God's Design

This post is mature in nature. Fair warning!
About 6 months ago, we wrapped up a series at church called Lovers. It was virtually a series on sex...got your attention now? I strongly encourage you to go check it out here.

The series really gripped me. While I'm not married or dating anyone, it spoke to me so deeply.

[I'm going to get pretty transparent here]

I am a 33 year old virgin. (Yes, we do exist). However, my thoughts and actions haven't always been as pure as I would have liked for them to be and I justified things because I wasn't having sex. That's the important thing right? [cough, cough]

Of course there are some things I regret, but I know I serve a God who has long forgiven me for those things the moment I confessed them.

But then I heard something that put it all into perspective.

[Get ready...here comes the "mature" stuff!]

When God created us, he hardwired our brains (literally) to be physically matched with one person. Meaning when we experience sexual release (the big "O"...can you believe we talked about this in church?!) our brains are hardwired, linked, connected to that person.  However, when we experience that with someone (or something) other than our spouse, our brain does the exact same thing but it connects to the act...not a person. This is why affairs, pornography, etc are so addicting because you begin chasing the act, not a person. The experience, not your spouse, is imprinted in your brain.

God's way is so much better than the short term, temporary pleasures.  Thank you God for your design.  Your good and perfect design!

Friends

Just a little laughter to brighten up your Monday. Some of my all time favorite scenes from my all time favorite show, Friends.











Did your favorite make the list?

Fractured Fairy Tales

We just finished up a series at church called Fractured Fairy Tales.  It has been a godsend.  Such a timely message for me.  Here's a little teaser for you:

Fractured Fairy Tales: Coming August 8 2010 from Mountain Lake Church on Vimeo.

My fairy tale is definitely not how I had pictured it would be.   While my life has been nothing short of blessings after blessings, I can tell you right now that I didn't expect to still be single at 33 (almost 34...gulp).  That's not the way the fairy tale works, right?  I'm supposed to be married by now.  I'm supposed to be serving in ministry with my husband.  And I'm pretty sure I should have a couple of kids by now.

But I'm not the only one with fractures.

During this series, we looked at different Bible characters who had some major fractures in their fairy tale.  

But the characters who stood out to me the most were 3 guys who had a fracture in their fairy tale.  And in comparison, my fractures seem like a tiny crack.

Shadrach, Meshach & Abednego were 3 friends who faced the biggest fracture of their lifetime.  When they were forced to choose between obeying the king or honoring God, they chose God.  But this came at a price...their life.

The king ordered them to be thrown into the furnace.  The furnace was so hot, that the guards transporting them to the furnace were burned alive in the process.

Imagine walking to your death.  Knowing you're going to be burned alive...all for the cause of Christ.  That must have been the longest walk ever.  Ever.   

Now, we all know that fairy tales end with "happily ever after".  Right?  So how wonderful would it have been if God came down during that long walk to the furnace and rescued Shadrach, Meshach, & Abednego?  Talk about a "happily ever after"!  

But then comes the fracture.

No rescue.  No knight on a white horse.  These three were thrown into the furnace.  

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were thrown INTO the fire, then God showed up.   

He showed up!  IN the fire.  He met them where they were.  He walked around with them.  He was present with them.

Sometimes God delivers us FROM the furnace, but sometimes He delivers us IN the furnace.

Those three boys walked out of that furnace with no physical reminders of where they had been.  No burns, no smell of smoke, not a hair was singed.  The only thing they left with was an amazing testimony of God's faithfulness.

And that's what I take away.   In the midst of my "furnace" of loneliness, HE is with me.  HE is walking with me.  HE is present with me.

If I just take my eyes off of the flames, then I'll see Jesus! 

If you have fractures in your fairy tale, I highly recommend watching the Fractured Fairy Tales series here.

Saturday Stumbles

It always seems that most of the posts I stumble tend to be food! And this week is no different....although there is a random party idea post at the end!

Wingless Buffalo Chicken Pizza -- Eaten to rave reviews!
Cream Cheese Chicken Enchiladas -- I'm a sucker for any kind of mexican food!
 Chipotle Chicken Pasta -- Can't wait to try this one.
Chicken & White Bean Stuffed Peppers -- Yum!
{apparently there's a chicken theme going on here!}
Twirly Lemon Cookies -- Because there's always room for dessert!
Cupcake in a Cup -- SUPER cute (and cheap) gift idea that looks more elaborate than it really is!
Gender Reveal Party -- This is just the cutest (yes, I realize I over use that word) thing yet.  Take note that I WILL be doing this...one day ;)
For more Saturday Stumbles, visit It's Come 2 This.

