Category: Blogs

Blogs, Devotional, Love

Setting My Priorities

Ali

I am the kind of person that has lists, lists of things to do, lists of projects I want to complete, lists of all the medications I/we take and even lists of chores that need to be completed! I also love to mark things off of my lists – it is a visual thing to show me I have not been a bump on a log all day long 😳.

I also use a paper day timer/calendar and it is full of lists. Lists of things that need to be done each day, things that need to be for the week and the month. I love to see things written down and crossed off.

One of my priorities, for lack of a better word is to spend time each day in the Word of God. I wish I could say I am successful at doing that every day but that’s just not true.

But this morning I did and it was good!!! I use a variety of different devotional tools along with my Bible. Today’s scriptures were from Experiencing God Daily Devotional (EGDD) and January Scriptures and Writing Prompts (JSWP) from PrayerfulPlanner.

This morning’s verses were Isaiah 6: 5-9 and 2 Corinthians 3:18

and

And I was reminded if I look at things through my mind, my eyes and my thoughts I take my focus off of God BUT by keeping my focus on God I see peace, blessings (physical, spiritual and emotional) as how God sees me and wants me to see the world.

The prompt from JSWP was to write a prayer of transformation ~ my prayer today is that as I busy myself with all the things on my list I want to keep my focus on the Lord and how He is always with me, even when I don’t feel his presence and to have God’s love that He shares so openly and willingly with me shared with those I come into contact with, whether that be in person, on the phone or through a post on Facebook or an email…Lord, allow your love for me flow through me to those I come into contact with. Amen.

As many of you know, one of the things I enjoy doing is writing and yes, writing, blogging, journaling are all on my lists ~ do I do it every day? No, but I want to. One of the tools I am trying to use this year is being a part of WordPress Bloganuary. Today’s prompt was to answer the question “How are you brave?”

When I first saw the prompt I thought “I am not brave.” But in reality I am brave in many ways…I don’t let physical stuff stop me from doing things ~ I am thinking of only having vision out of one eye. Oh there are lots of things I won’t do because I only have one eye like go water skiing or snow skiing ~ the fear is real I would lose my eye and it would be impossible to find! And at $5000 a pop, that’s too much money to risk. But I do things that I have been told I can’t do because I only have one eye ~ cross-stitch is one because you know I might poke my good eye out! I enjoy cross-stitching, it’s right up there with crocheting…I love to make things and give them away. And yes, I have scratched the lens on my left side of my glasses before with a needle and I have even superglued my eyeball though I don’t recommend either of those activities.

Another way I am brave but I don’t call it being brave ~ I call it sharing my testimony, my story of being abused, abuses in more ways than I can count and also being a verbally and physically abusive person in my past. Am I proud of that abuse ~ absolutely not! What I am proud of is that I have learned how to love myself (self-abuse is a big thing too), love those who God has placed in my life, learned to share with others that you don’t have to be abusive, that it is okay to be a loving and kind person. I have also learned that I don’t have to be in control all the time…for so many years of my life I thought I had to control those around me, to get them to meet my needs, to do my bidding. BUT in reality I have realized I can only control myself. I can only control what I say or do. It doesn’t mean I can’t share my desires and wants and needs but it does mean I can only control me.

I think I will always struggle with wanting to control things, it’s only human to want what I want, when I want it

BUT GOD
has shown me how to love myself,
how to love others,
know the difference between wants and needs

AND WITH GOD
I am whole,
I am loved,
I am loveable,
I am enough
and
I can love others
just as God loves me!

and most importantly

Blogs, Projects, Writing

Writing Prompt ~ March 9

Ali

I’m trying to find things to keep me busy…it’s not like I don’t have a To Do List a mile long…but who wants to do work when they can play??

So I did a google search for writing prompts…let’s write…is one thing I want to do each day and I’m not sure if everyone wants to read about the struggles of being a home parent to foster kids, listen to a mom complain about always being TIRED, or rambling so today I turned to my friend Google and found some different writing prompts.

Today’s is If you were to write a book, what would it be about?

That’s a good question because I do want to write a book. I would like to write a book about some of my life struggles so that maybe some of the pain I have had to deal with would/could help someone else. In fact, I wrote a story called Cycle of Pain, Cycle of Hope which was published in The Christian Leader in 1990. The story started out as a response to a comment that someone made to the editor that people who are abused should not go to their pastor…I was flabbergasted to say the least. IF someone who has struggled with either being an abuser or being abused CAN’t go to their pastor who the heck can they go to. And so I started a dialogue with the editor and he eventually asked me for my story. I wrote it not only in response to the comment to the person mentioned above but at the same time I submitted it in one of my English classes as an assignment. And to top it off I was paid $75 ~ that was the biggest surprise.

I have many topics that I would like to write about and have written in short story and poetry at different times in my life with the thought in the back of my head…some day I would write a book about the different situations I have dealt with, how I learned to deal with them and offer encouragement to others on those topics.

