My Night At The Hospital

My madre was in the emergency room last night. I've come to realize that being in and out of hospitals is just in my fortune. She's doing much better now but I would really appreciate prayers for her. Thank you!

One of the things about hospitals that Ive come to love, is the comradery that ensues when one is there. I'm ashamed to say so, but I would not be the type of person that would go around hugging strangers. Let me explain...

Let's pretend this senario happened in the day time and at Starbucks:
I'm sitting at a table talking with my mom and dad. A girl wearing really baggy sweats, and a do rag walks inside. She is crying pretty deeply and just walked from outside having made a phone call. My usual reaction would be to steal a few glances. Wonder in my head what's wrong with her. Possibly say to my parents "oh pobrecita" (meaning poor girl), maybe just maybe eves drop a little to try to gather more information- and then I would move on with my day.

That exact thing happened! Only it wasn't day time and it wasn't Starbucks. It was the emergency room of the hospital. There I sat talking with my parents trying to make conversation for the fourth hour in a row. We'd been waiting for the Dr. to see my mom and conversation was starting to get stale. I could see this girl sitting in the row right behind us, weeping.I kept glancing at her trying to be sly so that she wouldn't see the creepo staring at her while she was crying. And then I heard it! The Holy Spirit telling me to go pray with her and give her a hug. My instant thought was, "are you kidding me? I don't know this girl! For all I know she hates all things Holy and will pop me right  in the kisser!" Inner thoughts can be raw like that. So I pretended I didn't hear the command from God and moved on.

I heard it again.

This time I knew I couldn't live with myself if I didn't at least try. I trusted God and obeyed Him. I approached the girl and I said, "Excuse me, I'm so sorry, I don't mean to pry. But can I pray for you?" She looked up at me with her eyes swelled up with tears and said, "yes, I feel so sick and they won't call my name"  I sat down next to her and prayed for her, I held her in my arms and just loved on her and prayed out loud. It was unbelievable how amazing it felt to have God pouring his love onto this gal. I literary felt HOT when I was praying for her. Man, what an amazing experience that was. She said, "Thank you so much for taking the time to do that, I really appreciate it" and her name got called from the nurses station. She gave me the biggest hug ever.

I can not take any credit for that. I can not even say that I'm a great person for doing that because my FIRST reaction was, "no, I don't want to do that because I will feel uncomfortable". God can do wonders when we are opened to the idea of obeying his commands, they are subtle and most often than not it's easy to get out of doing them. We have a million excuses as to why we can't take five minutes of our "busy" life to help someone else out. Especially when it's a complete stranger or a person we don't really like.

 The ONLY thing I did do right was listen and obey. And I am certain that anyone is capable of doing that. It's tough, but once you experience it once, you kind of get hooked! The blessings that come from being a vessel for God are ten fold. The feeling you get when you've helped God help someone ELSE is something that not a million dollars could buy.

Being in a hospital brings a sense of comradery to my soul because that's when you know something is wrong and you NEED something else to help  you. You know that the others in there might not have exactly what you do but they have their own emergency. Politics, likes and dislikes, skin color, class, and anything that would otherwise separate you from another person fades away.

I am so glad that I get to experience moments that totally break me, because God puts me back together more beautify that anything else ever could.

Stay blessed and stay saucy.

Why Is My Aunt Flo Such a Party Pooper?

Today I just feel like organizing the heck out of everything in my house. I have this problem of always wanting to do something productive or else I feel like I am worthless. Okay maybe not to such extreme, but I'm always wanting to be busy with something. Although sometimes this is a good trait to have, some days it just bites me in the ass and makes me feel like my day meant nothing if I didn't climb Mt. Everest if you know what I mean. Couple THAT with being all hormonal and moody from a certain "visitor" and my gracefulness goes out the window! I want today to be different, and I know it can be because I am only a victim of my circumstances when I want to be.  I believe that a big part of what my life turns out to be is in my head. The more positive my attitude, the more positive my day is. The crappier I THINK the crappier I FEEL!

This is especially tough for me when I'm on my "days" if you know what I mean. Some days I just WANT to feel like crappy-dy crap! But more often than not this attitude is a downward spiral that takes heavenly intervention for me to get out of. So I try and try to not get stuck there! I know that my mind is powerful enough to get me out of any funky attitude, and if I couple that with prayer, it's all over. I can overcome anything!  I've done it time and time again with the help of God. However, sometimes I just don't want to feel good. Sometimes I just want to be a sourpuss! And that is just human nature. I've done that for the past couple days and now it's time to move on to more clear skies. I am choosing today to make my attitude one of gratitude and joyfulness, even if I'm not feeling that way right away, I know my body will follow my brain soon enough.