Top Ten Tuesday - Worship Songs

Music is such a powerful tool of worship for me. My commute to work is an hour round trip, so I spend that time in worship...inside my CRV! I've had some powerful times in that 4 wheeled sanctuary and lately it's been my life line!

So I wanted to share with you the top 10 worship songs that are playing on my ipod right now:

1. How He Loves by Kim Walker
2. The Stand by Hillsong United
3. Everything Falls by Fee
4. Jesus Paid it All by Kristian Stanfill
5. You Never Let Go by Matt Redman
6. Your Great Name by The People's Church

7. Revelation Song by Kari Jobe
8. Our God by Chris Tomlin

9. You Alone Can Rescue by Matt Redman

10. Beautiful Mystery by Telecast


For more Top Ten Tuesdays, visit Oh Amanda!

Dating Diaries

Dating is not easy.  Ok, that's an understatement.  My experiences with online dating have been less than desirable.

Today I had one of those less than desirable experiences.  A guy asked me out.  Sounds exciting, right?  Let me back up...

I'm a science teacher and today was one of our professional learning days where all the science teachers from the county come together for workshops.  I was a presenter for one of the workshops.  My workshop was an activity I do with my kids called Survivor Science.  It's a lot of fun and for my workshop we did a mock version of what I do with my kids.

There was this one guy who kept giving me grief on everything.  Questioning everything I did, rolling his eyes, and just being an overall smart aleck.  His team didn't win the activity so he wanted to see which ones he had missed and why he missed them.  He emphatically pointed out that I had made some mistakes in grading his team's paper.
Are you kidding?  Do you understand that's not *really* the point of this workshop??  Geesh!

So imagine my surprise when he came up to me at the end of the workshop. The conversation goes like this:
Baldy (yes, he looked like Mr. Clean): How old are you?
Me: 33
Baldy: Ok, please don't take this as sexual harrassment or anything [what the heck is about to come out of your mouth?!?!] but are you dating anyone?
[I wish you could see my jaw drop to the floor.]
Me: uh...kinda  [I wasn't quite sure how to answer that...that's another blog post!!]
Baldy: Well, I'd love to take you out for coffee or to a ball game or something.  Here let me give you my email.  [My face probably said it all because then he said...] You can throw it away after I leave, but I'd love to hear from you.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?  You spent the whole workshop complaining about everything I did and now you want to take me out?!

Am I in the twilight zone?

Needless to say the paper he wrote his email on never made it out of the room with me.

Winner of the Imprint Mat

Head on over to Simply Staci Reviews to see who the lucky winner is!

Imprint Mat Giveaway

Wouldn't it be great to have one of these Imprint Mats in your house? Go to Simply Staci Reviews to find out how you can win one for free!

Saturday Stumbles

Here's what I stumbled this week: (and most of them are food!)

Smores Bars

 Pina Colada cupcakes

 White Chocolate Kit Kat blondies 

Zucchini Bites

 White Chocolate Blueberry blondies

 For more Saturday Stumbles, go visit Its Come To This.

Top Ten Tuesday - What's Kept Me Busy This Summer

This time of year is definitely one of the biggest perks of being a teacher!  My summer's are usually pretty busy.  I'm half way through my summer and things have finally started settling down.  So my top ten list is all the things that have kept me busy so far:

1. Camp Rocks

2. Brown-Looney-Thornton Reunion
     We haven't all been together in years.  They are very dear friends and we had so much fun spending time together.

3. Performing Arts Camp
   This is kind of like a vacation bible school but cooler!  The kids take performing arts type classes (drama, dancing, singing, acting, set design, etc) and work all week putting on a full length play that they perform at the end of the week.  Amanda and I taught several classes.  They were...uh...interesting.

This was our clowning class.  We loved it and the kids in it.  They cracked us up!

This class was a choreography class to one of the songs in the play.  This picture is crazy (kind of like the kids in it!).  The kids did really good with their choreography, but Amanda and I turned our backs for literally 5 seconds to discuss something and we turn around and they are literally climbing the walls.

4. Making my own deodarant
   After reading this post, I decided to try it out for myself.  I have to say that I'm happy with the outcome.  I left out the sea salt that she added, though because I don't sweat that much.

