The Shafferland Shuffle

* After our busy weekend last weekend {hosting a craft night on Friday and all day shopping extravaganza on Saturday}, we literally had the restiest of all the resty Sundays. Church, leftovers, naps, football, scrapbooking, and of course, Ryan's traditional Sunday evening fare of chips and salsa/queso. Boring blog fodder but one sweet day.

* Monday, I decided to bake some cookies for Ryan, and they turned out to be pretty delicious, I must say! Maple cookies with frosting. Know what was NOT delicious? Tripping over my computer cord and whamming my foot into the ottoman. Ryan and his co-workers diagnosed me with at least one broken toe, and he taped me right up. I hobbled around for the rest of the night before giving up and reading. That seemed safe.

* Tuesday, I did my first podcast interview! {If you missed it, Ryan and I are continuing Spill the Beans every week, but I'm adding an occasional interview podcast to it, and I recorded the first one that day!} That night, we hosted Tuesdays at the Table with some of the very first friends we ever made as a couple! It was a fun night!

* Wednesday was a cold, rainy, miserable day on the outside, but I had a warm and cozy day on the inside while I traveled all around our old hometown of Marion, seeing friends and delivering copies of the Be Still book to people who were doing a little Christmas shopping! It was so much fun to see them. I came home to find the Christmas ornaments I ordered to commemorate our house sale/purchase had arrived, AND Ryan was kind to let the TV stay on Hallmark movies all evening - even if he did mock them. ;) That's just a banner day all the way around.

* Thursday, of course, was Thanksgiving, and this year we spent the holiday with my family. It was a comical day, for sure, as family gatherings always tend to be! When we were done celebrating with them, we went to Ryan's family party for a bit, but it was mostly done by the time we arrived. We had a couple little snacks and came on home to fall into our food comas!

* And when I woke up from my food coma on Friday, hoping to spend the day decking the new halls, I woke up with a crazy sore throat and aching all over. WHAT!?!? Where did THAT come from!? I was MOST unamused. So instead of decorating, I was stuck on the couch, sad that I was too sick to care about anything. By evening, I did feel well enough to at least take down all the fall decor, and Ryan and I spent a quiet evening at home.

* Fortunately, I felt much better yesterday, so while Ryan worked, I began putting up the Christmas trees, and I made a surprising amount of progress, considering I'd lost a whole day of work! When Ryan got home from work, he helped take down the outside fall decorations, and then we went to dinner with some friends - and laughed so hard my face hurt! Definitely a much better day!

Our Thanksgiving

Before I take you on a tour of the Shafferland Thanksgiving, I have a little bonus for you! I mentioned in a Spill the Beans episode a while back that I'd been given the opportunity to do a little interview hosting, just like I did back in my radio days! I'm excited about this, and just as a reminder, it doesn't interrupt the flow of Spill the Beans. It will still keep on keepin' on with Ryan joining me, stories galore, and a lot of fun.

But The Conversation Cafe will pop up now and then too, and in this podcast, I'll have a chance to introduce you to new friends! My very first episode is up today, and I think it's an appropriate day, because my guest is Melissa Hernandez, the owner of Simply Bliss Boutique, and since it's Black Friday, you can listen while you wait in crazy long lines! :) And if you get tired of crazy long lines, you can hop online to shop Simply Bliss!

Hope you enjoy episode 1 of the Conversation Cafe, and I know you're going to love Melissa! :)

Click here to listen.

And now...wanna see Thanksgiving? {Are you even out of your own turkey coma?}

I am because...I don't like turkey! Ha! I bet you can't tell here which plate was mine and which was Ryan's:

This year, we spent Thanksgiving with my family, and Mom put together a delicious lunch! {Ryan vouched for the parts I didn't eat.}

I don't remember what led to these faces, but here we are!!

Have I even told you that I apparently broke a toe (maybe more than one) this week? I get around pretty well most of the time, but I wore cute boots to Thanksgiving and that was a mistake. Back to elevation I went.

 And that's my "bring me my coffee and get out of my way" face. 

My sister Skyped in from Kansas:

And apparently, when it was time for the group pic, Dad wanted to hide.

I thought Julie and I needed a new picture together:

And of course, I can't go without saying again how thankful I am for Ryan and how well he loves me - AND my whole family. He is a blessing!

I told him yesterday that I so well remember the Thanksgiving of six years ago, when I just didn't think life would ever turn around for the better again, but God had a beautiful plan waiting. I am thankful - for the season of hard and the season of beauty!