 Today I will place value on giving my 100% attention to my baby girl. I know that that means the world to her. I will invite her to do my chores with me and have fun doing it, instead of forcing a strict deadline for all chores to be done. Today, I will be thankful for all the blessings in my life. Today I will live as if it were my last day on earth and truly enjoy the parts that make my heart full of joy!
What will YOU do today?

Stay blessed and stay saucy!

-Libby Lu

The Butternut Squash That Almost Killed Me!

The other day I was making a dish that said, "pair me with a butternut squash soup". So I said, "Okay"! It would mark the first time I made something with butternut squash myself and I had no idea what was in store! As I attempted my first cut, I struggled to get my knife in the right position, a couple seconds latter I KNEW this was going to be super difficult. I used the BIGGEST knife I had and the shell of this thing was so hard to cut through! - I feared for my life. Those suckers are difficult to dice!! Why did  no one ever tell me this!?

I did the best that I could and only managed to salvage 30% of the squash for my soup. I was left baffled and wishing there was a better way. After making my B.S. soup (sorry I don't want to keep saying Butternut squash.. Butternut squash... Butternut squash.. so we'll stick to B.S. I don't know what's worse), both my husband and I decided it was deliciosa (delicious in Spanish). It was just so darn tough to make it that it makes me not want to ever cook it ever again. However, I remember the sweet and butter-nutty taste and my mouth waters... and then I want to do it all over again. Kind of when you go through labor, you're in all this pain and then somehow you forget how difficult it was once you hold your little baby, you get mommy amnesia and you want bring another little nugget into the world    (pregnant pause).      And back to soup...

I started thinking of myself and I figured out that I am a lot like a butternut squash. How? You ask. Well let me tell you. I started out this hard shell. Walls up. Insecurities up the yin-yang. People would try to come into my "space" and I pushed away- hard! I was this self-seeking, not flexible, selfish, vain, judgmental person. Sometimes someone would be able to get in a bit; but even then it was frustrating I bet. The "fruit" that was in me still did not give any good taste. It wasn't until I finally let God IN that I was able to become sweet and soft so to speak. God in many ways was the boiling water wearing me down to be kind, humble, and joyful.

And then a new day comes and I start all over again! God tries and tries to break me apart so that he can put me in "hot" water to make me "sweet" once again. This is an every day process. I will never be fully GOOD, there are so many temptations and worldly desires that can ruin my walk with God. But He is always looking for the opportunity to help me along with my journey. I just need to let Him. I start off as the B.S. All hard and outer-shelly (I think I just made that word up). And then he dices me up and shows me what my place is in life when I walk with Him. Even if he gives me something difficult to go through in this life "my hot, boiling water", when I walk with God, I will always end up a sweet and delicious butternut squash soup.

P.S. I really hope you like butternut squash. If you don't, that sucks and you'll just have to substitute your favorite vegetable that's difficult to cook. haha

Stay blessed and stay saucy!

-Libby Lu

Don't Hate Me Cus' I'm Beautiful- Or Homely - Or Ogarish

 I watched Shrek today, in Spanish, and may I say that it was hilary (short for hilarious- as one of my favorite friends would say-in this instance making it way too long because of this extremely long explanation. But it saves you one syllable, applicable elsewhere. Okay the end). I enjoyed all the Mexican culture puns and the play on words. I laughed, I cried, okay maybe just the first, but most of all it made me think~

Princess Fiona: is afraid of being "ugly" so she automatically thinks that her curse  made her an Oger at night. At the end of the movie we find out that her True Love's Kiss revealed her true self. Her once "pretty" appearance disappeared and we see that she becomes the, all-the-time-ogeresque, beauty.

Shrek: Describes himself as an onion who is deep and misunderstood by the WORLD. He pretends to be something he is really not, to feed into the "image" that others portray him as, so people will just leave him alone.

So here's what I think (and this is just my opinion, you might have a different one, and guess what. That's okay).

We as people tend to always want to blame others for things (myself included). Simply put. When someone is mean to us because we have a "disadvantage" or we are "different",  it is so easy to blame them and anyone else who thinks like them for our bitterness. Deep down we are just hurt that we are not being accepted the way we want to be, by those people. In some cases most people can brush off a couple encounters with these people I like to call, Negative Nancies and Debbie Downers. But there are other people that have a little more sensitive soul that get stuck. They can get so stuck that they themselves become the N.N.'s and D.D.'s. They themselves become bitter and Ogeresque.

Just because someone is beautiful (and take mind that beauty is in the eye of the beholder), does not mean that they have it better in life. Just because someone is homely does not mean that they are a trapped oger mad at the world for their looks. To me, someone who is aesthetically pleasing, can be the ugliest person I know, based on their heart. And someone who is not so cute, can quickly become a beautiful swan in my eyes if they have a heart of gold. I think for the most part we KNOW this to be true. Why our society puts so much emphasis on looking a certain way, I have no idea. BUT the point I'm trying to make here is that, if we go around ourselves blaming the WORLD for our actions and our sadness and bitterness, it's going to be one long and lonely life.

