My Prayer for You

The past few weeks I’ve talked a lot about us as women making time for ourselves. Hoping to change our mentality of “Being on the bottom of the list” to one of “Being a priority on the list.” And I am so happy to report that women have been encouraged to make change. Comments are not always written on the blog but so many of you have blessed me with emails, phone calls or notes on Facebook. Thank you so much my dear sisters for encouraging me.

I would like to tie this month up with a prayer for you as you sift through the past few weeks and find your own little gem to hold onto.

My prayer for you is that you will remember you are fearfully and wonderfully made, by the true and living God who is creator of heaven and earth. Therefore you are good and precious in His sight. You are loved with an everlasting love, a love that cannot and will not fade. His love is a love that surpasses all human understanding, and is timeless and ageless as the heavens.

Remember these things my dear sisters so that when you find yourself in the midst of a storm, our adversary will not be able to convince you that God has abandoned you to fend for yourself. When someone in your life tries to make you feel less than special, remember that you are the daughter of a king. In fact my dear sisters you are daughters of the King of kings!! And no weapon formed against you will prosper.

When it seems like your prayers have not been heard and you will never receive an answer or help, remember He has promised to be your help in times of trouble, and that He has a purpose and plan for your life and it is one to prosper you and not harm you. So do not let your flesh, well meaning friends, circumstances or our enemy, talk you out of standing on His promises which He has given you through the blood of His Son.

As disappointment comes to visit and it seems like it will never leave, remember weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. Life is often full of disappointments but Jesus (Yeshua) has told us to be of a happy countenance because He has overcome the world for us.

If your mirror or someone else tries to tell you that you are unattractive and no one wants you, remember God says, “There is an unfading beauty in a gentle and quiet spirit”, and this is of great value to Him. We are who, and what, God says we are, not the world’s or anyone else estimation. We are defined by God’s love and Him alone.

My prayer is that you will no longer live beneath your privilege of royalty by staying in stagnant ruts or giving into a defeatist attitude. Jesus (Yeshua) tells us in John 10:10 that He came that we might have life, and that we might have it more abundantly. [My paraphrase] Decide what that abundantly is for you, and step out to make change.

Dear sisters take the encouraging words the Holy Spirit has inspired me to write to you the past 4 weeks, and use them to make time and changes for yourselves so that you can live life to the fullest potential that God has deemed for each of you.

Know that I am very grateful to God to be able to write to you. It inspires my soul richly to be reminded of how great our God is. How much He loves us and the great value He has placed on each and every one of us.

I am sorry to say that no one entered the drawing last week for a yearly subscription to In Style magazine. Girls, it really is a nice magazine. Oh well, hopefully the next drawing will will have a better appeal.

Love & Hugs
Ponnie

A woman's heart should be so hidden in Christ that a man should have to seek Him first to find her.

Let's Spice Things Up A Bit!

Usually when you hear, “Let’s spice things up a bit” it carries a sexual overture. But today I would like to talk about spicing things up in the content of change. Change is a big part of life and for the most part change is good. But good or bad, we often don’t like change and rebel against it. Even when the changes God has for us are good, we don’t always go willingly. Today sisters, I’m going to challenge you to make a change and maybe even step out of a comfort zone.

When we use the word “rut” figuratively we are talking about a fixed or established way of acting, especially one that is boring or monotonous. A rut is not a place we want to be but we somehow find ourselves there. Ruts can also become comfort zones, even when it is not a good or healthy place. And with most people, moving out of a comfort zone usually is not on our top ten things we really want to do. Even when it means something better.

This blog has an audience of women in their 20’s to women in their 70’s. That challenges me to find common threads so that there is something for everyone. Spicing things up to a 20 year old is very different than that for a 50 year. Or is it? I found the common thread. ~Smile~

With today’s economy women young and older have found themselves having to cut back or tighten the budget. Then there’s the group of women who put themselves last never making it on the list and last but not least, we have those who have not felt the crunch of the economy, but still need a push to make change.

