Not much to post about today. Nothing new or exciting going on in my life. I had a ‘girls’ (my son and my friend’s almost 1 year old boy were there too) lunch date today and it was really nice, I definitely needed to feel that connection today.

Caleb and I were supposed to camp this weekend and tonight would of been the first night so it’s kind of a bummer sitting here knowing we should of been at the campground instead

Caleb’s dad just picked him up for the night and they were heading about 1 1/2 hours away for a ‘guys’ weekend and Caleb has been looking forward to it all day. I guess it will be good for him to spend some alone time with his dad but I’m still bummed that we aren’t having our special weekend together.

Other than that I’m not in much of a talking typing mood. I’m in a ‘drown my sorrows in junk food’ mood. Good think I don’t have a car because I’d be running out to stock up on some comfort food for the night! LOL.

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So I’ve come to the conclusion that out of this car experience God is working on my patience (sigh! LOL) and getting over that ‘acting out of emotion rather than prayer’ issue I seem to have sometimes.

I can tend to act quickly and out of emotion rather than take a look at the situation, pray and then act. I’m getting better at it but it’s still a struggle. It was a struggle a couple week’s ago on Saturday, August 4th when I was ready to act on impulse and purchase a car for LOTS of money with a really HIGH interest rate and pay an ungodly amount of money each month for a payment (that I knew I couldn’t afford). I was caught up in the moment and at that moment I was LOVING driving the Grand Prix that had air conditioning blasting, radio blasting, windows that rolled up and down, etc, etc but deep down in my spirit I clearly felt God telling me to wait. Thankfully it was Saturday afternoon and I couldn’t drive off the lot with the car until Monday so I didn’t sign papers or anything.

And the acting out of emotion goes right along with another tiny little issue I’ve always had - patience (or should I say lack of patience?). So I’m pretty sure the whole lesson overall with this car situation is that I have to be rational and logical here and look to God for the answer/solution instead of acting out of emotion and doing something unrational.

A couple days ago a friend suggested that I take over the payments on one of their cars because her husband was wanting to look at a different car. The loan would of been small - $2,000.00 but I would of had to have a co-signer (and quite frankly I’m not sure that even a co-signer would help me get a loan!!!). It sounded like a GRAND plan at the time but I knew in my spirit it was wrong.

I know God doesn’t want me to borrow money to obtain a car. I know debt is a huge issue with me and God definitely doesn’t want me adding to the already rough situation I have with debt.

The very next day the option of a co-signer for a small loan was presented to me by my mom and step dad. But again I knew it was wrong. It’s hard to explain to my family and friends why I’m not jumping at the chance to find a $2,000.00 car and have my step dad co-sign. People aren’t understanding how I can not take the offer considering I have no car.

I can understand why people are questioning my decision because in my mind (and in my flesh) I keep rationalizing everything about how I’m in a desperate situation here and have every right to take advantage of what is being offered to me but there is that still small voice deep down in my heart, sould and spirit clearly speaking the word “NO”. I’ve always been hearing “be still and know that I am here, continue to wait and be patient”.

So it’s definitely got to do with building my faith up and believing that I’m doing the right thing because I’m hearing from God and I’m clearly hearing I have to wait. As much as my flesh doesn’t like this idea my heart is very very peaceful about it.

So I’m ready to wait for a car to come into my hands whether it means I’m going to be waiting for 3 more days, 3 more weeks, or heck even 3 more years, I’m happy to wait because I know God’s got a grand plan in all this

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my car that is. Anyone following along knows the car issues I’ve had. Well a couple days ago all hope wasn’t lost - it could be fixed if I came up with $300.00. As of today it’s official, my car will never run again. The parts are now up to like $364.00 and it’s a bigger project than the gentleman (from church) can do (it requires pulling the entire engine out, changing a bunch of gears (it’s a stickshift), changing a couple chains, etc. If I were to take it to a garage it would be double the $364 (because all he was charging me was parts and not labor). And the thing about putting any $ into fixing it is that that wouldn’t even guarantee that it would keep it running for very much longer!

I was a bit freaked the past 3 weeks not having a car but it’s even freakier knowing that this car won’t be fixed and I have no way to get financing for a new car or to get a different car period. I know that with God nothing is impossible but let me tell you in a human’s mind this is a lost cause especially if you knew the situation with my finances:-(

So I guess I’ve survived 3 weeks without a car I can survive for however much longer it’s going to be before I’m financially able to do something - now that’s a scary thought!

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I thought I posted yesterday but I guess I must of been thinking about it and never did it. Today I’ll post about a couple different things

School Open House: Tonight from 5-7pm is an open house at Caleb’s school.  We will get to meet his teacher, see his classroom - the same stuff we do every year on open house night.  He has a male teacher this year, the first time he’s had a male teacher, so I’m wondering if there will be less listening issues this year (he tends to listen to men better than women).

