Rescuing Heart

Over the last few months, I have learned so much about myself and the person that I want to be. I have experienced friendships that model the kind of friend I want to be towards others. I have also experienced relationships that were unhealthy and allowed me to see where I needed to change.

Let’s go back to November/December. A lady in my bible study discussion gave each of us in our discussion group a book called Reclaiming YourHeart: A Journey Back to Laughing, Loving, and Living. She volunteered/worked with a ministry that used this book.  Fast forward to the first week of January. I decided to read the book finally. And looking back, it was God’s perfect timing! First of all, READ THIS BOOK! It will change your life! Second, while so much of this book impacted my life, I’m only going to share one very small part that played a very large role in changing the kind of friend that I am (at least that’s what I’m striving for).

Screen shots take from the sample on google books.

My name is Angey, and I have a people pleasing, rescuing heart! I want to fix all that’s wrong, I want to make everyone happy and healthy and successful, I don’t want people to feel pain or suffering, I want to save them. Here’s the thing, *I wasn’t created to save people*… I had to say that to myself many times over. I was created to point people to the One True and ONLY Savior – Jesus Christ.

As I said before, God’s perfect timing. At the end of January and into February, our lives were rocked - I’ll go into more detail about that on a later blog post. I needed to lean into Christ more than I ever have before and I needed to lean into friends and family! I am so blessed in that I have a wonderful extended family that prayed for us, sent notes of encouragement and offered assistance in ways that they could from long distance. I have friends that are local that stepped up to make sure I was taking care of myself and that I was doing ok physically, emotionally and spiritually. I have friends that are long distance that were always just a phone call or text away if I needed encouragement or prayers. I am so thankful for my tribe of people! Basically, in this season (we are still walking through some rough stuff), I’m on what I would call the receiving end of the relationship – with any given friend/family member. I’m the one that needs the rescuing – the fixing – according to my old self’s heart. During this hard season, God really opened my heart to seeing the kind of friend I wanted to have and therefore that I wanted to be.

So many friends and family members offered counsel and encouragement and I appreciate every single piece of advice, offer of support, words of encouragement and knowledge from experience. At the end of the day though, I needed God. I needed to hear His voice and know that I was doing what He wanted and following the path that He had laid before us. And quite often, what I felt God saying and what others were sharing with me collided, and I chose God. People were hurt and relationships damaged. And I got it. You see, I have always been that ‘friend’ that gave advice – probably unsolicited – and would get very upset when my friend wouldn’t listen and would choose a different direction. I would be hurt and frustrated and damage the relationship because basically I felt unneeded, unwanted and ignored. And now, I was on the opposite side of the relationship and I understood. What I want people to know and understand is that I absolutely listened to every single person’s advice and help and I took it to heart. I prayed for hours over it because I was treading new waters and had no idea what to do, so I took it all to God, and I trusted Him. He gave me a peace that I cannot describe and pointed me to scripture to back up what I felt He was leading me towards. I will never resent or frown upon advice or encouragement because I know it is out of love.

Here is where I’m changing: I will offer encouragement when I can, I will be available for help and support when I’m asked. And I know, that there are circumstances where stepping up and 'just doing' to help are needed and I will seek God in those moments and pray that He will direct me whether I need to just do, or I should ask first. I won’t get angry, or frustrated, or hurt if my advice isn’t taken or if my help is rejected – I won’t take it personally. I will pray.

I don’t want to be the friend that seems to be in it to rescue and is selfish.

I want to be the friend that is available, listens, encourages and LOVES.

If you have been hurt, frustrated, irritated, etc. because of me, I am sorry. Will you please forgive me. And if you notice rescuing tendencies popping up from me in our relationship, will you please politely bring it to my attention? Let me know that *whatever rescue attempt I'm making* isn't what you want or need. Thank you! Love you all!

