concept to completion

mandi mapes attends my church and is simply awe-inspiring to hear. she has an album coming out later this year... i absolutely love this song. her testimony - and her music - is filled with the kind of grace and redemption that we all desperately need reminding of...

Concept to Completion: Mandi Mapes from Jason Wallis on Vimeo.

crayons in the carpet. and other things.

personalities captured perfectly

i was trying to clean up crayon marks out of my carpet last night, with tears in my eyes. there was a time when the thought of crayon marks on carpets and walls would've made me cry tears of a different angst. but these tears were ones of gratefulness for the little hands that scribbled the pale blue lines.

"crayons in the carpet" is a phrase i say often. when scraping play-doh out of my kitchen rug or silly putty out of parker's comforter or throwing away one of my children's new outfits after just one wear because it is irretrievably ruined. perfection in parenthood does not exist. to strive for it is simply, chasing after the wind. a futile, empty chase. mishaps and accidents that would have left me horrified pre-parenthood are simply crayons in the carpet to me now...

i started using this phrase after rick burgess shared a story about crayons at his three year old son's memorial service. they had instructed bronner countless times, like we all do, not to color on the carpet. he told a story of how, after bronner had died, he walked into his office to see his crayons scattered on the carpet. he intentionally stepped on them, crushing and grinding them into the carpet. he paused for a moment and then said, "i couldn't care less about that stupid carpet". and from that moment on, neither could i.

there are countless things that God changed in my heart the day i heard that message - this heart-wrenching change of perspective was just one of them.

of course, i don't advocate carpet coloring, or wall coloring, or furniture coloring and i still reprimand for such... but i don't shed tears over material posessions and i don't have a total come apart when something gets destroyed. not anymore. its all just crayons in the carpet.

but even more than that, i was reminded of how - in the not so distant future - there will not be crayons marks to scrub or play-doh to scrape. chloe, who starts kindergarten this fall, is already beginning her ascent out of preschool and into all things "big girl". "don't you want to watch barney", i ask... "or blues clues?". .. she laughs. but i am not joking. and my parker, my carpet artist, is following closely behind in her footsteps, shunning such preschool characters for dinosaurs and spiderman and all things superhero related. it makes my stomach turn when people tell me at every turn how very fast it all goes by, as if i'm not wretchedly, painfully aware...

we are always caught off guard by unexpected tragedy. in the wake of sudden death, an enormous part of the grief is realizing how much we had taken for granted and contemplating how we would do things differently... or how we will do things differently. as a mother, every time we hear about the death of a child we are shaken to our core. we tell ourselves that we'll do better, to live in every moment, to live without regrets... but the truth is, we can't live every moment allowing ourselves to grasp the magnitude of such a loss, because even the theoretical pain is too much to bare. a few moments spent scrubbing crayons out of my carpet is reminder enough of how grateful i am for the little, albeit mischievous, scribbling hands...

reconcilation

a few years back, shortly after chris and i had separated, i met a guy named traylor through my friend julie. she wanted me to meet him because he was [and is] a solid christian who had been through a divorce and at that point, i just needed to meet anyone who had lived through it and seemingly come out on the other side in one, still faithful, piece.

at that point, he had been divorced almost four years, shared custody of his four children with his ex-wife and shared with me that he still had some hope that they would reconcile someday. really? i thought... and said out loud. really? his wasn't the kind of hope spoken from desperation or some other unresolved issue. it was a quiet hope. an optimistic hope. i knew it was not some unfounded hope that stemmed from unresolved longing, but i could sense that it was hope in the Lord that stemmed from his faith. he was clearly not a man stuck in the past or unable to let go, but had somehow learned how to balance singledom and faith and hope for the future all while remaining hopeful that God would someday restore what was once irretrievably broken.

a couple of years passed by and our mutual friend julie mentioned in an email that he had remarried. good for him, i thought. i was happy for him. geniunely. and wondered how and when God had led him away from the hope of reconciliation and into a new life with someone else. when and if i see him again, i thought, this is what i would ask...

last week, i was walking out the door with the kids at don pepe and we ran right into traylor. "hey, i heard you remarried", i said. "yes, i remarried my ex-wife, melody", he said.... "after six years of divorce".

i had no idea. eleven years of marriage. four children. six years of divorce. and then, reconcilation. i could not stop the chills on my skin, the tears in my eyes or the joy in my heart for them.

click here to read the transcript from their marriage: http://traylorlovvorn.com/?page_id=104

"Though you have made me see troubles, many and bitter, you will restore my life again; from the depths of the earth you will again bring me up." Psalm 71:20

drum roll: boot camp results!

sandestin 06.20.09

week 3 of boot camp

success is subjective: i don't feel the least bit suicidal when looking a photograph of myself in a bikini. that is the measure of [my] success. granted, i was slightly reluctant to post it for all to see, but then again - this is me. i never had unrealistic expectations of perfection, i simply longed for the day when i would feel comfortable. i longed for the day that the reflection in the mirror or in a photograph would at least resemble the person i was on the inside. and so, this is me. . . inside and out.

boot camp was an awesome experience. it helped me push myself in ways i wouldn't have otherwise, moving me out of the confines of my spa-like gym and into a field at 5:30 in the mornings. no fancy equipment - just orange cones, a set of weights, a mat and fifteen other dedicated people... and one awesome trainer [who we affectionately refer to as the Jillian of Birmingham]. if anyone asks about it, i respond by asking, "have you seen the biggest loser?"... yea. it's just like that. lots of sweat. tears. vomit. it's pushing yourself - physically, mentally, emotionally - in a way you could never achieve on your own - and the results that campers obtain are incredible.

as of this morning, nine of the women in my camp had measurements taken and the collective total from those nine girls was over NINETY FOUR inches lost - nine of which i'm happy to report were my own my month-end results were: I dropped my body fat percentage by 3.1% to 26% and lost a total of NINE inches: 3 inches off my hips, 2 inches off my waist, 1 inch off each arm and 1 inch off each leg.

i was over 200 pounds, a size eighteen and 41% body fat when i started this journey three and a half years ago. i was carrying over eighty pounds of fat on my body. it took me the better part of two years to learn that the scale would eventually no longer be a measure of success. as a lifelong weight watcher, that was the hardest habit to break. for a long time, i would try to look back and remind myself of how far i've come and somewhere along the way, my focus shifted to how far i wanted to go.

results aside, it was just incredibly rewarding to complete something so grueling as a boot camp ... the physical and mental strength you build over the course of a single month is worth the effort alone. so much so that i talked my bff/workout pal, Stacs, into signing up for July and together, we're going back for more... stay tuned!

for more info. on boot camp, check out http://www.extremefittraining.com/.

mia at bootcamp

some of you know i'm doing a fitness bootcamp the month of june. i will blog about it soon, but suffice it to say that it has been an incredible experience (imagine your own personal version of the biggest loser) and it has really helped me take my level of fitness to the next level. let's face it, if i'm passionate about fitness to the point of finishing my degree and doing it for a living, i'm going to have the body to go with the book knowledge. i'm halway through and looking forward to the results. you can register to win a free bootcamp here:

http://www.extremefittraining.com/boot-camp-giveaway