Take the rains of your life and chose to be the most beautiful person from the inside regardless of what your shell looks like. In the end we ALL get saggy and wrinkled anyway and then what. Do you want to spend the rest of your life treasuring your good looks and wishing you had youth? No, that's another way to have a long and sad life.

Think about it.

Stay blessed and stay saucy!

-Libby Lu

Why I Write

Let me let you in on a little secret. I love writing this blog because I feel like I'm helping someone while doing it. Even if that someone is myself on days when no one reads the blogs. But I am far from always taking my own advise and I still need a lot of work in my walk with God.  I knew I had to start writing because God told me I had to. To be quite honest I never know what I'm going to write about. Let alone if I'm going to make ANY sense at all. You see, I was never a good writer in school. Shoot, you might think I'm not even a good writer now, that's besides the point. I now enjoy doing it and it makes me joyful. But anyhow. When I write all these things I truly feel like God helps me put the words together. Sometimes I will go back in time and read the things I write and think, wow, I should practice what I "preach".

I am in no way shape or form a  perfect person. I wish I could be on point all the time but I truly have many days where I am so deep in my own selfishness that I can't see past the hairspray in the room. However, the good part about writing a blog is that I keep myself accountable. I, at least have to try and do the things that I say most of the time. I guess I'm just writing this because I would never want any of you to think that I've got my whole act together and I can't take any advise or what ever. Because God knows that I am as far from perfection as Charlie Sheen is from getting back on any decent T.V. show (I'm sorry if you're a big fan). 

I hope you know that I'm in this as much as you are and if you ever need any prayer or anything please don't feel weird, contact me. I would love to pray for you. We are faced with such difficult spiritual warfare in this life and we need to join together as brothers and sisters in Christ and help one another out. If we don't who will?

Stay blessed and stay saucy! 

My New Year's Resolutions

     
   Hello 2012! Hello friends! I hope you had a great New Year's eve and a great start to the new year.

I wanted to write down my new year's resolutions and I wasn't going to make a blog about it, but the more and more I thought about it, I realized that by telling you guys, my friends, it would give me more of a sense of accountability. I know some people aren't really into the whole new years resolutions thing and that's okay. Why, they ask themselves,  would you need a new year to make your life better? I agree with that point of view because we don't need a new year to be conscious of our lives and the fact that we can start being a healthier, more peaceful and grounded at any date in the year. However,  I also believe in the power of  "starting over" -"clean slate"- a specific time in which you can sit down and think about your life and make some goals. And that is exactly what I'm doing right now. I hope this encourages you to do the same. It is so important in this life to evaluate our lives and ask questions about what we are doing, how we're doing it and what is important to us.

1.- I am going to make time in my day to stand  in awe of God. I want to set time aside to just sit in wonder and LISTEN to what God has to say to me. I am going to delve deeper in my study of the Bible and try to understand what God has planned for me this year. I am going to treat every bad situation that 2012 might bring as an opportunity to grow deeper in my faith and be a great example of a good Christian.

2.- I am going to make time to spend with my husband. I am going to make sure that I'm showing him the unconditional  respect he needs with out expecting anything back. I am going to find ways to express how much he means to me. I will find activities that draw us closer together. I am going to make him understand why I'm so proud to be married to him and make him know that he is a great man that I am so blessed to have a life with him. I am going to pray with him and for him. I will stay saucy for him!

3.- I am going to pray about mine and my husbands parenting skills, asking God to help us through the rough terrain up ahead with our daughters "terrible twos"! I am going to enjoy being a mommy first and foremost, and not let the "little" things bother me as much. I am going to allow my little pumpkin to be a kid and play and love on her every day I get a chance to. I will pray that I can be a good example for her to follow.

4.-  I am going to pray for my love of others. I am going to pray that I can love and see people the way God  sees, and loves them. I am going to pray for anyone that makes me upset, mad, crazy, angry, and any bad feelings that I've missed mentioning. I am going to cultivate my relationships with my family and my friends.

5.- I will find ways I can help others in need. I will pray that God opens doors where I can suffice a need.

6.- I will honor God with my body with exercise and eating healthy foods that support my training. I will pray for God to fulfill any "void" that I feel, instead of filling it with either food, shopping or being super "busy", I will ask God to help me and fill me with his joy.

These are my resolutions for 2012. I hope that you can pray for me as I'm praying for all of your guys' years to be full of peace and joy.

Live with no regrets this year. We can do that by being aware that life on earth is fragile and can end at any moment. You or I can die right this very second. Our life can end today!When I sat and though about  my mortality and TRULY understood it (about a week ago) I decided to not take another day for granted.
 Live each day with purpose and think of what's important to you. Don't throw today away!

Stay blessed and stay saucy!