Good morning, my lovely Scripture-memorizing Siestas! Happy Lord’s Day! Please see the addendum at the bottom of the previous post for why this turned out to be a much brighter morning than I anticipated last night. Yes, if I’m anything at all, I am mature. The very antithesis of superficial.

When our fifths or fifteenths fall on Sunday mornings, I can’t write an epistle to you because I need to hop in the shower and get ready for church. However, I am super excited about the glorious light at the end of our 2009 Scripture memory tunnel and having 22 solid gold verses in our spirals!! Yahooooooooooooo-Jah!!

Here is mine for this round. I’ll give it to you and then tell you why it particularly speaks to my heart:

“Blessed is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the posts of my door.” Proverbs 8:34 NAS

I’ve been thinking here recently how wise our God is. He is far too onto us and our severe cases of Spiritual ADD to often give us a sense of what is going to happen in a particular situation. He knows good and well that, if He’d just tell us how a temporal challenge is going to turn out, we’ll take that answer, thank Him so much, and go on with living and give a rare nod His direction. He wants us to desire His attentiveness more than His answer.

Scripture describes God’s Word like a lamp to our feet. In other words, God normally – and wisely – shines just enough clear light to help us take the very next step when it’s time. Imagine how far you could hold a lamp out in front of you as you walk a dim path in the forest. That’s what you’re promised as the most normal experience in your believing journey. Don’t get me wrong. He tells us volumes about how things will ultimately turn out but, much of the time in our temporal challenges, He simply asks us to trust Him and let Him sustain us and lead us one day at a time. “Give us this day our daily bread.”

I love Proverbs 8:34 because it describes the blessed person who has her ear pressed against the door of Heaven. The blessed person who watches daily at His gates. She is the woman who will hear, not only direction for the next step when the time comes but, priceless treasures, promises and truths of all sorts because she’s not so distracted with her own answer that she misses the marvels of other revelations.

God is so wise.

In my “Through the Bible in a Year” with The Message, I also came upon a well-loved verse, Jeremiah 29:11, that I thought many of you might savor in Eugene Peterson’s translation. Some of you who don’t know what to memorize this time around might see it as the perfect selection. Here it goes:

“I know what I am doing. I have it all planned out – plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for.” Jeremiah 29:11 The Msg

Isn’t that fantastic?

You are a pleasure to serve, my darling Siestas. Fight the good fight! Keep the faith! Let’s finish this race well.

Your Siesta Mama loves you.

OK, let’s hear yours!

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CRITICAL UPDATE: It is 8:45 the next morning and my man has saved the day! Yes, I said “Saved the day!” He said he spent most of the night tossing and turning about how he could out-smart my coffee machine and get it to work…at least a few more days. Up the man popped this morning and flew to the cabinet where he found his oversized toothpicks. (They look like something Gulliver would have used to get the pot roast from last week dislodged from between his teeth.) Keith stuck the toothpick into the steamer in hopes that it would plug it up, make it stop blowing steam, and signal the other part of the machine to work. AND IT DID!!! IT DID!!!!!!!! Even after I’d humbly prepared 8 cups in my new pot! (I’d decided to be more mature and thankful this morning. Usually a night does the trick on my petty attitude especially if I think God is getting annoyed.) Please see brilliant demonstration below. Give special attention to the toothpick in the steamer. It’s leaking a tad so next we will be wrapping a little duct tape around it. Thank you for caring, Siestas! I just knew you would. For those of you who have no idea what I’m talking about, I have recorded the drama below the updated picture.

The original post. A night that will live in infamy:

Seven years ago this Christmas, my man surprised me with one of the most extravagant gifts of our entire marriage. This Jura Capresso Coffee Maker from Williams Sonoma:

If he’s having an on year, he tends to splurge at Christmas time because of the inordinate amount of time he spends at the deer lease from early November to late January. These spurgings are his way of saying, “I’m sorry I’ve been gone so long, please don’t divorce me before deer season ends, and can I go one more time for just a few more weeks? I promise I’ll be the happiest husband you’ve ever had when I get home.” The year of this particular gift he stayed in my good graces all the way till the first of February (when I’ve ordinarily ceased speaking to him) because I’d never fallen more in love with an inanimate object in all my life. This, my dear Siestas, has been my best friend for 7 beautiful years. She makes the perfect cup of coffee every single time. Perfect aroma. Perfect weight. Perfect crema. Here she is with my very favorite cup and saucer:

Today she passed. Just like that. She passed. There I was in my jammies on an exquisite Saturday morning at home with Autumn leaves blowing from the trees and birds singing and circling my feeders. I was chomping at the bit to sit on the back porch with that first cup of the morning and take it all in. And for the first time in seven glorious years, she just couldn’t deliver. All she could do was sit there and blow steam. Literally. I nearly went into a state of shock. Keith threw on his jeans as fast as he could, grabbed the keys to his Ford Super Duty, and guided me to the truck still in my jammies. You know where we went. Where else could we possibly go?? Of course, we did the drive thru. My knees were too weak to walk in.

