The Journey

Every day it seems like there is a new decision to make, a new direction that can be taken. Whether it's with who I spend time with, where I work, what career I choose, or whether to sleep in or go to the gym, my decisions everyday are shaping who I am.
It makes me think of Derek in Zoolander when he's looking in the puddle and asks himself..who am I?
Am I going to be the girl who works out all the time? Am I going to be the girl that reads and has alot of depth and knowledge? Am I going to be the girl who lives life vicariously or the girl who sits behind a desk too complacent to chase her real dreams. Am I going to live life through faith that I serve a God bigger than myself or will I shrink back in fear. Am I going to live in my comfort zone or am I going to love and give enough so that I have abandoned my comfort zone and am completely trusting in God to fill me up.
I'm sure it feels like this alot through life but I'm finding that life after college is full of pivotal decisions. Once I take a step in one direction, the road never fails to come to another fork. Really God? Another one?
Last night though I had a revelation. Life is an adventure, I'm so blessed to have options and even more blessed to have a God that loves me, amazing friends and a supportive family. Regardless of which choice I make in life I know God can use me wherever I am. I am called to love him and love others wherever I end up. If I'm walking with God every single day wherever I end up I will be with him and that's all that matters~

Not Just Another Day

what an absolutely beautiful day. the crisp morning air sends shivers down my arms while the sunshine warms my face. soft music welcomes the day as i sit comfortably in my "captains" chair at work, sipping on the enormous glass of water I'm bound to tackle. the echo of high heels on hardwood floors from next door rythmically drums the pace of the day. today is not just a Wednesday. it's not just another day that will be lost in the monotony of thousands of other days in my life. God did not create today just to be a "space filler" in the scheme of our lives. Today we are meant to love, to serve, to laugh, to fully trust that God has everything under control so we can live with a heart at rest. When we seek satisfaction or approval it is easy to become frustrated, hurt and..well, unsatisfied.We are not meant to be satisfied by anyone other than God and I forget this so often. But thank goodness his mercy is new every morning.
The soothing sound of the dove cooing outside of my office reminds me of the dove that showed up on Noah's boat holding the branch from the tree..giving hope of a new start. we can let go of all of the regrets and hurt from the past and grasp on to the new start that Christ offers. too often i hold on to the past out of fear of reaching out to christ and the unknown. today though i choose to willingly let go and to trust. to live by faith instead of fear and bask in the sunshine of his joy and grace.
today will be a great day

Taking the Risk

There’s something thrilling about taking risks. Now I am not talking about snowboarding off cliffs into oblivion… which would definitely be thrilling, slash lethal, but I’m talking about leaps of faith. Remember when you were little and your dad would tell you to jump into the pool? There was something about the exhilaration of running and soaring off the hot pavement splashing into his strong arms that gets ya. I think it’s knowing that you’re doing something you can’t do on your own, yet you can do it anyways knowing you’re safe.
I was thinking how that’s how life is. God’s waiting up ahead of us with his arms wide open encouraging us to jump. We’re inadequate on our own, we can’t live or love how we are supposed to. This can either discourage us and weaken us or empower us. We can choose to be defeated or we can embrace God’s power he’s offering us through himself. On our own we can’t do it, but if we choose to take that leap of faith into his arms and let him take control we can change the world.
"Faith is a bird that feels dawn breaking and sings while it is still dark.”
Life may be dark right now, but choose to sing anyways knowing dawn is right around the corner. Faith not fear

Not Too Proud

i'm not too proud to admit that i'm not always strong..
its in my weakness that Christ can shine best through me

i'm not too proud to say that my heart still aches from past hurts..
but it's nights like these that push me towards Christ's loving arms to tell me it's okay

i'm not too proud to admit I do not have it all together..
my failures only remind me that I'm forgiven and unconditionally loved

i'm not too proud to say that I am broken and lost..
for i know the one who mends and has directions

thank God i am not going through this life alone, I have friends who care enough to talk me through things and remind me where my hope lies. My hope doesn't lie in people or circumstances, things that have happened or haven't happened... my hope lies in Jesus Christ who always keeps his promises and will never leave or forsake me. this is why my heart can rest- amb

Faith not Fear

Having the opportunity to ask a keynote speaker if he could time-warp back to his twenties and give himself some advice, I asked him what he would say. His simple answer was profound. “Live life by faith not by fear”.

I find myself at a crossroads. Graduating my BSU last May with a degree in Marketing, I decided to take the job offer my current employer offered me and begin the 9-5 work week. Working in finance has been interesting, learning about Roth IRAs and retirement planning. Berkeley, Inc has been a blessing and I have learned a great deal about this industry.

My heart has always been pulled toward ministry though and I jumped on the opportunity to become a leader for Student Venture at Mtn. View High School. Now my Monday nights are filled with teaching high school students about how to have a relationship with God, dodge ball and building trust with the students. Tuesday night I lead a college girl’s bible study at my house. This has been going on a year and a half and it has been incredible watching the girls grow and start to take on leadership roles in the group.

