Diamonds

Every girl should own a little black dress and a beautiful pair of diamond earrings. 

I've had a couple pairs in my life that have slipped through my fingers (or off my ears) for selfless reasons that were important to me and I've gone years without. 

One of the things I've always taught my girls is, if you want anything, flowers, jewelry, whatever it is, don't wait for a man. Get it. 

So I did. 

Beauty from Ashes

From career to career, I have been blessed with three weeks vacation off in between.

Week #1 consisted of Brooke being in Florida for Spring Break. An absolute welcomed time of solitude, peace and much needed silence, day trips and projects.

Week #2 consisted of day trips, day trips, day trips, projects, downtime, fun time, rest and relaxation.

Week #3 is seeing everything I wanted and needed to accomplish, accomplished. Brainstorming what I want to do next and doing that. Day trips, day trips and day trips and preparing for Easter.

Time.

A season for everything under the sun showered in blessings and time to acclimate and transition.

I have had time to relax, accomplish, have fun and do every single thing I've wanted to do in an unrushed pace. Is there anything I've missed? Any stone left unturned? No.

My finger on my pulse to make sure all is well and it is.

I am ready.

Nothing happens to me, everything happens for me.

I needed time. Time for so many things and for so many reasons I didn't even know until I had it. And as I reflect, I see myself being carried and transitioned in such a way that I couldn't have done it on my own.

God always and has always known exactly what I need. We don't necessarily have to step down so He can step up, He can in a breath take over at any moment, but it is so much more gracious to say, "Here, please handle this and shower it with blessings and favor." To be propelled into financial blessings gives me security beyond a leaf that blows in the wind from this place to that. God has always been my Provider.

He specializes in beauty from ashes.

The Years the Locusts Hath Eaten

And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten. 

                                                                                                         -Joel 2:25

I remember sending these words to a holy God in prayer. Words that meant, I want for the rest of my life the same things I wanted the first half of my life. 

    

Lift your finger off the fast forward button, please. My life has completely changed.

I am constantly putting my finger on the pulse of my life assessing all the changes in less than two short months. Everything happened so fast, so out of my control, that I knew I was being carried, because that is when you know.

Relationship + Career + New family + New routine 

Major life events that come with significant changes in each event ... all at once. 

My heart is beating and life is calm as if I am breathing the way I was intended to with pieces falling into place and blessings being showered on those. 

It is as if I am observing the changes from a distance watching my own life like an outsider with my head tilted seeing the pieces are falling together into a puzzle that is my own life, but I don't know what that picture is going to look like. As if I am nudging God standing gently beside me saying, "You remembered ..." 

I turn and look back and my heart hurts for what I have lost and the life I desperately loved. My grief significant and I have so many questions, but I also know the answers. 

My eyes back on the present, this new life and I feel as if I am walking through a garden with my finger tips touching petals blooming all around me and appreciating flowers I have never seen, breathing in their scent and feeling their velvety softness.

It isn't for me to know what my future holds, but knowing who holds my future. 

Love Letters

Love letters are a love language of legacy and memories. They are words that are not forgotten said in the wind that time questions, "What were those words? How was that said?" Or worse yet, forgotten.

This blog is life captured in love letters to my daughters. Printed into a book so they never forget.

I've captured memories, my heart, and my words to leave an imprint of all that is important to me in various ways. Maybe I was speaking a love language that was missing. Filling a void I needed, so I filled the void with my own words.

Writing love letters is a lost art. A hand-written note that can be tucked away and kept.

These are now mine.

Hidden love letters, left for me to find. An expression of the heart that speaks to me in my very own love language. And I already have a collection, for me.

Song of Songs is one of my favorite books in the bible. Words from a heart bursting in love describing his every thought of his beloved. The confidence of a man in love, the wisdom in saying words that speaks to her soul she understands.

Wrapping my own thoughts and mind around what I have poured onto others, that has now become my own and I just ran across this ...

A favorite quote of mine I've loved for as long as I can remember. 

When I wasn't even looking, the most beautiful things cross my path. It captured my attention and awareness. 

Thank you to the one who speaks love into me and for the most beautiful love letters. They speak to my soul.

xo

Tranquility

How do you know when you are being carried? When a perfect storm brews and all logic says to panic and worry ...

   But, a calm settles in your soul.

           Tranquility takes over in unusual circumstances.

                   Perfect quiet and serenity cover you.

Believe me when I say I do my own self-assessment and question and wonder, should I be worried? Supernatural calmness and peace is familiar. I remember my God of the past and while I cannot see in the future from my limited perspective, I remember how faithful He has been. His strength and power shines the brightest in our weakness ...

      So I step down.

             I know I am being carried.

