Hey, My Darling Siestas! How’s your weekend been? You guys that keep up pretty well know that I blogged last on Wednesday while we were on our way six hours northwest to our acreage in the middle of nowhere. We are now heading back to Houston so once again I’m writing you from Keith’s truck. My man of 31 years is driving next to me, singing to 60’s music and our two dogs are snoozing in the back seat. (He just stopped me and held my hand for a minute because the song was so sweet that he felt romantic.) We got to be away for four nights. The perfect amount of time! I wish I could say it was vacation but I had to take a ton of work with me. That’s ok. At least it was from a different venue and that can help a lot.
(I just got a text from Travis with a picture on it of his youngest son who just lost two teeth. Just living a little life here. Had to stop and text back and tell Levi how cool he looks.)
My heart is full where you are concerned and full with the last four days of life out in the country with Keith. And that’s why I’m going to share a little of it with you: because I love you and love how we can share so many parts of our lives with one another. This is going to be one of those posts when the girls (Amanda or Melissa) might say, “Are you sure you want to share that? You might get hit by somebody for that.” We, the girls and I, provide checks and balances for one another. If we’ve written anything at all besides your garden variety kind of post, we usually run it by one another. Sometimes we talk each other out of an entire post because we’re afraid someone will get offended or out of sorts or just take the opportunity to be ugly or critical. It happens in the blog world which many of you know from your own blogs.
Other times we just talk each other out of a few sentences or a paragraph or two. Most of you should wish you’d seen Melissa’s original Song of Songs Valentine post before I talked her out of a whole chunk. (Yes, we did have a few little words over it. Not a fuss. Just a good, healthy discussion. All four of us are strong willed and opinionated. We just speak our minds back and forth, work through our differences, and, a whole lot of the time, end up making a private family joke out of it.) Those who wouldn’t have wished to see Melissa’s original post are the reason none of you did. (Laughing and with much love.) There was nothing wrong with it. It was just extra colorful – kind of PG13 – because the Scripts happen to be extra colorful – kind of PG14 – in that particular book.
I’m not complaining one iota. To tell you the truth, we get so little ugliness from our commenters. You guys really are so loving and encouraging and patient and understanding and leave ample room for several generations to express themselves here in very different ways. We think we have the most amazing community in bloggerville but we’re not immune, of course. Sometimes we just flat out ask for it and don’t even realize it. Other times we expect somebody may take exception but we just decide it’s worth the risk.
This is one of those times. I’m about to show you guys some pictures – poor quality ones just off my i-phone – to give you a small taste of Moore life out at the acreage our family has. I know in advance that I’m setting myself up for someone to say sarcastically “Must be nice” but I’ll just sigh when I get it and, if it doesn’t get too ugly from there, post the comment anyway and wish she hadn’t misunderstood. The thing is, I love biographies. Glimpses of people’s real lives. Parts of their stories. For instance, every time I talk to Georgia Jan, I wish I could see her surroundings so I could picture her better. Know her in her own world. Every time Mom of Eleven (actually has 12 now, we learned at the SSMT celebration) comments I wish I could see a picture of all of them. It’s one way we, scattered all over the place, take a virtual stroll through a mile or two of one another’s worlds.
Actually, the world I’m about to share with you really isn’t my world. It’s my man’s. But once a couple has been married over 25 years, you really can’t know the one without knowing the other. You can no longer tell for sure where one stops and the other starts. This isn’t land I would have chosen in a thousand years but it’s what my man chose and I chose him. SO, when I talk about us heading to what I call our cactus land, this is the kind of place I’m talking about. I’ll describe it a tad first then I’ll stroll with you through some shots.
It’s a place where your cell phone won’t work and your land line is likely not to.
It’s the kind of place where Keith and I use (or misuse) English in a way we’d never do it at home. We don’t do it to make fun. We, for those few days, say it like we mean it. Like that’s who we are. Like, for instance, just this morning on an early ride with Keith in the old jeep, I heard myself say, “We ain’t seen deer one.”
