AdVerTiSiNg!

I love people that use their God given talents for God's glory!!!  My cousin Stacy just recently began making wreaths and all sorts of decorations and I absolutely love her work.  She has no idea I am letting others know about her business nor did she ask me to but I cannot help but share!

She is making Easter wreaths currently and summer too!  She can do absolutely anything and can be very specific to your needs.  I think the wreaths below range from $60-$65.

Just to share a few examples...




Aren't they beautiful??? 

Holler at me if you are interested and I can hook you up with her digits!  She does ship items too!

Happy Tuesday Y'all!

A SPECIAL Birthday CeleBration...

Melissa turns 9!!!

Anyone that is around Rance & I much will hear us often talk about David & Dana & their 4 children (The Thackers!).  We love them ALL so much.  We love living life with them in Robbinsville and more than anything, we love their hearts for the Lord, their obedience to being disciples & disciple-makers, and how they challenge us spiritually.

On Friday, their oldest daughter Melissa turned 9 years old.  She is so full of JOY and one of the most genuine children I have ever met.  She cares so deeply for others and she radiates such sweet love to all those around her.  Could that be because her parents have modeled this in front of her?  Without a doubt!  I am constantly in awe of the behavior of these 4 children and how they respond to their mom & dad.  It's quite beautiful. 

I was honored that I got to spend Friday evening with Dana & the kids celebrating Melissa's birthday at our local mexican restaurant.  We had so much fun!

Luke, Andrew, Melissa, Dana & Anna!

SILLY FACES!

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE time with them!
The birthday girl is in the center :)

HAHAHAHA love each of their unique personalities!

I am so thankful for such a precious family, God ordained friendships, Melissa's sweet life, and lots of laughter on a Friday night!

A VERY Special Valentine's Date - Party of 6!

My teenage girls discipleship group meets every Thursday night at the house!  We eat, laugh, catch up on our weeks, eat some more, drink some coffee, and then study God's Word.  These girls are precious to me.  God has entrusted them to me at this time in my life and I vow to pour every ounce of my being in teaching them, equipping them, and showing them how and what it looks like to live this life for the Lord Jesus - what it means to be his disciple - how to love God, love others, serve others, and make disciples. 

I cannot begin to tell you how excited I was when I realized that Valentine's Day was on a Thursday this year.  Why?  It meant I could take them on a special date and talk about a LOVE like no other LOVE.  It is my hearts desire for them to find their identity in Christ, to find their value in Him, to look to Him to fulfill that deep longing in their hearts, to see themselves as Father sees them, and to be completely content in Him and not dependent on a guy or anyone else to make them fill whole or "happy".  All 5 girls are single except one of them.  You remember being a teenager?  Some teenagers can be so devastated when this day rolls around and they are single, without love, and they absolutely hate dislike the day.  You see, that is just unnecessary.  Jesus is the most incredible LOVE of all time.  In that alone, we can REJOICE and be convinced we have the best lover of all times in HIM! 

I made reservations at Lynn's Place in town for 6 and the evening was so incredibly fun.  I am quite sure we may have disturbed some of the romantic dates that were happening in that place with our outbursts of laughter and silly jokes. 

Party of 6 Reservations at 6:15!



Our table!



My Loves - Autumn, Jaycee, Lindy, Anna & Kaitlyn

I heart them to pieces!

Dessert - a girl's best friend!

...AND WE HAD LOTS OF IT!

Enjoying every mouth full!

NEVER a dull moment with these two!!! :)

journals & love notes :)

CRAZINESS!

...and MORE craziness!!!
Check out Kaitlyn's EYES!

See, they are very special :)

Please look at the girl in the background on the right :)

The Lord lavished His grace on me by allowing me to be able to spend Valentine's Day with 5 of His precious daughters! I pray so much for them and I pray their view of LOVE, a boyfriend, a husband, and marriage will be based upon God's Word and not what the world is trying to convince them of.




I did get to see my sweet husband for a minute!



