Is it odd that I don't want this year to end?

2015 and 2016 I was ready to burn down in mania and enter the new year. Those years were rough.

2017 was too. But it's been the most wonderful learning exprience. I've learned more this year about me, about my gifts, about Christ, about God's power, about love and serving others than I have in my last ten years combined. I worry letting this year go before embarking into the great unknown (2018) may be finding me with another downer year like 2015 or 2016.

But I'm hopeful.

I don't have any new year's resolutions. Usually in December I assess how I'm doing and whether or not I feel I need to ring in the new year with a desire to change some aspect of me or my life.

But this year blew by so fast I never had the time to be so reflective...and I feel that's my cue to enter the new year with an open heart and open mind and what will be, will be.

One small change I've made (because lawd knows I could write a novel about all the changes) is that I don't think I'm going to be so public about this blog, as in linking it on my social media (except G+, for now); neither updating friends when I post something new. If you find this and read it, welcome, and I hope you stay. I hope you like what I write.

I have been feeling pressed to talk about the things on my mind and the emotions I carry within my heart, but I've decided that who finds it and reads it are the ones who need to, or should...not I trying to project my thoughts and feelings on others and await a response in return.

I have realized while my advice may be decent, that sometimes it isn't the best for the person I'm giving it to. And that's ok. Everyone's path is different and the best advice for my life will not always be the best advice for someone else.

(It's also frustrating to give advice and watch the person do the absolute opposite.)

So instead I'll go within and speak quietly what lies there, what burrows beneath the surface that I show the world...and write about it here where it's public, but safe at the same time.

Most people seem to find my blog from my "Why I'm No Longer the Type Three Woman" post. But rarely does anyone care to read what else I've written or especially what I recently post about. And I find comfort in that...oddly.

I often think about this blog and yearn to write in it. But grow in anxiety over feeling like I must share what I write. But I remind myself that in writing and in keeping a blog, there are no rules. Who says I have to blast my writings as far as my social media will reach only to chew my nails over the possible reaction of the friends/family reading it?

I hope to enter the new year (ok, wait, maybe this is a new year's resolution?) to write more musings on a regular basis. But there are no guarantees. To do so would be to have a quiet moment in my day where the madness in my mind is far away, where I don't have people needing my attention, where I don't have my mental list of daily things haunting me. While I'm reflective quite a bit, taking the time to write my reflections down can be mentally draining and time consuming.

But I'm hopeful. :)

Christmas hasn't even started but I am certain that doesn't matter for I know in a blink this year will be over. So why not say goodbye to it now?

I have remained quiet on this blog lately, not talking much about what's been going on with me as I feel that all I talk about is how much I've grown while another part of me wants to savor it and truly embrace this time in my life. Will this season end? Is this only the beginning? I wish I knew but if this is a season that will come to an end, I want to breathe it all in.

(I shall title this picture "Reflection" LOL)

I dunno, maybe it's because I feel like all this spiritual talk gets boring to you, my readers.... A friend recently said to me, "I worry that I talk too much about my mother's death that I'm becoming a bother and that people are assuming I have nothing else to talk about," when I have hardly noticed that at all in our conversations. I understand that her mother's death has been weighing a lot on her mind and soul, not to mention that many changes that have been made in her life have been from this death or a reflection from it.

But I understand what she means because that's exactly what I have been worrying about; that my posts are becoming nothing but yawn-fests.

This year, to put it simply, has been a year of "downloading". I often wonder if this year wasn't so much busy as it was my mind processing all that I have felt my Heavenly Father teach me. I have mentioned in a couple videos on my YouTube channel how I felt like the Summer had been robbed of me. That during those three months I wanted the stereotypical "Summer break" when instead it was packed with things unplanned and unexpected, to do at a moment's notice. I felt like the Summer came and went all in the course of a few days and before I knew it, I was at "Meet the Teacher" and then taking my kids to their new class, coming back home to an empty house and wondering what in the world happened to those three months that has me not mentally in the new school year.

I felt like I was learning at an incredible speed and didn't understand how those around me weren't, or seemingly weren't. I was finding new insights and inspirations on life and the meaning of it...with no way to bring it up to my friends in a conversation...which turned out to be a blessing as conversations with friends help divert me from the constant mind running as well as bring me back down to earth.

Several years ago I worried that I wasn't focused enough to learn. I thought maybe I placed so much stress on myself that something went wrong; how my brain would just shut off when I would try to study/read. I feared I was having a mental breakdown of sorts.

I've realized that my lack of focus wasn't due to the fact that I wasn't smart, or that I had issues with learning....it was because I wasn't to learn what I was attempting to cram into my brain. All this information, as interesting as I thought it was, wasn't what God wanted me to be studying. There was nothing wrong with me, nothing wrong with what I thought I was to learn or study, but it was the wrong information for what my mind and soul were searching for.

