The prodigal returns

I realize it has been several (GASP) years since I updated this blog. A lot has happened in the past few years....and I do mean A LOT! I only stumbled on this blog again out of curiosity and found to my surprise that it was actually still here. I began to read my own writing and realized how humbling, and how amazing, this blog really was for me.
I originally abandoned the blog because of a few "bad seeds" discouraging my work. I know now just how wrong this was. I also know that God has called me to this calling, and I can no longer deny this. After rereading some of my original posts on this blog I can see now that my own self doubt was so very wrong. God has most definitely called me back to this place and nothing can stop the will of God!
After a very personal tragedy in my life (the sudden, but not unexpected death of my young, 49 year old mom last week) I am reaching out for change in my life. I think that's what led to my seeking out this blog again. I just have a strong desire to get back to where God called me. I am reaching for something more, and I am letting God take me there.
I was healed, by God, of depression back in 2006, and I refuse to ever go back to that dark place again. I'm going to allow my mom's life and death to inspire something good in me, not bring me back down, so that is why I am here again. In some ways I feel like the prodigal daughter returning to her father.
I have to admit that I not only abandoned this blog, but overtime, after some very personal issues (the death of a close friend, and the birth of a beautiful baby girl), and a lot of discouraging words, I also abandoned my church women and the JOY group. I cannot apologize enough for this. All I can do is return to what God gave me - the calling to lead others, and myself, to joy and health. My entire life is one big testimony, and it is up to me, and only me, to allow that testimony to shine - not hide from it. So with that said I have decided the time has come to return. I'm going to be walking very slowly at first, maybe even crawling, but I am coming back - and God's going to move mountains for me - I can just feel it deep within.
I have learned one important lesson in the past few years: When God gives you a calling and a ministry He will make a way - but only if you obey the call. Not everyone will be on board, but that is not your concern. Not everyone agreed with Jesus' work either, but that did not stop Him. He didn't need a fancy building to do His work, or special circumstances. He ignored the scoffers, preached anyway - sometimes with nothing more than a hill of grass under his feet, and now His message lives on! God wants to do great things in our lives, but we too often let the thoughts of others dictate what we can and cannot do. God said go and do, so we must do just that and nothing else.
I was going to start an entirely new blog, but after reading this blog I realized it is already a great format and why should I mess with what works? The only thing I am changing is the template with a slightly newer design because the original html / design no longer works. I am leaving all of the original posts up for reference. I cannot guarantee how often I will post here, but just knowing the blog is still here gives me encouragement to go forth.
Pray for me.

JOY Meetings and an update

Hey everyone. I want to apologize for not updating the blog lately but we are in the last 2 weeks of school with the kids. We have to be most of the way finished by next friday and completely finished by the end of the month. So we have been really busy trying to get that all finished along with everything else in life lol. Anyway I have not abandoned you and I will try to start updating this blog more as soon as things are less hectic around here.

In other news I am still trying very hard to stick with my plan. I have now gone back to eating regular foods but I am mixing it with more fruits and veggies and healthier food choices. I am still only at a 19 pound loss total but hopefully I will have a better report at the end of June on this! I am going to go back to the fruits and veggies again next week after I go grocery shopping this weekend.

Now for the Joy meetings. I know that things have been crazy lately and we've had a meeting or two when we shouldn't have but this month we will try to go back to the normal schedule. Unless I tell you otherwise the meetings are always the 2nd and 4th wednesday of the month (unless of course I got this mixed up and it is supposed to be the 1st and the 3rd - please correct me on this if need be lol). So the meetings this month will be June 10th and the 24th. If the weather is nice we will be meeting at the park, the res, or maybe even the local nature trail. I will keep you all updated on this.

God Bless!

JOY meeting will be at the park

This message is for my JOY ladies. We will be meeting at the park tonight instead of the church. See you all there at our regular time - 6:30.

God Bless!

No Joy

Due to things going on right now we will not have our meeting tomorrow night as scheduled. We may have one next week instead to make up for the lack of meetings lately.

Also to the Joy women. I want to apologize for this but I will be unable to do the relay for life. There are several factors as to why I cannot participate but I will explain at the next meeting. If any of you would still like to participate in the Relay for life then please contact Kevin or Vanessa as I think they are still doing this with the youth.

All of our other activities will still be as planned and don't forget we are still on a mini challenge right now!

