There is still so much swirling and whirling around my my head from my weekend at Allume. Lots to think about and process. I will fill you all in as the time comes. But as for now lets just say how awesome it was to travel and have by my side my dear friend Jenni. I’m telling you people, I love her. She gets me fired up and challenges me. I like it. It was such a blessing for us to attend together. And then for us to meet our longtime “online friend turned real life friend” Christie. She is as sweet as can be with her Southern accent and infectious smile. She was just as I expected but better. It was only the Lord who could have put us 3 girls together. I loved how we met for the first time but immediately jumped into talking like we had just seen each other yesterday. Yes. And it was like that all weekend long. Good good times.

More to come! 

In just a couple weeks I will road tripping east to the Allume conference. Say what?!? Allume is a Christian blogging conference. I am super excited and nervous all at once. I am going with my local partner in crime Jenni who has become one of my best friends. So thankful to have her to enjoy this whole experience with. We are meeting up with Christie, an amazing gal and someone who has become such a dear friend. Christie, Jenni and I have been chatting back and forth online now for over a year. Words cannot express how excited I am for all of us to meet in person! So the three of us are not only meeting one another but we are rooming together at the conference. Good times are to be had for sure. But I feel I need to prepare these girls a bit for being a roomie with me.

Here are 10 things they might want to know:

1. I’m more of a morning person than a night person. There will come a point in the night when I just shut down. It’s bed time. Trust me, you want me to get good sleep.
2. I will take time to plan my outfits before I come but mostly certainly I will second my choices and I will need your reassurance that what I have brought is the most perfect  choice and I can’t go wrong!
3. I like to have a bedtime snack. So I will probably ask you to go on a hunt around the hotel to look for something to eat. No worries, I will share:)
4. Again, I am a good sharer so clothes, accessories, beauty products: it’s all up for grabs in my opinion.
5. I wear contacts except for the 10 min before I go to sleep and the first 5 minutes before I pry my eyes open to put my contacts back in. So…you may see some funky glasses that may or may not be held together with super glue at the time.
6. I will run in the mornings. Therefore my sweaty, stinky running clothes will be displayed in room somewhere to air out. I. Am. Sorry.
7. My face says everything. Anything I am thinking will be displayed through my facial expressions. Sometimes this is good. Most times not. Again. I am sorry.
8. There will be a point when I hit maximum capacity of social interaction. Our room will be the safe place. Just go with it.
9. Music is necessary when I get ready. You will probably see some crazy, absurd moves which I call dancing.
10. There are no other two people that I would rather room with that get to enjoy all this goodness about me!

I’m linking up with my friend Stacey who is also attending Allume. Are you going too? Don’t you want to share a little bit with your roomies?

Well here we are again for week 2 of my first official book club. It’s not really mine I am jumping on the bandwagon with hundreds of other women who are reading Grace for the Good Girl by Emily Freeman. Every Thursday Emily is posting her own thoughts about her book on her blog Chatting at the Sky. I would highly encourage you to check out what she has to say about her own book and even join the discussion over there or in the facebook group. There is much being said by what women are loving about this book, what they are learning about themselves and even how they are feeling encouraged because they aren’t the only ones. I know that is how I felt when I first read the book. I wondered how Emily jumped inside my brain and stole all my thoughts and endless inner conversations! Alas, she did not but her and many others feel caught up in this good girl, have it all together trap.

So let’s talk about that some more.

Again, there is so much I can say about what I read in chapters 4-6. I feel I could underline almost every sentence. But I’m going to camp out on the Mary and Martha story. This story has always intrigued me and kind of confused me. I can so relate to Martha. So much so it is really hard for me to see why Mary always gets the gold star in this deal. Like Martha, I’m a doer. I see something that needs to be done, so I do it. Especially, when it comes to serving others and hospitality. These traits are me at my core. They are in my blood. I’ve watched my Grandma and Mom serve and host exceptionally well all my life. I’ve learned from the best and have taken it on as my own. Now I am teaching my kids, especially the girls the importance and joy of serving and hosting others. So I read about Martha and I think “yes, I would do exactly the same thing. of course!” But why? Well, this is where the story and Emily’s explanation gets me. I do it because I love to serve others, yes. And we are called to serve one another and use our gifts and talents. But I also have these thoughts as well:

•      Well if I don’t do it, who will?
•      I want others to think well of me. I’m a hard worker, good, perfect.
•      I don’t want to let anyone down. Someone may have certain expectations and I want to meet and exceed those expectations so I will do it. Even though I have no idea if or even what the expectations are sometimes. Can we say maddening?

“Given the choice to please God or to trust God good girls become conflicted.” pg 64

Yes! I feel this tension so often because pleasing God is active. I’m doing something and it feels good. Others can see I am doing good things and that feels good too. I like doing. But trusting God is passive. You can’t really gauge what is going on, where the progress is, there’s no checklist. And really, trusting is way more hard, even when you feel like you aren’t “doing” anything. Dilemma. It was so well described in the book. You can’t jump back and forth between the pleasing road and the trusting road. It’s one or the other and there’s no third road to choose either.

So where do you go? What do you do? Do you stop doing all your things, your many things, hand them over to Him and just sit? And trust? Well, yes. As hard and as impossible as it seems. And know I am talking to myself more than anyone else right now. He doesn’t need me to keep things in place or to do “x,y and z” for Him. He can do it all.

He won’t come undone. 

” I want to give myself permission to sit down on the inside and live like I have God who know what he’s doing.” pg.65

Love this. I believe there is freedom in following the trusting road. I have caught glimpses of it. When fully trusting in Him and His plan there is peace and security. And then pleasing Him is automatic.

“He doesn’t want my service, he wants me.” pg. 65

Oh, there it is. That about sums it all up. When it comes down to it He just wants me, the real me. Not the good girl, the perfect wife and the mom who has it all together and is doing wonderful things. No. He just wants me with my fears, my failures, my flaws, my pride, my yuck. Yep, that’s what he wants more than me serving Him up in kitchen like Martha.

He says, “Aubrey. Aubrey. You are worried and bothered by so many things but just focus on the One true and necessary thing. Me”.

So, hesitantly I come and sit.

Will you sit with me?

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At our house we have a time out chair. And it gets used pretty often. More often than not the chair is not used for discipline but to give the person a break because their actions are showing they need it. They are overwhelmed, not thinking straight resulting in not making the best decisions. A little time is good to clear the head, get a little space from the situation and take a breath.

Well I have given myself a timeout from blogging. Yes, even big kids like us need time outs. I just need a little breather, a little space, some time to refresh. I was finding I had no margin in my life but always pushing way past my limit. I want to makes sure I keep my first priorities first and be in the right mind to not just make okay decisions but the best decisions for me and my family.

I’m not going to lie, some of you have checked in with me to see if I was ok because of the lack of blog posts and that feels good! Thanks for missing me. I enjoy and appreciate each and every comment. I look forward to coming back soon with a renewed and refreshed mind and spirit!