It’s a place where men are not limited to inside facilities…but I’ll not elaborate on that.
It’s a place where our favorite show is “The Duck Commander.” We laugh our heads off…and, perhaps most worrisome to some of you, totally get it.
It’s the kind of place with a VERY small town nearby that I have fallen head over heels in love with. It has one real grocery story, a “Super S,” and just yesterday while I was picking up a few items, as I live and breathe and without one hint of exaggeration, the woman at check-out got on the microphone for the store and said over the loud speaker, “Mr. Brown, your wife called and wants you to pick up a bag of potatoes.” Ain’t no doubt in my mind he got some. I was so happy I nearly got some, too.
It’s a place with a LOT of these, hence the name:
It’s a place where a woman (even a non-hunter like yours truly) sometimes dresses like this on an early morning ice-cold jeep ride (with no windows in it) with no make-up on:
It’s a place where, if the temperature’s right, a woman would be wise to wear snake boots like mine:
It’s a place where your man’s taller than usual and where manliness can sometimes be gaged by how old and beat up your vehicle is: (For those of you who can’t fathom it, that’s a corn feeder on the front of the jeep for feeding wild life. You guys just have no idea what my life is like at times. Or his, because of mine.)
It’s a place where your man’s favorite hot rod looks like this:
It’s a place where the gate might latch with a horse shoe:
It’s a place where that tiny one hundred year-old German farm house that I told you about in So Long Insecurity resides. My man went to great pains to restore this thing back to its original look. Every window and door in it is a century old.
It’s a place where the sunrise this morning from my little porch looked like this and this one’s not even an especially good one:
It’s a place with, I reckon, my favorite place of all tucked right in it. I swing here and think about all sorts of things and sing hymns and pet Star:
It’s a place where a woman can take her spirals and practice them loud without a single soul hearing or caring:
It’s a place I wish all of you who wish you had one, did. Maybe one day, when you’re older like Keith and me, you will. It’s a place others of you might be bored out of your mind. Maybe your wish list would be a tiny little bay house instead. It’s just all a matter of taste. Sometimes not your own.
It’s a place where my man seems to love me a lot.
So it’s a place I love to go.
Robin 
That was so endearing, Beth. Thanks for sharing that with us. I hope to one day have a place to retreat to like that. Mine would have to include a lake though. The moonlight on the water is just a wonderful sight to behold! You and Keith and your marriage are an inspiration. I've been married 21 years and we are going through a very rough patch right now but God is at work and I know He has a happy ending in store. I am encouraged by your love for one another even though you have different likes and hobbies. You appreciate how he is different from you instead of wishing he would be more like you. That's a good place to get to.
BTW, I'm really enjoying "So Long Insecurity"! Thanks!
Beth,
I think the house is utterly charming! Everything about this out of Houston place is sweet and makes me think that it was first a dream of Keith's. And it has become your dream. That is what I see. Its a beautiful thing.
Much Love, Alli
Thanks for sharing your special place with us. You make even full-body camo and ear muffs look cute!
I was glad to see a post from you today, Beth, & it was a treat to actually see the house you described in SLI. I was trying to picutre it in my mind, so thank you! You are precious.
Love your precious post Beth! Thanks for giving us a glimpse into Keith & your private sanctuary – your words are even more picturesque than your photos as you share the things of your heart. I love that you are NOT like Ephraim – a cake half baked, but instead one who is willing to be vulnerable and real and consistent on all sides.
Our place of retreat is a small motor home but I love nothing better than to get away with my man and parked in a serene spot somewhere I can enjoy a stunning sunset as my creator and I say or first 'good mornings' to one another.
Love you!
Ada
Dear Beth – How fun to get to tag along with you and Keith on your mini getaway together to your man's beloved Cactus Country! Thank you for taking us along and for the sweet intimacy you allow us to have with you. So glad God has given you a heart for women — and a place where you can go get your batteries recharged.