While this year hasn't been bad, it's by far a better year than 2015, I'm ready to say goodbye to it, even though I hate wishing life away like this. I guess my hope for 2017 is a year-long vacation...haha, which I know won't happen. In my two dimensional thinking I keep hoping that as soon as January 1, 2017 rings in that suddenly the constant mental-chaos-turned-clarity will cease and I'll hear nothing but crickets and then bask in the sound of silence.

I can dream, can't I?

And while I feel like I've done nothing but run since January of this year, I've never been happier. Life hasn't felt more clear and while my mind is constantly "downloading" more and more information that I know God and his angels are sharing with me, I've never felt this much strength, this much love and companionship, this much control, and this much confidence in every waking day of my life. I find myself stopping to admire smallest bits of beauty in this world. Every sunrise and sunset seems to catch my breath these days. You'd think during a time when my mind is constantly thinking, constantly processing, constantly asking God more questions and listening for answers, that I wouldn't see the tender mercies of our Lord and Savior, the beauty of a robin hopping on fallen Autumn leaves, a person saying a kind word to a stranger. And yet, the Lord sees that I do.

How I feel like this world has become new. I look around and feel like I have been given a second chance to see His creations with different eyes and fresh perspective. And I have loved every minute of it....even though life won't slow down. :)



P.S.While writing this post, my brother sent me this video. How much Jim Carey's words and beliefs resonate strongly within me and within the truths I feel God has shown me.

(Source)

In listening to a podcast this morning, this poem was given.

What's funny was the slew of emotions just the name "Shel Silverstein" has given me all these years.

I believe I came to know who he was towards the end of my elementary school experience. I grasped on to his funky poems and squiggled drawings more into my middle school years. After marriage and with two kids, it was rumored that he "liked kids a little too much". This had me so upset that the copy I had of his The Light In The Attic was then treated as nothing but a toy for my kids to trample on, tear pages from, and use as a coloring book...because now, after knowing this knowledge, his writings were essentially useless.

I couldn't bear to throw the book away though. And we very well may have it still lurking under my daughter's bed, the binding ripped, a chunk of pages pulled out. I just couldn't let go of how happy his poems made me...the reminder of those simpler times in life and how many of his poems mirrored that time or brought a smile to my young face. And I could tell by my daughter's insisting on keeping the book, as mangled as it is, has done the same for her.

Just a couple years ago, I found that rumor to be untrue.

How I wished that I didn't believe something wrong and false about someone so quickly. That I'm more willing to trust that something is bad about someone than something is good. How I'm seemingly more happy to have a reason to not be someone's friend or to not respect someone than I am to embrace everyone as a Child of God and see them through the eyes of Christ.

I have been on this running search to find truth, for years now. But it's been especially concentrated these last, oh, six months or so.

I struggle with this voice within and with what my mind "knows". I used to forgo everything my heart told me if it didn't go with what I was taught. For in my imperfect thinking I thought my heart, the true me, was in the wrong and an "enemy to God".

In my hopes to find truth I've had to step outside of habit. Outside of "the norm", outside of tradition. I've also had to look at everything I've known as being true to being EITHER true or not.

While I found myself, during this search, to find several things I have been told to be true that I now say I officially know, within my heart is true, there are other things that I question and yet, while that feels uncomfortable at times--to have that blanket of assurance and knowledge that held me close and kept me warm my whole life removed from me--I find peace in being here. And a happiness I didn't think would be here either.

All because of that voice inside me.

I have found that this voice gives me more happiness and peace and clarity than the things that I forced myself to "know" as truth and pushing aside that voice within that says, "Hey wait! That doesn't feel right..."

But I'm finding that this voice that speaks truth to me, that I know without a doubt is from God, is something that is being questioned by others. I know it may have others questioning my validity as person who is intently listening to Christ and His teachings. I could very well become the topic of gossip to my peers, that I'm the one that could be shunned and placed in a category of not being trusted or that I'm living a life in deception because I've let go of some of what I "know" and replaced it with what rings true in my heart.

And for that, I mourn.

(Source, pinterest)

But I am so happy. So in love with life. I feel Christ every day in it. I've never felt a stronger companionship to Him than I do now and I'm grateful for that. If stretching me out of my comfort zone, feeling many times without bearings in my search for truth, wondering what HIS TRUTH is for me will give me this companionship, I'll take it over and over again than to go back to where I was.

I feel I'm honoring God and Christ most when I give them my heart and follow Their instruction while being most authentically me. I am of no good to anyone, including God, if I struggle in fitting into mold that is a great one, but hinders my light from shining.

(I saved this years ago, so I do not have the source to this image. If you know the source, please comment below so I may correct this. Thank you!)

Valentine's Day is coming.

And while I should be brainstorming more about what to do for my Valentine's Outfit Of The Day, I instead have something else on my mind.

Love.

Which you'd think, "Duh, Ladee, of course you're thinking about love with Valentine's Day coming up."

