing this: my home. My kids see a lot of the ways I am broken, but I don't always allow them to see how my sinful nature breaks me and often causes me to despair. They see the results, and witness the fallout, and I do my best to repent to them when I've sinned against one of them, but I often internalize a lot of the struggle in-between.

This week I was purposeful with texting a friend or two about my struggle, and it was really helpful just to get it out into a safe place. Then I had some frank conversations with my boys about my desire to live better and how discouraging it can be to keep on sinning and keep desiring things I should not desire. Success, prestige, accomplishment, and control all call my name incessantly, and it often feels easier to cave, to pursue those tangible goals and not consider why I am chasing them. But talking about it with my kids, admitting my struggles out loud has really helped me see my own skewed perspective.

It's almost comical how that works. Being honest about myself and my desires to other people helps my mind trust the path I knew was best but was fighting against. Why don't I do it more often? Why do I wait until I've wrestled for two weeks before talking about it? I'm not exactly sure, but I'm becoming more brave about it and I'm witnessing some of the benefits already. I'm less nervous to admit my downfalls to my kids and husband, less scared they will think I'm too sinful to love, less afraid that these sinful parts of me are beyond repair.

God is so gentle toward us. If nothing else, I'm seeing His sweet kindness toward me in deeper ways much more frequently than when I try to wrap my mind around my struggles all on my own.

How about you? What broken parts are you hiding, working through, or trying not to admit? What will you do about it?

I hope these insights are encouragement for you. And if you ever want a listing ear (or a reading eye), hit me up. I'm here.

The Best Way, The Broken Way.

Thanks again to The Blythe Daniel Agency and BlogAbout for providing a copy of this incredible book for me and for one lucky winner. This post includes my two cents on Ann’s newest book, as well as a couple affiliate links. Enjoy!

Earlier this summer, when I first saw that Ann Voskamp had a new book coming out, I added it to my wish-list right away. There was a bit of build-up in my heart about reading this book, and I was not disappointed. The Broken Way is a book you need to read now. Ann has a way of explaining truth from the gospel and truth about life in a poetic and moving way, without any hint of condemnation or comparison. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when I read the first few pages, but I was quickly pulled in and left reeling after just one chapter. I wanted to keep reading long into the night, but I also felt the need to stop every few pages and think hard about what she was saying. 

Ann has certainly had more broken in her life than most people I know, but she never holds that pain up as a badge of honor, or puts herself on a pedestal for having endured. She talks about tragedy in her childhood, the uncertainties she faced growing up, the painful roads she took in an attempt to cope with the pain life kept giving her, and she gives us glimpses of how those affected her life then and what it is doing now. Overall, she depicts a beautiful picture of restoration, but teaches us that it is never found in the ways we expect or even hope. 

I’ve been struggling with my own selfishness lately, and while Ann never addresses this directly, she shows me through her own example that living for my own desires is not the way of Christ, nor is it actually the way to find happiness, fulfillment, fellowship with others, or even my own identity. Being broken for others means giving in a thousand different ways: giving your patience when all you want to do is freak out, allowing yourself to be kind when everything in your heart feels mean, not holding back the love you feel in case something goes wrong. 

In her book Ann uses a bunch of ideas to explain the abundance that can be found in brokenness. These ideas are based a Greek word she finds in the Bible - koinonia, meaning, communion. She gives us a perspective of what communion really is through the recent circumstances of her life. The way this word kept coming up over and over again, almost always mingled with brokenness, is truly a beautiful story despite the tragedy mixed in. She points out that we forget what to expect from life, and we are often wrong in assuming an abundant life is a "happy" life, full of pleasant circumstances. Happiness doesn’t come from ease and comfort, but from sharing, from being broken open and spilling out into the lives of those around us. Oddly, pain is the route this takes most often. Life is full of pain no matter what, and sharing our pain, giving others the chance to bear our pain, is actually a gift. When we keep the pain inside and refuse to allow others to see it, we die a slow, painful death of loneliness, heartache, and confusion.

What will stick with me most from her book is seeing that perfection does not grow us into better wives, better friends, or better people. Brokenness is where we grow, where we meet with God, where our friends become life-long safety nets. You cannot avoid being broken, and it really will bring about fruit in your life. The amount you are willing to be broken will determine the amount of growth you see in your brokenness. Being perfect, always speaking from a place of knowing fully, always having an answer for every question… these things seem good, but they are not life-giving. 

This is a lesson I need. Purposeful or not, I like to wait out my hardship until I share all about it. My friends are not fooled when I am in a dark place, my husband knows I am having a hard time, and it is easy for me to just disappear from pretty much everyone else until I can straighten it all out in my head. How do I walk that line, that little beam of being broken but not in despair, of having a hard time but not allowing it to suck me dry, and be able to share that with others from a place that isn’t filled with complaint or selfishness? Ann’s book has helped me to gain a better perspective in my broken places and I am trying to put koinonia into practice. I know reading this book and attempting real, broken, honest communion and fellowship will bless you as well, even if it is painful and difficult. 