Feeling provoked

God has been doing a great work in my heart through Bible study and relationships. I find myself angry, hurt, frustrated, irritated, sarcastic or even happy -- when I shouldn't be -- as a response to something I’ve heard or read. Most of the time, I’ll be honest, it's from something on social media. Occasionally, my reaction has come from a passage in the Bible, from a bible study question about what I read, or from words that were spoken during an in-person encounter. My immediate reaction is to react out of whatever emotion I’m feeling, mostly anger. If it’s on social media or an in-person conflict – my chest will tense up and my anxiety will flair. Because I don’t often like to engage in debates, controversial topics or any confrontation, I often don’t actually respond, but just let that emotion seethe within my soul and eat away at my insides. If it’s a response to the Bible, I will often take it out on God – I am SO incredibly thankful that He has very large shoulders and can handle whatever words I decide to hurl – and He’s also a God of patience and grace and gives that to me freely while I calm down.

What God has shown me over the last few months, is that when something someone provokes me, it is usually my own heart that needs examination and change. Why is what I heard/read making me angry, sad, frustrated, etc? Why do I feel the need to react? The simple answer – my pride. I don’t want to be wrong, I don’t want to learn something new, I don’t want someone else to be right, I don’t want someone else to have something I don’t, I don’t want someone else to have what I do have, and the list goes on and on.

Why am I writing this all? Maybe this is something that someone else needs to consider as well. If you find yourself welling up with not-good emotional reactions at life, maybe do yourself a favor and check your own heart first. You may surprise yourself. It could very well be that the emotion that was provoked is justified and you have very good reason to be angry or sad or frustrated, but also then take that to heart and see if you can’t come along side of whatever provoked you and see why it was said/done/written in the first place and resolve the issue in love and peace rather than stir up more dissension.

Truly thankful?

We all love a good story, right? Well, it’s story time.

Once upon a time there was a girl named Grace who loved God and loved her family.  Grace and her family moved into a smaller home while waiting for the dreams of their forever home to be fulfilled.  She thanked God for providing their current home as it was a roof over their heads and it met their needs.  The cost was low enough that she was able to stay home and take care of the household, while her husband worked diligently to provide.  Her husband was even able to go back to school for a season.  Grace was always quick to tell others about how much God had blessed her and her family and how she was so thankful for her home.

Here’s what Grace didn’t tell people.  Here is what Grace harbored in her heart.  Here is where the truth comes out.  Grace was always dreaming about the next house.  Grace didn’t put forth much effort to make this ‘temporary’ house a home.  She pretended to, but she didn’t really.  Grace longed for the day that she and her family could put down roots and settle into their forever home, their dream home.  She longed for the day where she could decorate the walls and hang pictures. Grace didn’t seek out relationships or friendships in her community because that isn’t where her heart was.  Her heart was where her next house, her forever home, was.

Let me ask you a question, if Grace’s heart is waiting and longing for the future, so much that she isn’t enjoying what she has now, is she truly grateful and thankful?

Truth: This story is true.  This story is based upon someone whom I know very well.  This is my story.

We bought a small 2 bed 2 bath house in a small town.  This house has been a huge blessing – which I’ve written about previously, so I won’t go into crazy detail.  This house was inexpensive so my hubby was able to qualify for a mortgage by himself with his new job.  It gave us a place to live, a place for me to move down to, that was at least ½ the cost of rent.  The low monthly payment has meant that I haven’t had to work over the last 2 years.  I’ve still been able to travel to visit friends and family quite often.  We’ve also been able to bless others.  We are spoiled with 2 bathrooms.  A railroad track lines our property!  We live in a very walkable neighborhood and we are so close to town that I can walk to the dollar store, park, coffee shop, the post office and many other places. 