And actually no, it's not because of that.

LOVE has literally been on my mind a lot lately.

This past year I've been thinking a lot about me (ha, I sound arrogant) and about how much I want to be the best person I can be. And in my journey of forever betterment, or whatever you may call it as while I know that I am a work in progress, I am certain that I'll never always have it right or be perfect, I've been listening to how I talk to others, watch how I treat others as well as how they talk and treat me.

And I do have to say that I look back with a lot of shame.

How could I so easily love someone, or give someone the benefit of the doubt and then lose all that within an instant when I hear of a secret of theirs or hear that they no longer attend church/stop believing in God or that they choose to do anything against my moral code?

What good am I doing by suddenly seeing them in a different light, therefore choosing to forgo that "benefit of a doubt" that I only hope others would give me?

I felt it was drilled within me to "love one another" and to be like Christ, who loves everyone, only to be whiplashed with how I should be careful of those I allow as friends, for their influences could affect me.

I literally felt the only friends that I was to have were not those that had the same "standards" as mine, but only those who attended the same church as mine.

Every one else, all those other potential friends that I could have had, I was just to be kind to, but keep at a distance.

And I look back on my life, wishing I had been more accepting of others.

I have a good friend who left my church.
Her mother told her, "I would've rather heard you died than leave the church."
Her father emails her with quotes upon quotes, wronging her reasons for leaving.
Friend number one pulled me aside one day and said, "I don't know how to act around her now."
Friend number two said, "I was told that I should lose contact with her."
Many friends talk about her as though her salvation is lost.
And many of those friends don't talk to her anymore.
But when I asked my friend how she feels about everything, she gave me a genuine smile and said, "Ladee, I am at peace."

And I felt peace too. Because how can I argue that? Argue the fact that she's at peace with life? Who am I to say she's not? Who am I to say that she is now unworthy of love and friendship because she made a decision she felt within her was the right one?

If we feel inner peace with that we're doing in life, how can that be wrong?

While this has been a slow transition for me, to love one another as they are, starting around the age of high school, I woke up one day just tired of judging on the whole. I got tired of thinking someone should be loved to a certain degree more or less than someone else because of the way they choose to live their life.

I'm not saying that I'm completely judge-free. I still have my times when I make assumptions of people and for the most part, any negative assumption I have generally ends up to be a wrong one, which only reminds me that I'm a fool and need to leave the judging and the assumptions to God, for heaven's sake (pun intended).

Why are we so selective in the love we give?

People act like love is some finite resource. Like it's gonna get all used up so we must use it wisely.

I understand how loving someone, only to have them stab you in the back (or to not reciprocate it), sucks. I understand the blow that is, I understand how hard it is to sleep with that knowledge and knowing that person won't be there tomorrow or worse, knowing you must cut those ties tomorrow. I understand how it feels to know you gave love throughout a period of time, wondering if that person was deserving of it and if they truly loved you back.

I understand too how that can have us putting love on hold for others. Or keeping them at a distance to protect a resource within us that we cherish so much; a part of ourselves we may never get back.

But why can't we give some love and care to everyone? Why must our hearts run cold until someone comes along to warm it? Why must we look on the outside or look at the faults FIRST before assessing whether someone is worthy to be loved or even accepted?

When I decided to believe that love is an infinite resource, I found myself with more love to give. And I found myself making far less negative assumptions.

As it says in 1 Thessalonians 3, when given instruction on how to better one's lacking faith:

11. Now God himself and our Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ direct our way unto you.
12. And the Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward another, and toward ALL MEN, even as WE DO TOWARD YOU.
13. To the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, with all the saints.

I feel that if we are commanded to love one another and that being it, no asterisk next to this verse, no "if, and, or but" afterwards then shouldn't we do just that: to love one another and to give them that part of your time and even a small part of your heart?

I started this blog years ago, hoping that I could word vomit everything that I'm feeling and what's going on in my life and in the lives of my friends so that I could back up why I feel this way and what honestly started this post.

I guess what has me hurt the most and has me writing this post is because I know far too many people, myself included, who feel they can't be truly honest with those around them because they feel that those they cherish the most will see them differently and therefore remove their love from them and create a wall of separation because, "it's you that's changed".

I hate that I can only tell a few people what lies within the deepest realms of my heart or be most authentically me because they're "safe" when I could easily be this way with a stranger and spill my guts to them and they wouldn't see me any different than any other person. How is it at all logical to trust a stranger more than to trust a family member with what's burdening you? I've wondered how many times I've told my children they could tell me anything, but my actions have had them second-guessing that and therefore, they don't?

I want to change that. I want my kids to know that the safest person they can trust, is ME. I want my kids to know that any question or concern or worry or fear or anything can be held safe within me and that they'll know I'll still LOVE THEM.

