Today’s little miracle: Ellie smiling in a photo with Charlie 👯♀️ The greatest miracle of all: Jesus is RISEN!! 🙌🏼 Happy Resurrection Sunday! He is alive!!! 
What does it mean to let the Lord lead? ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ It’s something I pray for every day - for the Lord to lead us in our life and business. But what does it actually look like on a daily basis? ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ For so long, the idea of God leading me felt a little lofty. I mean, the idea of Him nudging me in a general direction of “be a good person” was fairly easy to wrap my head around - of course He wants me to be a good person. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ But the notion that our God, the Creator of the ENTIRE universe, cares enough about me personally to guide and provide for me every single day - in all of the big AND little ways - that was a little harder to understand. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Why would He care what I work on today? How I spend time with my children? What I eat or how I take care of my body? Where we live or how we keep our home? ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ It all felt a little too self concerned. Surely God had bigger things to worry about. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Did it really make a difference what I do in the every day moments if I’m on those general path of being a “good person”? ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ The problem with that thinking is that at the end of the day, God doesn’t just want us to be a good person. He wants us to be redeemed. To live in the fullness of life as a child of God. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ I had to ask myself: If I really believe God is who He says He is, then why wouldn’t He care about every single detail of our lives? Why was I placing my own limits on what God could do when all I have to do is look around our world to see the infinite wonder of what He is capable of? ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ He cares about the details of our lives. He is with us in EVERY moment. He wants us to worship and honor and glorify Him in every single thing we do, every single day. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ And I don’t want to miss a moment of living in the fullness of life and power that comes from knowing our Father. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Thank you Lord that there is nothing too big or too small for you 🙌🏼 there is no place where your love can’t reach! ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Anyone else struggle with praying about or letting God lead in the little things? 🙋🏻♀️ 
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes...” ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ This is my current memory verse (Romans 1-16) — and it’s been weighing on my heart this entire week. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ There was a time in my life where this verse would’ve been hard for me to share, let alone live out. There is so much that can feel uncomfortable about sharing my faith and the life-changing power of the gospel, especially in our world and culture. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ But then I think about what the gospel is - it quite literally means Good News. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Because that’s what it is. It’s the greatest news we could ever share. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ In a world oversaturated with noise and news that doesn’t matter, shouldn’t we be bursting at the seams to share the news that changes lives and impacts eternity? ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ What I’m realizing is, the more time I spend reading the Bible, the more time I spend with God, the more and more my seams are starting to burst. I can’t hold it in, and I don’t want to. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ I’m not ashamed of the gospel. It’s changed my entire life, and it can change yours too. 
Confession: I used to have a separate, anonymous Instagram account. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ It was a space for me to freely share my faith as a new Christian, without all of the fear of “what will they think” - I had no problem pouring my heart out to strangers on the internet, but it was the fear of what the people in my life would think that stopped me from sharing on my personal accounts. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Because surely, anyone who knew me before I found Jesus would know I’m a fake. They know who I was. How I lived. How I grew up. The mistakes I’ve made. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ They’ve seen my sin, and I was too scared of their judgment to also let them see the transformation of what Jesus was doing in my life. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ This time of Lent always brings me back to those moments - when all I wanted was to share the life change and hope and love I was experiencing from my relationship with Jesus, but I was too scared of what the world would think. I told myself it was too soon. That maybe later I’d have the courage, but for now I was far too imperfect and didn’t know nearly enough yet. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ That’s when I realized: it was never about what I knew then (or what I know now). ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ It’s about WHO I know. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ And I know that He’s changed everything. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ So how can I not share? ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ ____ For anyone else who struggles with people pleasing, this verse always hits home for me: “For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.” - Galatians 1:10 
Getting serious about my garden this year 😍🙌🏼 ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Last year by some miracle, I didn’t kill all of my plants and fell in love with gardening. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ I had only planted a little haphazard box at the house we were renting and i planted waaaaay too many plants too close together (it looked like Jurassic park with my tomato plants 😂), but cultivating that tiny little garden brought me SO much joy. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ When we found our new home and saw that the previous owners had a garden already marked out, it made my heart so happy - this year, I’m going to become a gardener! 👩🏻🌾 ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ I found such a peace and purpose in bringing my little seeds to life and to our plates last year - so I can’t wait to start planning a more intentional, functional, and beautiful garden this year 🌱 ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ All gardening tips welcome! ❤️