5. Movies
    I don't get out to see many movies unfortunately, but my old roommate and I (with her husband) went to see Date Night.  We loved it!  We laughed the whole time. 

6. Blueberry picking
   This was definitely a first for me!  My sister and I decided to go pick blueberries at Mercier Orchards and we loved it!  What we didn't love was the scorching temperatures.  Oh my gosh, it was so stinkin' hot!  The blueberries were delicious and they were huge!!  My little niece ate more than we picked.

7. Beach trip!
   It's not summer to me without a trip to the beach.  Our family goes to the beach every summer and we have been for over 20 years.  We always go with another family who I considered to be my extended family. 

8. Lots of pool time at my parent's house

So that brings me up to today.  I've got about another month left of my summer and still more stuff to do:
9. Two baby shower cakes and birthday cupcakes for my niece and nephew.
10.  Another possible mini vaca with one of my old college roommates!

For more Top Ten Tuesday, go visit OhAmanda.

Flashback Week

Today is the final day of Flashback Week here at Simply Staci.  For the rest of the Flashbacks, scroll back through the last 7 posts.  You're in for a real treat.

So this last picture is another birthday party picture that I actually threw myself!  I wanted to enter into my 30's with a bang!  And what better way than to do it disco style!

It was so much fun and guests were encouraged to dress up in their best 70's attire.  These are 3 guys that are all practically like little brothers to me.  In fact, the guy to my right, Wes, was in the first Flashback photo probably like 6 or 8 years old!

At my party, I had a photo op station, a kids area, and on the table were retro games like Connect 4, Etch-a-Sketches, Slinkies and Silly Putty.

Thanks for hanging out with me this week.  I hope you've enjoyed seeing some crazy pictures as much as I've enjoyed reminiscing.

Flashback Week

We're winding down Flashback Week here at Simply Staci.  Today we're gonna go back in time to the days of pirates and go-go dancers.  When was that?  Well, that was Halloween a few years ago!

This is myself and Amanda at our old church's annual Pumpkin Patch Party.  Don't really need any more description than that!  I will say, though, that I have gotten so much use out of those boots!  No lie!

Flashback Week

Today's Flashback takes us back to the college years.  To see earlier Flashbacks, scroll down below.

This picture was taken after a long, grueling, intense initiation for my sorority, Sigma Nu Sigma.

I didn't know these girls before that weekend, but going through everything we went through really bonded us in a way that I won't forget.  I absolutely loved being involved in a greek club at college.  I went to a small christian school, Lee University, so I know our initiation must have been a walk in the park compared to some of them out there.  We had so much fun, though!  Well, I can say that now that it's been almost 10 years!  Believe it or not, I actually still keep up with almost all of them.

Can you spot me?  I'm on the back row with the dark hair.

More Flashbacks headed your way!

Flashback Week

Moving on through the portals of time...

Today's flashback is a doozie!

This was my best friend's 16th birthday party.  We got all dressed (in dresses we found in the attic of our church...no lie) and went downtown to eat.

Sooooo many things worth commenting on in this picture.  We'll start left to right...

• This is yours truly.  Oh to be that skinny again!  The sleeves are so big and puffy I'm surprised I didn't take flight!  The hair...really?  I couldn't have done something with it?
• In the middle is Amanda.  Please notice her hemline...the Leaning Tower of Pisa.  The white hose that perfectly match the white complexion of ALL of us!  But I think the wide rimmed glasses top it all off!
• Finally there's Mandi.  The hairstyle is out of this world.  I need to get the name of that hairdresser!  Her and Amanda must have gone eye glass shopping together.  But the classiness is the brown hose with cream shoes!  

Ahh...we were stylin'!  Scroll down to see more Flashbacks and don't worry...there's still more to come!

Flashback Week

We are half-way through Flashback Week here at Simply Staci.  Scroll down to see the other days you've missed.  You'll be glad you did!

This picture is very sentimental to me.  We were at our youth group's Back-to-School retreat.  From left to right the girls are Mandi, Amanda, and me.  The man is Matt Willetts.  He was our church's associate pastor. 

Matt was not at our church very long, but in the short time he was, he took the 3 of us under his wing.  He was probably the funniest man I've ever met, and had us laughing all the time!  Matt passed away about 4 months later from cancer.  I think about him often and miss him deeply.