And the parent in me thinks that maybe that's where this all should start: within the home. For if we show those around us how it is to love and to give the benefit of the doubt, then maybe, just maybe, that Christlike example will be etched within our hearts and will come naturally to those who are outside the home.

I got new jammies!

Every Christmas Eve each member of the family gets new jammies.

It would be a shame to have gone this whole year, with my new obsession of plaid, and not make sure that the theme of our family's pajamas is PLAID.

I love how my family opened presents with their new jammies and instead of groveling over a pattern that they've certainly seen too much of, said, "These are so cool!"

Christmas was the day that I planned on staying in my jam-jams all day long. But that didn't happen. 

Instead I planned it for today. 

Monday.

I think all Mondays should be jammie wearing day, IMHO.

It's the 28th of December and while I'm sure someone's partying somewhere, it's a sure boring day over here.

I've been asked "What can I do? Who can I play with?" four times today. Just now I was asked, "Can you see if so-and-so can play tomorrow?"

Apparently the new presents Santa provided aren't near as fun to play with when the weather went through a forty degree drop overnight.

Ok, first off, last week's weather was freakin' AMAZING.

I swear this was an answer to my last three years' prayers. My gym friend and I have loathed the cold weather and every morning would shiver our tails off while waiting for those blasted gym doors to open. I feel like our cries were finally heard.

Global warming? BRING IT. It sure makes for a better workout anyway! ;)

......................................................................................................

Annnnnnnnywayyyyyys.

To get to the brunt of this post:

I realized that my last blog post may have come off like I was complaining.

Or depressed.

Or anxious.

Or tired.

Or any emotion other than happy.

"It does sound like a bummer post, doesn't it?" I asked Mr Hunter last night, while reading through it one last time.

Mr Hunter shrugged and smiled, saying, "I thought it was very sweet what you said about me though."

I want you all to know that I'm doing so well right now.

The first of the year wasn't too bad. 

And then as the year progressed, it became less enjoyable and more life learning.

I'm still considering writing another post about all I learned so I'll skip to October.

October was The Great Shift in my life. It was that month when I felt like all those angels I've leaned on for support, care, to hold me while I tackled my demons, finally took a step back, loosened their grip around me and said, "Ladee, be free. You can do this."

(I saved this on my computer this summer, posted it on FB and can't find it online to source it. If this is your photo, contact me and I will source you.)

From then on I was changed. 

But in a good way.

Actually, in a GREAT WAY.

I felt like my soul was in hibernation; going through extensive amounts of questioning and learning, healing, searching for inner truth; an internal whirlwind. My soul went through such a concentration of highs and lows, comfort and loss in a few short months than I have experienced in years combined. 

But finally: I found freedom.

(Source. Thank you!)

And never doubting once that God had ever left my side.

I realized just how many things held me down. Things that I thoroughly believed were to uplift me, were actually the shackles that imprisoned me my whole life.

I was robbed. So robbed.

Letting go of all the "fluff" as I call it, and holding tight to God, Christ, and my family; the bare essentials, and letting go of everything that doesn't feel right within me, has given me such freedom and a happiness so rich I have felt at times my heart would burst.

While I know I could write more and go into way more depth than I am right now, I leave my readers with this:

If ____ (you fill in the blank) doesn't honor you, doesn't make your soul sing, doesn't bring you PURE joy and happiness, doesn't have you waking up proud of the person you are...

LET IT GO.

If it's a person you must keep in your life (example: a family member that you love dearly), LET GO of the way they feel about you/your situation/your decisions. Let them think and judge and act for themselves, but don't allow it to affect you. The moment you don't let their thoughts/words affect you is the moment you're liberated.

For if you are truly happy, does it mater what anyone thinks? Would you rather be unhappy but keep them happy? How unfair that is. To sacrifice your happiness, forgo what God wants you to have most, for someone else's opinion to be the way they want about you.

So, going back to my last post, this year wasn't catastrophic, although it sounds like it. It had it's ups and it sure had some downs.

And yeah, I'm really, really ready for the year to be over. Because I'm so excited to start new, with a new me of sorts.

But I've never been happier.

And I've never felt more loved and more free.

<3

First and foremost: MERRY CHRISTMAS!

I kept kicking myself this holiday season because as much as I tried, I couldn't get myself to be motivated to make my tree look like last year's.

 (Decemeber 2014)

Or like anyone's, for that matter.

I pulled out the tree and the lights early this month but found myself just not in the mood to do even that. I kept delaying the ornament hanging to "tomorrow"; a word that I love and a word that I love to hate.

My son pulled out the silvery-blue Christmas bulbs that we have had for the past several years and added them to the tree, bless his heart. I handed each family member their new ornament for the year, to which we hung.

But that was it.

I did buy two new boxes of white lights to add to our tree though because nothing is prettier than a tree so full of lights that the neighbors living behind us wonder if the darn thing is aflame.

I wish I could pinpoint why I don't have the motivation to decorate much this year.