I wrote before about living for today, but guess what?!  After I finished that wall – I gave up.  I started putting off projects because we weren’t going to be here for much longer, therefore why bother.  I started watching real estate and actively looking in multiple areas for our forever home, for the house that fulfills all of our wants and desires.  I started looking at floor plans again, just in case we decide to build.  And with each house I looked at, I became more and more discontent with our current house.  It’s too small.  The layout is crazy and the walls are stuck where they are – the exterior AND interior walls are cement block.   This house has almost zero insulation so even though it is only 1000 sq ft, our energy bills are crazy high.  Our kitchen has a weird layout.  Our dishwasher doesn’t work well.  We don’t have a grocery store nearby.  It takes me at least a half hour to visit any friends or to go to Bible Study Fellowship.  OUR HOUSE IS ORANGE!  The list kept growing over things that I didn’t like.

Home Depot had a great sale on paint Memorial Day weekend.  I was able to purchase 10 gallons of exterior paint for $120 after rebate.  The weather eventually cooperated and I was able to start cleaning and painting the outside of our house.  Painting the house is one project we knew would help the house to sell when it comes time for us to move.  It was while I was painting that the Holy Spirit whispered truths to me (I didn’t hear it audibly, but I felt the words in my heart).  This house is our home.  This community is where God has placed us for this season.  This is where God wants us for now.  Seek out purpose HERE and NOW.  Stop waiting for the future.

Our house isn’t painted completely yet – it became too hot too fast and we have the chance for pop up showers every day.  I don’t really want to put all the effort into painting and then have storms pop up and wash the paint away!  I have been making progress on the inside though, cleaning, sorting and organizing to make our living space more livable.  

Though I have resolved to live for now, it isn’t easy.  Our temps are approaching 100* - they have been for the past week and they will be for the next 10 days at least.  AND our central A/C broke.  It’s done for.  It needs to be replaced.  We have some amazing friends that are letting us borrow their portable unit which helps keep most of our house cool.  But more discontentment started to pour out last night as I lay in bed sweating because our bedroom does not have a window that opens.  The portable unit requires a window for venting.  In fact, we only have 3 windows that open in our entire house – 1 in the living room, 1 in the 2^nd bedroom/family room and 1 in my bathroom.  Not having A/C would be fine if we had all our windows open at night to pull in the 70* air and cool off the house – but we can’t, because they don’t open.  However, with each discontent thought, I'm reminded of things to be thankful for: Friends - who are more like family and so generous; a lower electric bill - I've been watching our daily usage and it has dropped to less than 1/2 of what it was when we were running the central A/C every day!; and cold water baths and showers!

Ya’ll, it’s a struggle, but I’m choosing to be thankful for our cheap house in a quiet neighborhood that is next to a railroad track.

Today, I choose to be thankful and grateful.  Today I choose contentment, peace and joy! Today, I choose to bloom where I am planted!

Approval Addiction

Hello, my name is Angey. I am a recovering approval addict. A very recent recovering approval addict.

What is an approval addict? Someone who lives for the praise and approval of other people. Someone who needs to be liked by everyone. Someone who fears what others may or may not say. Someone who cannot fail. Me. Or at least what I was and what I am trying to no longer be.

I heard a sermon from Red Rocks Church (link at the bottom to listen). It pierced my heart. I was striving to win the approval of others. I wanted people to notice me, applaud me, and I’m ashamed to admit, I wanted them to praise me. Look at what I did. Look at what I’m doing. See how smart I am? I wanted people to see that my life was just as great as theirs! Don’t misunderstand me, my life is wonderful and amazing and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. BUT, I wanted others to see it. So much pride, so much arrogance and so much insecurity! Over the last few years, I’ve let approval addiction rob me of so much joy - it hurts to look back and see how much I hurt myself by choosing to live to please others.

The purpose of this post is not to get everyone to look at me.  I pray that those that do choose to read it will take the time to listen to the sermon (35 minutes) and that they will be blessed and set free!  The only approval I need – is from God.  He is the author of my life and director of my path! He is who I am choosing to live for.