My man's happy place happens to be on his Harley with his BB (Biker Babe) on back. That would be me, leather jacket, biker boots and all. I even sacrifice my "do" and willingly succomb to helmet hair all to be with my man in his world. So I can appreciate your camo outfit. 🙂 The things we do for our guys …and the things they do for us!
Thank you for loving us Beth and for the time you put into this blog. It has obviously been a life line to so many.
Love you much,
Robin
My man wants a place where he can ride his horse with freedom. We have put off buying it for so many reasons, but when I read what you said, maybe we shouldn't anymore. Life is short and to have the joy on one's face just because they are heading to their happy place is precious. Taking trips to Hawaii to stay in a condo just doesn't do that. Even visiting family from one end of the country to the other isn't like stepping out into the open and filling your lungs with peaceful air…
Thank you for sharing your little bit of heaven story!
Beth,
Thank you for posting about such a peaceful place. It looks fantastic.
My gosh, Beth. If anyone wants to get ugly about you sharing this part of your life with us; tell you what: I'll load myself up in my truck and drive for a week down from Alaska to wherever Snark Has Struck. Then I'll just spit (not directly at them, don't worry; or stick out my tongue – in their general direction; or whatever it takes to beat the snark right outta 'em).
My goodness.
"Must be nice?" – said with sarcasm?
I'll tell you what's nice: you being honest enough about your life and esp your marriage that some of us out here hanging in there with our husbands in some pretty rough patches of life – have an example of someone who lives, breathes, loves Jesus, and wears snake boots when the need arises. But who is hanging in there with her marriage, too.
I'm not trying to be in anyway unbecoming. Truly. But I honestly don't need one more example in Christianville of some blissfully, fabulously, picture-perfect marriage (not that I believe in them anyway, but some people do have an easier go of it – and I love knowing that).
But.
But for those of us who are fighting the good fight, trying to stay full of the Word and loving our men – you are the example that speaks volumes to me.
I'll take your six or seven i-phone photos of an old tractor and a fuzzy sunrise any day over one more article about the "Top Ten Ways To Keep One's Marriage Healthy."
I like hearing about marital health from someone who I'm pretty sure has seen some of the trenches I lived in for years.
So to think someone, anyone, esp a siesta somewhere, might get her feathers ruffled b/c you're letting us in on a sweet little bit of God's goodness to you….. well I'll be danged (and I don't actually ever say danged).
Just go ahead and keep living the thing, Beth. And if it's all the same to you, let us keep peeking in on you every now and again. You being 100% real about your marriage has had a more positive impact in my life than any of your Bible teachings.
(And I can't actually believe I just wrote that b/c God speaking to me through your studies has been a mainstay and joy of my life these past ten years. But I did write it. Because it's true.)
Press on, Dearie. Keep taking photos. Keep getting up at 4:30am to drive around and spot deer. Keep being amazed by the dawn stretching across a Texan sky. Keep loving your man – openly, honestly and nevertheless.
Warm in Alaska.
Dearest Beth, one of your blogs had read "my soul is often fed and encouraged here." That is exactly the way I feel!
Thank you so much!
Thank you Beth! It's such a joy to get a glimpse of your family's special place. I'm a country girl at heart too, but God has tricked me (smile- LOONG story) into living in in incredibly densely populated concrete jungle in Beirut. I know we are right where we are supposed to be, but that doesn't mean I don't daydream of being in places exactly like what you shared with us. We are beyond blessed that when we are in the states, we have several friends that share their family's "get aways" with us. Just last year Jason and I were able to go to such a retreat together and fly fish. I love watching him love something so much and being able to share it with him. Oh, and our first baby, Sam is our 11 year old border collie who my parents have adopted now- I"m sure he and Star would have a blast herding everything in sight together… Bless you for sharing with us!
thanks for sharing. For all of us to have that place. I hope someday, my husband can have a place, and I join him.