I often wonder if it's because this year is much different than 2014. In some ways good and in other ways not as good. I wouldn't say this year was catastrophic. All years have their ups and downs. Maybe my tree is looking more "plain" because this year I've come to find that the simple things in life are the things to be most valued.

Or maybe it's because I'm just super ready to have this year over.

I've learned a lot this year.

And while I know that I will never go a day in this life without learning, I have felt that a lot of *life lessons* were made this year; lessons that I will no doubt carry with me throughout the rest of my existence.

I felt like 2015 was another 2011, in many ways. It was great and terrible. And life changing.

But I have nothing but gratitude towards our Lord and our God that it happened. I know that all things happen for a reason. I know too that all lessons learned are times when God sits back quietly, much like a teacher does during an exam, to see how we'll handle these hard times but ready to help the moment your hand is raised.

I'm grateful too for a patient and caring husband. I feel like I've dragged him through these changes of mine, whether he liked it or not and at the end of each day he would hold me close, told me of his support and helped comfort me so I could rest a little more easy.

I have found how important family is this year. How I cherish each one of my children in a way more rich and deep than I have in years past. And I cherish the lives of my friends and their family a little more too.

After all, life is truly about enjoying the simple things. For without simple things, there's no great rewards.

Maybe I'll do another blog post or video, about all this year has taught me.

But for now, I want to wish you, my readers, a Merry Christmas.

And I want you to know how much I love you. How much I appreciate you. How much your kindness and support has meant so much to me and has been something I have leaned on heavily during those days when I felt hopeless. I know I've been absent many times during these trials, but you've been understanding, held no judgement and I knew I always had open arms to run to.

May you be blessed. Loved. Cherished. Held close. Know your value.

And thank you, again.

Confession.

Which isn't really much of a confession because I'll tell this to just about anyone. But only when the time is right.

I absolutely love mixing patterns.

I don't have the best eye for it, or so I thought. And then I realized it didn't matter if I had any "eye" for it, as long as I enjoyed wearing it.

I originally was going to wear a stripes-and-floral outfit today because my all-time favorite pattern combo is that. I remember seeing that pattern as a small child and just being enamored by it--black and white stripes with a creamy, soft autumn floral pattern. Who thought up such genius?

I remember too seeing skirts (and shirts) that were black and white striped with bright colored flowers printed on them and thought that was the best marriage that ever happened in the universe.

But at the last minute, I changed my idea. I grabbed the $9 shawl I bought from the store yesterday. It was one of those items I saw sitting on the rack and prayed it would be cheap because it clearly told me it's coming home with me...along with Maybelline's (Red Revival 645) lipstick, which also makes an appearance today.

^^^Whoops, I forgot to hide my camera remote. ;)

I live for Fall. How I love the crisp of Autumn, the excitement it brings as we anticipate the holidays, watching the leaves fall from the trees in a myriad of colors and they crunch under soft boots as we walk to and from the mailbox.

This is the time when we stock up on the hot chocolate, gather those best fudge and cookie recipes for the holidays, and start the first fire of the year in the fireplace and pull out all those thick blankets to snuggle up in.

Oh yes. I've been waiting for this all year.

I found this beautiful, wannabe vintage desk (American Signature) and chair on craigslist this summer and like the wonderful person Mr Hunter is, helped me get it for cheaper than the asking price and said, "Tell the guy we'll be there in 30 minutes."

How I love that my husband can drop everything for a moment to do something for me, when he doesn't have to.

I probably spend most of my free time here. This is where I catch up with friends, edit my videos, write these blog posts and I even snapchat, frequently, from here. The glow from my laptop screen helps with my phone's poor resolution with indoor lighting. ;) That, or I'm lazy and would just prefer to live all day on this chair.

I learn from here, study from here, post about life and the hard times that can happen from here. I've laughed until I cried and I've been frustrated enough to scream and I've been full of tears that were of happiness and sorrow. This little nook knows just about all of my emotions better than any place on Earth.

I'm constantly grateful for the many blessings of the internet and for all that came along with it these years. But of all those things, I'm most grateful for the opportunity I, and many others have, to be able to be a blogger, to write, to share our innermost thoughts, our life, our tips, our laughs and cries in our little nook on the internet.

I met a man a couple weeks ago. I was looking for curtains through WalMart's clearance section. He was close by and came up to talk to me. He was an easy person to talk to; someone who, like me, loves to ask questions, loves to know about the lives of others, loves to know why we're here at this time and what that could possibly make of our destiny. One thing that stood out to me most is how his life was and is completely opposite of mine; his past, the now, and probably his future. And yet, our completely opposite lives brought us to a silly store, at the same time, in a random spot in the middle of WalMart.

After our conversation he asked, "So what are you going to do with all this knowledge you have?"

I wasn't sure the question he was asking. In my mind I'm thinking about how I praise my Lord and God for all the knowledge, blessings, LIFE that I have. So, if anything, I give thanks.