I am already 12 pounds away from meeting my goal - how are you doing? :-)

No updates this week!

I am going on a mini family trip this weekend starting Thursday, and I have a final exam tomorrow morning so there will be no updates this week. I apologize for not posting this yesterday but I have been extremely busy trying to get my house in order before we leave and getting things straightened out.

Also there are a couple things going on in my life right now that I would like all of you to pray about.

To the JOY women - The meeting is next week, not tomorrow night. Remember the meetings will always be the 2nd and 4th wednesday of the month!

God Bless everyone and see you next week.

Tasty Tuesday - Spinach Salad

Amazing isn't it - you get two real posts in two weeks! This will become a habit I'm sure ;)

A reminder to the JOY women there is a meeting tomorrow night - not next week.

Today's recipe is for one of my favorite salads to whip up for myself when I'm running low on calories for the day but I'm still incredibly hungry. This is very filling, very low in calories and very high in good for you stuff.


Spinach Salad

2-3 cups baby spinach leaves
1/4 cup dried cranberries
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese
A sprinkle of sliced almonds - less than 1/4 cup
2 tbsp. Light balsamic dressing or olive oil drizzled on top
Fresh ground black pepper to taste

Toss together in a large bowl. Enjoy!
This can be made with many variations and you can omit the cheese if you want this to be even lower in calories. Baby spinach leaves are a staple in my kitchen. I use them in omelettes, pasta dishes like lasagna, soups, and I even make this yummy dip using green onions, baby spinach leaves and FF cream cheese - I will post the recipe for this at a later date.

Time to get back to business

Ok I have neglected this blog for far too long. Those of you that know me IRL know that the biggest reason was my internet. Well we subscribed to a new internet service and now I am able to get online again. With our previous internet I was only able to get online just to check email and that was pretty much it. Now I can blog again and all that fun stuff. We have also started our JOY meetings again so this blog will be hopefully be going strong in the future. Well just thought I would give you all a status update and let you know that this blog has not been abandoned, just neglected for a little while :-).

Note: There will be a JOY meeting this wednesday night at 6:30 and another one the following week at the same time. Hope to see you all there. God bless!

No JOY 'til January

Since our next two meetings are so close to the holidays, and because of all the snow and cold weather, I've decided that our next meeting won't be until the last Tuesday in January. That means that there won't be a meeting tonight either. If you have any questions or need anything feel free to contact me. God Bless!

JOY Announcement - Change of plans

Hey everyone,

Due to me and my kids being sick this week I'm going to have to reschedule the meeting and picnic to next week. I think this may actually work better for some of you - I'm hoping. Our meeting will now be on September 30th at the church at our regular time (6:30) and the Picnic will be Sunday October 5th at 1:00 p.m. at Mary Fate Park in Plymouth. If the weather is bad we will have to make a change of plans but I'll keep you all informed. If you cannot attend the meeting next week but need details on the picnic please feel free to contact me.

Have a great week and hope to see you all this weekend at church!

It's JOY time again!

Hey ladies we are having a meeting again. We will be meeting next Tuesday - Sept. 22nd - at the church to discuss the picnic. The picnic will be next Sunday the 28th at 1:00 p.m. at the Plymouth park. All future meetings after this will be held on the last Tuesday of the month until further notice. Hope to see you all there!

J.O.Y. Tomorrow

We will be meeting at the Shelby Res. - Hope to see you all there! :-)

***J.O.Y. info - Important***

In preperation for the homecoming dinner at the church this weekend we will not be having a "normal" JOY meeting this week. Instead I'm asking for all of you, if you are able, to come and help clean the church on Wednesday night instead of Tuesday. We will be doing a thorough cleaning of the church and we need all the helping hands we can get. We are doing this on Wednesday night instead of Tuesday because I am in the process of finishing up the painting / remodeling of the nursery and I'm counting on being finished with it by Tuesday evening. We really appreciate anyone who can come help! We will be meeting at the normal JOY time - 6:30 p.m. - Hope to see you all there :-)

God Bless!

No J.O.Y.

For those of you that didn't get the other zillion messages or emails I just wanted to make sure you knew that we cancelled tonight. I'm still having stomach problems and the storms look pretty hideous out there. Have a great week everyone and keep me in your prayers.

God Bless,
Amy

I hate to do this but...

