Springing into Spring

Springing into Spring with a fresh outlook!

Filling you in on my life the last couple of weeks.....

For those of you who are trying to shed a few pounds before summer, here is a great Smoothie recipe that is very low calorie, but yet your kids or husband will LOVE it to! 

Ingredients:

1 small 4 oz. individual yogurt from a pack. (any flavor of fruit or even vanilla to)

ice

fresh fruit..I usually do a strawberry yogurt, then add a few strawberries and a banana and it's so YUMMY!

Put your ice in the bottom of a blender, add your yogurt and fruit and you have a yummy low-cal smoothie that is filling and gets you in the MOOD for spring!! Thank you aunt Sheryl for this yummy smoothie! i love it! This serves about 2-3 people, depending on how much your serving each person!!

"You had a green thumb and you didn't even know it!"

About a month and a half ago, I was so ready for summer and spring weather! So at the grocery one day I picked out the prettiest flowers in the seed rack that I could find, got some potting soil, and a vase. I proceeded to dump! all of the seeds in my potting soil. and watered it and set it in the window to get some sun. My husband came home from work laughing while exclaiming "That vase is not big enough to hold all of those flowers if you dumped the whole packet in there! Your soposed to only plant one, two or three seeds in a small vase like that at a time! I was already discouraged! but continued to water it daily for about 2 weeks. There was no progress on my sad little flowers so I gave up and completely forgot about them! But 3 weeks later my mom came up to visit and wanted to see my flowers i planted! I exclaimed there dead, and sitting in the window. i need to throw them out! So she goes and gets them, and THEY WERE ALIVE! I have about 12 little blossoms coming up! I do need to get some smaller vases and separate each plant! My mom exclaimed when she saw them "YOU HAVE A GREEN THUMB AND YOU DIDN'T EVEN KNOW IT!!"

Brightening up my life with some confetti finger nail polish!

For those of you who don't know me, I love bright colors, and anything that is fun and exciting!~especially this finger nail polish I spotted the other day! I love it! It just makes me smile! :) Oh the simple things in life!

...And a new haircut and color! Added some blonde to freshen up my color, and a new look for me!-lots of bangs! I love it! :)

Lastly..God is good all the time! "Come everyone CLAP your hands! Shout to God with joyful praise! For the Lord Most High is AWESOME! He is the King over all the earth! "Psalm 47:1&2  Happy Spring Day to YOU! xoxo

My heart to Yours.......

It's been forever since I have posted a blog. In fact I have had a post ready to put on here in my journal for a few days now...but for some reason I haven't posted it yet. I guess because I really wanted to share my heart with you...and my other post just seemed like I was just going through the motions...not really REAL. Well I am doing a Beth Moore study up here with a group of ladies, and I love her. She is so inspiring...when I'm having a rough day, I open up my Beth study. & I'm always so excited to go to Bible study on Thursdays. Anyways, I've had a great past month and a half up here as far as homesickness goes, and adjustment. But the past two weeks have been so hard. For those of you who have moved I'm sure you've experiences some of the anxieties or even just moving away from home is hard to. So..Beth got me all pumped up tonight as I was doing her study. She is encouraging us to BREAK THOSE BONDAGES in our life...that put us in captive before our Lord and keep us from serving Him fully. Those bondages are anything from pride, insecurity, worry, doubt, faithlessness, unbelief  or whatever is keeping you from taking a step closer to God. Those bondages can seriously wear you out!! I am so thankful I am on this journey to freedom from these obstacles. I was humbled tonight after doing my Beth study to open Psalms and just go through some of the chapters and jot down words that God has promised me in the Bible. I came across so many promises that I hadn't ever even realized. I wanted to share a few promises with you because this life is full of hardships, whether you've moved somewhere new like I have, or experiencing a loss, or your just sad about life or an experience or outcome... we are called to come together as the body of believers and EXHORT one another and encourage each other when we are sad, happy or whatever stage you are in life. 
Psalm 1:6.....But the Lord watches over the path of the godly.....
Psalm3:3.......the Lord is a shield around me.........
Psalm 4:3...........He will answer when I call on Him........
Psalm 5:12...........He surrounds you with  shield of LOVE.....
To think the God in all His Majesty and Holiness cares that much about me.........He wants to protect and love me....When I am sad or happy He will answer when I call upon Him.....and I want to choose to BELIEVE that...not Satan's lies that easily discourage us and the bondages we are in........
So I hope this isn't to scatter-brained for you..... I just want to encourage you and let you know God does care. He has your best interest and I am choosing to believe Him today!

Fire Stove

How to build a fire in your stove!-This is for you girls who are just like me who have not a clue how to build a fire, or even light a match.

What you need:
-1 log
-5 or 6 pieces of  small wood.
-a lighter or a match
-patience

Time: 5 minutes - 1 hour depending on if you have any hot coals or not in the bottom of your stove.