But I remember him every year on his birthday, March 4, because he said it was the one day soldiers hated..."march forth!"

More Flashbacks to come!

Flashback Week

This week I'll be taking a trip down memory lane in old pictures.  Scroll down to see yesterday's.

Today's picture is truly a blast from the past!  I remember this like it was yesterday.  It was my 16th birthday and my parents had thrown me a surprise party.  To this day it was one of my most favorite birthdays of all! 

Introductions:  From left to right we have Mandy, Kristen, Mandi, Amanda, Me, Bethany, and Becky.  We have all been lifelong friends.  That is so rare and that's why I truly love these girls!  With the exception of Bethany, the rest of us stay in regular touch with each other.  We go on trips, girls nights out, and have an all around good time!

Ok, now on to the picture.  There are several things to point out here:

• The hair - apparently dark hair was in.  Or maybe it was just au natural.
• The biggness of the clothes - The bigger, the better.  Nothing that showed you actually had shape!
• How high are my jeans??
• We all just look like we're having a good time! (except for Mandi's poor hand being crumpled up).

Stay tune for tomorrow's Flashback!

Flashback Week

If there's one thing I love, it's sharing old stories!  Songs, smells, sayings...all can take me back in a second and I have such great memories of growing up.

So this week, I want to share some of those with you.  Each day will be be a different picture...and you just might see yourself in it!

This is probably the oldest one.  It's Easter Sunday at my old church.  This picture wasn't actually taken at the church because we were in the middle of building a new church and in the mean time held services at a local high school.  Every Sunday morning, my dad and several other men of the church would have to roll out huge carpet rolls, set up chairs, sound equipment, choir risers, sunday school rooms...an entire church!

In this picture is me (pink dress with enormous pilgrim collar), my sister (in country blue with enormous ruffles) and my 2 younger brothers in front of us.  Clint is covering his eyes from the sun and Matt is looking off into space.  The other 2 boys are some dear family friends of ours.  They are practically like brothers to me.  Paul (in the back) and Wes (struttin' his stuff in the front).

Stay tuned for more flashbacks tomorrow!

Photo Meme Game

My friend Jenn from {delightfully.cliche.} tagged me in this fun photo meme game.

 This is me and my old roommate, Amber.  We were at Screen on the Green at Centennial Park.  It's where they play movies in the park during the summer.

Go to the 8th folder where you store your photos, select the 8th photo, post it to your blog and tell the story, then tag 8 other people to do the same!

So, I tag...


~Lauren from Walk with me on this journey called life
~Aishlea from Excursions of the Spurgins
~Kristin from Deeply in Love 
~Leigh from HopefulLeigh
~Josie
~Rebekah from Rebekah's Bits & Pieces
~Sarah from The Stephens Family
~Jayme from Stripes, Dots, & What Nots!

Saturday Stumbles

Here's what I stumbled this week:

Make Some Tracks: Next time your kids say they're bored, this will be the perfect cure!

Flag Cake: Easy trick to design any cake.

Birthday Book: Love this birthday book idea for your kids each year.

Memory book: Cute book to chronicle the year.

Survivor Party: How fun is this Survivor party for you and your friends?!

Linked to Its Come To This.

4tunate $4 friends

If you're not reading Jen Murray and her adventures over at 4tunate, then you are missing out! If you think your life is crazy or out of control, just click on over and read about what it's like raising quadruplet toddlers!

Anyone who can parent 4 toddlers, raise over $2,500 to support March of Dimes, give to others when she doesn't have much to give, and still have time to skype, blog and tweet with her friends...

...IS AN AMAZING WOMAN!

Recently, she and her family have experienced some trying times.

Her family was riddled with illness. Can you imagine trying to take care of 4 toddler boys while you weren't feeling well?  Her mother-in-law was diagnosed with breast cancer, progressive breast cancer. They wait for news on what is next. And it was discovered that her father is having a relapse with prostate cancer. 

We all experience tough times. Perhaps you are going through them right now yourself. And when your friends have gathered around you with prayers, support and encouragement you know the uplifting effects it has on your life.

Some of Jen's friend want to rally around her and help make things a tad bit easier.  Click below to read more awesome posts about Jen!

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If you're interested in helping this amazing woman, we're collecting $4 donations...that's it.  FOUR DOLLARS.  ALL money raised will go directly to Jen and her family! If you can swing $4, please click on the "Donate" button below!