STRESS Reduction Diet

Breakfast
1/2 Grapefruit
1 slice of wheat toast
8 oz of skim milk

Lunch
4 oz lean broiled chicken breast
1 c steamed spinach
1 c herb tea
1 Oreo cookie

Mid Afternoon Snack
Rest of bag of Oreo cookies
2 pints Rocky Road ice cream
1 jar hot fudge
nuts, cherries, whip cream

Dinner
2 loaves of garlic bread
Lg sausage, mushroom, & cheese pizza
4 cans of beer
3 milky way candy bars

Late Evening Snack
Entire frozen cheese cake eaten directly from freezer

RULES OF THE DIET:
1. If you eat something and no one sees you eat it, it has no calories
2. If you drink a diet soda with a candy bar, the calories in the candy bar are cancelled out by the diet soda.
3. When you eat with someone else, calories don't count if you don't eat more than they do.
4. Food used for medicinal purposes never count, such as hot chocolate, toast, and Sara Lee cheesecake.
5. If you fatten up everyone else around you, then you look thinner.
6. Movie related foods do not have additional calories because they are part of the entire entertainment package and not part of one's personal fuel.  Examples: Milk Duds, buttered popcorn, and Tootsie rolls.
7. Cookie pieces contain no calories. The process of breaking them up causes calorie leakage.
8. Things licked off knives and spoons have no calories if you are in the process of preparing something.  Examples: peanut butter on a knife while making a sandwich, ice cream on a spoon while making a sundae.
9. Foods that have the same color have the same number of calories.  Examples: spinach and pistachio ice cream, mushrooms and white chocolate.  (Note: Chocolate is a universal color and may be substituted for any other color).

Locked OUT!

Have you ever gotten in your car, felted in your pockets, and realized you left your keys in the house?  I have many stories, my husband could share, about loosing my keys.  Once I lost them in K-Mart.  I found them in a shoe box in the shoe department.  Long story.  LOL  I've locked myself out of a truck.  Short version.....I was in Crossville.  Robert was in Niota.  Robert's comment after an hour drive.  "Sure is a long way to unlock a door." 

Over the past 15 years I've done much better.  Hahaha That is until Friday.  I was in the morning rush of getting out the door to take my son to school.  My car/house keys were sitting on the kitchen counter.  I go in the kitchen to get them.  Todd, our youngest, digs into his backpack to give me, what appeared to be, a bag of rocks.  I said, "Todd this isn't the time to give me..." And then it happened. The bag had a hole.  EVERYWHERE went the contents of this bag.  Then I discovered it wasn't rocks... it was cereal.  Some kind of Chex like cereal.  Todd gets a paper out with instructions.  "Here Mom, we might want to make this later."  LOL LOL LOL

Todd makes a "Todd effort" to sweep up the rocks, aka cereal, as I leave the kitchen and proceed to go downstairs and head for the car.  Todd runs to catch up. Door is slammed shut, we get in the car, I check for my keys, and....... you guest it.  I left the keys on the kitchen counter.  No need for panic.  We have a spare key in a certain place.  Did I mention it was 22 degrees outside? I went to our hiding place and .... the stinkin key was not there.  "Stinkin" is Greek for "Dad burn".

Now this was about the time I wanted to tell Jesus how much I was grateful for this day and how much I loved my family.  Especially whoever it was that used the key last and didn't put it back.  I sent Todd to look at a couple of other places.  Is it just my boys?  But do all boys not open their eyes when they look for things?  NO key.  Did I say it was 22 degrees outside?

I walked around the house hoping that one of the doors was irresponsibly left unlocked.  Why is it that when you want a door to be left unlocked....they are always locked up tight?  As I walked around the house, I began to pray.  "Lord, I need your help.  I am locked out of the house.  I can not start my car.  It's cold.  I need to take Todd to school.  It's very cold.  I need to attend a water aerobic class.  I need my keys that are in the house.  Help me find a way in the house." 