Thank you Father for Your Love & for Your Son Jesus!

L-O-V-E

Yes, it may be Valentine's Day and yes, LOVE is being advertised all over the world and yes, I do LOVE my husband but one thing comes to mind when I hear the word L-O-V-E.

Let me tell you what does NOT come to mind.  It's not red hearts, special cards, romance, chocolate candy, and hot dates.  The world's concept of love is temporal, it's conditional. 

Let me tell you what does come to mind...

GOD IS LOVE.

GOD IS LOVE.

GOD IS LOVE.
(1 John 4:8 says it)

We love because HE FIRST LOVED US.  1 John 4:19
While romantic love has so many delusions, there is no delusion about God’s love.

During my time with Father this morning studying 1 John, I could not stop dwelling on the fact that outside of Him, it is impossible to love.  He is love.  He defines love.  He demonstrated that love through His Son Jesus.  Only through Him do we have the ability to love.

There is nothing you can do to make God love you more! There is nothing you can do to make God love you less! His love is unconditional and impartial.


There is no greater love.



The more I love God and abide in that love, the more I am able to love my husband and others.  I can only love others as much as I love God.  Is that not fascinating?

Whether you are single, divorced, married, a widow, etc - we have a reason to celebrate every single day of the year!  Absolutely noone can love you the way Father loves you!

Have you responded to His love?  How are you doing loving others?

Things I am lovin'

I love living in an awareness of constant blessings and the little things that I am just lovin' in the middle of an ordinary week...

• Ghirardelli Milk & Caramel Chocolate Squares

• These sweet faces

• Nahunta Pork Center Sausage (thank you Mandy & Brandon)

• A FIREPLACE in the winter!

• A husband who LOVES to go out and cut wood to keep our house cozy & warm.

• HOMEMADE biscuits made by Rance (thank you Aunt Shirley for teaching him)!

• Sweet time with Father studying Christ deep deep love for His Bride, the Church

What are you lovin' in the midst of your week?

Recap of last SONday

It has been one crazy week..............
 
...more on that later though!
 
All our snow has officially melted and we are all wondering what type of weather will be coming our way next!  This winter has been extremely interesting to say the least.  I am grateful we are not getting 3 feet of snow like they are up north right now.
 
I was perfectly content with the few inches we got from Friday to SONday last weekend. Speaking of SONday, Rance and I were surprised to wake up to more snow falling. 
 
SONday morning looked like this in the Shuler household...

We headed outside first thing...

 

 



And the snowball throwing began...
...straight at me and the camera!



And another...
(yes Rance is in SHORTS)

 

He was too excited to put on PANTS!

 

alllllllllllll WHITE!



Feeding the birds!

 

...because this is IMPORTANT even if it is 17 degrees outside!

 

We were SOOO thankful that church was not canceled for anyone that was willing and able to venture out in the SNOW.  OF COURSE, we were up for the adventure crossing over the mountain!  There were only a few of us that made it but we enjoyed every minute of our time in the Word & fellowship together.  Snow boots & all :)

 

And that was our SONday!

 

 

*FAITH*

Sometimes I can feel overwhelmed by all God is teaching me and showing me and revealing to me about Himself and MYSELF (ouch!).  What is Faith to you?  Is having complete trust & confidence in God easy or hard for you? 

Father is showing me that the beauty of walking by Faith is not having all the answers, not understanding at the time, stepping out into the unknown and completely trusting in His character & His calling every single step of the way when absolutely NOTHING makes sense.  Moving to Robbinsville and trusting Rance's calling to be here was a really huge time period in my life where the Lord tested my trust & confidence in Him.  I remember not understanding and even questioning why Robbinsville?  There was even a time I doubted Rance's calling because I was stuck on myself having to leave all.  It did not seem fair.  My flesh was at WAR with the Spirit living inside of me.  It was an extremely hard test but God knew there were many things that Jennifer needed to DIE to, let go of, and surrender to Him.  I thank God for that test.  I thank God for His Spirit and a loving husband that helped me recognize my selfishness.  I thank God for relentlessly pursuing my heart because He knew moving me here was what was spiritually best for me even though I did not understand.  I would have never realized some of the things I held onto until He moved me across the state.  It hurt but I felt more freedom than I can begin to explain when I let it all go (family, friends, and the list goes on) and stepped out on Faith, trusting Father's will, even when I could not make sense of it.  Father does not have to give me an explanation and His reasoning behind things.  HE IS GOD!  He can do what He wants, whenever He wants, however He wants!  He just says "TRUST ME, I KNOW WHAT IS BEST FOR YOU!"

