He infiltrated my 'to-do' list...

I have much to say at the moment and yet my brain is not helping me make coherent thought.

Yesterday was Tuesday which means I was supposed to be writing about God-sized dreams.  Our assignment was to spend some time with God, listening for His voice in regards to our dreams.  I am not opposed to quiet times or listening to God our writing about it but I have to admit that the assignment felt like a heavy weight when I first read it.  It felt like a 'have-to'...and I am so weary right now.

This has been an arduous week. (you do NOT have to read all of this...)

Wednesday morning:  beloved Auntie goes to be with Jesus, the world is not so bright without her

Wednesday evening:  sister-in-law and I travel through ridiculously ugly roads to get to a conference

Thursday: sit in conference learning why my RAD son is the way he is

Thursday afternoon:  run to the mall to help my husband wrangle kids while one of them is at the eye specialist, decide to keep the two girls because yet another 'spring' storm is making it's way through the province and my wise husband doesn't think I'll make it back to use the symphony tickets we bought for the girls for their birthdays Saturday night

Friday: keep girls busy while still attending the conference

Saturday: pleasant day hanging out with old friends and attending the Disney symphony with my girls - a wonderful oasis in the storm but NOT at home with my grieving family

Sunday: my family makes an extra drive of about four hours to get me from the city so we can go to join the rest of the family for the viewing, funeral, etc.

Sunday afternoon and evening: viewing, crying, hugging and another night away from home

Monday: graveside service, funeral, more crying, hugging and travelling back home

Tuesday morning: lead Bible study I am totally unprepared for (thanks to my gracious friends, that was all good)

Tuesday afternoon : our dog goes missing

Wednesday morning:  our daughter has another episode of racing heart and shortness of breath...

By the time I got home on Monday night I was emotionally, physically and mentally exhausted.  However, on Tuesday afternoon I sat down to read for a little while because I have a book I need to review and I needed to rest. I figured I could cross both things off my to-do list at the same time, very efficient of me, yes?

In the midst of the pages of this story God so graciously spoke to me of dreaming and not settling for something less.  He spoke to me of understanding where I am so that I can know where I am going.  He spoke to me through a story that my dream IS important, that I shouldn't settle for anything less than what He has dreamed for me, even if it might take work and I might not see results for awhile, and it may be in the midst of difficulty, all these things make me more of me.  These storms will help to shape and define and bring greater clarity into the dreaming.

Dreaming is important enough to Him to include it in the pages of a novel that I need to review to remind me that He was thinking of me, even though I wasn't thinking about Him. He knows that I learn better through stories, that I can hardly wade through a 'teaching' book. Reading that novel was on my to-do list and He wasn't, but He got in there anyway and I am in awe of His care for me...

This post is written as part of a community of God-sized Dreamers.  We hang out with Holley Gerth and link up on Tuesdays for encouragement and engaging the community in dreaming big!

ps.  I'll post a review of the book later this week!  It's called, The Gate.

Living a God-sized Life

You’re reading a God–Sized Dreams post. Each Tuesday, a team of God-sized dreamers writes on the progress of their dreams, spurred by the wisdom in Holley Gerth’s new book, You’re Made for a God-Sized Dream: Opening the Door to All God Has for You. This week’s question is: What’s a typical day in your life like right now? How can you see God’s hand in the middle of the “small” and ordinary too? (I borrowed this blurb from Mandy, cause it looked good and she's so smart! - go read her blog over here!)

The way my day looks and way I want it to look are vastly different.

What I want is idyllic and perfect.  Rising from my fragrant bed to happy children kissing their mother.  Delightful smells emitting from the kitchen by some miracle before I have awakened.  My husband would lead us in a rich, insightful time of scripture and prayer.

We would then gather around the table for learning together.  The dishes and laundry and cleaning and finances would all be taken care of in due time, nothing late, no debt and I would always look put together and well rested.

We would sit down to candle-lit meals prepared and beautifully presented with zero mess in the kitchen.  All would gladly bless their mother for her amazing talents in the kitchen.  After volunteering to do the dishes and tidy the kitchen the children would go off to practice instruments, study the stars and read Chaucer whilst my gentleman and I would entertain those who need our counsel and prayer.

**SCREECH**

(or some other awful sound to bring you back to reality )

More often than not the younger kiddos are all awake and reeking havoc in the kitchen while the teen-agers are fastidious in their need of a pillow.  Breakfast is most likely toast and cereal.  We do try to read the Bible and pray together every morning but often that time is punctuated with correction and direction to someone who is doing something that is less than idyllic.