A couple times a week I’m meeting with college or high school girls hearing their stories and helping them grow towards God. There is a dire need for transparency, accountability, encouragement and discipleship for girls this age. Between relationships, self-image, career paths, friendships and family issues ladies between 15 and 25 need a Christian community to help guide them to making wise decisions and creating a foundation to be a Godly woman.

This is my heart. I love writing and preparing bible study material to help people understand God’s truths and how to tackle tough topics such as purity, the Holy Spirit, forgiveness and our identity. For example, the other day at study we were talking about having eternal perspective. I used summer camp as an analogy. Summer camp, like life is temporary. Why on earth would we knock ourselves out to be CEO of summer camp when we know we’re leaving in a couple of weeks? Why are we paving our lives to follow the “American dream” when we can’t take any of it with us? We need to be building up our treasures in heaven.

I believe we need to dream big. We need to seek after God’s heart and take steps of faith. We serve an absolutely incredible God who has dreams bigger for us than we can imagine. We need to put wind into each other’s sails to reach these dreams. Some of my dreams include writing a book and/or high school/college aged girl’s bible study material. I want to devote as much time as possible to discipling girls and preparing material to help them find truth and to bring them closer to God. I am not sure how exactly this is going to work, if I need to quit my job and try to raise support or if I will just write into the wee hours of the night, or finding another job! :) I'm willing to do whatever God wants me to do, I'm just praying about what exactly it is!

I am asking you for prayer; prayer for direction with my job and prayer for opportunities to share the gospel and to be Christ to others. Prayer to live my life out of faith and not out of fear. I hope that you are doing well and that you are chasing after God with all of your heart. He will change your life in amazing ways, trust Him.

In His Love,
Audrey

Isaiah 58:11
The LORD will guide you always;
he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
like a spring whose waters never fail.

Butterflies or Burritos

it all starts with that feeling in your stomach. some people refer to it as "butterflies", i think mine is closer to the "man, I'm craving a burrito" feeling, but food is my love language so i'm guessing it's the same thing.
then there is inevitably the movie date. PS when you are dating someone movie never means movie. Move is code for, "I want to hold your hand, or snuggle", if we're all honest, no one is really interested in the movie itself.
The first movie date is always marvelously awkward. You glance over...where is their hand? If it's just sitting there on their lap, open palm, that's a blatant green flag that it's missing something... YOUR hand. In it. If you play fight over the arm rest..that is always another green flag. hold my hand silly. now. not later, now.
We have skipped a critical step though. Before the hand holding is the "knee touch". This one is my favorite. It's the step when you sit close enough to eachother to...whooops, OH! our knees are touching! Weird, neither of us are moving. mmm. i like it.
New relationships are just plain fun.
From here on out though relationships get slightly more complicated, okay alot more complicated. Our nation is plagued with divorce. Marriage vows are broken left and right. So where do we go wrong? Now seeing that I am a 22 year old single girl I am not claiming to be a relationship expert. This is simply my two cents about some things that I do know.
Alot of people think love is a feeling. Wrong.. on so many different levels. That love-sick, hungry feeling in your stomach is a feeling, feelings are incredibly real but not something to be trusted.
Love is a commitment, not a feeling.
Say someone commits to train for a marathon. Maybe in the beginning they feel motivated and are out of their mind excited to train for this race. There is inevitably going to be a day, or weeks, where they do not feel like running. Running becomes zero fun, maybe even negative ten fun. But however rough it gets you are committed to running that marathon and you better dang well keep going. Download new running music for your ipod, find running buddies, get accountability, get new running shoes, but whatever the heck you do..KEEP RUNNING. It's the same way with love, and marriage.
Alot of people get into relationships because they feel they are missing something. The best relationships are the ones where our love for eachother exceeds our need for each other. We are created for relationship, but make sure that God is filling your needs first so that we are free to love others instead of demanding love from them.
So I realize i skipped alot of stages from "knee touching" to marriage, but this is a blog, not a novel :) I just want to encourage people to take their words and relationships seriously. Love is a commitment, not a feeling... For some more thoughts on love... from someone alot smarter than me!
1 Corinthians 13
Love is patient, love is kind, love doesn't envy or boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes and always perserves. Love never fails.

Silas Dee's Birth Story

With his sister's birth there was an obvious beginning to labor. Silas, on the other hand, had a mind of his own. Throughout the week before he was born, I kept getting Braxton Hix contractions. I'd break out my trusty ancient phone's timer, and then after I realized how sporadic they were, I'd shut it down and go on with my day.


At my midwife appointment at 40 weeks 1 day, I had a feeling she should check to see if I'd progressed at all. I knew I wasn't in active labor, but with all of the sets of long contractions, I thought to myself, "Surely SOMETHING must have happened?!". So she checked me. Man it's funny the things that just get normalized with birth, right? Anyways, I was dilated to a SIX, and 100% effaced. To those of you who have not birthed, these numbers probably don't mean a lot, but basically, this is not normal to be walking around that close to birthing a child. My mid-wife almost didn't want me to send me home, but since I wasn't in active labor off to home I went.

