Reading from different passages today, a theme jumped out at me:  God as the center of my life, my thoughts, my desires.  As I continue to protect His place in my heart, my life becomes more and more wide, free, open, fulfilled.  Amazing words.  

When I read them, that stirring of God's Spirit that expands my heart and makes me aware of His presence, compelled me to take these verses as my "God~message" for today.  I love it when He speaks so clearly ~ gently confirming and assuring me of the lessons He is teaching...    

"If your first concern is to look after yourself, you'll never find yourself.  But if you forget about yourself and look to Me, you'll find both yourself and Me." Matthew 10:39 (msg)

"Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life.  Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God.  Anyone completely absorbed in self ignored God, ends up thinking more about self than God.  That person ignores who God is and what he is doing.  And God isn't pleased at being ignored.  But if God has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of Him.  Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won't know what we're talking about.  But for you who welcome Him, in whom He dwells ~ even though you still experience all the limitations of sin ~ you yourself experience life on God's terms.  It stands to reason, doesn't it, that if the alive~and~present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, He'll do the same thing in you that He did for Jesus, bringing you alive to Himself?  When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as He did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life.  With His Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!" Romans 8:8~11 (msg)

This assures me that as long as God is the center of my life, my dreams, and my desires, I can rest assured that I will find myself and Him!  My life will also be open, spacious, and free ~ and I will be alert for whatever God is going to do next!  In this regard, I'll never be left feeling shortchanged - instead, I won't be able to round up enough containers to hold everything that God will generously pour into my life through the Holy Spirit!

"We continue to shout our praise even when we're hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next.  In alert expectancy such as this, we're never left feeling shortchanged.  Quite the contrary - we can't round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit."  Romans 5:3~5 (msg)

For those of you who are way into music as well as social networking (i.e. Facebook, Xanga, Twitter, etc) here are a few sites I found this week that I made use of and thought were pretty cool and interesting.

http://www.playlist.com/  ~ This site is cool because it's versatile.  Some players will only work for MySpace or Facebook but this one works for a number of sites listed and also offers an option to get a code that will work on any other website you might have.  I've been keeping an eye out for a play list that would work for my Xanga profile - had tried a few - but hadn't been able to come across anything compatible.  Good news!  This one works.  I simply went to "edit my theme" and clicked on "create new module".  When the box popped up, I named it, added the code for the player and voila! it worked.  Since music means a lot to me, I was pretty excited!

http://blip.fm/all ~ This site I found through my new fav. site:  Twitter!!  yeah!    So cool, because you can create an account easily enough, then type a song into their search bar.  When you find the one you want, you can "blip" it - add it to your profile page along with your thoughts or comments.  In this way, you can be your own DJ, can add your friends so that they can listen to your music, and can attract other users who might like your selection.  However, the feature I really like, is that you can connect it to Twitter, so that when you "blip" a song, it automatically "tweets" it, along with your thoughts/comments.  Want to add a song but don't want to "tweet" it?  Simply put a "!" in front of your blip - and your blip stays on blip.fm without being "tweeted".  My blip.fm username is "b_girl" fyi!

Anyway, just wanted to share - for some of you who are social networking, Twitter, or music addicts! 

 Today, it has been 29 years since I was born.  Hmm.  Something to think about, especially when I'm only one year away from the big 3-0. 

Speaking of the big 3-0, I'm in a bit of denial about that.  The thought of 40 or even 50 doesn't bother me (at least, not now! lol) but for some reason I'm having a spot of trouble about 30.  I think it's because it's such a thresh-hold.  Once you're 30, you cease to be a "young adult".  You've crossed a line that, though invisible, is glaring and final.  I rather like the 20's...  I'm comfortable with them.  They provide more maturity than the teens and yet still maintain that life is streching out before you in a long, winding, exciting road. 

Oh, I know that the 30's can be just as great and I'm really sure they will be.  It's just the mental factor about crossing that line that I hope reaches some perspective in my mind before my next birthday!  :o) 

But 29.  It's a great birthday!  The last one I will experience in my 20's and just that alone is reason enough to celebrate.  I feel happy about my birthday this year, excited even, which I find refreshing.  For those of you who know me well, you know that the last few years have been a difficult journey of healing for me and there have been days and even months when joy and excitement have seemed unobtainable.  This anticipation and enjoyment make this year's event all the sweeter for me.  It truly is a happy birthday for me!  Yeah!! 

Tomorrow night, Rick and I are having our very favorite sitter, Tosha, over to watch the babies for a bit while we go out for a drink and (hopefully) a walk @ the Leamington Marina, weather permitting.  It will be refreshing to get out and have some "grown up" time and conversation!

And as for my gift this year.... well, besides Jesus, love, and family (which are the very best gifts one could ever wish for) it will be the best present I've gotten in a long time:  a new Blackberry Curve PINK in July.  I don't care one bit that I have to wait 3 months to get it - oh, it will be worth it!!  :o)  I'm so psyched about this - more than I have been about something in a while!!!  Yipee!! 

And finally, I'll end with a quote that makes so much sense and is an inspiration to me:

"For everything you have missed, you have gained something else; and for everything you gain, you lose something else.  It is about your outlook towards life.  You can either regret or rejoice."

Go ahead.  Go back and read it again...   So simple, yet so profound.  "You can either regret or rejoice."  I choose to rejoice!  29 years... 

"Thankyou, God, for all Your love, care, and fatherly guidance in my life.  You are the first reason that I can rejoice!"

I just wanted to share some pics of the kids getting their Easter baskets.  Pretty exciting stuff!  

This morning we headed out the door around 8am to help cook for our church's Easter breakfast.  Turns out, all the spots were filled with great workers, so we hung out and visited until 9am when the breakfast started.  Wonderful people thought to fry up some gluten-free pancakes, so R.J., Beth Anne, and I were able to eat something that we didn't have to bring!  Yeah!! 

Easter service was great, as always.  Amazing time of year... remembering and celebrating some very core reasons for our faith...

This afternoon, we took a drive near Lake St. Claire, on to the Detroit River/Riverside Drive in Windsor where we stopped @ McDonald's for some sundays!!  Mmm.  I think that's the only thing on MickeyD's menu that we can actually have, which doesn't break my heart. lol  After our yummy sundays we headed back to Riverside Drive to one of the many little play areas along that stretch and let the kids run loose for a bit.   They got lots of sun and fresh air.  It was beautiful - though a bit chilly.  *shivering*  Sunshine was fabulous.  Ahhhh.  Warm weather is coming...

You know, I signed up for Twitter today - and I gotta say, it's pretty darn cool.  The best thing about it, for me, is that not only can I link it to my Facebook status/account but I can also update it from my phone via text msg.  Alright!  That's pretty amazing for me - because my phone is pretty, well... featureless! lol  But I do have txt'ing! ;o)  So, if I'm out and about, I can tell my friends what I'm up to.  Pretty cool, if you ask me.

Gotta love technology, eh?