Four of our kids go to the local public school and two of them study at home.  These two are mostly independent in their learning so my job is to be the whip-cracker and make sure they are getting their assignments in, there is not so much direct impartation of knowledge as there was when they were young, I miss that and am glad at the same time that it doesn't take up so much of the day, leaving it open for my dreamy pursuits.

My dreamy pursuits look a lot like trying to find the floor of the laundry room, cook something edible and find the piece of paper that my husband needs to go to the accountant.

Somewhere in the course of my day my heart longs to create.

To put words out there that might encourage someone.

To take fabric and thread and delight someone's senses.

To meld paper and glue and bits and pieces and encourage someone with a card or get down the memories that make our family what it is.

Some days I get to do those things.  I dream of being gracefully disciplined so I can do those things.  My purpose, my destination is to share with others what I have been given, whether that's in words, or fabric or paper, on a screen or in person.  Today I am going to go lead a Bible study that is probably more for my benefit than those of the participants because I so desperately need to learn these truths myself.

I am learning to make shorter 'To Do' lists and give myself grace for the day.  I am trying to impart that grace to my children and at the same time motivate them to reach high and believe they can do it.  Today I will probably get frustrated that they aren't moving in the direction they are supposed to (already did *sigh*), I might even yell at them.  I will do laundry and cook something.

And I will keep on dreaming and living this life that is a dream come true.  I am surrounded by the love of an amazing man, I have six beautiful children that love me (most days!).  I live in the country where I am surrounded by fresh air and an abundance of life, even though it is still covered by thick snow.

This is my God-sized life and I am blessed to live in it every day.  It may not be idyllic or perfect or even enviable, but it is mine and if I'm really honest, I love it.  Sure I would like to tweek it, take out some debt, put in some more downtime...but we're on a journey to that place and I don't want to miss a thing!

I am just one of many God-sized dreamers, please come on over to Holley's site and be encouraged by reading a few of my sister's 'day-in-the-life' accounts!

Letter to My Fellow Dreamers

Dear Fellow Dreamers,

That means you.  You are a dreamer even though you might not call yourself that right now.  Perhaps you're too scared to dream because you've been hurt and discouraged and your hope has been disappointed one too many times. Or maybe you think your dream is crazy or silly or you're scared someone else will think that for you.

I know how that feels, I can't take time today to tell you all the times my hope has been disappointed but I hope you'll trust me on this one...I really do know, but I've decided to start dreaming again.

I'm ashamed to say that I'm more of a glass half-empty kind of girl but it's the truth.  If I hadn't signed on to this team of dreamers I don't think I would have written down my current dreams.  I certainly wouldn't have posted them for the world to see.  And I wouldn't have been able to look back and see that there is progress being made, I'm stepping closer to the fulfillment of those dreams...I would not have been able to see it.

But I can, because I chose to be brave and look.

You can, too.

Please be brave with me.  Your God-sized dream doesn't have to look like mine or anyone else's.  Your God-sized dream is just the right size for you.  It's called God-sized because He sized it.  He made that dream and placed it in your heart.

But what to do with that disappointment over the last time you thought you had a dream and it didn't pan out the way you thought?

Take it to the Maker of Dreams, ask Him to heal that dream and re-shape it.

It might not look like what you expected.  His dream for you is not what our flesh dictates but what His desire crafts.

Dare to dream.

Be brave.

Today I am stepping out into one of the dreams on my list.  Perhaps the silliest and least 'spiritual' of all of them.  We leave today on a two week holiday to celebrate 20 years of a wonderful friendship that caught on fire and is still blazing.

The blog may be quiet, or it may be filled with delightful pictures of what we're experiencing because I would love to take you all along with us somehow.

Dream sweet friends.  Dream big.  

We have a really. Big. God.

Won't you leave a comment and tell me how you're being brave today?

Head over to Holley;'s (our Dream Team coach) and read other letters from amazing women who are part of the team. (psst you can enter to win a Dream Bag!! :)

Sometime in the next two weeks I'm going to post a review of Holley's new book, You Were Made for a God-sized Dream, it will contain a give-away for the book, so check back or sign up in the sidebar to get posts delivered right to your inbox in the Subscribe button. You can get her book on any of your favourite bookseller sites, it's so worth it...go grab a copy!