PS!!! I almost forgot to tell you I bought that shirt from Simply Bliss. I thought it was a good choice for the day!

Happy Thanksgiving/A Little Christmas Shopping

Happy Thanksgiving, my friends!

I'm not going to presume that just because a day has been declared the day of thankfulness that all of you are swelling with profuse thanks today. I've had some years when I would have dearly welcomed a one-day hibernation until this day passed. It was too hard to pretend to be all happy and thankful when life was hard, and I don't even like Thanksgiving food, to boot!

So if today is that day for you, if your heart is heavy for whatever reason, I send a little bloggery hug your way today. It's okay to not be okay. It's okay to struggle to be thankful. It's okay to know you have a million things you should be thankful for, but somehow you can only focus on what brings hurt.

But can I encourage you to find a moment sometime today when you sit until you think of one thing you are thankful for? Genuinely, legitimately thankful for? And then give thanks. It may not change everything, but it might just bring a measure of joy that you hadn't known was still inside you.

I know I told you this last week, but it bears repeating: I am thankful for all of you. You travel this way {some of you every day} to check in on the latest in our world. You love us. You encourage us. You welcome us into your lives with your comments or your own blogs, and I am thankful for you.

Someone else I'm thankful for on this day is the guy who has come to make an annual Christmas shopping trip way more fun than it should be. {Also...every day. He makes every day more fun than it should be.}

But anyway, yes, we did our Christmas shopping last Saturday. We awakened to the first snow flurries of the year, which seemed very appropriate for a Christmas shopping day. It was actually a pretty miserable weather day for driving around and running through parking lots and hauling packages, but that didn't seem to stop the greater population of Indiana from venturing forth to all the stores.

We started with a breakfast date, because everyone knows you can't shop on an empty stomach:

We concluded we looked terrible. TERRIBLE. But then again, it was early.

I was a bit ridiculous with my organization. I had made out lists of everyone we needed to shop for, and I had the whole thing sticky-noted and color coded and hole-punched! I took some ribbing from fellow customers and workers alike, but I stand by my system!

Ryan takes his shopping seriously:

We knocked out a lot of our list that morning {those stories are on the podcast if you missed it}, and then we stopped for a little lunch and blew back to our car:

You should have seen Ryan's hair.

We did more shopping, and at the end of our push/shove through an overcrowded Costco, I told Ryan I just needed a cookie. JUST GET ME A COOKIE.

{Also: somebody get me some lipstick!}

We had the best little date in the back corner of the Panera. Fresh brew and a snacklet.

I was thankful for the cookie, too, by the way.

Ryan, thanks for a fun day out, for dropping me off/picking me up at the doors and carrying the bags. You are a great shopping partner! :)

And thanks for all you do every day. I am so thankful for you! :)

The Saturday Six

One.

Source

Our first year of marriage...well, to be fair, our first MONTH of marriage...included our first time to get a live Christmas tree. Ever. In our lives. About ten days before Christmas, we trekked to a little tree farm about an hour and a half from home, chose a half-priced lopsided leftover from the picked-over farm, took it home, named it Chuck, and that was our first live tree experience. So it's a little different for the 94 foot, 14 ton tree that was transplanted into Rockefeller Center for this Christmas. But HOW COOL to see how they do it! Check it out!


Two.

Source

And speaking of Christmas, if you're in this general area and looking for some fun things to see during the holiday season, The Adventure Mom blog has compiled a list of things to try in Cincinnati. Ryan and I went there for our first birthday getaway, but after reading this list, I may have to put it back in contention for a future anniversary getaway. Some great stuff here! Perfect long weekend getaway destination for Midwestern folks!

Three.

A few days ago, when I blogged about our best purchases of the past year, I included my Fitbit, which Ryan gave me for a birthday present earlier this year. Not long ago, the band on it bubbled up and one side broke free from the mechanism. Thankfully I was asleep when it finally gave way, and I didn't lose it! Earlier this week, we got online and chatted with customer service at Fitbit. They answered quickly, resolved the issue, and put a new Fitbit in the mail to me. {And they no longer make the model I had, so they replaced it with the newest comparable version.} HUGE KUDOS to them for providing a painless fix! Looking forward to wearing a regular Fitbit - not one held together by tape! 

Four.

Source

Still unsettled on your Thanksgiving menu? Need healthy options? Not surprisingly, I'm going to send you straight over to Katie Farrell at Dashing Dish, who has compiled THIRTY (yes, THIRTY!) secretly healthy Thanksgiving menu options. Sometimes the search for the recipe is more exhausting than making it, so this should save you time and exhaustion! :)  

Five.