As the snowflakes slowly fell from the sky, I drove our Subaru the 40 minute drive back to Nampa. This appointment was around noon. Our bags were packed and we had our toddler-drop off plan in place. That evening around 6pm contractions started. Kristi, our mid-wife, had warned me that if I felt ANY hard contractions, at all, to head to the hospital.

Pain is such a relative thing. Well I wasn't THAT uncomfortable, I thought. The Brian Regan "Emergency Room" skit always flits through my mind during labor... "A nine?! That's like a broken femur..or a woman giving birth!! What about a woman giving birth WITH a broken femur?!" Anyways, I digress. Since I figured labor was obviously going somewhere at this point, it'd be smart to take Isla over to our friend's house. This way she could get tucked into bed in case baby boy was coming that night. The thought of being in hard labor and then waking up a toddler to cart across town just sounded dreadful right?!

When we got to our friend's house, the contractions definitely began to get harder. We had planned on pulling into the mall and doing some lap walking. So as we pulled into the mall in Boise, we got out of the car and as soon as we got into the brightly lit area, I realized walking was a no-go. "Sorry babe, back in the car, we need to get to the hospital".

As we checked into St. Luke's downtown at 9:15pm, we sat in triage. I sipped on some cranberry juice as they monitored my vitals and checked for progress. "Well, you are still a 6...and still 100% effaced". Great, I thought. It was about 9:35pm at this time. They checked us into our room and said to let us know when we go into "active" labor. I started second guessing if I'd made the right choice into even coming into the hospital.

So we put on the tennis shoes and both headed for the long set of cement stairs in the hospital. We are going to cardio this baby out! First of all, I am wildly out of shape, so laboring or not, the stairs were kicking my butt. Once the contractions were rough enough, I was scared of freaking out the poor by-standers in the hallway, so we headed back to home base.

A little back-story with our last birth. I gave birth laying on my back on the hospital bed. While this was all well & good and how they portray it in the movies, I wanted to do it different this time. My amazing mid-wife Kristi explained how the pelvis opens up a ton while you are squatting (think like 20%), so that sounded helpful right? So my birth plan going into this was... 1. Natural  2. Squatting  3. Using motion and sound during labor.

Let's talk about #3 for a moment. This terrified me. With Isla's birth I was like the silent birther. It felt safe, and I didn't want to freak anyone (including myself! out). This worked for the last time until the pushing part, I was all calm and collected until the real work began. Then I felt kind of panicky. So anyways, I'd chatted with Kristi and she recommended sounds like Oooos and Aaaaahs (vowel sounds) to open up the birth canal and relax me. Still freaked out by this, but completely trusting her method I decided to get over myself and try it. I also did lots of hula-swaying back and forth. So back to birth..

After the stair master method, we were back in our room and things got real...real fast. At 11:30pm contractions were so painful that after each one I kept looking at Matthew and saying things like... "WOW, that hurts so incredibly bad!" Then laughing with him. All while Oooooing like a lost, dying cow. "It's time to call Kristi," I told him. She had told me she lived close to the hospital and she could be there whenever I needed her. So within 10 minutes she arrived in the room.

She arrived, dimmed the lights, and quietly assessed everything and talked me through a contraction. As soon as that contraction ended she said, "Why don't you go to the bathroom and empty your bladder?" Not wasting a minute I headed into the bathroom and did as I was told. My brain was on auto-drive at that point and I would have done just about anything she suggested to get that baby out!!

So get this. As I stood up off the toilet a contraction started and I braced myself against Matthew. "He's coming!!!" I hollered. Then literally in one push, and in one split second, my water broke and Silas landed in Matthew and Kristi's hands. What. In. The. World. I leaned again the wall and just sat there in shock. You have got to be kidding me. This kid basically just arrived on a water-slide, landing in his daddy's arms.

As I held him and looked into his sweet little face, we just laughed. It was so unreal. It was so FAST! He was perfect. And he wailed, straight up yelling, announcing his arrival. 12:05am, only 20 minutes after our mid-wife arrived. He had the cutest little scowl lines, he was giving us the stink face already.

Looking back, all of it was just perfect. I'm so thankful for Kristi, for her encouragement and for helping me to look past my fears of the unknown in doing this birth completely different than the first time. I was empowered and felt so supported by her. Matthew was the absolute perfect teammate once again. He never left my side, and he oooo'd and breathed with me through each and every contraction. God's presence was so strong with us as well. He gave me the strength I needed to birth this little miracle and created him in the first place.

We are so blessed and are so thankful for this handsome, healthy little boy. Silas Dee we love you to the moon sweet boy. Welcome to our adventure, so glad you are here!