Play by Play of My Valentine’s Date

Friday Evening

5:00 p.m. I send humorous friend a Direct Message on Twitter. “I’m wearing old man socks under my sexy boots on our date tonight.”

5:30 p.m. Husband returns home and helps pile kids in car to take to church.

6:00 p.m. Drop girls off at church (where they are fed and entertained—a cool ministry our church offers once a month…we certainly appreciate it).

6:15 p.m. Arrive at fun Italian restaurant (two steps up from an Applebee’s. One step down from a place where you pay out the nose).

6:18 p.m. Kindly ask to be reseated. Families and crawling children every which direction. Craved a little more ambiance and shall we say privacy for our Valentine’s dinner.

6:20 p.m. Reseated and settled into conversation with my man.

6:40 p.m. Devouring my lobster ravioli. Discussing where we’d go on pretend vacation and real one. We come up with Greece and camping in the White Mountains respectively.

7:00 p.m. Still yapping away comfortably. Launch into topic of friendships. I name a few of my closest friends reminding my husband of one of my favorite introductions. I met one of my dearest local friends while our kids were trying not to drown during swimming lessons. Somehow we meandered into book talk (somehow, right? That’s funny! It’s my friendship litmus test). We both giggled like second graders when we discovered we share the same favorite book—Peace Like a River.

7:15 p.m. Realize I wore a shirt that clings to my tummy. Not the best idea when you know you plan to eat and eat well. Take only a few bites of the brownie my man ordered.

7:30 p.m. See we have plenty of time before we need to pick up kids. Contemplate places to go. My pomegranate martinis lead me to make the same suggestion I always make at the end of our dates. Where else but Barnes & Noble?

7:45 p.m. Arrive at Barnes & Noble. Feel like I’ve walked into a slice of heaven.

7:47 p.m. Spot Peace Like a River friend and her husband.

7:50 p.m. Walk the store with Peace Like a River friend discussing books, periodically checking on our husbands firmly planted in the historical section.

7:55 p.m. Make a beeline for the new Chris Bohjalian book. Discuss his other bestsellers, The Double Bind and Midwives with PLAR friend.

8:10 p.m. Laugh when we lock eyes with yet another couple from our church doing the B & N date night wrap up.

8:40 p.m. My man surprises me by buying a novel (he’s a smart man).

8:45 p.m. Say goodbye to friends and drive to collect children from church.

Here’s where the play by play stops. ;)

So now you see what communicates love to me, don’t you? Book talk. Book browsing. And books bought. Love is so in the air!

How about you—what communicates love to you?

*Blogger had some issues on Fri. Please vote for new Friday name if you didn’t already get a chance to.
*photo by flickr

Last One Question Friday

No need to panic. Keep reading...

Every Friday I’m going to ask a question. The questions I choose might be ambiguous on purpose. The goal is to have you answer the question according to your beliefs, where you’re at in life or a circumstance that might have recently impacted you. The only thing I ask is that you provide an explanation for why you answered the way you did.

It’s my hope to understand you better through this and also to gain a greater understanding of humanity and how people make decisions.

I’ve been thinking about a change. My One Question Fridays are calling for something fresh. But here’s my predicament…my voice comes through every single time I ask a question and I’ve been told numerous times not to stop the questions. Also blog traffic is still strong on these days.

So, I’m changing the name. Concept stays. Questions will stay. Heart behind why I do it (to get you thinking about something in a new light) will stay. But it’s time to call Fridays by another name and I need you to vote on it (and of course explain your answer)…

One Seed Fridays
One Spark Fridays
Moving Thought Fridays
Kinetic Fridays

*photos by flickr

Jennie Allen on The Call to Bleed

There are times I stumble across a blog and immediately know I’ve come across a remarkable person. This is how I found my guest today. I welcome Jennie Allen as she joins ~ thoughts that move ~ today with these powerful thoughts…

The Call to Bleed

Cut open. Spread out. Picked through. That's how I feel.

It sounds painful? You're right. It is.

I've always been transparent in my friendships and in my marriage....and then I started a blog, and then I wrote a book. It felt different... it felt out of my control.

I didn't know how else to be. So I did what I always did, I bled out in front of everyone... I cut myself apart and laid myself out, and then I pushed "Publish". But that little blue button did something to me, like the girl who did something stupid at a party and everyone took pictures of her and posted her on Youtube. I kept taking down posts feeling regret, but mostly I didn't want to live so exposed.

At the time of this inner war, I was reading Henri Nouwen. Nouwen was ahead of his time in the way of authenticity, a priest who wrote in the mid 90's. He wrote about his soul and sin and struggles, as if he were writing about what he ate for breakfast. I clung to this quote, not as encouragement, but as my calling,

“it is my growing conviction that my life belongs to others just as much as it belongs to myself, and that what is experienced as most unique often proves to be most solidly embedded in the common condition of being human.”

I had never considered that my life was not mine to own and to hide and wall up and protect. I am not my own. God bought me, and He is the one wanting to cut me up and spread me out and allow others to take what they need for their lives.

It is our call as writers.

We are to be the well. The place where readers come and find a piece of their own soul. The place where they come and see our sin and want to run from their own sin. The place where they come and find comfort in a friend that is worse off than they are. The place they see how to wrestle with the God of the universe. We expose our humanity so that they can see their humanity. As writers we are called to be the ones bleeding out for all to see.... no matter the cost... no matter the pain.