As I began to meditate on the blog for this week, I realized I needed to start with me. I can’t encourage others to try or do something that I haven’t tried myself. Yes girls after a long hard look….my ruts are the same old haircut, makeup, perfume, and clothes. Yup…Ponnie is in need of an overhaul!! But Ponnie’s pocketbook is expressing that at this time that is not possible. So, what can be done? The conclusion I came up with is that spicing it up doesn’t have to cost a lot, and you don’t have to do it all in one day.

I wanted a new scent for the winter so I went to Sephora’s. If you have never been you’ve got to check them out! Tovah is 16 and loves it, I took my girlfriend there who is 64 and she feel in love too. It is a place for every woman, no matter your age, skin type or complexion. Cosmetics, cosmetics, perfumes and more cosmetics! It is wonderful. I tried a couple of different scents, but I need to smell them for a couple of hours before I can commit, so I was given a sample of Vera Wang, (they put some in a spray container for you) and have worn it over 5 times and just adore it. Yes, this will be my new winter scent.

The next thing was to look at spicing up my wardrobe. I don’t work full time and even that has been affected and cutback, so I had to take a hard look at what to spend. If you have a black pair of pants, skirt or dress you can build a wardrobe just on that if need be. And that’s where I started. I’m going to purchase a really nice cabled cardigan sweater, a ruby sweater to wear underneath and a chunky necklace from Lane Bryant’s to wear with a black pair of trousers and ankle boots I already have. This all comes to a little over $150, but I have a $50 coupon. Adding this rust colored Nine West leather bag I purchased last month at Ross’ for $25, I will have a fresh modern look. This same sweater can be worn with a chocolate top and pants. Pair them with a colorful scarf and my(faux) red snakeskin purse, I have another totally different look. Scarves, necklaces, earrings and bracelets can breathe life into that same old outfit. A dark blazer can be worn with a dress, jeans, pants or skirt, and all you have to do is change the accessories and it won’t look like the same blazer or same bottom.

Makeup colors are different for the winter versus the summer. Fingernail polishes are deeper and so are eye shadows and lipsticks. I still have my summer bronzy look, so I’ve scheduled a trip to Sephora’s in a couple of weeks just to get a new lip color. I’ll be able to test as many colors as I want and get the assistance I need in making just the right choice. As far as my hair goes, I don’t like a lot of fuss and so I’m still in the exploring stages of something new. It could be a new hairdo or it might be a hat that really makes me look great!!!

Tovah and I like to look through fashion magazines, and when my 10 year old granddaughter Zoë is around she’s right in the mix too. In Style magazine is something we have fun searching through. Some of the styles are wild, but we like to talk about the crazy ones, pick out what we like and even try to find an expensive look on the cheap. Being in my 50’s and very close to 60, I’m not sure I would have ever purchased In Style had it not been for trying to teach Tovah the benefit of sophistication. But to my surprise and delight, it has also inspired me to try different scents, cosmetics and accessories. And I think it will inspire you too, so I am having a drawing for a one year subscription to In Style magazine. I know that some women say they don’t have time to read magazines, but I encourage you to start. The right magazine can be very inspiring, my favorite is Prevention magazine because it inspires me to make healthy changes in my life.

Don’t fret, I didn’t forget the woman who has already tweaked her winter wardrobe, has enough perfume, and is fighting the urge to buy anymore jewelry. For you I have two things. One, give some of your over abundance to someone else. And I don’t mean the old stuff, but give some of the good stuff. Women’s shelters are in great need of clothing, and there might be someone in your church, or family who could also benefit. Hording is an issue women have and pairing down is a good way to work on changing that. Second, change your surroundings. It can be fun and doesn’t have to cost a lot.

Painting walls a different color makes a room fresh and new. If you don’t feel like painting, then changing your bedcovers and throw pillows can turn a drab bed into one that is luscious and inviting. Rearranging the furniture and adding new lampshades or throw rugs and drapes can do wonders for any room. Whatever the change, start with something as simple as a new lip color, eye shadow or haircut. Maybe a can of paint from Home Depot. Bangles and a pretty scarf from one of your favorite shops. Take the first step by taking inventory and then add a little spice!