Source

Anyone gearing up to decorate for Christmas in the next week or so? I am!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Sorry for the overuse of exclamation points, but I just really, really love decorating for Christmas!) Anyway, sometimes it helps to get a little inspiration, so here's a Christmas home tour for you. This is from last year, but Christmas is Christmas, so I don't think it's all bad to recycle last year's home tour. I found multiple inspirations within it. Hope you do, too! :)  

Six.

Source

Before I launch in to my book review this week, I'll confess I had a huge struggle with this book. Rhythms of Rest by Shelly Miller initially caught my eye, because I have a tender place on my soul for the topic of Sabbath rest.


My parents were very careful to set apart the Sabbath day and keep it holy, and in the years that have followed leaving their household, I have spent much time on this issue, figuring out how it works for me and how I want to be intentional to do it. Since getting married, Ryan and I have finally found our best Sunday practices, and I feel our bodies and souls are healthier because of our choices to abstain from all work (and as much social activity as possible) and truly rest on Sundays.

I always enjoy reading what others have learned about Sabbath rest, and that's why I wanted to read this book. And for the first half of it, I found the writing to be captivating, but (and I have never said this about a book before) the presentation of the book itself was off-putting to me. It's not a terribly long book - just over 200 pages, actually - but there was so much text on a page, and the font was such that I felt worn out just picking up the book (on rest!!) to read. It baffled me, because I've read hundreds of books and have never struggled with the font, the words on a page, or anything else. It was very strange. And very probable that it's just unique to me, but I still feel I must admit it.

Then, about halfway through the book, I started struggling with the book itself. Shelly is a good writer, and I enjoyed her thoughts (and even underlined a fair number of things I agreed with). But I felt confused, because it seemed like sometimes her writing style was very lyrical and poetic - almost like Ann Voskamp's - and then other times, I felt like I was reading a cross between her journal and her inbox, while she shared conversational stories from her ministry and actual email conversations with people who read her blog.

The stylistic jumping back and forth eventually lost me. I also saw themes pop up throughout the book but never found their full-circle or resolution moments. Maybe they were there, but I was so lost in all my struggles with the book that I just failed to find them. I'm not sure.

I do think she had some great points throughout the book, even in the final chapters, when I felt lost and confused on the whole, and I underlined several things that I think are worth remembering. But the book, both the literal book, and the jumping around in writing style, confused me. I really wish I would have loved it more. I wanted to! But this just wasn't a fit for me.

* Bethany House sent a complimentary copy of this book to me. All opinions are my own. *

Just Thankful

Thanksgiving rolls around next week, and speaking of rolls...anyone looking forward to indulging in one of those during the holiday meal? My mom is a great roll-maker, and not surprisingly, it's one of the gifts I did not inherit from her. That...and pie making...and candy making. It's all very sad. So whenever she makes a batch of rolls, I like to save a carb up and have one. They're worth it.

But even though we're still a week away from Thanksgiving, it's not too early to be thankful, and I thought today would be a great day to do just that here on the blog!

A few things I'm thankful for...in no particular order:

* This house and the journey to get here. When I think that ten months ago, we had not even stepped foot on the property, and now it feels like we've always lived here, I think that calls for some major gratitude. Everything about finding the house, purchasing it, renovating it, settling into it, and now enjoying it brings about a major swell of joy in my heart.

* Our new city. I wasn't scared about moving to a new city, but I was curious how the transition would go, since I'd lived my entire adult life in Marion. But it's been such a blessing to be closer to our family, to be able to be involved in helping them when they need something, being able to be included in things that we were too far away to be part of before. This place suits us.

* Those who carry the baton. This year we said farewell to the Bekah-mobile and to our first home together. While we try not to be overly sentimental, those things did matter to us, and in both cases, we passed the baton to people who understood the love and care we had put into them and promised to carry that on. And we've heard that both are thriving under new ownership, and that makes us happy.

* Our new church. We have begun attending a church closer to home, and while it was hard to leave the place where we worshiped for the last 3.5 years, we've begun to settle in to our new church home. We're starting to learn names, we've found a seat to call ours, and we've been welcomed and embraced already, which is a huge answer to prayer.