                    I rest in Him,

                           and watch what He can do far greater than me.

The pieces fall in place and what I couldn't do in my own power, He can.

My God of the past is my God of my present and my future. He has been faithful, all-powerful, all-knowing and specializes in billions of details.

He is my Provider, my Protector, my Advocate and my Vindicator.

I am still under His wing because I can feel it. I feel the peace, the calm, and am seeing so many blessings fall softly.

Don't be afraid of storms. Do not be afraid of closed doors. There'd be no point in attacking you if the devil didn't know God has a great plan for you.

God allows weapons to form, but He won't allow them to prosper.

Perhaps, He loves you too much to leave you were you were.

It is more real being in a peaceful place when circumstances shout otherwise, than to be in control of your own life and believe you are in a good place when you are not.

Nothing Happens to Me, Everything Happens for Me

It has been 13 years that I have had the same bedding set in my bedroom. I am such a creature of habit and I get comfortable with what I have until its been too long; however, in my defense, I've never sat on my comforter and it has been in excellent condition because of that.

Being a creature of habit and for so many years I thought my life was truly going to change. It was supposed to, so I held on waiting ... and the years continued to slip by.

Keeping my eyes open for well over a year the perfect bedding set, I found it today.

It is beautiful and it is perfect and my bedroom is about to begin transformation.

There is so much change happening in so many aspects of my life. 

Nothing happens to me, everything happens for me.

Things that were intended to destroy me, became the catalyst for blessings in my life. I am being carried and I have so many questions, why? 

I loved my life. I thanked God for my life, all the time. I kept my eyes on what was good and prayed through what wasn't good. I gave everything I was and my loss felt worse than a death, because death isn't a choice. 

My feet being gently set in my new life is filled with details I had forgotten. Details I have been praying about, details captured in my prayer journal. As if God said, "I heard your prayers, here you go ..."  

It is wonderful. It is unfamiliar. 

The hardest part for me was letting go. 

The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new. 

Those little things that meant so much to me I held out so long for, I'm not waiting on anymore. 

Caribbean Blue Life

Menopause comes from two Greek words: menos or "month" and pausis or "cease".

From my female perspective the term and the cliches are everything negative when it comes to the transition of "the change".

Perimenopause, menopause, post menopause, symptoms, side effects and hot flashes, Oh my!

It's real and it's uncertain and a different experience for every woman.

Natural menopause can take years to d e c a d e s. Forced menopause, which is what I did on purpose began when I was 39 years old and had my uterus yanked for 40's & fabulous and quality of life purposes.

Best. Decision. Ever.

Menopause begins after you've gone one year without a menstrual cycle and as I am about to turn 47 years old I have lived through those unknown menopause cliches and have reached the other side at a young age.

Most women struggle and I've always only heard of the horrors of menopause from women throughout their 40's, 50's and through their 60's dealing with never-ending transitions that make life uncomfortable.

I remember my own experience with the grand finale and crescendo of the end of my own menopause transition. I remember mood swings that kept me at zero tolerance and hot flashes that hit me every 20 minutes I swear for one month. No exaggeration.

All day and all night I would break out into full sweats. Showering constantly, I was scared to death believing I was transitioning into blue hair and massive wrinkles on the other side and searching the internet for relief to squelch symptoms and side effects praying I didn't have another decades of hot flash hell yet to go.

My eyes reading what to expect on the other side scared me worse than hot flashes!

My menopause experience lasted seven years.

It's been seven months since that awful crescendo and for every woman who is fearful of the process and what life looks like on the other side, let me tell you, it is GORGEOUS!

I am living a Caribbean blue life with sunny skies and the horizon has never looked brighter.

I no longer fear my 50's and 60's being miserable years of suffering before I enter old age of tiredness, mood swings, hot flashes, cravings, vaginal dryness, blah, blah, blah, everything old.

E.V.E.R.Y.T.H.I.N.G. intact and working like a champ.

The best tip I can share that I had heard and worked was exercise! That if you sweat during exercising, hot flashes will cease. I found this to be 100% true. When I was super active from spring to autumn I never hot flashed. Those slow winter months were miserable flashing constantly. Once I started getting active and I mean really active, the hot flashes completely stopped. For years this was my routine.

I had full control of those until the end of last summer. The grand finale and crescendo of menopause was untouched by exercise. Nothing worked, I was hormonal raging and it was miserable.

Then is stopped ...

... and I began assessing the damage. Am I whole? Is everything working correctly? Still no crows feet, my hair isn't white, is it truly over?

It's over.

Life on the other side is far more beautiful than I ever expected.

I have nothing to dread and perhaps I am one of the lucky ones, blessed actually.

For my girls ... in case I forget, this was my experience and I hope it will be yours. xo