I survived the morning on a grande nonfat dry cappuccino and pulled myself together to spend a great day at the Nutcracker Market with Amanda. Since there was also a Starbucks there on the premises, I had all a soul could stand and didn’t think about my morning mishap until I got home that evening. You know how a mind tries to block out the unthinkable. Keith had also promised me we’d pack up the coffee maker and send it off to be repaired and I’d found considerable comfort in it. A brief separation. That’s all.

When I walked in the door this evening, all the sudden the realization hit me.

“Oh, no!”

Keith: “What, Honey? Oh, no, what?”

“My coffee maker!”

Keith: “You didn’t remember to get us a back up?”

“NO!”

Keith: “Bummer. It could be a rough morning.”

Mind you, it was late by now. I grabbed my keys and ran back to the car and headed to our only nearby store – a Walgreen’s – to find a Black and Decker or Mr. Coffee or SOMETHING to tie us over until we could find something more suitable to tie us over in the long run. Maybe I’d have my best friend back by Christmas. I looked all over the drugstore. My pulse sped up. I scurried to check out and asked in the nicest but fastest way if I could have some assistance.

“My coffee maker passed and I need something for the next few days until we can find a better back up. I can’t find a coffee pot anywhere in the store! Do you guys have one?”

Sales clerk: “Absolutely! Let me help you find it.”

So relieved. But that word “it” bothered me a tad. Surely she didn’t mean “it” as in “one.”

Yep. That’s what she meant, all right. Here it is:

I nearly had to be helped to the car. Sometimes we have to make hard choices. Other times we just don’t have any choice at all. This is what I’ll be drinking my coffee out of in the morning.

Not even a Mr. Danged Coffee!! Who ever heard of this brand? Oh, I know! I know! It has no eternal significance. It’s totally trivial and pitifully temporal but I’ve been waking up to fresh grinding beans for seven solid years and many of those mornings I’ve taken that first hot sip and said out loud, “Thank You, God.” And maybe I’m making something up but I’ve wanted to believe He was up there saying, “You’re welcome.” Do you remember about a month ago when I told you guys I’d given up something for over a month? My eyes nearly bugged out of my head when I saw so many of you suggest that I’d given up coffee. Do you honestly think I would have waited a month before telling you that? Seriously? I would have called for an emergency support group.

OK, I’ll go get a grip. In no time at all, our old girl will be repaired and we’ll be back in business. Until then, mornings could be tender around the Moore home.

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Good morning, Siestas! How is everyone today? Well, ever since the time change my kids have been waking up at about 6 a.m. That is definitely not when I would prefer to start my day, but with the extra time I’ve been trying to get out of the house and jog a little bit. I’m NOT a runner by any means, but this baby weight has got to go! So I’m trying. If nothing else, I’ve enjoyed getting to talk to God without morning cartoon background music or needing to stop and wipe someone’s nose or worse. Was that TMI? I’ll go ahead and change the subject now.

I’ve been thinking a lot about Marlon Alexander, who is one of the children we sponsor through Compassion. He just turned twelve a few days ago. Every time Compassion sends out a group of bloggers, all the posts give me this overwhelming desire to get on a plane and head to Honduras to see him. By the way, have any of you ever been to Honduras? Did you know that Tegucigalpa, Honduras, has one of the scariest runways in the world? Curtis and I have survived it a few times. I feel like we should get a t-shirt or something.

Compassion has a team of bloggers in El Salvador this week. You can go here to read about what they’re doing. I know they would appreciate our prayers. While it’s fresh on our minds, this is a great time for us to log in to Compassion’s web site and send an email or even a Christmas gift to our sponsored children. I was never good at writing until I realized I could email. I love that! I hope you all have a wonderful Wednesday, ladies. We love you here at LPM.

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Living Proof Live – Springfield IL from Rich Kalonick on Vimeo.

This was the last Living Proof Live event of 2009. Thank You for a great year, Lord! And thank you, Rich, for giving us a glimpse of each event through these recap vidoes. We appreciate you so much!

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Siesta Video Message from LPV on Vimeo.

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Hi Siestas! This post is going to have information for you about a block of hotel rooms at a special group rate, hotel room scholarships that we are giving out, and a few other tidbits. We will also use the comments in this post to allow you to connect with each other regarding the event, especially those of you who are traveling solo.

Special Hotel Rate

We were able to confirm a block of rooms at an Omni Hotel for our Siestas so that you will have the option of staying together. The Lord came through for us in a big way because initially they were not able to accommodate us. Praise Him! This is a nice, newly renovated hotel just 2 miles from the church and they have given us a reasonable rate. Here’s the information you need if you’d like to reserve a room there.