"You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you,
because he trusts in you.
Trust in the Lord forever,
for the Lord God is an everlasting rock."  Isaiah 26:3-4

Who wouldn't desire this 'perfect peace'?!? 

Hello February!!!

...Thank you for starting your first day of the month with SNOW! :) 

We have THOROUGHLY enjoyed the first 3 days of February with no rain, no ice, just beautiful, fluffy SNOW!  School was closed on Friday so Rance spent most of the day outdoors with a chain saw - getting us LOTS of wood to use in our wood stove in our basement which helps with heating our house. 

Man of the House!

I love how excited he gets over wood!

Making sure we stay warm!

On Saturday - there was a Men's event in our county for anyone interested - studying the role God has called men to - what that looks like - and what the Bible specifically says about it!  I pray so much that men desire to be who God has called them to be and that they STEP UP and lead their households in the ways of the Lord.  How beautiful would it be to see men fulfilling their role as a leader of the home?!  Can you imagine how different the home may look?  I pray for not just the men in our county but all across the world.

Kelly and I decided to venture out Saturday on a little shopping excursion since both of our husbands were attending this men's event!  The roads were clear when we left and to our knowledge - the snow was not supposed to start back until 3 or 4 on Saturday afternoon and we knew we would be back before that happened so we headed to Waynesville about 10 Saturday morning.  Our last stop was Walmart!  We noticed the craziness and LARGE crowds in Walmart after 15 minutes or so of being in there only to realize - it was SNOWING LIKE CRAZY OUTSIDE and it was only 12:30.  You have never seen two girls and a baby scurry around Walmart so fast grabbing the last items on our list - on a mission to get OUT and on the road before it got worse. 

Minutes later, we were checking out, in the car,  prayed up and headed home towards Robbinsville.  The roads were already covered in snow and we knew we were in for a LONG drive home going only 20 mph.  I must say - Kelly did an amazing job driving.  She is from Michigan so she has had plenty of practice driving on bad roads in the snow before she moved to Robbinsville and married Luke.  We were on her car - so no 4WD - but her car was a beast in the snow!  To say this drive home was an adventure was an understatement.  We passed several wrecks and one that happened right in front of us where a car braked going down the mountain and did a complete 360 in front of us and the truck following too closely behind then hit the car.  We were the next car but thankfully we were NOT following anyone closely and were able to gracefully stop without using our brakes.  Again, Kelly did a great job handling her car through this.  Pretty soon after that - we saw a 9 car pile up.  I'm not sure WHY people choose to follow each other so closely in the snow but they do needless to say. 

This was only the beginning of the snow as we left Waynesville...

Thankfully 2 hours later - we made it home from Waynesville SAFELY and Lily slept in the backseat the entire drive.  Oh the JOY of being a baby and not a worry or care in the world.  

Look at that sweet face!!!

Best lil shopper!

She is SO much fun!

And she loves to share her crackers too!!

Home safe & sound thank you Jesus!

Kelly asked - "Lily, how much does mommy love you???"
Notice Lily spreading her arms WIDE OPEN!
She KNOWS how much her mommy loves her!



“Though your sins are like scarlet, They shall be as white as snow; Though they are red like crimson, They shall be as wool." Isaiah 1:18



Bye Kelly, Luke & Lily!

Breakfast for dinner Saturday night!!!

February, what else do you have in store???