With tears in my eyes, I love your place! I grew up on a "place" and my heart still longs for one to share with my family. Maybe one day…Thank you for sharing!
oh, i love it. thanks so much for sharing. its so fun to be able to picture where you go when you say you're heading off there. love you, Beth.
I enjoyed the photographs. I too live in a "little" town a little north of I-10 and we have a SuperS~~~~
Thank you from my heart:) As I scrolled down through each pic, I grinned bigger and bigger. Noone can narrate quite like you, and make the person reading feel as if they are there too:) Love your place!
Thank you for a snapshot of your life and the real-live snapshots of your place…Texas, the Great State of contrasts…some say from the outside you can't understand it and the inside you can't explain it…but you, dear Beth did a terrific job. Now, about that venison burger…..
Beth,
Cool! Thanks for sharing. It made me just a little homesick for the wide open spaces, drop-dead-gorgeous-God-is-smiling-big sunsets and gates held shut by horseshoes. All of us need a "retreat", where we can gain some fresh perspective and sit back and appreciate all that God's blessed us with.
Vicki
Hi Beth, I am so happy you and Keith have this sanctuary. Thank you for sharing with your Siestas. There is nothing so soul satisfying as one's retreat and solitude from the world.Thank you for giving so much of yourself and taking time to renew,rest and commune with God through his beautiful nature.
Gale Boling
Clinton, SC
(I'm having trouble remembering my password!!!) Beth I have really been enjoying your posts. My Tuesday morning Bible Study is currently doing your updated Breaking Free. Thank you so much for writing that and taking us through these really difficult places. I deeply desire to be a woman after God's heart which means letting Him have full access to every area of my heart and life. You talk about letting God get into our business—Boy Howdy, is He!!
LOVE the John Deer tractor!!! With tinted windows??? My husband has one (really 3 in various sizes) and I call it his big green toy. He is so happy when he's plowing or discing, or mowing, or whatever it is he does with that thing! Just makes him happy. Glad to know he has hunting and John Deere's in common with Keith!! Nothin runs like a Deere!
Be Blessed, you are a blessing to me! 🙂
My man would love to have a place like that now! His would include our 5 dirt bikes and trails for them! One day….God willing!
Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for sharing the pictures. I grew up in west Texas and though I never really appreciated the flatness or the huge, huge, huge blue skies while living there…getting away from it has made me remember it all fondly. Snakes and Mesquite "trees" were part of my life and some day I hope to take my kids out there to take it all in. I love that blue Texas sky and that sunrise, wow!
The love story part is so inspirational, Beth! God is doing such great things through your book and your marriage as an example!
It's great to see the place you talked about in your book! I love it. And thank you for posting a picture of you with no makeup. Very brave of you; but you seem just that much more accessible. And you're still beautiful!
My Dear Friend Beth,
I feel we are good friends! I have a wonderful man (of 33 years) who loves the lake and fishing. I love to be there with him even though I don't fish. It does give me the opportunity to share bible study with you on my portable DVD player bobbing in a boat. I have had to pause a good bible study a time or two to admire a 4lb bass.
Thank you for sharing the pictures. I love getting to see what is a part of others happiness.
Janice
Loved seeing your pics and got me all excited again about a piece of land we have a contract on in rural Georgia!
You and your family are so generous to share your private lives with us!
BTW-what brand of snake boots do you recommend??
I am thankfull. For this post and dare anyone to have a problem with it. There are so many blessings that I like to enjoy vicariously and this is one of them.
You are rockin' the camo-coveralls girl! How timely to see these pics in light of what we just read in SLI. Beautiful job on the restoration Keith! My favorite pic is the swing…I would so be there with coffee in hand.
Love you big!
Thanks for sharing, I have always felt that you are very modest in your living.
To tell you the truth, I am TERRIFIED of creepy crawlies. LOL. So, it looks beautiful in pictures, but spiders are bad enough without the snakes. GRIN. I am such a chicken.