Omni Houston Hotel
Four Riverway
Houston, Texas 77056
Phone: (713) 871-8181
1-800-THE-OMNI
Tell them you want to book a room with the Siesta SMT Celebration for the night of Friday, January 22, 2010.
The room rate is $80.

*This is NOT the Omni Westside. That would put you much farther from the church and you wouldn’t get our special rate.

Hotel Scholarships

By God’s grace, LPM is able to scholarship 100 Siestas in 50 double rooms at The Omni for our Scripture Memory Celebration. We are thrilled to be able to do this!

-We will cover your stay for Friday night, January 22.
-You will share a room with another siesta in which there will be two double beds.
-If this will allow you to attend the conference, please email [email protected]. She is going to give scholarships to the first 100 women who email her.

Jenn and I are both part-time LPM employees with small children, so it may take us a couple of days to answer all the emails. Thanks for your patience!

Things to Do

If you’re staying the whole weekend and will have time to play, here’s a great web site to help you plan. You can even request a visitors guide.

www.visithoustontexas.com

What About our Husbands?

We have been asked if men can attend the Siesta SMT Celebration. This is going to be a very intimate group and we want our ladies to feel the freedom to worship and study with just the girls. We love our Miestas, but we would like to keep this event for women only. Thank you so much for understanding.

Connecting with Others

We know many of you are traveling solo and are hoping to connect with a travel buddy or even someone to split rental car and hotel costs. We want to open up comments in this post to allow you to do that. Just make sure you provide a way for others to contact you.

We hope this information will be helpful as you plan for our big weekend. We can’t wait, Siestas!

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Our church hosted First Fest on Saturday night. We went every year growing up, so it’s fun to go now with my own kids. Back in the day, mom was the women’s fitness director at our Christian Life Center, so she was always dressed in a costume for this event. On our way there, we were recalling some of her best ones, which included the year she went as a plumber (our family was in the plumbing business) and another year when she was a present. She wore a huge, wrapped cardboard box. I would give anything to have a picture or two. I don’t have those, but I do have these!

Here is our little tiger giving a loud roar to let everyone know he had arrived.

The best part of First Fest is all the inflatables they have. Jackson loves these. Curtis and I had our wedding reception in this outdoor area at the church. I think our groom’s cake was pretty close to where this thing is.

I’m really blessed because my groom turned out to be a fabulous dad.

There’s our tiger getting ready to take the plunge.

Me and AB, who happened to be A Bee.

Why is Santa Claus at First Fest and why isn’t he wearing red? Oh wait, that’s Noah, as his name tag clearly states! Meet Pastor Gregg, who was preaching about Noah the next day. Next to him is Bethie and our little bumble bee who was trying to figure out if she should grab onto Noah’s beard.

Here’s Jackson getting his face painted by Cinderella.

My camera battery died on me, but my friend took this of our family.

Here’s the Queen Bee at home.

And here’s her brother in a sugar high frenzy.

He kept saying, “I love candy!”

These shots are all the same – Annabeth looking a little iffy and Jackson thinking it’s hilarious.

Annabeth is 9 months today. I can hardly get over it.

We are planning to do another post on Thursday about the Siesta Scripture Memory Team Celebration. We’ll have some info about a block of rooms and a group rate at a great hotel. We’ll also give those of you who are traveling alone a chance to connect with each other. Be looking for it on Thursday!

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Whew! That title was a mouthful!

Siestas, congratulations on making it all the way to Scripture 21. It is finally time to register for the Siesta Scripture Memory Team Celebration! Woo hoo! (From now on you might see it abbreviated as the Siesta SMT Celebration.) This is a free event for all of our Siestas who have been working hard to memorize two Scriptures a month in 2009. It will be held at Houston’s First Baptist Church on January 22-23, 2010.

Before I tell you how to register, I need to emphasize one thing. We know based on the size of HFBC’s worship center and the number of comments that we get on our Scripture memory posts that we can accommodate every single one of our Siesta Scripture Memory Team members. Praise God! We are not in danger of selling out this event, for lack of a better word. Please know that you can take your time registering. If you’re not sure that you can really attend, please wait to register until you know that you can. We won’t close registration until two weeks before the event. Having an accurate count will help us tremendously as we plan for that wonderful and long-anticipated weekend. Thank you so much!

Registration Step One:
Please read our event FAQ page for all the details. If you have a question that isn’t answered, it will explain how to handle that.

Registration Step Two:
Follow this link to our registration page and register thyself!

We were a little nervous about rolling out registration on a Sunday because our web masters are not on call. But we really wanted to do it in conjunction with today’s verse. So if you have any trouble registering, please know that we will do our very best to get it sorted out on Monday.

