Blog Challenge - Accepted!

Ok, blogland friends - I have accepted this challenge through NaBloPoMo - you can read about their site here.  It requires me to post Monday through Friday, so we shall see! I have listed the prompts for the month below! Happy New Year everyone!

Blessings,
Stephanie

Thursday, January 1, 2015
What are your resolutions for the new year? Tell us how you picked them.
Friday, January 2, 2015
Do you usually keep your resolutions? Tell us about a time when you were particularly successful.
Monday, January 5, 2015
Tell us about your worst habit?
Tuesday, January 6, 2015
Have you ever tried to break a habit and failed? What made it so difficult to break?
Wednesday, January 7, 2015
Do you have any good habits that were hard to start but you're happy you worked to build them?
Thursday, January 8, 2015
Tell us about the habit you wished you had. What stops you from trying to build it into your daily life?
Friday, January 9, 2015
Do you think you have more good habits or bad habits?
Monday, January 12, 2015
Do you enjoy repetition, or do you always need change?
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
Do you tend to order the same thing at restaurants? Or do you like to jump around the menu?
Wednesday, January 14, 2015
Do you need to always find new music, authors, or actors, or do you stick with what you already know you like?
Thursday, January 15, 2015
If you had to read the same book year after year after year, what would it be?
Friday, January 16, 2015
Similar to yesterday, if you had to watch the same movie every single month for the next 10 years, what would it be?
Monday, January 19, 2015
Aristotle said, "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit." What do you think he meant by this statement?
Tuesday, January 20, 2015
Twyla Tharp said that creativity is a habit. Do you agree or disagree?
Wednesday, January 21, 2015
Hippocrates famously said: "Make a habit of two things: to help; or at least to do no harm." Add one more important habit to his list.
Thursday, January 22, 2015
Olympic medalist Jim Ryun said: "Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going." Where do you find the motivation to start a new habit?
Friday, January 23, 2015
Mary Martin said, "Stop the habit of wishful thinking and start the habit of thoughtful wishes." What do you think is the difference?
Monday, January 26, 2015
Do you feel chained or released by your habits?
Tuesday, January 27, 2015
Tell us about your morning routine. What is one thing you want to change?
Wednesday, January 28, 2015
Tell us about your night routine. What is one thing you could never imagine changing about it?
Thursday, January 29, 2015
Do you think of yourself as a creature of habit or a change monster?
Friday, January 30, 2015
Are you still keeping the resolutions you made at the beginning of the month? Why or why not?

Holiday Blues

I love the Christmas season.  I really do.  And usually by now I have the tree up, the porch decorated and a smattering of décor throughout the house.  This morning I sit with fall decorations just taken down last night, storage tubs still sitting behind the couch and two more floral arrangements and wreath to dismantle and find a home for.  No Christmas in sight.

I have actually bought a few presents already, and the Christmas music has been playing in the car and around the house.  But for some reason, I am just not in the Christmas mood yet.  I am pretty sure it has to do with how overwhelmed I feel at the moment with everything in my life that "needs" to be done with the limited amount of hours I have between now and the end of the year to do them.

I miss my daycare kids and the holiday traditions we had, decorating the tree, making silly crafts for them to give to their parents...I recently saw a reindeer hand we made one year on a Christmas tree picture posted on Instagram and it made me smile, but also a little sad too.  Sad because I want that for our family...a child to have traditions with, to share our story with, pass our history on to. 

Maybe that isn't God's plan for me, or His timing isn't exactly what I had hoped.  This is yet to be seen.  I am just not in the let's decorate it with glitter and bows and pretend it's all okay place today.  Or yesterday. Or last week.  Well, you get the point.

I have been mulling over this passage of scripture from Hebrew 19:13 and following.  Trying to focus on the promises of God to never leave me nor forsake me and work things for His good in my life.  So that's where I leave it for today.  Praying that God's direction and plan for my life will be the forefront this Christmas season.  And everyday beyond that.

The Certainty of God's Promise

¹³ For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself, ¹⁴ saying, “Surely I will bless you and multiply you.” ¹⁵ And thus Abraham,^[b] having patiently waited, obtained the promise. ¹⁶ For people swear by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes an oath is final for confirmation. ¹⁷ So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, ¹⁸ so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. ¹⁹ We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, ²⁰ where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.