Our lives are not our own, so we write to give them away.

Write on. Bleed on.

You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20

Jennie Allen’s passion is to make God known through writing and teaching. She graduated from Dallas Theological Seminary with a Masters in Biblical Studies and serves in ministry beside her husband Zac, senior pastor at Austin Bible Church in Austin, Texas. They have three children—Conner 11, Kate 9, and Caroline 5—and are in the process of adopting their youngest son from Rwanda. Thomas Nelson will publish Jennie's first women’s Bible study titled Stuck: The Places We Get Stuck and the God Who Sets Us Free in the fall of 2011 and her first trade book in the spring of 2012.

You Write Like a Statue

I’m not slamming your writing. Really, I’m not. Instead, I’m playing with statues today. I want you to tell me which statue you write most like:

The David

You feel exposed when you write, vulnerable. Your words are on display for all the world to read. Much like David in the Bible, you pen your novel with passion and purpose. Your heart pounds within you as you pour your characters onto the page. Ideas wake you in the morning and tuck you into bed at night. You were made to write. This passion can be misunderstood and judged, but you answer to only One.

The Thinker

You take a long time to ponder your thoughts. No doubt you’re a plotter. A surefire way to know if you resemble The Thinker is by examining whether your WIP causes as much growth in you when you write it as it will for your readers when they devour it. You also hesitate to write from the gut and this frustrates you more often than you’d like to admit. Your novels are like birdbaths, places for your active creative thoughts to cool off and bathe.

Caesar Augustus

You rule over your manuscript, making sure every detail is accurate. Your author platform is imperative in spreading the word about your books. It’s clear after reading your work that you go about constructing stories that appeal more to the head than the heart. Calculated, business savvy and discerning are all words that would readily describe you. You are king of edits.

Lady Justice

You write like Lady Justice if there’s always a message in your work, a moral story. You appreciate instigating thought in your readers—probing them to come to moral conclusions. You long for your readers to evaluate your work as you do, objectively, weighing truth, fairness, justice, and mercy.

Iwo Jima Memorial

Writing is not only a battle for you, it’s a war. You have to put on armor as you sit to write, forging through the disparaging self-talk, abundance of adverbs and muddy indecipherable meaning of your WIP. But you’re determined, girded with resilience and belief in your calling. Critique partners, agents and editors may surround you to help you plant your manuscript where it needs to be. As you lift your head to see the symbol of your endurance, you are encouraged to fight on.

Discobolus (Discus thrower)

Writing is a sport for you. You’re in position to throw your work out there. You’ve put in the hours (perhaps years) training and now it’s time to let it go. You fling your words to the wind just to see how far they’ll fly.

So tell me, which statue describes you?

*photos by flickr

One Question Friday

Every Friday I’m going to ask a question. The questions I choose might be ambiguous on purpose. The goal is to have you answer the question according to your beliefs, where you’re at in life or a circumstance that might have recently impacted you. The only thing I ask is that you provide an explanation for why you answered the way you did.

It’s my hope to understand you better through this and also to gain a greater understanding of humanity and how people make decisions.

What’s not funny (that joke, TV show, biting remark, etc.)?

*photos by flickr

A Year with God: Daily Readings and Reflections on God’s Own Words

There’s nothing like being in the Word. In his devotional, R.P. Nettelhorst invites readers to reflect on Old Testament Scripture. I appreciate how A Year with God isn’t dated so I felt like I could pick it up at any point. Because the book is arranged by topics, such as loyalty and betrayal and companionship and isolation, I felt an added convenience to dive in at the reflection of my choosing. The use of different Bible translations added to my understanding of certain Scriptures. I’ve read numerous devotions and I found this one, with its 365 responses to the Word, educational and probing of my faith.

I’d recommend it to someone who desires to dig deeper in the Old Testament, someone who appreciates living in a way that is open to conviction, instruction and encouragement (in the true meaning of the word).

*I received my copy of A Year with God as a member of Booksneeze and in exchange for this honest review

8 Things I’d Say to 30-year-old Me

You are going through one of the hardest trials of your life, but hang on for the blessing. You are on the brink of being blessed with a beautiful gift. Wrestle it out and hang on.

You’re learning more about friendship, how genuine and thoughtful women can be working toward a common purpose as you lead the MOMS group at church.

Yes, you will always look tired until about 10:00 a.m. Even after you have newborns, you’ll still feel wide awake early in the morning, but you’ll never look it.

You are a couple years away from discovering Facebook and it will baffle you how you could connect with so many from your past, those from all the places you’ve lived. But this is merely the beginning of many friendships you’ll discover online.

There will come a day when there are no more diapers to change. And oddly enough, you’ll miss it. Only a little, but you will.

Things you say to your father will mean more to you in a few years. Life is short. Choose your words carefully.

Your man’s company will ask you to move again in a less than two years and yes, you will be nine months pregnant (again!).

Breaking through the hardship, you will feel closer to God than ever before and realize the depth of His love for you. You’ll become bolder about sharing your story (you’ll also love to seek out stories) and the impact of His love on your life. You’ll surprise yourself how unafraid you’ll be!

What would you say to 30-year-old you?