And now, I need to repack my suitcase one more time, because there isn't enough room for Katharine to come along anymore!  I need to make room for whatever God has in store for us...but that's another post.

Blessings abundant and grace for the day,

I am off to the Carribbean!!

Inspiration from the Past - George and Gladys, 2 of my Heroes!

Who inspires you? What stories do you gravitate towards when you need a lift?  Quite possibly you are inspired by those stories because there is something of your dream in those who have already reached the place you long to be.

I am always inspired by stories of great faith.  People like George Mueller and Gladys Aylward inspire me to go after God, to ask the seemingly impossible things.

There was no breakfast for the children and yet Mr. Mueller had the children gather around the empty table and thanked God for food that wasn't there.  A knock sounded on the door.  The baker had been prompted by God to get up early and bake bread for the children, did they need bread?  Another knock at the door.  The milk wagon's wheel was broken and the milk would be spoiled before they could fix it, could the children please drink the milk?  I so love hearing of God's faithfulness.

If you're unfamiliar with Mr. Mueller there are many books published that describe his life and works. (Christianbook.com has several versions of his biography).  In a nutshell, this man had a heart for the poor.  He saw their need and went with God to try and meet it.  He established orphanages and prayed in the resources, never announcing what was needed.  There are countless stories of his faith and the answers that came.


How could they get the gospel message into the remote villages?  There didn't seem to be a way.  One day they had an elite visitor to the inn.  Could Ms. Aylward become the foot inspector to the remote villages?  The practice of foot-binding had been outlawed and they needed someone to travel and make sure that the gov't orders were being followed.  Ms. Aylward proclaimed that she would share the gospel of Christ as she went.  That didn't matter to their visitor, all he wanted was a foot-inspector.  That job paid the bills and allowed her to share the good news throughout the remote regions of China.

My kids love this version of her story.

Ms. Aylward is a similar type of character.  She was told she was unfit for missionary service, but her indomitable spirit pushed her forward.  She managed to take a rather large herd of children through the mountains in China and get them to safety, putting her own health in peril.  She, too, had faith to believe that God was more than able to supply what they needed and He did.


When I look at how these people put their faith into action, believing God for the impossible, it encourages me to do the same.  The dreams I have for our family and the ministry we long for with them seems impossible to me.  Yet our God says that with Him, nothing is impossible.  We have already seen answers to prayer that looked impossible from the a human perspective.

Sometimes we get discouraged by the mountains that are in front of us.  We have to move around roadblocks, climb over obstacles and find new pathways to the goal.  However, God says to look at the mountain and not be dismayed.  He made that mountain and He can move it if need be.

Be encouraged today friend.  If that dream you have is put there by the almighty God, know that the resources you need to accomplish it are on their way.  The current circumstance may seem bleak and unfavourable but know that the God of heaven has heard your prayer and is on His way to answer it.


Come on over to Holley Gerth's site see what inspires God-Sized Dreamers to go forward in their dreams.

Fear and Pride

"There's nothing but fear and pride stopping you!"

I have a friend who used to say that to me all the time.  We are on a year long team together which was full of things to be fearful of, for me anyway.  I was (and still am to a lesser degree...I hope) an insecure, introverted, people-pleasing good girl who was heading out on a year long trip with a bunch of strangers.  We were going to be sharing God's good news through music, drama and puppets for a whole year.  We traveled across our country, down into the states and over to Indonesia and Australia.  There was plenty to be scared of.

What if that cute guy on our team started liking me?  What if he didn't?  What if I really screwed something up?  What if I got sick?  What if our plane crashed?  What if I'm not all that great at meeting new people constantly?

Image by J. Astra Brinkmann

I was one scared little girl.  But this was a dream I had been after for awhile.  I wanted to share the gospel.  I wanted to be part of a performing arts team and here I was at LAX phoning home telling my mom that it might just be better if they came and picked me up.  Of course that wasn't possible because L.A. and Saskatchewan are a long ways apart.  Then something happened.

Remember that cute guy?  Well, he didn't like me, he was dating another girl on the team, but he became my champion.  He got on the phone with my mom and reassured her that he would walk me through this and that she had nothing to worry about.  Then he took me in hand and marched my hyperventilating self onto the plane.

The seven of us lived together for a year, learning how to deal with conflict, learning who had what was needed in the moment.  Learning how to use our gifts and talents to encourage and challenge the people that we met. And we learned how to overcome fear and pride and do what God had sent us there to do.