* Phoebe. Since I still haven't convinced Ryan that Shafferland needs a dog, I'm grateful for Phoebe. We get to watch her semi-regularly, and she is such a fun little girl. We love how excited she gets when she sees us, we love how she adores cuddling, and Ryan particularly loves what he calls "joint custody." All the fun without the expense. Maybe that's why he sees no need for a dog of our own...

* New opportunities. This year brought about a host of new opportunities for me. Speaking in new places, writing new material, freelance work, podcasting, working from home, chasing dreams, releasing a new book...WOW! What's not to be thankful for there??

* Tuesdays at the Table. This little idea we conjured up and threw into motion at the end of the year has been such a blessing to us. We have loved actually having time to open our home and welcome in friends and family, and my goodness - do we ever have a growing list of people yet to invite! {And if you want to come visit, give us a holler!}

* Great friends. From those who pitched in to help us with all the aspects of moving, to those who have included us in their happenings this year, to those who keep in touch even though we may live a great distance apart, I'm reminded that we both have many wonderful friends. That is a huge blessing!

* You. Hanging out with you every day when you come to visit is a complete joy. I look forward to talking with you in the comments, hearing your stories, and sharing with you. THANK YOU for coming over so regularly and allowing us to be part of your days!

* Ryan. I can't close out a list (and this is by no means a complete list of what we're thankful for) without including Ryan. I am thankful for how hard he works to provide for us, how he supports me in my dreams and makes me feel like I'm making a difference in our home, and how he shows his love in a million ways. I'm thankful for the dreams we've conjured up for the future and for all the exciting things yet to come!

So that's a few thoughts from my head...now it's your turn! What are you pausing to be thankful for this week?

The Saturday Six

One.

Source

I don't know how many of you are immersed in the adult coloring world {ahem, Shari}, but if you are, here are a couple of pages you can print for Thanksgiving. I know every family does Thanksgiving differently, but if your gathering is the hang-out-all-day-together kind, this might be a fun thing to have on hand for people to do while they wait...for the meal to digest so they can snack again. :)


Two.

I probably should have said this FIRST, but I didn't. I feel it is part of my Shafferland blog duty to remind you that tomorrow is time change day. I still hate everything about changing clocks as a general principle, but at least this is the half of the change when I get more sleep and magically transform into a nicer person!! Three cheers for extra sleep!!!


Three.

Our anniversary is coming up in less than a month, and while I think I know what I'm getting Ryan, I confess that this anniversary has stumped me. I have always gotten a gift that matches the traditional/modern gifts for anniversaries. {First anniversary is paper, and I got a piece of subway art that recounted our first year's adventures. Second anniversary is cotton, and I made a canvas print using a photo from one of our trips and a quote Ryan loves. Third anniversary is leather, and I got him a leather desk caddy which turned into our remote boat. LOL!} The fourth anniversary gift is fruit or flowers, and that is proving quite challenging for a December anniversary. But meanwhile, I stumbled upon this article, which offers some really great suggestions for anniversary ideas in general!

Four.

Source

Hey book lovers!! If you haven't already seen this...check it out!!! A Christian Fiction blog scavenger hunt! It runs through Sunday, so you still have one more day to participate. You start at the first stop {HERE!} and follow the posts...each one will give you the link for the next one. At the end, you enter the message you pick up along the way and you'll have a chance to win great books. And many of the stops along the way have their own extra giveaways. You'll have a chance to meet authors you've maybe never heard of, and learn new fun things about authors you know and love!  

Five.

Isn't this a cute DIY project? The fabric part would be beyond the scope of my skills, but maybe you're smarter than I am!! :)  

Six.

Source

Earlier this year, I read the first book in a new series called Prince Edward Island Dreams. I know. It's obviously a winner already, says this Anne of Green Gables junkie. The book, The Red Door Inn, combined the swoon-worthy island with another swoon-worthy element: a bed and breakfast. I loved the book and literally chomped at the bit for book two to release...which it just did. 

Where Two Hearts Meet picks up shortly after book one ended, and I have a confession to make. I actually fell in love with the cinnamon rolls in the first book. {This is new. I have never before fallen in love with fictional food. When you can make your non-existent FOOD memorable, you're a good author.} And much to my utter delight, they were the first thing featured in book two, chapter one. My mouth is actually watering right now as I write about them.

They were featured because Caden Holt, cinnamon-roll-baker-extraordinaire from book one is the leading lady of book two. Caden had helped her father run his bakery on Prince Edward Island, but now she's the executive chef of the Red Door Inn, treating guests to cinnamon rolls and other culinary delights...though she has no formal culinary training.

