Thank you for five amazing years

You have a few more hours to enter this week’s giveaways.

Go here to enter to win one of two $50 Target gift cards.

Go here to enter to win one of two tickets to dotMOM.

And finally…have a great weekend. I hereby send you all a great big cyber hug! BOOM! Did you feel it?

5 Year Blogoversary Giveaway Part Deux

this giveaway is now closed. I will be in touch with the winners. Thanks for participating!

First of all, I would like props for what might possibly be the most creative blog post title ever. Because we all know that you can take a perfectly mundane phrase, toss in a little French and WHAMO! You’ve created art. (Never mind that I had to look up how to spell deux. Deaux? Deux? I JUST DON’T KNOW!!!)

Artsy, right?

No?

Ah, whatever. I’m not going for the Pulitzer here.

So you can STILL enter to win one of two $50 Target gift cards. That giveaway will be open until Friday so go comment to your little heart’s content. Today’s giveaway is equally as fun, though it may be a little harder for everyone to participate in.

Last September, I had the amazing privilege of attending dotMom as one of their featured bloggers and it was one of the highlights of my 2012. I met wonderful people there and came home so completely refreshed and blessed that I almost felt guilty about it.

Almost.

It really was a wonderful experience. The conference is put together by moms for moms and it is a place where you will be encouraged in your motherhood journey, no matter what phase you are in. Whether you’re pregnant, adopting, a mom of grown children, of toddlers, or children of the elementary school variety. There is something for you to learn, a nugget of truth for you to grasp hold of, a mentor who will give you the tools to keep taking steps forward toward shaping the small people in your midst.

It was such a great experience that I am planning to go back to dotMom again this year AND…

The fabulous women at Lifeway have given me two tickets to give away to the upcoming dotMom conference in Dallas, Texas!

The conference is Feburary 22-23 and, if you think you can make it to Dallas, I’d like to give you a ticket to dotMom. So…you know the drill, right?

Leave me a comment. Any comment. You can tell me why you would like to go to dotMom, what you ate for breakfast or what your favorite flavor of ice cream is (mine is chocolate/vanilla swirl, if you’re curious…). Just leave a comment to be entered to win a ticket to attend the Dallas dotMom event.

If you share this giveaway on Facebook or Twitter, come back to earn multiple entries (leave a comment for each time you share it. You can receive up to three entries).

I’ve checked the line up of speakers to the Feburary dotMom and am frantically checking my schedule to see if I could possibly make this event. The speakers are a-MAZ-ing!

Vicki Courtney

Angie Smith

Priscilla Shirer

Jen Hatmaker

John Croyle

And those are just the featured speakers. That isn’t the extensive list of wonderful speakers who will lead break out sessions geared toward inspiring and encouraging us moms in every aspect of our jobs.

So, who wants to go to dotMom next month? I will choose two winners on Friday at 2:00 EST.

Disclaimer: Lifeway provided me with the tickets to giveaway. I was not paid to write this post. All opinions expressed are, of course, my own.

On Being Intentional, Believing in Miracles and Punching Insecurity in the Face

My husband, God love him, is ornery. He takes a sick and twisted amount of delight in scaring the s*&$ out of me on a weekly basis. While I am busy turning out lights, whispering prayers over sleeping babes and shutting down the house for the night with grace and love, he is plotting evil.

I walk around the dark corners and he acts upon his wicked ways, jumping out at me from the shadows. And I usually yelp in terror and, more often than not, pepper my reaction with a four letter word or four, because honestly, when my heart skips like and that and my senses jolt and buzz I cannot be held responsible for the words that come out of my mouth!

(It is for this reason that I hold firm to my belief that my mansion in heaven will be bigger and shinier than his. And will be stocked with Nutella while his will be stocked with only radishes…and haggus.)