Thanks for being so real and tangible. (Remember the PMS post?) LOVED IT! LOVE YOU!
Beautiful!
What a beautiful place! Thank you for sharing that part of your life with us Beth, you are so authentic and real, I love that about you!
Beth, can I just say… I LOVE YOU IN CAMO!!! I am a camo wearing girl myself (Real Tree Girl Camo ONLY)…yes, they make camo for women…and it FITS women, if you know what I mean!!…you should look into it! I wore my mans camo for a very long time, now I have my own and my man thinks I look HOT in it too!! I'll have to send you a pic sometime!!
LOVE your old home..I hope to have one of those someday with a lot of land for my man to hunt on too!
Have a good week and thank you so much for sharing your life with us!
Love ya, Brandi
I am so genuinly HAPPY for you! You put so much of yourself into ministering to so many, that you need that!
My husband and I are 52 years old, and still hope to have that some day. We still have a sweet daughter at home with us for a few short years more. Then…..maybe a getaway place much like yours. Without the snakes, of course. ;o)
I'm very open, and sometimes share too much on my blog, and have pulled some posts. I am grateful that you share your lives with us.
I love this: "It's a place where my man seems to love me a lot. So it's a place I love to go."
I so enjoy biographies also. Thanks for sharing some of your life with us!
Who could, or would want to, bash that! 🙂 Thanks for sharing so much of who you are, because that makes you real! And in this world of many fakes, even fake christians, we need real! You are a real woman with a real life that God uses to draw women to Himself!
Between doing most all of your Bible Studies (currently reading So Long Incurities) and this blog, I feel like you and your family are my extened family. One that I never get to see, but I keep in touch with daily through this blog. I LOVE it!! I even make recipes and get to say I got that from Beth, Amanda, or Melissa. People look at me SO funny! 🙂
I love you and your precious family! Thanks for being real!!
Thank you for that post! My husband and I just returned from a few nights at our little "retreat cabin". More a guy cabin as it's been in his family for many years and was used as a hunting cabin. No shower until within the last year! I used to go because my husband enjoyed it, now I love to go and enjoy it with him. No TV, no phone, just quiet, out in the middle of the Pennsylvania mountains with nothing but wildlife and trees and the bubbling stream outside this crude little cabin.Plenty of time to enjoy each other and to commune with my creator! Oh, and I can totally relate to the "where men are not limited to use of indoor facilities" part! My husband has all male cousins, they all use the cabin, and they don't think twice of walking outside to "water the grass"! I was appalled when we first started going to the cabin, but now have grown quite accustomed! Thanks Beth! I just love you!
Beth, thanks for your post to remind us that we can reconnect. I've been married 29 years and unfortunately my husband and I have never been further apart (not technically). We seem to have differing opinions on everything. The closer I have gotten to Jesus, the further away my husband seems to be. I keep praying though.
From one biography lover to another…THANK YOU!
I just couldn't picture the ranch and now I can.
It just doesn't get better than sharing an adventure with your man! And I can't imagine anyone who needs to get away for some peace and quiet with God more than you.
Blessings,
Tracy
Fort Mill, SC
I hope I am not that woman that says, "it must be nice," but here goes. For the younger women I would say this. Be careful how you treat your marriage and your money. My husband and Keith Moore are literally the same man. But because I over-spent in our thirties and early forties (we both just turned 50) my man cannot go hunting now. Where we live he must belong to a hunting club and we can't afford it. It is all my fault. I ran up credit cards he never knew about and by the time he did find out the amount we owed was unreal. I was good at hiding things.
Every year when hunting season rolls around–and yes, I was that woman who was stupid enough to marry during deer season too, but I never minded–he can now stay home and celebrate our anniversay wtih me because he can't afford to be hunting. Believe when I say, I would trade my heart for him to be hunting instead of with me.
