I Couldn't Love You More

Sometimes being a mentor is incredibly hard.

My mom always says that most kids bring home lost animals but I brought home lost souls.

I know I was bound and determined to be where I am today. My entire life has set me up to be in the line of work and lifestyle that I live.

It is really easy to mentor young people when you just pick them up for ice cream and talk about school work and their dreams.

But there are times when it doesn't matter how many times you talk or show them the light sometimes they still choose darkness. You can pray all day every day and they still choose to lie, cheat, steal, sneak around, and make dangerous decisions.

When I mentor, I mentor with my heart. I always try to give them my true self, to be as transparent as possible, because there are too many fake people in this world. And when you mentor someone over a long period of time you begin to feel what they feel, you hurt when they hurt, you feel joy when they feel joy. And when they mess up royally you feel like it was a slap in the face. Like there should have been something I could have done to prevent it. Often when this happens you can see the other side they can't, you can see the light, you can dream for them, you can see their future, and all they can see is right now and are in survival mode.

I know this also comes when you're a parent. I don't have children of my own yet. But there are many young people who I feel are mine. I pray for them, dream for them, hope for them, and support them in every way I know how.

Doing what I do and being who I am, I have found myself many times with a broken heart for someone that I want nothing more than to help, but they are refusing to see the light and are choosing to live in the darkness they have known for years, because familiarity is easier to handle than the chance the light might not work out.

And so I find myself in a state like I am today. With tears in my eyes and sadness in my heart, but knowing that I couldn't love them more, at this point I have to let them go. I have to give them to the only one who can truly love them through the darkness. I have to let go and trust that God will protect them and hold on to them even if they are lost for awhile, he has plans for them, and hopefully one day soon they will see the light and will see how beautiful life can be when they walk away from the pain.

So this one is for all those souls in my life that I love dearly. I will continue to love you and pray for you, but today I am letting go of whatever control I wish I had and letting God love you in His perfect unconditional way.

I Couldn't Love You More -- Matt Hammitt

The Reason for the Season

Well we just had our church Christmas Program on Sunday afternoon. It turned out to be a lot fun and the kids did a great job.

When I was looking for a show to do, I needed something easy, free, and multiple age friendly. This can be hard to find, since I don't want to pay anything. But Google proved to be helpful and I found
The Reason for the Season. You can click on the link and see the script. It really was cute and funny.

I then decided that I only wanted to work with the Middle School Students when it came to the script, but you can't have a program without all of the cute little kids, so we created a little angel choir, and Marge took care of directing that, which is good because I don't do the singing part.

On a side note, I found this video when I was googling the show again. These are not my kids but this is the same show. Their costumes are even similar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3qKBOxDIxU


We had an interesting time figuring out how to practice for this show. The little kids practiced right after school for two weeks and then they were ready to go. But all of my middle school kids had practice after school so we had to be creative. Then of course they failed to tell me the night most of them were going to be gone to an away basketball game (I have all home events on my calendar so I worked around those). Then there was the fact that I got married right before Thanksgiving and was gone for a week when we historically practiced that week. So we practiced about 5 or 6 times and they were never all there so come Sunday I was definitely wondering why I even tried to do this, this year. But they pulled it off and it was cute.

Big thanks to:
Marge for leading the music.
Jessica for making all of the costumes.
Lennea for accompanying the music.
Zack and Jakeb for running the technology during the show.
Pastor Keith for keeping me sane and for the opening and closing so I could hide.


The Christmas Tree: Is important at Christmas time because it is an Evergreen. The evergreen represents Everlasting life, which we get from Christ who was born at Christmas.

The Star: Is important because it led the Wise Men to Jesus, and it still reminds people today of the way to Christ.

The Angel: The angel was the voice of the good news. And our Angel learned that she should be that voice with or without her halo.

The Card: The Christmas Card is important to share the Christmas cheer and greet everyone in the name of Christ.

The Candy Cane: The Candy Cane represents the staffs the Shepherds carried, the stripes represent the blood Jesus shed when he was whipped, and it is shaped like the letter J for Jesus.

The Present: The Present represents the greatest gift ever given: Jesus.

The Bell: The bell's job is to ring in the good news.

The Stocking: The stocking is empty because it shows that even the emptiest of hearts can be filled with God's love.

The Candle: The candle's job is to bring light to the Reason for the Season.

Our kid choir was quite cute and definitely made the show!

We had two special pianists and they did a great job!

Then we ended the night with a Christmas Banquet

Thanks church family for a great night!

How's Married Life?

How's married life?

That is the question of the season. Which makes sense since I got married two weeks ago. The wedding was beautiful! It was everything I could ever imagine and more. It is the one set of pictures I look back and don't think, "man, my arms were fat." I truly have never felt more beautiful and loved than on that special day. My dress, hair, the decorations, from walking in with my father to you may kiss the bride, it was amazing. And even with the minor little things that always go wrong when you throw a special event at the end of the day we drove away married.

We have left the, are you excited, questions, and moved on to How's married life?

It was always hard for my sarcastic brain not to answer duh, I'm excited, I'm getting married. But that would be rude.

How's married life?

Not that much different. My husband works nights, and overtime, I never see him. My name has changed, we have one checking account, no one thinks it is weird if I leave early to go make dinner for my husband, and we get two nights a week together.

I still head for work as he is heading to bed. I wake him up in time for dinner, and we get to eat together, Tuesdays are pretty dedicated to date night, and Wednesdays are for church. Those are his two nights off. We play with Ranger, watch some TV, he plays video games and then he goes to work. Our schedules are exactly as they were before we got married. I still pray from the moment he puts his uniform on until he returns safely. We still struggle trying to spend time together, we still hold each other through our fears, insecurities, pains and frustrations. We are still a team.

We just happen to be a team now with the same last night. I know now, that if something were to happen to him at work they would contact me, I wouldn't have to wait to hear from someone else. I take great pride in being a Mrs. and still find myself staring at the rings on my left hand, and the one on his.

Our schedules are so different though, it makes it hard for married life to be different than engaged life. You see I cooked dinner for us ever since he moved to Hesston. I would get off work and let myself into his apartment and wake him up then we would do dinner and hang out until he had to go to work. We would cherish every moment we had together and then say goodnight, that hasn't changed.

Don't get me wrong, I love married life. I wouldn't change it for a minute, I just don't know how to answer that question the way people want me to. It has taken more getting used to my new short hair and using the word husband than anything else. I'm sure that will all change when he gets a different job and we have a matching schedule.

So married life is great. I love my husband, and I can't wait to do the Christmas season together, and it is amazing to do this life with someone always on my team. I love not having to make all of the decisions by myself, I love having someone to cook for, and a reason to leave work. So these first two and half weeks haven't been all that different but this is just the beginning of a life long adventure!

Picture curtesy of On the Wall Photography