"You need to write it. All of it. And you need to let others know," he answered himself.

"Oh," I said, snapping myself out of my mind, "I already do that!"

He seemed genuinely pleased. "Good. You have a story to tell, an incredible mind, intuitive heart, and you can't live this life without writing it down."

For all those that are considering taking up journaling by writing, blogging, vlogging, a picture a day, voice recording or any form of documentation:

Start now.

There's no wrong way to portray what's on your mind. There's no wrong way to express how you feel. There's no rules in journaling. It's your life's history! It's The Story of You.

Trust Your Story.

...and document it.

I tend to get sick twice a year.

Once when it starts getting cold, and again when the weather starts warming up.

Yesterday I awoke with the scratchy, pinching throat and my sinuses felt loose and sloshy. On top of that, for it being a sleep-in Saturday, I was uncommonly tired considering how well and how long I slept.

My health was on the decline. I took medicine, vitamin C, and caffeine and hoped, out of all of those, that something would make me feel better.

I was wrong. My body became tired from being so sick I crashed on the couch come 9pm.

This morning I awoke with my head throbbing, my body weak, my stomach gurgling.

While I committed myself to putting on hair and makeup (as I always feel better after that), I decided I would sport the day in my PJs: an oversized shirt and oversized yoga pants.

That is, until Mr Hunter called. Mr Hunter was about 45 minutes away and was supposed to be home this morning but plans had changed.

"Could you bring me my laptop, charger, and a set of extra clothes?" he asked.

So I changed my pants, put on some shoes, put the kiddos in the car and we road-tripped for almost two hours.

But first, my daughter snapped a couple photos.

And thankfully, I felt pretty good...until coming home where I took a solid, two hour nap.

I'm making THESE tonight.

And not once have I heard anything but raves reviews once someone has finished these twice baked potatoes.

Sometimes I wonder if the only reason we get invited to ANYTHING these days is because people will know I'll make these on request so they don't have to.

One day a family invited us over for a BBQ. The husband/father of this family is a professional cook, and has a powerful, intimidating presence and personality; standing over 6 feet tall and weighing well over 400 pounds. His fuse is short and he refuses to take crap from anyone. Most importantly, this man knows his food. And I'm not just saying that because of his title, I've had the food he's cooked and he's a food genius.

It was originally planned that I make potato salad for this BBQ, another delicious side that is derived from a great recipe a good friend gave me.

And that was the plan, according to this chef.

That day I decided I didn't want to make my potato salad, but these twice baked potatoes. I had no doubt this chef would like them as I confidently carried my cookie sheet into his home, full of 16 halves of potatoes, stuffed with everything fattening and cooked to heaven's perfection, and set them gracefully on the table as they glowed so bright I could hear the song of angels.

I take my seat on the couch with the ladies when five minutes later I hear a booming voice from the dining area, "LADEE, THIS ISN'T POTATO SALAD!"

Clearly, he was irritated. I look to meet his gaze and knew he was fighting the urge the strangle me, said the hint of fury in his eyes.

"I know. I--"

"WHERE'S MY POTATO SALAD?"

I felt backed in a corner. At that moment it didn't matter what I said to him. I ruined his meal plan. Which I should've known better considering his love for food. I should've given him a heads up. But that thought never crossed my mind.

His harsh attitude had my mind screaming, "Be happy I made ANYTHING, sweetheart." I didn't care at that moment that he could very well break me in two as easy as I could the BBQ skewers that were being used for dinner, I refused to be talked to like that. But, BUT, I was the guest, and I was at fault for not considering how much a food change could upset this food genius.

I bit my tongue, told myself not to take it personal and said, with a smile:

"I promise, you're gonna like these...better than the potato salad."

Knowing he had no other choice he muttered, "you better be right," loud enough for me to hear, before turning into the kitchen.

Dinner came and went and during clean up I hear, "Oh-mah-gawwwwsh, those twice baked potatoes were the best I've ever had. Is that your recipe, Ladee?"

How I wish I could've seen the grin I had on my face. For my mind played myself pointing at him and yelling, "HA! I TOLD YOU SO!"

But instead I heard myself give a couple chuckles, "heh-heh".

Later that night I was informed that he ate four potato halves. I took home an empty cookie sheet.

I couldn't have been complimented better....even if he didn't apologize for his doubting me.

I think way too much. 

If my blog posts aren't evident enough of that then, CONFESSION: I think too much.

Sometimes I wonder if I don't think any more than the next person. That we're all just a bunch of thinkers but don't voice it. I know that we always seem to have some streaming thought going on in our head, according to some show I watched years ago. 

But to contemplate, to really consider certain things, including the pointless things, until you've either got it down to a science or tire of it, I wonder how much of that we all, as a whole, really do.