Fear and pride.  Two enemies of our souls that keep us from doing the thing that is needed to walk into our dream.  I still battle those two enemies and sometimes, unfortunately, they win.  Some days I 'forget' to make that phone call.  Some days I hide behind some imagined need that my kids may have so I don't have to take my introverted self out there again.  Some days my pride won't allow me to put myself out there one more time because fear is screaming at me how stupid I would be to try.

But on other days, God sends along an encourager,  some one who will take you in hand and say, "You can do this thing.  Just one more step and you'll be there. I will walk with you."  Jesus didn't send his disciples out on there own, he sent them in groups.  In Ecclesiastes it says that two are better than one.  Apparently we need each other!

If fear is causing you to shut the door to your dream you may need to swallow that pride of yours and ask someone to help you.  You may just need a partner, someone to shoulder the load and help hold up your hands when you are having a hard time believing anymore.  God told us that we need one another for a reason, because we do.

Perhaps you are the one in a sweet spot where dreams are bursting with reality all around you, then look for that one who is struggling and sitting with the dark cloud, the one who needs you to say, "I've been there before, let me give you a hand."

Don't let fear and pride stop you from reaching for the dream.

  It may seem hard to believe but someone, somewhere needs you to realize that dream, 

because their dream is depending on yours to succeed. 

{put that in your pipe and smoke it!}

May I just give a shout out to my peeps who help me keep dreaming!  You ladies rock my world - and I think ya know who you are... you are amazing.  Why not share below someone who has helped you overcome your fear and/or pride to help you walk into your dream, I'd love to hear about it.

I am linked up with others from the God-sized dream team over here:  CLICK LINK

Crossing off #14

I'm a dreamer and I often set super unrealistic goals for myself.  

I am also a perfectionist whose worth is far too often tied up in what I can do and how well I can do it.

I am a 'good girl' who doesn't want anyone catching her making mistakes/being weak/screwing up.

But this year, I am trying something new.  It's called grace.

This year I am trying to allow myself some breathing room.

In her book, The Do What You Can Plan, Holley Gerth encourages us to set a goal that is short term...a small goal, and then cut it in half.

Last week our assignment was:
Do one thing to move forward in your God-sized dream. You get extra credit if it’s simple, small and takes just a few minutes.

If you've read my God-sized dream you may recall that there isn't a single item on that list of dreams that isn't HUGE!!  {I wrote it before she started giving us assignments}

One goal I didn't write down was my desire to finish unfinished projects before I get going on new ones.  There isn't a huge list, but it's daunting enough.  My husband threw out a challenge.  We've been talking for the last year about celebrating our 20th anniversary (#14 on The List).  We decided on a cruise.  He told me that if I could get our accounting caught up on our farm books we would book one.

That was a challenge I couldn't pass up.  So I rolled up my sleeves and got to work girlfriends...a cruise was calling my name.  I petered out for a few days and then pulled up those bootstraps and kept going...I got to the end of September and realized that all I had left to do was file that GST report and in the government's eyes...we were caught up.

So on Tuesday last week, when Holley gave that assignment, guess what small thing we did?  We filed that report and booked ourselves on a cruise people!!!  It only took  a few minutes for that report to get filed even though hours of work had gone into getting to that point.  I still have a bit more to do to get to year end and I just got the paperwork I need to get there today.

Not only that, but my diligence and discipline in that matter spurred my husband on to start the ball rolling on another two of the dreams on that list!  One domino goes down and more have to follow.

That wee bit of success is heady stuff.  I know there will be kinks in the road.  There will be roadblocks and fatigue.  However, I am beginning to believe that just maybe these dreams aren't just ours, they belong to God and we are his and I am going to keep moving forward.

This is the ship we're going on  ms Maasdam

A God-Sized Dream

Several weeks ago I got an e-mail inviting me to apply to a 'God-Sized Dream Team' with Holley Gerth.  I like Holley Gerth and a dream has been brewing and taking shape in my head so I applied.  However, because the dream was kind of vague all I put on my application was that I wanted to write a book.

Holley Gerth and the Dream Team

I didn't really think much more of it and life went on.  Then I got accepted to the team and I started reading what other people were thinking and saying and the dream in my head started to get a little less vague and a lot more crazy sounding.  I'm going to lay the whole thing out here for you so that I have something to look back on and if you are directed to, pray into it with us won't you?