Approval Addiction

Canvas Art

I have discovered a new love for painting! I've always enjoyed creating, but never really practiced beyond elementary school. I've learned that I especially love painting words on canvases! With the encouragement of family and friends, I've decided to put this love to good use.

I've decided to embark on a path that I've always known I wanted to follow, I've just never taken the leap to start. Galatians 6:2 tells us to "Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ." I have decided to sell a few designs and sizes. The proceeds from these sales will be going into a 'benevolence' account. Currently the funds from this account will be given to a dear friend of mine who has experienced numerous life challenges this year and is in need of help. Lord willing, this account will be used to touch many lives and help bring peace and comfort to those that need it. Another purpose for this account will be to help us (my husband and I) be able to bring children into our home via foster care or adoption. Our current house will not meet the home study requirements for foster care or adoption, so I'm raising funds to help boost our ability to purchase a larger home. If you would be interested in purchasing a custom painted words on canvas, please continue reading for details.

Follow this link for color choices: https://www.glidden.com/colors

I am still compiling the list of the phrases for each letter of the alphabet for the Name Canvas. Here is the partial list that I have so far. I will update as more become available. If you think of one that I don't have, please feel free to share with me. Some letters are just difficult!

These next examples are digital examples. The canvases that you will receive are completely hand painted, therefore will not be as clear and crisp as the digital files show.

8x10

11x14

Please visit my etsy store for more information, designs or to order. 
https://www.etsy.com/shop/GladdenAJoyDesign

If you have any questions, feel free to email me or leave a comment.
angeyjoy@yahoo.com

Live for Today

Our family gallery wall featuring our nephews and nieces

When we bought this house, it was not meant to be our ‘forever’ home.  We bought it because it allowed my hubby to move out of his gracious brother’s house, me to move from Michigan and for us to live cheaply while I traveled between South Carolina and Michigan to finish school.  Redoing the kitchen and putting a laundry room in were easy decisions.  However, I pretty much stopped there.  I didn’t want to make the effort to make this house our home, after all, we weren’t planning on being here forever.

Over the last couple weeks, God has revealed discontentment in my heart.  I realized that I wasn’t living each day to its fullest potential.  I wasn’t living for today and mostly, I was putting my life on hold for things to come.  While, it’s ok to plan and dream, it is not alright to not enjoy today.  I was only given so many days in my life here on Earth, I need to make the most of them.

Years ago, I bought inexpensive picture frames from Ikea.  We had a wall in the living room of our house in Michigan that I wanted to make our family wall.  I never did.  I decided that to help make the most of this house and my life right now, I was finally going to make my family gallery wall.  This house doesn’t have a lot of open wall spaces, but we did have one empty wall in our TV room.  I bought 2 8x10 canvases to paint, and command hooks to use to hang all the frames and the canvases.  I decided to use command hooks because I had 11 frames to hang and I didn’t want to put that many holes in the wall, especially because we don’t plan on being here long term.

The Command hooks in formation on the wall.

The blank canvases that I used.

The Ikea Picture frames.

The frames were white and too plain for what I wanted.  I decided to paint them and initially that was a mistake.  The frames are made of a material that repelled the acrylic paint.  After getting annoyed at first, I started applying a thicker coat of paint and that held better.  I used carbon paper and traced each niece and nephew’s name and birth date onto each frame.  When I went over it with a black permanent marker, the paint started chipping away.  Again, I became irritated and almost gave up.  After stepping back though, and looking at it with fresh eyes, I loved it!  Since the paint chipped off so easily, I ended the process by spraying two coats of clear coat spray paint over each frame.  I painted the background of the canvases to match the frames and then painted a quote on each one. 

The canvases and quotes that I painted.

I chose these quotes because our family is scattered all over the country and we don't get to see our nieces and nephews nearly as much as we would like.  We don't have the opportunity to play as big of a role in their lives, but we still love them to pieces and they are our world!  I love the end result and am so happy that I decided to tackle even little projects to continue to make this house our home, while because we still live here!