What inspired me was Ester 2:12 (Complete Jewish Bible) Each girl had her turn to appear before King Achashverosh after she had undergone the full twelve-month preparation period prescribed for the women, consisting of a six-month treatment with oil of myrrh and six months of perfumes and other cosmetics for women. I ask you my sisters, “Are we not daughters of the King? Should we not be perfumed and looking good?” The answer is, “Yes!”

I pray that I have encouraged or even inspired you make change in any area that has become boring or monotonous in your every day living.

For the drawing: Please send an email to: <hope2win_bloggdrawings99@verizon.net>; with your name, city and state in the body. You have until Tuesday, October 27, 2009 at 6pm ET.
The winner will be announced in next week’s blog.

Have a blessed week women of God. And remember that sharing what you plan to do or have done to spice things up will only encourage others, so please write a comment.

Love & Hugs
Ponnie
A woman's heart should be so hidden in Christ that a man should have to seek Him first to find her.

Sometimes We Have To Encourage Ourselves

When I was coming up, the two words you never said out loud were, “I’m bored!” Reason being, my people didn’t believe in kids being bored, so they always had some type of chore waiting in the wings to help you not be bored. I quickly learned to not utter those dreaded words, “I’m bored” even if I was. But the truth of the matter is that most of us experience some type of boredom in our lives from time to time. And so today let’s explore how we can turn that into something positive and good.

Being bored doesn’t necessarily mean that you don’t have anything to do. It is also a state of being, concerning the things you do all the time. You could simply be bored with your every day routine. Your days are probably very full with a lot on your plate, yet you still find yourself experiencing boredom of sorts. We have a tendency to fall into ruts, especially during the winter months when we spend more times indoors and at home. We are less physically active and often eat more. And some of us might even suffer from some form of depression as the nights grow longer and the days are shorter. I’m here to challenge you to do something about it.

In the spring and summer of 2008 I faithfully walked 2 miles 6 days a week and lost almost 25 pounds! And then the cold weather set in and I walked once or twice a week, and began to eat what we like to call “Comfort Foods.” My dear sisters, I want you to repeat after me…”There is no such thing as Comfort Food!!” That will be a discussion for another day, but the idea of finding comfort in food has tricked many of us up for far too long. I just needed to put that nugget of truth out there. ~Smile~ And along with not walking or exercising as much, eating heavier foods and watching much more TV, I ended up finding 20 of those pounds I had lost. That was sort of discouraging to say the least but inspiring at the same time. I was inspired to not give up and give into this momentary failure. I was inspired to move forward. But there did lurk the big question of, “How?” I walked again this summer and lost 15 pounds. I didn’t walk as many days because one thing I realized was that realistically I was not going to walk 6 days a week for the rest of my life. Therefore I needed to search out things that would work for me as a lifestyle change and challenge me at the same time.

Looking inwardly and truthfully at ourselves most often is not an easy task. Therefore we don’t rush to do it and given the choice we’d probably rather clean the toilet. But self-examination is a very important component to good emotional health. We have to come to the place where we are willing to look at the good, the bad and the ugly parts of those things that make us who we are today. One thing I’ve discovered is anything that demands a big chunk of time from me and is repetitious is something I’m not going to stick with. I love walking and for city living I am blessed to have a beautiful residential area to walk in that is full of flowers, trees, great architectural design and a park. But I still get bored walking every day. I have to mix it up. I love to dance and so workout videos that have dancing work for me, but I will become bored if I have to do that every day. I love watching Top Model marathons on the weekends, but if I had to watch it every weekend, I would be bored with it. Another fact about me is that I’m a daydreamer and a storyteller, so my mind has a tendency to wonder a lot. Even when I’m reading the Bible, certain words can trigger my imagination and I’m off. But worst of all, when I am bored I can gravitate to food for something to do. Yeah, I learned that about myself this past winter. So with this new found knowledge about me, I’m in the process of inspiring myself to live differently this winter and feed my boredom with creativity.

