The Shafferland Shuffle

An OFFICIAL happy birthday to Ryan!! Today is the day, and I'm excited to celebrate him all day long. {He's still getting used to the overdone birthday traditions. But he's a good sport.} I'm also looking forward to a day of celebration because this past week has been a rough one. Lots of little hiccups along the way that when added up, have exhausted us.

But here are some of the prettier parts of our week together!

* Last Sunday we stopped by our old house one more time {maybe?} to pick up a couple of things we'd accidentally left behind. Ryan needed some mental creativity time, which for him comes in the form of organizing, so he organized the garage while I sat next to our big stack of broken down boxes and played with computer projects. And we got to take a walk and enjoy a stunning sunset! Not a shabby Sunday!

* Several years ago, my dad built me some huge bookshelves for my office, and Ryan took them apart so we could transplant them to the new house. Monday I spent most of the day in the garage, running from makeshift-sawhorse to makeshift-sawhorse, painting all the shelves so he could put them back together! And on the drying-time breaks, I sat with Ryan, who was still working on his stone wall. He was determined to complete it THIS WEEK. House projects continue!

 * Tuesday, Ryan put the bookshelves back together for me, so I could unpack allllllllllll the boxes of books {that is a LOT of boxes} and get them organized on the shelves. It made me so happy to have all the books back where they belong! Also, to try to be a helper, I offered to mow the yard {which is normally Ryan's job} and he took me up on my offer. It turns out our lawn mower is NOT self-propelled, and by the end of the mowing adventure, I was smelly, sweaty, and pooped!

* I had to run errands on Wednesday, so that took me all over the place {including a stop for coffee and a chat with a friend who is about to move away}, and when I got home, I resumed work on the assembly of the office. Offices and garages take forever because there are so many tiny pieces to them. Ryan continued working on the wall, which was coming together SO nicely.

* Thursday was one of those why-bother-getting-ready days, because I spent the WHOLE day working on the office, taking a break only when our sister-in-law stopped by {with niece and nephews in tow} to visit for a while. I accomplished so much, and that night, I addressed all our change-of-address cards while Ryan {guess what?} worked on the wall. In a twist that neither of us expected, we were able to install the counter top ourselves, and we LOVED the way it turned out!

* Friday, my friend Amber and I spent some time together. {She's helping me know what flowers to plant in our new spaces.} She took me to a big, beautiful greenhouse and I found a goose to replace the one the old owners took with them. {Kidding.} And that night, Ryan worked SO HARD to knock out the living room portion of the stone project. Last stone in place!

* Last night we began the celebration for Ryan's birthday! His Dad and Lynn stopped by to see him and then we went to dinner with his Mom and Allen - at Tucano's, per Ryan's request. He was in a bit of a meat heaven followed by a meat coma. LOL! Delicious food and a fun evening!

The Saturday Six

One.

Last week, my friend Kari came to see our {still messy} new house. She was part of our takes-a-village team of people who helped make this move possible. We appreciated her finding boxes for us from the kitchen of her workplace so our packing could move along at the necessary breakneck speed! Wanted to get her a little token of thanks {truly not enough to say thanks} and thought it turned out pretty cute! {That's a banana split cake, by the way. I did not make it. It turns out there's a killer bakery in town. Someone help me now.}


Two.

Several weeks ago, I wrote a couple of posts {here and here} on the Dignity Project, which is a ministry that provides reusable pads to women who otherwise have no way of living a normal life during their periods. This week, the missionary that receives and distributes theses posted this update, and I wanted to share it with you, because some of what she said, just blew my mind:

"With every "yes" that I say to Jesus, He takes me further and further into the outer edges of society. I first brought The Dignity Project to boarding school children, then orphans, then impoverished village women, then prisoners and now the mentally ill. It's been a progressive movement to the outside.
Today I spent my day in the largest psychiatric hospital in Uganda. Over 650 people find refuge there. Men and women who are survivors of genocide, war, human trafficking, abuse, trauma and neglect fill the wards. "These people are shunned from society. They feel utterly forgotten," my friend shared.
Soon after I arrived I found the staff making sanitary pads for the patients out of cotton and gauze. I was so happy to see first hand what the women normally use. It really is quite a creative use of medical supplies! As you can imagine, the patients and staff were absolutely thrilled to receive new reusable sanitary pads that don't leak and last years with proper care.
After one woman received the first pair of underpants she has had in SEVEN years she started dancing. I was so moved by her joy I started dancing with her! It was a taste of Heaven dancing in her celebration! I am telling you, it was as if she won the lottery. The ladies could not believe the care and detail that was put into these Dignity Kits made by you all! I am so proud of you!
Next week I have the honor of going back to the hospital to train a group of 12 women how to make our Dignity Kits. Several of the women are soon to be resettled back into their communities and want to make them for a sustainable income.
There have been times when I have been ashamed to tell people what my job is here. I usually say something like, "I am a reusable sanitary pad missionary of sorts". Today I have never been more proud of my title."