He is such a man, and in so many ways, I have taken his maniliness from him. I not only spent his money but I hen-pecked him to death. There is no maniliness in his eyes now, only a man who still sticks to his obligations, takes care of me and tries to find ways to make the money last.
He had so many dreams of hunting out west, it never happened. He likes going fishing once a year at the beach with his buddies, that went about five years ago. I work now, but we got so far behind that by the time we get caught up, he'll be too old to tote a gun.
I have watched a man who towered over other men and who is the wildest man I know give up every dream he ever had because of my mistakes. And, ladies the money I can only call stupidity and sin, but taking his maniliness from him, was a product of the worldliness I had wrapped myself up in. Not until I read the book Love and Respect did I get a glimpse of what I had done to him. I was horrified.
So, not all of us who say, "it must be nice," mean it in a bad way. Some of us are just way past that kind of happiness and we ache over our mistakes. But some of us have time not to make them, so perhaps your post is timely in a strange way.
So, I suppose if anyone reads this post and feels sadness in her heart, it might be because she's like me and her man will never have a chance for the lovely description you just wrote.
My prayer would be for those younger women who still have a chance to help make their husband's dreams come true.
That is so cool that you would share that with us!!!
I just finished the book "So Long, Insecurity" and it was a blessing to my soul.
Love cactus land. I hope it continues to bring y'all much joy for many years.
Thank you, Beth, for sharing your special place with us. It's really neat to see pictures of the place you described so well in the book. I enjoy having a sneak peak in your life.
I hope your time with your man was extra special.
How sweet of you to share a glimpse of that happy place. Thank you for sharing with us.
Those glimpses make you so real to me.
My happy place would have to be the beach. We live about 2.5 hours from the florida panhandle. The sand is like sugar and the water is the most beautiful color. There is nothing more peaceful than to put my feet in the sand @ Cape San Blas, fl….
Happy Monday Beth
hugs
Latrelle
What an honor to have you share this special place. What a blessing for you and your man!! It's a piece of Heaven right here on Earth. Love ya girl!
You are so sweet to share your life with us. May we all find our own "place" even if it's a bench underneath our favorite tree in the back yard!
Those last 2 sentences are my favorite.
p.s. Camo is a good look on you. I dare you to have a cute little camo outfit made for yourself. Maybe for Keith's b-day. 🙂
That is so cool. I love nature. If I can get away and be outside, I can get over just about anything.
It is nice! I'm SO glad you shared the pictures. I was reading about the farmhouse just last night and it doesn't look a thing like I had imagined it.
One of your studies (either Believing God or Fruit of the Spirit) you sat on a big porch and I always thought that was your house (or the cactus house) until somehow I found out different from the blog. I'm visual like you and I love to see people's surroundings.
Thank you thank you for sharing so much of you and yours!
I love you!
Oh what a special place. We are aspiring for that now that the kids are leaving the nest. I often tell the kids the happiest times of my life was when we were first married and lived in the country on 30 acres in the tiniest house with 3 laughing children. Now in the"empty big house" I long for that tiniest house again. Soon….Thanks for sharing your special place
Glad there is another couple out there that watches the Duck Commander. I draw the line after that one…I can only listen to so much turkey calling!
Don't you love the "Fresh Encounters" you get when you are out in the open-away from distractions and technology? Love this post! Keith is such a man's man! I love mine more and more when I see him in camo coveralls or waders! Something about that tractor and 4-wheeler gets me every time!
Than you soo much for sharing this! What a wonderful thing to read on a Monday morning right before I start work! Thank you for giving all of us a peak into your life. I know for me it is a blessing to see some of the things that you see and hear about what you experience in your life. It really helps knowing that you are human with us 🙂
Also, thank you to Keith for sharing you with us and being willing to let you share about him! I know I appreciate it!!
Blessings to you!!
thank you so much, Beth, for sharing your life with us. My husband and I don't have any land, yet, but we still go there, mentally, and talk and dream together and it is a special place. thanks again,
rebecca