I told Todd to get back in the car.  The car was just as cold as being outside.  22 degrees is pretty cold.  The time is now 7:35 a.m.  I walk across my yard, through the woods, and in between fence posts to a neighbors house.  I had hoped that maybe they would be able to help.

Any other day I could have called my husband, Robert.  He would have just left for work just as we walked out to my car.  But on this day he was on a business trip, in another state.  I have a friend who has a key to my house, but she and her husband was on a couple's retreat.  What was my friend thinking?  :)  My daughter has a key.  She lives 1 1/2 hours away.  Todd and I were left to freeze.  Probably to death.

I called my husband and hoped that he would let me know of another secret key.  My fingers were getting frost bitten.  Robert had no idea about the key.  He insisted that I just need to look again.  And this time look underneath our spot.  Just get down on the ground.  I reminded him, "There's NO way I can get on the ground.  If I did how in the world could I get up."  I would die laying on the ground...frozen.  It was 22 degrees. 

If I sent Todd to look around, under, or on the ground, I knew I had better odds to send a blind man to search for our spare key.  The neighbor was so sweet.  While her husband was in the shower, while her 19 year old son was still in bed, she came over and said she would look for me.  God love her.  As we both walked back  the between the fence , through the woods, across the yard, she said, "It's really cold out here."  LOL

That dear lady got down on the ground.  She looked, felt, and crawled around.  Then she victoriously yelled, "Is this the key?"  Woohoo!!!! YES!  Thank you Lord.  She even opened the door for me.  I thanked her at least a million times.  Finally the 35 minute freeze was over.

I went straight to the kitchen and there the keys laid.  They were the prettiest "stinkin" keys I had ever seen.

New Direction - Will you come with me?

When my children were preschoolers, I use to write down my thoughts, feelings, devotional inspirations.  I didn't realize I was journalling.  I did it because it caused me to think.  It gave me something concrete to see God's hand and remember how He was working in my life.

I remember those early days of staying at home with my kids.  I chose to stay home but what was happening in the "real" world got loss sometimes.  I wondered if I was doing anything important.  If I was doing anything right.  Mostly I think I wondered if anyone noticed or cared. 

I still have some of those early writings.  When I read over them I see how God was there.  How God's hand guided me, encouraged me, comforted me, and forgave me.  I wondered if I should throw them away?  When I die would I want my kids to read them?

The writings were meant to be between God and myself.  I only have 2 regrets.  One I should have been more honest.  And I should have wrote more.  I couldn't write everything.  We didn't have a computer to store my writings until I was ready to print or post.  So when you're busy "mothering"...things like writing didn't come very often.  I also love to paint.  But after my, then 2 year old, son, Brandon got into my oil paint and smeared in on my bedspread and wall... I had to put my paint aside too.

I started writing a blog a couple years ago.  I now do two blogs.  The second one is a video blog that ministers to women through instruction, helps, and encouragement. (Womanhood GFF) In the past whenever I posted on the Godfreyhouse blog, I wrote my posts more as a devotional of my thoughts.  This year I want to be more diary or personal with my post.  But I've been afraid.

There I've said it.  Fear has been a struggle for me for almost 2 years.  And this fear has made me less confident in myself and some ways in the Lord.  This year I would like to begin the journey of setting myself free from this fear.  Well let me re-phrase that.  I want to allow the Lord to set me free from this stronghold "FEAR". 

                     (Video: Give Me Jesus by Fairview Baptist Choir)

I'm not afraid to die.  I'm not afraid of people.  I'm not afraid of the economy.  I am afraid of situations that have and may still physically hurt me.  (Including unknown medical mysteries.)

Bare with me as I step out and open up.  I'm not looking for approval, praise, or compliments.  I'm looking for freedom.  I know where to go to get it.  I am willing to take the readers of this blog with me. 

That is if you want to go.