Three.

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One of the things Ryan and I are hoping to do in our new life/town/home is entertain more. And this blog post about a weekly supper club just made my heart sing! 

Four.

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I'm a huge advocate of Katie Farrell and her Dashing Dish website. Ryan and I eat many of her recipes, and I really appreciate her approach to clean eating and body image. {Be sure to check out her story if you're not familiar with her, so you can understand why she's so passionate about this!} Anyway, she just released a free guide to clean eating, which explains a bit about what it is and offers ideas for both homemade and store-purchased foods that fit this category. If the whole concept just sounds trendy and confusing to you, check out her free download!

Five.

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This week, I not only had the chance to read a book to share with you, but I watched a movie to tell you about, too! 


Ryan and I don't often GO to the movies, because we're too cheap to pay ticket prices, but we do love to watch movies at home, whether we rent them or watch them when they air on TV. A couple of weeks ago, FishFlix {a company specializing in Christian DVDs} asked if I'd like to review a movie for them. They sent me one titled Virtuous, and Ryan and I watched it together this week while working on our house projects. 

The movie tells the story of Simone Burner, a young woman who is assaulted one night after walking home from work. She shoots her attacker in self-defense, and finds herself arrested, facing trial, and opposed by a corrupt prosecutor determined to use her unsavory past against her. 

The movie is a little over two hours long and has a large cast of characters whose stories are wildly different, but intertwined together. {In that respect it reminded me of movies like New Year's Eve or Valentine's Day with so many connected story lines.} It took me a good portion of the movie to figure out how they were all connected, and a flashback toward the beginning further confused me, because I wasn't sure how many more flashbacks to expect or how that one fit with the present day activity. At times, it felt like there were so many story lines that the action was all over the place and hard to follow. Ryan commented on that several times while we watched.

I appreciated that Virtuous was not as predictable as some movies in this genre can be, but the acting wasn't as top notch as you would find in mainstream movies. Again, that wasn't a big distraction to me, because I somewhat expected it, but it did bug Ryan. While it wasn't as much of a focal point as I expected from the synopsis on the cover, the movie focused on the {important!} message that all women have worth, regardless of their past, their age, or their occupation. Even though the plot centered around a murder and featured women turning their lives around from all sorts of past behavior, they did not show any of the violence or other behavior on-screen, and the language was clean, keeping the movie family-friendly.

While this movie may not have been my favorite, because of the confusing story line and the quality of acting, I did see some previews at the beginning for other movies that caught my interest, and I was glad to be introduced to a company I'd not previously been familiar with that is a resource for entertainment with a gospel message behind it. {And for those of you with kids, they do have many kids' movies to choose from!} 

My thanks to Fish Flix for providing Virtuous for me in exchange for a review!


Six.

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I've told you before that I like to switch up the kinds of books I read to get a well-rounded reading experience. This week was no different. I read One Dress. One Year. by Bethany Winz with Susanna Foth Aughtmon. 


Bethany was sixteen years old when she decided to do something tangible and entirely out of her comfort zone in order to help raise awareness about modern day slavery. She'd learned in junior high that slavery wasn't something that happened only way back in the olden days, but it was {sadly} alive and well at this very moment. Sickened by the idea of humans treating other humans in such a degrading way, she wanted to do something.


So she made a black dress and wore it every single day for one year. Talk about the ultimate capsule wardrobe! During that year, Bethany blogged about her adventure, shared {sad but true} facts about modern day slavery, and challenged readers to give money to reputable organizations working to end trafficking. 

The book is a quick read {just 146 pages} and part of each chapter shares excerpts from her original blog posts, including some of the slavery facts she shared and how she wore the dress that day. {Using accessories, she actually wore it differently every day.} The rest of the book shares her thoughts, her ups and downs, her fears and triumphs during that year of explaining her experiment and raising awareness.