Some of the topics include depression – being asked “how does it feel to be in with all those crazies?,” “being told “if you had more faith you wouldn’t be depressed,” depression is for those who are weak; sexual abuse – the trauma of not being believed, how it almost cost me my marriage and my children; anger – displaced and for all the wrong reasons; parenting – it’s not easy being a mom; seeking help and being made to feel bad for asking for help; doubting your Christianity; and the list goes on and on!!

I have most of the journals I have written over the years…they sit in a trunk in my living room…I’ve thought of putting them on the computer and yet the task seems daunting and I ALSO WONDER what the heck do I do with all those journals…do I leave them for someone to dispose of after I die? do I transcribe them like I keep telling myself I want to ~ to use in the book I want to write.

I also would like to write some devotionals – sharing short stories about how the scriptures speak to me and lessons I have learned. I have one that I wrote called Walking the Dog, Walking with God – I shared it on a friend’s blog awhile back https://thisunexceptionallife.com/walking-the-dog-walking-with-god/ if you want to check it out.

******
Question of the Day?
Would you like to write something to be published? If so, what would you write about?

2nd Question of the Day?
What do I do with all my journals?

Blogs, Change, Writing

Changing Things Up a Bit

Ali

I’ve been thinking a lot about changing up my blog as I am getting back into the swing of things and taking my writing a bit more serious. As Ron likes to say “Ali hasn’t met a word she doesn’t like!” I’ve been thinking of revamping my blog and so I’m moving things over to WordPress instead of Blogger because it gives me a bit more flexibility and I can personalize things a bit more…well at least I think I can.

We will see!!

Let me know what you think of this new layout. What’s working and what’s not!!!

Blogs, Devotions, God, Quiet Time, Spring, Sunrise, The Lord, Yellow

Y is for …

Ali

Y is for …

…hubby says

yellow

The morning sunrise!

y sunrise

Yellow roses!
 y roses

A yellow kitchen ~ we used to have a bright yellow kitchen, much brighter than this one.  Then we moved to a new home and we painted it yellow and blue – still like yellow and in fact painted the bathroom in our motor home a light yellow.  Guess I have mellowed in the past 25 years 🙂

y kitchen walls

Yellow Fish – this is more the color of our first yellow kitchen 🙂

y fish

Corn on the cob – one of our favorite things to eat.  Am hoping since we are now in Kansas we will find lots of fresh corn this summer.

y corn

When I was thinking of a Y is for ?  The word that came to mind was Yearning…yearning for God.

 y yearning

I have found that in being more intentional about my time with the Lord, studying His word, writing out my prayers and talking about and trying to understand different things from the Bible with others I yearn more for the Lord.

I do another blog, Alice’s Restaurant ~ Dishin’ Up Food for Thought where I write about what is on my heart.

Today’s Post is here where I share about my yearning for understanding the Holy Spirit and being an encourager.

What is your favorite Yellow thing?

Mine would be the sunshine!!!  I love the sunshine and I even love hot summer days.

 

Blogs, Devotions, Habits, Plans, Projects, The Lord

W is for Writing

Ali

W is for

writing

I enjoy writing.

I like to make lists.

list

I like to send cards with little notes in them.

I like to write letters to our family and friends that don’t do the internet thing.

letters

Writing helps me sort things out.

I like to write my prayers out,

prayer requests

 sharing praises and requests.

praise

I like to send postcards to our grands.

postcards

And I like to write blog posts.

Alice’s Restaurant is a mixture of writings.  They include prayers to God, thoughts about world happenings, devotional’s and anything else that just pops into my mind that I want to reflect on.

Alice’s Restaurant ~ Dishin’ Up Food for Thought

and the first edition of  The Wandering Workentins can be found here.

The Wandering Workentins ~ First Edition

Highlights include February to September 2010 of when we worked, lived, traveled with a carnival,

Selling Christmas Trees November to December 2011

Our very eventful trip to Texas from Washington January-February 2012

You can check any of these out using the link above and going to the archives.

And of course writing this blog where I am currently doing the

A to Z Challenge for April 2013.

What do you like to write about?

Do you like to get real mail?

Do you have a prayer request you would like me to pray about?

Oh and with writing goes PENS!!

I love me Fine Pt Colored Pens!!!

colored pens

because not all my writing is on the computer you know 🙂

Beginnings, Blogs, Change, Uncategorized

A Change in the Making

Ali

Welcome to our new blog: The Wandering Workentins; Lovin the Lord, Travelin the USA, Sharing God’s Blessings.

With all the rumors, ramblings & restrictions that are happening on blogger.com and the desire to just have one blog I have made the leap to wordpress.com.

So far all I can say is that wordpress is very confusing to me.  But like with any new adventure we take on we know it takes time to get to the comfortable place.  So for now, I guess I will be doing three blogs 😕 ~ oh my what am I thinking?

I need to figure out how to add followers, blogs I follow on wordpress and if I can have a list of the blogs I follow on blogger…any ideas or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.