I usually put a small log in the stove first. Second, I take my small pieces of wood and place them against the log in a "tee-pee" shape. I light a few pieces of the small wood with a lighter. Next you have to blow on the flame to make it get bigger. This can take time..usually it takes me an hour to get the fire going good. After theres a pretty good flame going, collect a few more pieces of some small wood and add it to the "tee-pee". You may have to continue to blow on it for a little. As the flame gets bigger, you can place bigger chunks of wood on the flames. The fire should be going good enough to put several logs on the fire.
& there ya go girls..get out the marshmallows and chocolate its time for smores!!!! :)

This really is a good thing I have learned. We can set our house on 68 degrees and I can have it up to 75 degrees easy with the fire stove. The hardest part is the patience to build it and to clean up the mess! (WARNNG: Your dusting and cleaning in the room the stove is in will triple.-but just try to remember your saving money and your husband is happy!!)

Tips on what NOT to do:
From experience...
-newspaper looks like a good way to start a fire. It is definitely the easy route..AND unfortunately your fire probably won't last. One time I used all the newspaper I could find in our house. I had flames..but as soon as it burnt the paper it would go out and leave TONS of ashes.
-Don' wait every 8 hours to check the wood in the fire to make sure it's still burning. You will end up having a fire that goes out. Check it at least every 2-3 hours.

my brother came out and he helped Jared put our stove in

getting it going!

loading it up..

the mess it makes. i was going to crop the mess out of this photo but decided i needed to be honest with ya and let ya know really how much of a mess it does make. 

i let the fire go out..

ooops!!

This explanation is definitely for dummies. I'm sure a professional fire-maker could use newspaper and start a fire. But I haven't learned the technique. 

New Bookshelf!

 our new bookshelf wouldn't fit in our trunk, so i had to ride in the back while the bookshelf took up the front and part of the back seat!

we thought it was hilarious.

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and felt so odd with me sitting behind him!!! 

we also spotted this snowplow that was trying to spread salt in the mcdonalds parking lot. he had an interesting technique. we laughed about this also :)

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In order to be submissive to your spouse you have to be patient! (I am learning!!)  Nagging just doesn't work. Asking them to do the same thing five times is a big fail also! Sometimes it's better to just bite your lip and keep quiet! Something I'm not the greatest at! First I will say, even though getting married and moving to a completely new place is hard, it can be so much fun! Even through the tough times I wouldn't change a thing. I got married pretty young, and have only been married for 3 months but me and my husband have had so much fun together! He has taught me many things about life that I never new..such as: learning to build a fire, how to get knots out of your bobbin on the sew machine, how to drive in the snow, how to drive a stick shift truck..how to snowboard..how to patch work pants.. and the list goes on! Honestly at this point, I don't have any idea what I'd do without him! There's so much youth in our marriage, and I love my husband so much! Now, here comes the fun part...learning to be SUBMISSIVE and PATIENT. Here is a lesson that I learned about being patient! After we got married, we had and still have tons of giftcard, so I told Jared we needed a bookshelf. We had a huge box of books just sitting in our living room. He agreed with me. Well a month went by, and I didn't hear a thing mentioned about the bookshelf. (The books were still laying in my living room) So one Friday night before Jared got home from work, I got really grouchy about the whole situation and picked up the box and hoofed it up to the attic. Men just don't notice detail..
( that i had moved the box of books) so i informed him i carried the huge box up to the attic. i think he felt bad, so i started to feel bad..but still no talk of the bookshelf. another month went by..and we were so busy with Christmas and other Holiday fun we didn't have time to go get the bookshelf! FINALLY.. just last weekend Jared mentioned we would go to Target and get the bookshelf. I was so happy...so we bundled up and took off to Target on Saturday. We bought the bookshelf and it is now sitting in my living room! We had SOO much fun that day! I can't imagine why in the world I wanted him to go any before last Satarday..because we had such a fun day together. I guess God's timing is most important. something to remember when trying to be patient.

Joy or Happiness...

Wow! so I'm here..in this cold, flat place. Snow is falling and the sky is grey as usual! Life is hard..I am learning. Somedays it's easier and the sun is actually out..and other days the sky is grey and harder to see the positive! Makes me wonder- why in the world did God want a shy, timid, home-body to move hundreds of miles away from her family who was also her best friends?? Well I am learning..that Christ wants my heart fully. He doesn't want half, and He definately doesn't want a third. He wants everything!-and I am learning to cling to Him. I hear Him in my heart tugging! Telling me that this is a lesson. This is a lesson about life. A reminder that HE is in control and not me. And that is how my relationship with Him is being challenged..and I know He can use me in Ohio. I am learning to Trust Him like I never have before..and to cling to my husband! I am learning to have joy instead of happiness.
- OK so i'll be honest..if my husband were standing right here he'd be the first to agree with me that i LOVE to shop. You see.. I can be the happiest person in the world when he gives me money and lets me go shopping..and I can buy whatever I would like..but the minute something goes wrong..... I have lost that happiness. I'm upset. You see happiness depends on happenings, and joy depends on Christ. I'm learning that as tough times come and go... I can still have the JOY of the Lord. A Reminder that I am not here for me, I am here for HIM. I hope this encourages you.. A great example of a person that has the joy of the Lord is Paul. I love his encouragement..and love reading his letters in the new testament...
This is my first post..I hope God can use it in your life as He has mine..PRAISING HIM WITH A JOY OF THE LORD!

xoxo MRS HOLLINGER