Though not marketed as a young adult book, I would say that the writing style {which holds true to the teen voice that Bethany was when she completed this experiment} would make a teen audience the logical draw to read this book. Having said that, I recognized my teen self in Bethany and was able to relate to her as I read, even though I'm not that age {kind of by a long shot} anymore. And I did learn things about modern day slavery that I did not know.

One thing I really appreciated about this book was that her experiment was not the wild success she hoped for when she set out. {Hang on! Stick with me.} Her goal at the start of her year was to raise $100,000 for her cause, and when all was said and done, she raised less than $10,000 in a year. She wrote regularly about her frustration that all her efforts {through social media, blogging, making connections, speaking to groups, etc.} didn't make the wild impact she hoped it would. She wanted people to care and jump on board and they didn't with the intensity that she desired.

And yet...her work still mattered. I think that truth spoke the most loudly to me as I read. We are conditioned to believe we have to do something crazy huge to matter, but being obedient to the call of the Lord is what matters. Bethany did that. She kept her commitment to wear the same dress every day for a year and came out on the other side a different girl in her own heart. And while she didn't raise what she wanted to raise, she DID make an impact for organizations working against trafficking, and she did raise awareness. I'm glad she was able to share her story in book form especially because her campaign didn't achieve what she hoped it would. It seems that the only people who get book deals are those who have some massive story, and it was refreshing to hear from an ordinary person who tried something new and different.

Check out Bethany's website if you'd like to see more of the actual dress and the ways she wore it, and if you have a teen in your life who feels passionate toward social causes, this story might provide the needed encouragement to take a stand and trust God with the outcome, big or small.

* Baker Books provided a copy of this book to me in exchange for a review. * 

Happy {Almost} Birthday, Dear Husbannnnnnnd...

Sunday will be kind of a big deal in Shafferland.

This guy enters a new calendar year!!

Our life has changed dramatically since his last birthday, when we still lived in Marion, I still worked in Fort Wayne, and he still commuted every day.

We had an idea {on that day} that life was about to change, because I had already turned in my resignation to the station. But we had no idea just how much life was about to change. We had no idea the doors God would open, and we probably still have no idea just how much is yet to come for us.

Ryan, you have made this last year, with all its wild adventure, such a delight. Your life makes mine better. {And certainly a lot more fun.}

In this year, we've traveled to new heights {literally!}...

...we've seen some beautiful places...

...you've been a good example to young and old alike...

...you've been part of every corner of my world because you wanted to be...

...we've said some hard goodbyes...

...you've pulled me out of my comfort zone...

...and you've taken time just to be still with me...

..we've had adventures that would only happen to us {ahem, the plumbing geyser}...

...we've carried on traditions...

...we've made new traditions...

...you've fit into every celebration...

...you've learned new skills...

...you've been creative...

...you became an uncle again...

...you sacrificed vacation days to be part of our yard sale {and you pulled a bee stinger out of my tongue after I ate the bee hiding in my sammich}...

...you rocked your Halloween costume, earring and all...

...you taught me to play Frisbee...

...we ran a 5K and you won for your age group...

...we saw the ocean {again}...

...made complete idiots of ourselves {taking our friends down with us}...

...climbed to the top of a lighthouse...

...hiked a HUGE state park...

...you saw Niagara Falls for the first time...

...we walked to Canada...

...we learned how to roast coffee...

...you were selected for jury duty, which made you MUCH happier than it made me...

...we celebrated our third anniversary...

...we celebrated another Christmas, not knowing it would be our last in that house...

...we rang in another new year together...

...followed by the failed owl hike on New Year's Day...

...you turned the car over to 200,000 miles and promptly pulled it over for a full photo shoot, earning you 10 million husbandly points...

...and while I know you'll say "REALLY!?!?!?!!?" I have to mention the time you fell asleep on our date...

...you surprised me with the most incredible Valentine's date...

...we did the completely unexpected and bought a house...

...you were obedient to the Lord and worked a men's retreat, even though it meant hours and hours {days} apart, and God used you in HUGE ways...

...we dog sat a Great Dane that weighs more than I do...

...you did demo on our new house...

...we MOVED!!!!...

...and we got an offer on our Marion house...

...you have supported me in my new life of writing and speaking...

...and you've worked so hard to make our new house a true home...

...and through it all, you've made me laugh!

Happy birthday, my love. You make every day a treasure. I hope the year to come is as full of as much delight as the one behind you. Thank you for being a man of integrity, compassion, and joy!

I LOVE YOU!!!!!