Insecurity does the same thing to me. I can be moving along, calmly taking care of business, then BOOM! I round a corner and insecurity is there waiting to steal my joy. Where moments ago I felt confident and secure in my path, insecurity works to instill doubt. I walk forward with trepidation, fear dictating which way I will turn.

Left unchecked, this fear can begin to order my steps, filter words spoken and limit opportunity.

I left last weekend for dotMOM with a lot of doubt and insecurity. I was part of a group of bloggers brought in by Lifeway for the conference and from start to finish it was everything I needed right at that moment. I entered completely unsure of myself and my abilities and I left with a fresh perspective about why I do what I do, and with the knowledge that there are some amazing people in this world doing amazing things.

I felt immensely loved all weekend by the other bloggers in attendance. They laughed with me, spoke wisdom into and over me and gave me all the courage to believe that this path that we’re on as a family – this path of adoption – is right. It’s good. It’s going to be great.

Every time I turned around this weekend, I met someone who has adopted and oh the grace they shared with me. They didn’t sugar coat things, they didn’t make it seem like sunshine and roses, but they did tell me that the process is beautiful and good and worth all of the effort.

I learned to be more intentional in all areas of my life. More intentional in parenting, more intentional in blogging, more intentional in wife-ing.

The amazing Jen Hatmaker in her sassy dress and boots...

There are so many women who blessed me this weekend. My roommate, Stacey, poured wisdom into me…and coffee. She bought me coffee in the mornings. I mean, that’s not why I fell in love with her, but it didn’t hurt, you know?

Jessica rushed up to me when she heard our adoption story and told me she wants to help. Then she spent the rest of the weekend making me smile and feel special.

Amanda encouraged me to be more intentional in mothering.

Jen amazed me with her grace and sweet, calm spirit. She’s raising quadruplets, people! Boy quadruplets!  It exhausts me just thinking of it.

Erin and Brooke speak directly to the hearts of mother’s of boys. Nish keeps it real and tells it like it is and in so doing requires you to stop and think about this journey called faith with a little more depth.

I heard amazing speakers like Jen Hatmaker who encouraged us to push our children toward courage. Don’t hover over them. Safety isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. “I don’t want to be the reason my children have chosen safety and comfort over courage,” she said.

I enjoyed a wonderful dinner with Vicki Courtney who later encouraged us all at the conference to be aware of the dangers of media and how the internet, with all it’s goodness, can also be a crutch to both us and our children. “You need to lighten up from trying to be the perfect mother,” she encouraged.

There was so much good that came out of last weekend, so many wonderful people met, so much laughter and praise. But perhaps the moment that impacted me most came late one evening, after we had raised our arms in worship together. I met Amanda Jones, a fellow Compassion Blogger and a sweet woman with a deep heart for Jesus.

Amanda and I spoke of the adoption and the many times I sit back in doubt. Will God provide? I say with my lips that He is bigger than the funds needed, but do I believe it with my heart? As we spoke, Amanda reached forward and grabbed my hands. “Can I pray with you?” she asked.

And she did. And I believed.

And just like that, all insecurity fled and I came home filled with…peace – ready to face the dark corners and excited to see what comes after each next step.

What are you facing that insecurity threatens to ruin?

dotMOM

I’m leaving this afternoon for the dotMom conference and the timing could not be more perfect. It has been a long, emotional, trying week. I need the refreshment. I need to get away. I need to be reminded of so many things. I’m so grateful and honored (and a little flabbergasted, to be honest) to have been asked to come to the conference by Lifeway. I look forward to soaking in all the wisdom offered by the many amazing women who will be there.

I’ll only be gone for two days, but I think it’s just what the doctor ordered to lift me out of the funk. I have packed dresses and scarves and boots because by golly if ever there was a chance to dress cute, this was it. I don’t need my yoga pants or my tennis shoes for any reason at all!

Hot dang!

Are any of you headed to dotMOM? Find me, please? Let’s hang out and get to know each other in real life!
Happy Thursday!