So, do you want to open this book up? Do you want to flip these pages, get a glimpse of Ann’s heart and see God working in all of her pain? And seriously, how blessed are we that she was willing to bare it all for our benefit? 

I’m using a new little plug-in to make entering this contest super easy for you! So start entering, and I will post a winner on Saturday morning.

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Stay tuned this week for a little glimpse into how I am putting Ann's insights into practice in my life, I hope they will be a blessing to you and not just a giant complaining session, or a silly story about being ungrateful for the challenges of my (undeserved) privileged life. 

I feel like I should also say thank you to all you faithful (or first-time) readers. It's not easy to bare my heart here, to put my thoughts into my computer, beam them up to the blog, and not let their popularity determine my value. I appreciate that so many of you encourage me to keep doing it, no matter the outcome. I pray this blog is a blessing to you and I am grateful for your many kindnesses! 

Feeling the Love from 66 Ways God Loves You.

I have been so blessed to be a part of the BlogAbout Network through the Blythe Daniel Agency. Thanks to them, I was given two copies of this beautiful book - one for me, and another for one lucky reader (it could be you)! And just so you know, this post does contain some affiliate links.

This book was kind of like God saying "How do I love thee? Let me count the ways."

In my spiritual life, I tend to focus on considering God's eternal plan and reminding myself of the truth about who He is, while spending very little time considering God's love and how He has shown it to me. This book has been such a refreshing journey of looking at each book of the bible, in a super concise format, and being reminded of what He's done throughout all of History and how I can see His loving hand in all of it. 

First off, the book is beautiful! There are delightful floral prints, shimmering foil embellishments, and an intricate design on every page. The book is small and perfect in every way for leaving out on your coffee table. Children and guests alike will reach for it without thought, and if they read even one page, they will be receiving a message of God's love in action. Jennifer Rothschild has done a fabulous job keeping each chapter brief, but I didn't feel like any of them were lacking depth or meaning. This certainly isn't a book you would study in isolation to learn about the bible, but it is a wonderful supplement, a perfect reminder and encouragement for challenging days. 

Here are a few of my favorite parts...

I loved the chapter on Joel. Jennifer says "God may not replace what you have lost, but he will redeem what you have lost." I found this incredibly comforting, especially in a world where we expect our lives to have an outcome more like Job's, receiving back in abundance the physical possessions we may lose in life. She encourages us not to focus on the pain in our circumstance, but the deliverance that will come. Her title for this chapter is "In Joel God Restores the Years the Locusts Have Eaten." Isn't that wonderful to think about? God restores us. He doesn't leave us disciplined and destitute, but uses even our own mistakes to bring us closer to Him. 

I've always loved the song by Matt Maher called Sing Over Your Children. I didn't realize this idea or phrase came from verses in Zephaniah until reading this book. Jennifer tells us that despite being a stern prophet, completely willing to call out Israel on her sin, Zephaniah insists that God delights in us. To think that God so loves me, that he beams with joy and bursts with song about who He has made me to be is almost shocking. It's hard for me to sit still and take it in. I feel humbled, relieved, and completely undeserving. It's already hard for me to sing that Matt Maher song without getting a little choked up, but now when I hear it played, it is even sweeter to my soul. 

I have always had a stronger-than-average yearning for eternity. I remember dreaming about Heaven ing grade school, then pondering it even more in Jr. High after reading a book by Joni Eareckson Tada. I loved looking at the sunset and imagining I could fly right up through those peachy clouds into the presence of God. In difficult seasons, I have to remind myself often that I am made for eternity, and not to expect an easy life one earth, so naturally, I loved what Jennifer says about 1 Thessalonians. The promise of Jesus' return is real. We are made for that day! It is our purpose, our promise from God, and our hope should rest upon it. In this book, I am reminded that God's love for me is a promise in the wings, waiting for the right day for me to be taken to Him and presented as righteous through the blood of Christ. What else could possibly top that? It is truly a comfort to know that I am made specifically for that glorious day.

Again, I am so grateful for the privilege of reading this book. I read about five or more chapters in each sitting, but I now will be going back through, reading just one a day with my family to have more consistent reminders of God's love. It will always reside on my end table, or my coffee table, or my kitchen counter. If you come over, don't forget to take a peek. 

Now for the really fun part - one of you can win this book! And it's so easy. 

Leave a comment on THIS blog post. Your comment can be about anything! 

To win bonus entries, leave an additional comment telling me if you have:

1- Followed me on Instagram

or...

2- Followed Jennifer Rothschild on Instagram.

See? So easy :) I will draw a winner on Friday night - try to contain your excitement until then!

I hope this review has sparked a desire in you to know the breadth of God's love for you. It certainly has encouraged me and changed the way I seek to know God more deeply. 

Come back next week for my long awaited, over-thought, incredibly procrastinated post on would. It may not be my best work ever, but it'll be done! Enjoy the rest of your Sunday.