My God-Sized Dream

(which is really, REALLY huge)

Note:  alot of this involves my husband and his dreams, cause we kinda go together and have been dreaming for 20 years now

1.  We want to be debt-free.  And we're farmers!!!  That in itself should be big enough.  Most of the farmers we know (including us) live mostly in our credit lines.  The cheques coming in look big, but the cheques going out are even bigger most of the time.  A repair on those machines has the potential to cost more than a small car.  Add to that the reality of living well below the poverty line while we were students.  Yup, we are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay down the hole.  BUT we believe that God is bigger than that.

2.  Our heart's desire is to be able to travel around encouraging people with the gifts God has given us.  We have written songs, we are both musicians and our kids are coming along nicely on that front, too.  We believe there is a message that God has given us to speak, even though we're not exactly sure what it is yet and we're obviously not ready for it, #1 being a big factor.  And my husband...well, the man can sing...his voice is a gift from God and needs to shared with the rest of the world. (like CDs and stuff)

3.  We would love to adopt internationally (Asia, India and South America are on our hearts).  Yes, we do have six kids already.  However, we have dreamed of having an international family within our walls for 20 years now.  We see that doing so has the potential to be a prophetic statement of how God sees us, no matter the color of our skin or where we come from.  We have one adopted son who is partly First Nations and 2 delightful German girls that we call our own even though they no longer live with us.  Again, #1 puts a bit of a damper on this.

4.  We would like to see our adopted son freed from the things that hold him back and have a whole, trust-filled relationship with him.  He has a long list of issues that I will not get into at this time, I could write a book about that and I probably will, but we're not quite there yet.  When he's free and willing, maybe we'll do it together.

5.  We would love to home-school all of our children so that we can do #2.  This would take a huge amount of healing in our family before it could happen.

6.  We would love to be able to encourage other parents in situations like ours.  There is very little support for families in situations where they are trying to love/manage very damaged emotions/hearts.  There is very little understanding in the public sphere for what we go through every day.  I would like to get a lot more education on this particular topic and be able to advise, counsel and comfort others who need to know that there is a way out...we haven't found it yet but we believe there is one!

7.  I love to teach and write.  I have no fear of speaking in public.  I love women's ministry and would like to combine those things.

8.  I want to write books and have them published.  I write this blog and the odd book review right now.  I have written plays, songs, poems, short stories, curriculum, articles and have about five book ideas swimming in my head, most of them started in some form.  I dearly, dearly want to see my name on the cover of a book!!

9.  I am a very creative person and would love to create something that people would like to purchase.  I've made lots of things and some of them have sold, but most of the time I feel like what I make isn't good enough for anyone to want it.  I am a pathetic marketer!!  Recently God has given me designs for two different items and I would like to see if I could make a pattern for other people to make them!

10. I'd love to own my own little store where we could sell our honey, organic products and my crafted items.  I'd love it to be a little tea shop where we serve soup and bread and people can come and enjoy a welcome spot.  I'd like it to have a crafty area where people can do something creative while they enjoy a cup of tea.  (I love a good cup of tea!!)

11.  I dream of getting my WordPress site up and running.  I bought the basics, but I am technology stupid!! I dream of having a beautiful site for all of you to come to that would fill up your spirit and encourage you on your way...

12. And then there's our house.  We dream of turning our garage into a family room with a corner for crazy gymnastics kid, a place for my dancers to practice, an area for learning to happen and an expanded entry (if you've ever been to our house you know that the entry is a necessity)!  THEN, we want to add a new garage that fits our over-sized van with living space over top of that (to accommodate our expanded family).  This would also include taking out a wall in our kitchen and opening up the existing living space so that when we have lots of people over (which is mostly the youth group...which happens fairly often since we're the youth pastors) the flow of conversation and living works better.  Again, #1 makes this difficult to even dream about, but at least we'd like to get all the holes in the walls repaired.

13. We want our farm to be self-sustaining.  Meaning that we would like to get our power and heat sources off grid, be able to feed ourselves and others off what we produce and make a smaller impact on our natural resources.

and last on my list (for now)

14.  My husband and I would love to take a trip together, maybe a cruise, where we could just relax and not worry about a thing...

So there you have it...kinda crazy isn't it?  It's kinda of overwhelming to actually spell it all out like that...that's what my God-sized dream looks like.  Phew, feels good to get it all out there...hold it gently please.