The Inn, still new and finding its place in a tourist-laden island, is in financial trouble. It needs a new roof, and of course the recurring bills keep doing what they do best: recurring. The owners, Seth and Marie, are desperate to keep the Inn afloat, and when they get word that a travel writer will be visiting and might feature the Inn in a magazine, they hope against hope that this will fix everything.

Adam Jacobs checks into the Inn for a couple of months and mentions in passing that he's a writer, so Marie and Caden are certain he is the writer. Marie assigns Caden the task of making Adam fall in love with the Inn and the island, but before she can get busy on that, Caden finds herself unexpectedly falling into some feelings of love herself: for Adam.

But no one ever loves Caden. With the big 3-0 looming not too far away, she's aware that she's the awkward and invisible misfit. She hides in the kitchen and impresses with her baking, but no one ever sees her. And someone like Adam would certainly never go for a girl like her. Even if he's forced to spend large quantities of time with her.

But Adam has a few secrets of his own - ones he'd rather not confront, but something about the Island and the girl named Caden makes him begin to do just that.

SO many other things I could tell you about this book and its captivating story, but I won't because then you wouldn't need to read the book. And you do need to read the book.

Maybe it's because I saw so much of myself in Caden...maybe it's because I love bed and breakfasts...maybe it's because I really love cinnamon rolls...maybe it's the lure of the Island...I don't know, but I do know book two was as captivating as book one, and hold me back come summer of 2017: book three is on its way!

* Revell sent me a complimentary copy of this book. All opinions are my own! *

The Saturday Six

One.

Source

I do love a good party theme, and in my world, any party theme involving ice cream is a good party theme. So this triple scoop party was pretty amazing, in my opinion. Good job, Anne!

Two.

Source

I am not a political blogger, and I'm not starting now, but I think this post by Beth Moore is well worth a read. She speaks great truth here. God is sovereign, always has been, and will continue to be in November and beyond. I'm choosing to focus on that.

Three.

Source

I found this idea on Pinterest and the link I found was just for the picture, so I have no idea if there is supposed to be an accompanying post or not, but I LOVE this idea for setting a Thanksgiving table with brown paper for the "cloth" and drawing on the placemats and placecards. It makes my heart happy. {Would make my heart happier if I could actually script like this!} 

Four.

 Source

And for those of you who are already working on Christmas gifts, and you need fun, inexpensive ideas for neighbors or co-workers, here's a whole list of play-on-words, usable gifts you can share!

Five.

Source

Have you had a bad day this week? READ THIS. Sometimes we just need a perspective shift. Thank you, KariAnne! 

Six.

Source

This week I absolutely devoured a novel, and if you like good suspense, you might want to devour it too! {For the record, by "devoured," I mean that I started it one night when Ryan wanted to go to bed early, but I wasn't tired, and I pretty much canceled life the next day to finish it.}

Irene Hannon's latest romantic suspense, Tangled Webs, is the third and final book in the Men of Valor series. I did not read the first book, but I caught the second one, Thin Ice, earlier this year. As I mentioned in my review then, I continue to be amazed at Irene's fiction-writing talent. She can crank out a thriller like the ones in this series, and she can just as masterfully deliver sweet small-town romance stories like the ones in her Hope Harbor series that I also just adore.

Tangled Webs focuses on the youngest of the McGregor brothers {each book in the series focuses on a different brother} - Finn. After six years as an Army Ranger, Finn is discharged following a horrible mission in the Middle East that nearly ends his life, and he decides to take a month off to spend in solitude in the woods to try to mentally regroup and figure out his next life moves.

Solitude comes to a literal screeching halt when he hears screaming in the middle of the night and meets his neighbor-in-the-middle-of-nowhere, the lovely young Dana Lewis, who is battling through nightmares of her own. She's come to the woods seeking solitude and fresh starts, too, but mysterious happenings on her late grandfather's property spook her and intrigue Finn.

Investigating the odd {and dangerous} happenings proves challenging for the two non-natives of the area, but all the time spent together also ignites more than healing in their hearts and minds. As they chase truth and answers, they also chase one another toward a renewed faith in the Lord and chance at trusting enough to love.

Suspense, ethical dilemmas, danger, faith, love...they're all tangled in the web of this book, which I found impossible to put down and surprising to the end!

* Revell provided a copy of this book to me at no charge. All opinions are my own, and I was not required to give a favorable review. *

The Saturday Six

One.