Kitchen Redo #2 Continued

It is a well known fact in our household that I am great at starting projects, and not so great at finishing them! Our kitchen has been a work in progress for many months.  Thankfully this progress hasn't made it a war zone though, like our previous kitchen.  We still have had full use of cabinets and counter space.  My first post said that I had 2 phases to finish the kitchen... and now it's turned into 4 :)  I still have to complete the 4th, which is staining our lower cabinets.  I am not completely sure when I will actually finish the kitchen, but I wanted to share the progress that I've made with phases 1-3.

Before

Phase 1

This phase was just painting all the upper cabinets.  This took a bit more effort than the initial small bank that I showed previously.  The rest of the cabinets had paint that was chipping from the previous paint job and some had greasy spots that I couldn't wipe clean.  These doors required much sanding.  I set up my sanding station outside using old chairs and an old door.  I do what I can with what I got, and I didn't have a work table/bench or saw horses to use! :)

I washed the cabinet doors down and then went to work sanding.  As you can see if some of the pictures, the old paint just started peeling right off!

If I I would have known the severity of the need for sanding, I would have used my electric sander.  However, I just figured it would be a few spots here and there so I didn't bother.  My arms got quite the workout, and my fingers had blisters!

I started to paint them outside, but bugs kept flying into the paint!  So I set up shop inside.  I used the same chalky paint mixture as shown in my previous post.

After painting two coats, I applied Minwax Polycrylic for protection.  With chalky paint, you can either wax it or use a poly.  I prefer the poly because I already had some, and I won't have to keep reapplying every year (or more often since kitchens get a LOT of usage).  I prefer the polycrylic over polyurethane because it's a water base, therefore easier to clean up and it doesn't yellow over time like an oil base would.

For the actual cabinets, the prep work was a little easier.  I didn't have to sand and I didn't have much scrubbing.  I did have to 'fill in' one area because there was a gap and you could see right into the cabinet.  For this, I measured the gap, and then bought a square dowel that was close in thickness.  I used my hand saw to cut the length to the correct size.  After sanding the edges, I applied liquid nails and clamped it to the cabinet.  Now that it's all painted, you wouldn't know it was ever repaired (unless I pointed it out to you - which I just did! haha).

After the cabinets were painted, but before the doors were put back on:

Phase 2

Phase 2 was simply painting our bar/wall that separates the kitchen and living area.  For this, I did not use the chalky mixture.  I just used the same ratio of the latex paints to create the same color and mixed it without the calcium carbonate.

Having it the same color as the upper cabinets brightened up the space so much.

Phase 3

Our house has cinderblock walls with only 3/4" styrofoam and 3/4" plaster/drywall.  This combo makes for a very difficult process of hanging anything of substance.  This means that hanging my decorative wall shelves and many of my pictures weren't an easy option.  Since this house isn't our forever house, I didn't want to put all the time and energy into trying to decide the best way to anchor everything without huge holes everywhere.  With the wood planks that I bought YEARS ago for a bed project (that never got completed), I decided to build open shelves on the bar.  This still allows for an open area from kitchen to living, and light to pass through which is important because these spaces are small.

I measured 3 or 4 times before I cut the boards down.  I ran into the problem of warped boards from age and storage.  So the cuts weren't perfect and my measurements ended up being off a little.  I was still able to make the shelves work.  I found stainless steel L brackets to stabilize and secure the wood so the system wouldn't collapse under weight.  

I am really happy with how our kitchen is turning out.  As I said earlier, phase 4 will be staining our lower cabinets and also adding new hardware.  I will update again as I finish that phase.  For now, here are the after pictures of our kitchen area!

Don't mind all the dirty dishes! That's my project for today :)

The shelves filled with my treasures.  And a whole lot of clutter on the
floor that still needs to be taken care of haha!