For starters, I’m going to learn something new each month! October has been a technological month thus far. I’m learning how to create my own website, starting a daily blog with a group of talented women, joined a group on Linkedin and the list goes on. November I want to feed my creative side, so I will be making homemade bath products with my oldest granddaughter Zoë for Christmas presents. Secondly, I’m focusing on exercise and relaxation. I want to try a dance class and yoga this winter. I might even take a quilting class in January. And last but not least I want to pickup one of my hobbies I have let slip over the years. I love crocheting baby blankets. It’s imperative for me to have some type of ongoing project that I can work on when feelings of boredom try to rule. My oldest daughter Shelley and I would do jigsaw puzzles on the dinning room table throughout the winter. We would start it together but worked on it whenever we felt like it and would come together to finish it. This was something we did for years and it was always a lot of fun. I think today computers have replaced that type of fun in many households.

As individuals we all have different personalities, gifts, talents and desires, so what inspires one person may not necessarily be inspiring to someone else. But there is a common thread that we all have and that is a need for good emotional health. Continuing in the theme of helping us to find quiet time and rest for our soul, spirit, mind and body, what are some ways you can inspire yourself? The picture I used this week inspired me because sometimes I do my best thinking while soaking in a nice hot bubble bath. In order to inspire ourselves we must have a place to think without distractions. It might be a bath, or it might be at Borders with a latté or cup of tea. Talking to a friend about how you’re feeling can also help put things in perspective.

I want to challenge you my dear sisters to think about how the winters are for you and if there is anything you would like to change about them? Is there something you’ve wanted to do that you keep putting on the back burner, such as a class? Do you keep putting off buying that exercise video you know you need? Is there a book club you would like to join, or maybe you’ve even thought about starting one of your own with a few friends.

Take time to look at your physical and emotional health and see what you can do to improve or maintain it. How are you feeling emotionally? Is there some depression lurking about? If so, what can you do to make things different? What is the root of your depression? I have purposely left out looking at your husband, marriage, and children because I’m encouraging you to take care of you. When momma is happy and content, things go oh, so much better. We are more patient, it is easier for us to wink at mishaps, people want to be around us and that person who likes to raise her voice in frustration all but disappears. It is about us my dear sisters, as women we often put ourselves last or neglect the things that make us happy and whole.

Mark 12:30 (KJV) tells us: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. I ask you, “If we are tired and our spirits and souls are sad and worn out, how much love can we give God?”

My dear sisters, I pray that you will take the challenge to try something new and take another step toward taking care of you.

Please write a comment and share from your heart what you think the upcoming winter months will hold for you.

Love & Hugs
Ponnie

A woman's heart should be so hidden in Christ that a man should have to seek Him first to find her.

It’s Amazing What You Can Accomplish in 15 or 20 Minutes!

When I first became a homeschool mom back in 1999, my great organization skills seemed to literally fly out the window. I went from neat and organized to clutter, clutter, and even more clutter. I know that some of you homeschool moms are LOL and ROF right about now, because you know all too well that clutter has a way of taking over the homes of most homeschoolers.

At the time I lived in a 2 bedroom flat and as an apartment it was fantastic, but once it had to house a classroom everything changed. Pennsylvania is the 2nd toughest state to homeschool in, New York is number one. So if you private homeschool (buy your own curriculum and don’t use cyber school) the state requires a lot of paperwork from you. The daily school log alone can cause you to pull out your hair, especially when you only do it every three months versus every school day!!! Oh, the tears that first year. Some days I cried more than Tovah did. ~Smile~ The one thing we can always count on is that when God gives us instruction to do something He does provide all that we will ever need to succeed. Besides the brain smarts He had already given me to do the job, He gave me a spiritual mentor who is pretty darn smart herself.