Am I allowed to start with a prayer request? I have one! I am speaking at another women's retreat this weekend, talking on the same topic I presented last month in Ohio. As I have mentioned on here a couple of times already, I've been fighting an annoying cold for the past couple of weeks, and while I feel significantly better than I did, I am still not in the "well" category. I need to be able to present {without sounding horrific} two times today and one time in the morning. {One session is already done.} I would completely welcome your prayers as I speak! And because I know firsthand how important this topic is, I would welcome your prayers for those attending, too. This one does not seem to go without a battle!}


Two.

Source

For a while now, I have been following the adoption journey of blogger Nicole and her husband. They battled infertility and began an adoption journey, and then found out they were pregnant. They were recently matched with a birth mama and drove to get their baby right after he was born, and the mama changed her mind and kept the baby. They're caught in the place of grieving the son they lost and anticipating the daughter to come so shortly...and Nicole's faith through it all is inspiring. She's writing a series on the attributes of God for Write 31 Days this month, and if you've not seen it, I want to point you to it. 

Three.

Source

I read this article this week and have to brag on Ryan for just a moment. He does this. He sees people as people. If we go out to eat, he makes a point to learn the waitress's name on her first stop at the table, and he calls her by name every single time she comes back. He does ask the cashier how his or her day is going and proceeds to make actual conversation from the answer, not just shrug and call the conversation done. As a girl who is ridiculously terrible with names and generally hides to avoid divulging that fact to waitresses and cashiers, I have to say what he does, and what this article suggests really matters. 

Four.

Source

You know of my undying love for all things photo booth related. So even though I know Thanksgiving is over a month away, I wanted to share this now for those of you who might be planning ahead. FUN!!!!

Five.

Source

At our Bible study meeting this week, we talked about how important it is to teach Bible verses to kids while they're little, because we've noticed that the verses we know the best are the ones we learned early. It just gets harder for most adults to memorize as adults. So I found this list of 25 suggested verses to teach your kids while they're young. I wanted to pass it on for those of you with little ones at home!!

Six.

Source

Last year, right about this time, I read the book The Road to Becoming by Jenny Simmons. I was extremely excited to learn that she actually signed a deal to write more than one book, and the second one, Made Well, just released. {It's been kind of a big month of Jenny: a book and a new baby! Lots of births! Lots of celebration!}

Jenny writes with such a beautiful heart and no reservation. She'll tell you honest stories about herself, even if they're scary to share. She'll pull wisdom out of them and write it out for you to see, so you can nod your head and realize that wisdom hides in an awful lot of places. And the blend of these two things causes Made Well to be a treasure, in my opinion.

Made Well works two ways. It's a good reminder that as people made in the image of Almighty God, we are indeed made well. It's also a reminder that we live in a broken, broken world, but if we desire to see it happen, we can be made well. {See what she did there??}

Filled with stories from the scope of her life, this book makes Jenny incredibly relatable, even though most of us will never live the kind of life she leads. Not long ago, I read a series of book reviews for a recent release by a pretty well-known author. I noticed a common thread in the review: readers felt like they couldn't relate to the author because her life was filled with privileges that the common readers wouldn't connect with. You won't find that issue in Made Well, because even though Jenny travels and sings and writers {which most of us don't do}, it's not been a smooth journey. The path of service the Lord has called her to hasn't been easy, and while the details may differ from her journey to ours, it's clear that she gets it. She gets the struggle and she's slogging through the trenches with us.

Multiple times as I read, I stopped to read out loud to Ryan, because the things she said fit so perfectly with what we're learning in our small group study or conversations we've had in recent days. Affirmation poured over us as she said what we'd been trying to say...only she said it better.

The wounds for Jenny run deep: the plague of lifelong, debilitating anxiety, the loss of people dear to her heart, the disappointment of a career that didn't do what she hoped, the confusion of trying to parent well so her daughter is strong and well-equipped for life, the exhaustion of trying to keep up with it all and be all things to all people.

But the gifts of healing for Jenny run just as deep: story after story of God's provision in unexpected ways, the glimpse of this story He's weaving with all our lives interconnecting, the reminder to look for Him in the most obscure places.

I dearly loved this book and will treasure it as a permanent resident in my library. I'm grateful for the reminder that someone else struggles in ways similar to mine, and I'm grateful for the reminder that God is very much at work in our world today. {How much we need to know that right now!!}

Thank you, Jenny, for being so transparent with your life and for writing deep wisdom, coupled with compelling stories. You were made well...and you are being made well. I'm grateful for both!

* Thanks to Baker Books for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. *