I wonder this because I have had mental battles, wars, while sitting amongst a quiet group of friends. Where I think something and then debate it, or view it from another angle, debate that and then go back to my first thought before the debate to start fresh. I will then look over at a friend, remember something I needed to ask her, to which it interrupts the organized chaos that is raging in my head and suddenly my mind is now an eight semi-truck pile up all thanks to the 1998 Dodge Neon that cut everyone off.

One gal I'm subscribed to uploaded a video and in it, she was frustrated. She ranted about other YouTubers, one in particular, but how a lot of them are "fake" while screaming to their viewers that they should be themselves. She also talked about the demands these people have and the difficulty of that to post videos on a regular basis to meet the expectations of their viewers. 

This video had me coming to a screeching halt while applying my makeup. I took a look at myself in the mirror, wondering with that over-thinking brain of mine, how much her rant could very well apply to me. 

And I did a video on it. Because I want you, my favorite people in the world, to know what my response is and I think it's only fair to finally tell you what you should expect from me. 

Growing up I followed the crowd, I followed the rules, I wanted to be

Just
Like
Everyone
Else.

Why? Because the majority of the population, in my opinion, liked and was most comfortable with those who were followers of the norm, or were rule keepers...

And I just wanted to be liked. I didn't know how else to be liked than to do what I was told. Everyone likes a good person who doesn't question things...at least that was what I learned from a very young age; that those I love were the happiest with me when I did what I was told.

I have found that for the most part that the rules that were taught to me to live by are rules that I still follow. I have found most happiness and freedom within these guidelines.

But I have found that some rules that I've ignorantly given myself from a young age, have been doing no benefit to me and if anything, have hindered me from becoming the person that I feel I've pushed aside and belittled for so long. And all this conditioning I've placed upon myself still haunts me today. While they haunt me less, they still tug and make their presence known when I go against them. Even if going against them is right.

But as I've searched these past several years to know what is best for me, what is the best person that God would have be, and trusting that God has my heart and I would not go wrong following it, I've settled myself on this:

I no longer want to follow the norm, and their rules.

Something happened today that sparked this blog post. Something that tugged at my gut just so that I knew I couldn't sit back and not give my two cents.

I stumbled upon a website. A website full of those who "know it all", who believe that if I follow what they know, that I would be happier and see better results in my life.

My mind trailed back to the past year or so and I realized that I was doing just about nothing that this website claims is a "sure-fire win" to having the end goal that they assume that I would want to have.

But in that moment where my mind looked at all the "wrong" I've done, for the slightest fraction of a second I felt regret that I had done those things, I suddenly wondered if there was a way I could go back and fix my "faults" to which I then told myself to take good mental notes as to what is on this website so that I may follow it, to the letter, in the future.

Once that split second ended, I came back to reality and looked over the website again and shook my head.

My mind retorted, "I didn't come this far in life to conform, again, to what a few people think I should do in order to succeed. I've have done pretty darn good these past few years, so why change that?"

But what gets me is how much I still allow these pointless "rules" to have me second-guessing everything that I've become. To have me feeling like that little Ladee who is now in trouble for not knowing better and shunned into her room until the lesson has been forever burned into the memory so it won't happen again.

I've often wondered what I could do to no longer feel like my differences are bad. Many times I sit among a group of women and know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I am not like any of them. And how grateful I am for that. Not because I don't want to be like them, but because I know that I am happiest being me and having embraced my differences. The differences that God gave me so I can be an instrument in His hands. I'm more comfortable in my skin than I've ever been.

And yet, why, if I'm so happy with this person I've become, should I still feel that thread of the past, pulling me back?

I hold the greatest fear of the unknown. I get ill over not knowing when things will happen and how they'll happen. Could this be the old me, the all-familiar, the rule-keeper pulling me back to "safety" because there I know what to expect? But that's just the problem...I don't want the life the old me had, regardless of how well I know it and how predictable it is. Because in that life I am not true to myself.

Thank God that life is lived a day at a time. And that each day we learn a little more, if we allow it.

While I don't know what tomorrow brings, I've found that my tomorrows are better as I look forward to them, with God at my side, than when I have wished for my yesterdays back in attempts to change what one person may believe I'm doing wrong.

"To thine own self be true."

We all have that one night where we get no sleep. How it affects your day. How it changes your mood. How it affects the way you eat and what you consume (copious amounts of caffeine, much?).

I'm used to a day, here or there, of no sleep. That's the problem with being a thinker, and over thinking things, even the smallest things that no matter how many times I think it over and over again that it won't change the past, present, or future. A sad reality that has taken me years to accept. 

But it still doesn't stop my mind from the intense wandering until 30 minutes before my alarm clock goes off, to which it shuts down and I finally find dreamland. 

How unfair and cruel my mind can be.

I'm also used to having a couple days, in a row, of no sleep, thanks to said mind.

