Tongue Tied

A lot of people my age give up on church. They grow frustrated with ideologies that they disagree with or the prevalent attitude that is displayed, or by the conservatism or staunchness or hypocrisy that they perceive. So eventually, they stop trying and decide to love Jesus all on their own and denounce the church altogether. At one time, I was *this* close to being among the casualties. I can remember when each week, I left church discouraged. Ready to quit. Longing  to go elsewhere. In my early twenties, I struggled with the sins I saw that I thought were ignored. I loathed how it took years and years for things to change. I felt like I had no voice, no place, that I would never be heard. But try as I might, I never had a peace about leaving. So we stayed. Not a day goes by that I'm not grateful that we stayed. Seriously. Not a single day. Were there things in the church that were wrong? Yes. Were there things in me that were wrong? Even yesser. If I had left,...

First off, let me just say, I love you guys. You're, like, totally the bees knees. I think we're working as a great team here and for the most part, things rock. Seriously, great work out there, guys. There are just a *few* minor issues that need to be addressed. Not even issues. More like encouragements. Yes, encouragements. Let's call them "Mom's Minor But Enthusiastic Exhortations For Better All Around Family Quality". MMBEXFBAAFQ for short. MEE for shorter. MEE #1: It's really  not necessary to pull items out of your drawers and throw them into the air behind you when looking for acceptable clothing to wear. This is often the reason that you claim to have nothing to wear. Just scan the room. MEE #2: If there's dirt all over the towel after you wash your hands, you haven't really washed your hands. MEE #3: There will never be a time in my life when I don't consider some of the shows you love lame. It's pointless to press the is...

I have not been much good in the blogging department lately. I sorta feel like my writing button is stuck. It seems my brain can only hold so much  in the creativity department, and lately, my limited creative resources have been busy with photography. I actually have two different posts forming in my head about completely random topics, but they never seem to leap from my brain to the screen. I seriously can't even finish a coherent sentence. I keep backspacing. So I guess what I'm saying is, until inspiration hits, you might hear crickets chirping on my blog for a few more days. But, dude, my flickr is lighting up like a Christmas tree.

Click to view in a slideshow. You may notice there are eleven. That was accidental. And I'm too lazy to remove one. BONUS!

Yesterday, I tried on a swimming suit I liked. It didn't go well. I'm sure you're familiar with the feeling. Standing in front of the dressing room mirror, in a suit that looked modest and adorable on the hanger, in a size you thought would be more than ample, and finding that your reflection is not at all what you had in mind. How easily the thoughts come. "Blech. So fat. I'm hideous." I've learned by now not to really give those fleeting thoughts much attention. I dismiss them as quickly as I dismiss the ill fitting suit. Not because I think I'm awesome sauce. Not because I "love my body" or all of that nonsense. But because I've learned the hard way that my worth as a human isn't measured by how my body looks at the beach. There was a time in my life when I was incredibly thin--much too thin for my height. At my skinniest, when I "should" have been happy with how I looked, I hated myself. I was insecure, needy, ...