The whole LPM staff is so excited to spend a great weekend with you, Siestas! We can’t wait. Thank you for taking this Scripture memory journey with us.

*You will see the post for memory verse #21 right below this.*

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Scripture Memory Team, we only have four more verses and we’ve made it! I am so happy! We’ve come so far that it’s even time to register for our Siesta Scripture Memory Team Celebration in January. I hope so many of you can come! Please see the coinciding post for registration. It’s free of charge but we do need to know how many Siestas to look forward to having. We are beside ourselves with joy.

Now, onto our present purposes: our next verses!

I cannot overestimate how much God has used the verses in my spiral this year to speak strength and faith into my journey. I was laying in bed early this morning reflecting on a present mountain that I would love to see “move from here to there” (Matthew 17:21) and said aloud to God, “I need a verse! Lord, give me a verse to claim over this situation!” My mind immediately began to flip through my spiral and I felt like He was reminding me that He’d given me 20 of them thus far to equip me for this very situation. And, as we walk together and new needs arise, He’ll be faithful to supply me with more. I don’t know about you but sometimes I ask God for a word He’s already given clearly to me. I love the thought that, when we live a life with Christ in His Word, He is constantly equipping us for the future (2 Tim. 3:16,17).

This time around, I’m drawn again to a portion out of Psalm 119, an unparalleled chapter of Scripture for anyone who loves the Word or wants to. I’ve checked several versions and I think it resonates with me most out of the NIV. It’s a portion that asks Him to simply accomplish what He’s already promised. I love that. Based on what I shared with you in the previous paragraph, it couldn’t be more appropriate. Here it is:

Fulfill Your promise to Your servant, so that You may be feared. Take away the disgrace I dread, for Your laws are good. How I long for Your precepts! Preserve my life in your righteousness. Psalm 119:38-40 NIV

And, just for good measure, in case what spoke most clearly to you in this post was the reference to moving a mountain, here’s that portion:

I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you. Matthew 17:21 NIV

No, I can’t explain everything that statement means to us living in this era, under this covenant, and in this insane world but I find this most stirring: it’s in the same chapter as the Transfiguration and I don’t doubt for a moment that the mountain Christ pointed to when He made the statement was the very mountain where three disciples had seen Him transfigured. So here’s what I get out of it: Ask Jesus to give you the faith to command your mountain (your huge obstacle) to move then do it with all your might. If it doesn’t budge, climb it and see Him transfigured.

Stay with it, Siestas! We’re getting closer and closer to the finish line!

You are loved and prioritized here at Living Proof.

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When Curtis and I started volunteering occasionally in the preschool department at our church, I was embarrassed to find out that I didn’t really know how to play with the little girls. The boys are easy simply because I have one and I am now equipped with the ability to make engine sounds, the importance of which cannot be overestimated. But toddler girls were a mystery to me. What has shocked and tickled me about them is how much they love to play with the baby dolls. I had no idea!

Usually there are more little girls in the classroom than there are baby dolls, so you can imagine how they follow each other around, hoping to recover any doll that may be fumbled. In spite of the inevitable fumble, these baby dolls are very well taken care of by their pint sized mommies. They hold them close, with their little plastic heads over their shoulders, and they walk around patting their little backs with such intensity. One Sunday Curtis had a line of girls who wanted their baby dolls swaddled. It takes a lot less energy to sit next to my friends in the married young adults department, but you cannot get entertainment like this anywhere else.

I never really played with dolls when I was small. I was much more into stuffed animals, My Little Ponies, and an E.T. doll that I dragged everywhere I went by one arm. Ironically, Melissa loved baby dolls and she has yet to have any interest in giving me a niece or a nephew. Even though I never liked dolls myself, I’ve been so excited about getting Annabeth her first one. I didn’t know when this big event was going to occur, but when Annabeth started crawling last week, and when she started crawling repeatedly to Jackson’s large plastic garbage truck, I knew it was time for some girly toys in our house.

So Mom and I went to Target yesterday and bought Annabeth’s first baby dolls.

Here’s the tiny one. I thought it would fit nicely in the diaper bag.

Here’s the big one, which I later realized doubles as a bath toy.

I am now presenting Annabeth with her first doll. We are in the dining room because it’s the only room that isn’t a mess right now.

Perhaps counting fingers and toes?

This doll is useful for teething.

We’ll take that over this.

Let’s see how she does with two.

Annabeth is either giving this baby the infant Heimlich maneuver or demonstrating the colic hold. She’s already so advanced.

Thumb sucking is Annabeth’s sign that she would like a nap. Motherhood is very tiring. Who knew that two were twice as much work?

Thank you for my first dolls, Bibby!

What was your favorite toy when you were a little kid?

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