Writing: I purchased Laurie Dart’s book The Everyday Guide to Writing Wisely quite awhile ago but I never made time to sit down and go through it…until this weekend.  With the burning desire to write a book I’ve been reading and researching and getting my hands on everything I can that will help me write better.

And boy oh boy do I feel like I’m starting at square one! Reading through Laurie’s Everyday Guide to Writing Wisely reminded me just how much I’ve forgotten! I mean even your basic grammar I’ve forgotten.  And I’m also learning new things.  Like I never knew that writing on the web you weren’t supposed to put two spaces behind punctuation like I learned in school during my typing class. I was taught (in typing class) that after a period or question mark or whatever you spaced two times before starting your next sentence. Laurie’s book informed me that when writing on the web you only space one time! This is definitely an adjustment to get used to when I’ve done the two spaces for YEARS! Even in college when writing papers, etc on the computer I did two spaces. It’s hard to retrain yourself when you’ve done something for so LONG! And I’ve learned that I’m ‘wordy’ (which I knew that) and need to cut down on using extra words. I loved the book and definitely recommend it!

Car Update: Wednesday will mark the three week period with NO car! The ‘diagnosis’ came in yesterday and wasn’t very good. I need a new timing chain and a bunch of other stuff. Not a cheap or easy fix. I need $300.00 to cover everything. Not sure what God’s plan in this situation is but I’m sure there is a lesson to be learned, as there always is in situations that come about.

Camping Trip (Mini Vacation): Caleb and I were supposed to camp this coming weekend for three nights as an end of the summer ’mommy’s sorry she’s done nothing but work all summer’ trip.  Something the both of us were really looking forward to. But now because of the broken down car & trying to come up with the money to fix it & no car to get us there we can’t go.  Caleb was so heart broken when I told him last night. 

Church: I can’t believe how amazing and ‘right’ my new church is to me.  My old church was amazing to and they helped me through some really rough times in my life but I never felt like I was my ‘own person’ there.  Everything I did was with my friends and sometimes I was afraid to do anything without a friend(s) doing it with me.  At my new church, maybe because it’s so much smaller, I’m definitely my own person and do things without needing to have someone do them with me (if that makes any sense).

I’ve been thinking about how I would love to put together a bulletin for Sunday services so they have something to hand out to people Sunday mornings and I was so excited when Sunday morning they announced they were looking for someone to start putting a bulletin together (thanks God!).  So I’ll be volunteering my time and printing services (lol) to putting together a bulletin.  It’s gonna take some time and lots of tweaking especially since I’ve never done anything like a bulletin before and of course I want to make it extra cool - LOL!

Life: Life is great! God is amazing! Caleb is good, I’m good. Life is just all around great! My brother’s wedding is coming up in just 2 short weeks! The big day is Saturday September 8th! I can’t believe that my baby brother (he’s 22) is getting married. It seems like just yesterday I was babysitting him and my sister and changing his diaper! I can’t believe he’s 22 now and gonna be a husband! Wowsers.

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Ok so after a very sleepless night I spent alot of time pondering things while I cleaned last night and then while I laid awake in bed. 

I’ve always loved writing and English was my favorite and best subject in school.  I’ve been a ‘pretend’ writer (journals, letters, etc) all my life.  The thought of writing a book has crossed my mind many different times over the past several years.

I’ve wanted to write a book about my struggles as a Christian woman that came from abusive relationships, an alcohol addiction, a food addiction (that I’m still working on overcoming to this day) but most of all being a yo-yo Christian (which I’m thankful and blessed to say that God has cured me of this! My faith and relationship with the Lord are the strongest they’ve ever been and there is no more yo-yo action for me - it’s all about walking the right path instead of one foot in and one foot out).  But it was never more than an idea - I mean who am I to write a book anyways?

Then all of a sudden Kelly’s awesome Hot Seminar Series was coming to an end (this past Wednesday night) and I wasn’t planning on attending it because I just didn’t feel like it.  But about 20 minutes after the teleseminar had started there was a tugging on my heart to join in and it was all about writing a book to build your business! So now I have this notion in my head (and heart) that I so could write a book to help build my business!

Lynn Klippel was totally amazing and awesome and I’m so interested in taking her Book School class she is offering next month but as a single mom with a broken down car, a son that needs school clothes, a business woman that needs a new computer and on and on there just isn’t any financial way I can swing it right now.  I hope she will offer more classes in the future because I really really want to go through this nine week course!

But then the nagging thoughts come into my head - you can’t write a book, you aren’t smart enough to do something that grand, who’d read your book anyways, what do you have to offer in a book, your writing skills aren’t good enough to write a book, and on and on and on. 

So I spent those couple hours pondering whether I - a 30 something single mom from Northern Michigan - had the skills, the knowledge or the information to do such a grand thing. 

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