I'm going to have to cancel JOY tonight ladies. I've been having some pretty bad stomach problems for about a week now. I just don't think I'm up to having joy tonight. There are also some severe storms headed this way so everyone can just stay home and be safe tonight. :-)

Please be praying for me. Have a good night and God bless!

Tasty Tuesday & Joy Announcement

Wow I can't believe it's July already! I haven't posted in almost a month, but thankfully we are finally finished with school over here so I will hopefully have a little more time to post. For those of you that don't know, I homeschool my children and we were in the last few weeks of crunch time trying to get everything finished. I now have a little breathing room in my stress level but I am still extremely frustrated right now with a lot of things going on. Please keep my family in your prayers!

Anyway I just wanted to remind all of you that we will be meeting at the park tonight for Tennis and Badminton. Hope to see you all there!

Tasty Tuesday - Easy Biscuit Recipe


(Note: This photo is not mine but these are pretty much how the biscuits look. I "borrowed" this one from this site: http://www.yumsugar.com/774382 - Looks like a pretty interesting site. Go check them out!)

Ok I realize that biscuits are not exactly a great food when you're on a diet but sometimes there's a need for those little puffy bread creations - like when you're making low fat gravy and biscuits. I discovered this recipe last week and made them twice for my family and they absolutely loved them. They said they tasted a lot like the biscuits from a local chicken place (Churches). I think this recipe could easily be made using whole wheat flour, liquid egg substitute and skim milk and still turn out just as good.

Dry Ingredients:
2 Cups all purpose flour (for healthier whole grain biscuits substitute whole wheat flour instead)
3 Tsp. Baking powder
1 Tsp. Salt
1 Tsp. Sugar (This is very minimal in the recipe so I would not worry about it. An alternative sweetener would probably work just as well or you could leave it off all together. I used honey in mine, I like as much natural ingredients as possible.)

Wet Ingredients:
3/4 Cup Milk
1/3 Cup Oil (Corn or canola oils are healthiest. I would not recommend using olive oil as it may alter the taste of the biscuits or even give them an odd taste.)
1 Beaten Egg (Or 1/4 cup liquid egg substitute)

Blend the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar. Combine the remaining ingredients and pour over the dry ingredients. Stir together lightly.

Drop by spoonfuls onto a cookie sheet lightly sprayed with cooking spray. Bake in a 450° oven for 12 to 15 minutes.

Makes 12 to 14 biscuits

I put a little melted butter and honey over the tops of mine. You could also coat them with a few sprays of the parkay margarine spray or I can't believe it's not butter spray. You could also add some low fat cheese and onions, or just about anything to make unique biscuits. Enjoy!

JOY

Don't forget that there will be JOY tonight. Hope to see you all there :-).

Meeting at the Library

We are meeting at the Mans. Library tonight. The event starts at 7:00 p.m. so we should get there a little early in order to get seats. The library events are usually held on the second floor between the childrens section and the a/v section. You can wear your JOY shirt if you like. I will probably wear mine. We may go out to eat afterwards but I'm not completely sure about that. We can discuss it later. Hope to see you all there!

Still no Joy

Sorry everyone but I think I need another week to rest up. My ears are all plugged up and I'm not up to "speaking" when I can't even hear myself talk. I do want to remind you all that next week we will be meeting at the Mans. Library at 7:00 instead of our regular JOY meeting. Hope to see you all there! Have a good week and God Bless.

No JOY!

Joy is cancelled tomorrow night. I'm still very sick and in need of all of your prayers. I don't think I've ever been this sick before in my life. Well God bless ladies and have a great week.

Important Announcement about the March of Dimes Walk

Due to the fact that I am still very ill I really don't think I will be able to participate in the walk on Saturday. I just don't forsee myself getting well enough to go with you. I will warn you though that I won't be the only one missing - some of the other members will be travelling south for a funeral this weekend so I'll leave it up to the rest of you whether or not you still want to participate. Those of you that are still interested in going are free to do so and if you need directions just give me a call or send me a message.

Please keep me in your prayers. I am very sick. I went to the dr. and all they had to say was that I had all the symptoms of strep but it's not strep - go figure! It's just a severe viral infection or something like that. I can't eat, I can't drink, I haven't slept well in about 2 days and my body feels like I've been hit by a truck. Also be praying for those that are heading south this weekend. God give them peace and comfort in this time of sorrow!