One day as I was expressing my frustration with paperwork, and no longer able to eat at the dinning room table, she suggested that I begin timing projects and when the time was up move on to something else that had to be done. She then added, “You will be amazed at what you can do in 15 minutes!” At first I thought she was making light of the situation and trying to pick my spirits up by making me laugh, but she was very serious. That was 10 years ago, and I’ve become a pro at using 15 to 20 minutes to get things done. I want to share this little nugget with you, because someone of us are having trouble making time for rest or even just a quiet moment to think. Trust me my sisters, this works. And the more you apply it to everyday things, the better it gets.

I started by taking 15 minutes every evening to make sure my bedroom was picked up and everything in its place. I had a habit of cleaning my room once a week and that was it because by the end of the day my butt was tired! The handles on my exercise bike housed all the clothing I didn’t hang up during the week, and there were piles of books, papers and junk on the seat of the bike too. By the week’s end my dresser was cluttered and covered with white talcum powder and I won’t even talk about the night stands. But I will say that once I did the weekly cleaning of my room and began picking it up every night; I had the sanctuary one needed after spending all day in the front of the apartment working from home and homeschooling a second grader. Before long I just automatically put everything in its place. Tovah’s bedroom, the bathroom and kitchen were places that were always neat and clean, but there was a huge problem in my living and dinning area. Because of the way my flat was designed these two rooms were together without the division of a wall, and often at the end of the day I just walked away and left the stuff there. After conquering my bedroom I began to focus on picking up 15 minutes after school was done and 15 more minutes after my paid work was done. This really helped me to feel good about things and I was no longer overwhelmed trying to get a month’s worth of paperwork done in one day.

I don’t always use a 15 minute time frame, but I do use a timing system for many things. When I have a big project that seems intimidating or overwhelming, I begin to block a certain amount of time each day to work on it, often it is an hour. At the end of 2 weeks I am amazed at how much I have accomplished. When I moved a couple of years ago, I had boxes on top of boxes to unpack, so I took on one box a day and before I knew it, everything had a place and the boxes that needed to be stored were put away too.

As Tovah grew older and could handle her 15 minutes of chores in the evening, together we would get a lot accomplished. Truth is it really doesn’t take longer than 15 minutes to mop a floor, or dust a certain area. I can freshen up the bathroom in 10 minutes. The more hands you have (meaning kids) the easier it is to get an hour’s or more worth of work done in just 15 minutes.

Over the years one of the greatest things I’ve found to do in 15 to 20 minutes is meditate on the Word of God.

I’ve taken this example for you from the book [In Every Pew Sits a Broken Heart, by Ruth Graham (daughter)]. First choose a Bible verse that speaks to your heart. Get comfortable in a place where you will not be distracted. Relax your body and let all the thoughts and to-dos pass from your mind. Consider a phrase or concept in the verse you have chosen. Meditate on the phrase. What does it mean? What does it say to you personally? What does it tell you about God? Do not rush while you think on these things—stay relaxed. Invite God to show you something new, to change you in some way. Allow God to increase your clarity about what the verse is communicating specifically to you. As you gain understanding, begin to thank God for what He is showing you. Praise Him for what you have leaned about His character and ask Him to help you apply whatever it is you have learned to your every day life.

Joshua 1:8 (The Message) And don't for a minute let this Book of The Revelation be out of mind. Ponder and meditate on it day and night, making sure you practice everything written in it. Then you'll get where you're going; then you'll succeed. Now I ask, "How wonderful is that?"

My hope is that I have encouraged you to tackle some of the mountains that have been overwhelming you, by continuing in the theme of helping us finding quiet time and rest for our soul, spirit, mind and body. Drop me a line and share how you tackle overwhelming “jobs to do” or just express an opinion on what you might be able to do in 15 to 20 minutes.

Winner of the drawing for a gift from Cupteavity.com is: Rita Scarborough of Sicklerville, NJ, USA. Rita will be receiving a Tin of their special blended “Pumpkin Tea,” and a shiny strainer. Keep looking because we have a few more drawings coming up.

Blessings & Love to you all!!

Ponnie