But after the third day of no sleep, my anxiety kicks in. I am more startled, I have a harder time falling asleep due to this startling. Any sound has my heart racing and putting me back at square one in my feeble attempts at rest. I am also restless and uneasy, wired and dizzy.

In this video (made yesterday, Friday, April 24) I had gone four nights without sleep. A whole 96 hours awake with only 12 hours of sleep. I tried sleeping in when I could. I really tried napping. And I wasn't successful. 

I had fallen into a deep sleep about an hour before I had to get ready for a dental visit. I wanted so bad to stay in bed. But I couldn't. This was a special dental visit that had to be made on this day, at this time. 

So come watch as I ramble on and on about more-or-less nothing, as you take a car ride with me to find a new dentist office in the middle of nowhere, so much so that my GPS couldn't even find it.

P.S. I finally got some sleep last night. I went to bed and DIDN'T MOVE until my alarm went off this morning. My head hit the pillow and within minutes, I was out. It was glorious. 

This is part one of two videos! Be on the lookout for tomorrow's video!

Since I mentioned in this post about a quick and easy favorite snack/cookie of mine, I thought I'd bring you along as I made it today.

Welcome to my childhood.

Or perhaps I should call them the "Welcome to Ladee's Childhood Cookies"

Or "Ladee's Favorite Cookies" because nothing's better than to have a cookie named after you!

First, the "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Frosting recipe, right on the back of cocoa box:

 I don't follow the mixing directions, but I'm pretty close.

Next, ingredients.

1. 1 stick of butter/margarine, softened

2. 2/3c Cocoa

Here's a little trick to try with your cocoa. I'm always getting cocoa dust on me or it spills too fast out of the container when I'm measuring with a larger measuring cup. If you only open a corner and tip it to disperse the cocoa, a little will come out at a time. If you want more, all you have to do is squeeze the container a bit and more will come out. Less dust, less mess!

3. 3c powdered sugar

I've had this Pampered Chef measuring cup for nine years. I wash it in the dishwasher at least once a week. It still works like a champ! There's a true product review for you. Their measuring spoons on the other hand only lasted a year, tops.

I have no idea why it didn't cross my mind to use it for the cocoa.

It is a little beat up and stained, but very loved. ;)

It can only measure two cups at a time.

Still need to measure out one more cup!

Putting that 3rd cup in! 

4. 1/3 cup of milk 

5. Hand mix until the ingredients are blended enough together so that when you use the hand mixer, all the powdered sugar and cocoa doesn't fling everywhere.

Not there yet. 

There ya go!

6. Get your hand mixer and whip it on high, slowly circling the beater around the bowl and remembering to get the sides. 

(You don't technically need a mixer, you can continue mixing by hand if you'd like.)

And yes, I only used one beater. Don't ask me why, I don't really know. I just use one beater when I make this frosting. I guess somewhere in my brain I am convinced that one beater on high will whip the frosting with less of a mess and with a better outcome than two beaters?

Oooooh, looks like the beginning credits of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. 

I thought I was done and licked the beater when I noticed the frosting didn't taste right.

And then I remembered the vanilla!

So,

7. 1 tsp vanilla

Now the cap of the vanilla holds about 1/2 tsp of liquid.

So I used two capfuls. 

I grabbed that second beater and whipped away.

Perfy.

8. Grab a Texas Rangers cup. 

Ok, any large up, or bowl, will do.

9. Get a gallon sized bag and stick one of the bottom corners into the cup. 

10. Spoon or dump the frosting into bag. 

If there's any reason I go to the gym and work out my arms is so I can lift that heavy bowl long enough to get alllllll that frosting out carefully.

My love for these cookies runs deep.

11. Set aside frosting and clean up your mess because....

12...it's time to pull out the graham crackers.

13. Divide graham crackers into two piles.

14. Use the first pile and do this.

15. Now grab that frosting bag!

16. Twist the top so the frosting is airtight in the bag. 

17. Clip that corner of the bag about a little more than a quarter inch.

18. And put a generous dollop of frosting on each graham cracker.

...until they're all done.

As you can tell, there's still enough frosting for three or four crackers.

Buuuut, since I didn't have any extra crackers and since I just hate to waste something...and since I didn't want to save it as it may go bad....

I ate it.

19. Now top the crackers using the ones from the second pile.

Quick note: place top cracker with perforations going in the same direction as bottom cracker. It makes it easier to eat!

BUT LOOK! I accidentally iced one extra cracker. So what did I do?

I made a double stuff.

  

And here you go! All done. And super easy. Honestly, the pictures make it look harder than it really is.

Let the crackers sit out without a cover. They taste best after day, IMO, but that doesn't stop me from eating them immediately and I won't judge if you do too!

 Oh and 20. ENJOY.

P.S. These photos came straight out of my camera, with no photoshop effects. I know that some could use a little doctoring. But I knew that if I doctored one, I'd HAVE to doctor them all! And ain't nobody got time for dat!