My New Sister

I have a new Sister! I don't know much about my new Sister but I know some & I have a picture. I haven't even known her a day but my love for her is strong. Even though we live thousands of miles away from each other, we love & worship the same God. One thing I like about her is we share the same name but we spell it differently. My Sister is 15 years younger than me, she is 9 years old. She is in the first grade & her favorite subject is English. That was probably my least favorite. I'm glad she likes it though. What she likes most about school is studying. Again, not my favorite thing to do. When she grows up she wants to be a nurse. She is most thankful for not having to pay school fees. My Sister has 5 other siblings not including me. She lives at a school in Uganda.

All my life I have wanted a Sister or Brother. I have been an only child until today. Starting today I have a Sister. After 24 years of my life, God has blessed me with a Sister. It gets better than that. God has also blessed my new Sister. He has blessed her with someone to love her, pray for her, & provide for her. I can't begin to imagine her reaction, her joy, & her thankfullness when she finds out that she has a new sister. I'm excited to begin this new journey of being a Sister. I know that God has been planning this for years, bringing the two of us together, and today on April 25, 2010 it happened. We both gained a new Sister, a love for each other & for the God that brought us together.

My Sister's favorite Bible verse is from Hebrews 11:6: And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him. When I read that this afternoon, it hit me like a rock. The past few years I have gone through times when I struggled with just that. I had no idea that God was planning this but He was. He knew exactly what I needed. I needed a Sister, not just any Sister, but this very little girl. He knew before we even met, that she would teach me so much more about Him. She would bring me closer to Him.

I just did a search on Sister quotes & this was one that I loved: A sister is a forever friend. ~Author Unknown

God has blessed me so much today. He has given me more than I could ask for. He not only blessed me with the Sister that I have always wanted, but with a forever friend. A forever friend that in just one day has taught me so much more than I ever thought she could. I can't wait to find out what else God has in store for us, for me, & for her. If this first day was this powerful for me, the rest are going to be AMAZING! I will go to bed tonight & every night now thanking God, praising Him for what he has given to me. He gave me a Sister. A Sister that I needed. Thank you God!

This is the first picture I have of my Sister, Catherine.

I love you Catherine & I pray that as we begin this journey together that our relationship with God will continue to grow, that I am able in some way to bless you, encourage you, & guide you as you grow up. I also pray that one day God would bring the two of us together in person. I can't wait for that day and pray it comes sooner rather than later. You are the best Sister & I'm proud to say that your mine. I will praise & thank God for the rest of my life that He blessed me with you.

The Little Puppy

In January I signed up to be a substitute teacher for grades Head Start-1st. I have had a wonderful time doing this! My favorite class is Kindergarten. One day I hope to be a Kindergarten teacher. :) This is from today:

Yesterday morning one little boy brought a tiny stuffed puppy from home. He had  been told several times to stop playing with it and pay attention to the teacher. Well he just couldn't keep his hands off his little puppy so the teacher had to take it away. She told him that it would spend the night and he could have it back today. Fast forward to today... This little boy had to go visit the office and ended up getting spankings. The first thing he asked when he got back to class was if he could have his little puppy back. The teacher said he could as long as he had a good afternoon. He got all excited and started telling her that today was it's birthday and that he had to take him home so he wouldn't miss his party. He continued talking about the party for a few mins and then the teacher asked him if he was the dogs dad or if he was just a friend. The little boy said no I'm his Uncle. We just laughed and laughed at this little boys story about the party and being the the Uncle. He was just too cute! I wish I could say that he was able to take his puppy home but he ended up getting in trouble again. The puppy missed his party and will have to spend a few more nights at school. :(

Opening Up

It has been way too long since I have written here. I wish I could say that this post is going to be happy & fun but I don't think it will. What I'm going to be writing is something that has been on my mind a lot lately but I have just ignored it. It's something I don't want to admit but I feel the need to. It won't be easy to hit publish but I know when I do a huge weight will be lifted off of me. So here I go...

Growing up I have been the shy one, I didn't like crowds of new people I didn't know, I even went through a period of not going to Church when my parents were out of town. I felt most comfortable in my house or with people I knew. When I was a teenager I went through a period of depression, & my Mom & I had daily fights where we both ended up hurt & crying. I went to counseling & took some meds for my depression & got much better. I still wasn't the person I should/could have been, but I was better. When I moved out on my own for the first time it was because I couldn't respect my Mom enough to obey & not cause daily arguments. So I moved out. It took some time but our relationship grew. I feel like we repaired our broken relationship & got better. Looking back now I wish I had acted different then but I didn't. I lived in Tyler for about 2 years, had a pretty good job, and was enjoying my life. Only problem was I wasn't enjoying life like I should have. I met a Christian guy and we started dating, we really liked each other but our relationship didn't last for several reasons. One of those being sin. I won't go into detail but I did some things I shouldn't have done. That was about three years ago. During these past three years I have still struggled with different things. At times I like to think I'm perfect but I'm not. I'm far from it. I haven't been as close to God as I need to be. As much as I don't want to admit it, I pushed Him away. I turned to other things/people when I should have & needed to turn to God. Today I'm slowing crawling back to Him. I'm not where I need to be. I'm far from it. There are still many times when I don't turn to God, I ignore him. I know deep down inside that I need to change that but change is hard. I have been in a Beth Moore Bible study the past few weeks & it has made me really start to think about things & my life. I have ignored a lot but tonight I was opened back up & made myself think about some things. I realized that I can't go on living my life without God. He MUST be in my life daily, no matter what. There are several things in my life that I have been wanting lately but I haven't gotten them. I believe part of that is that my relationship with God hasn't been what it should be. Once I let Him back in my life he will start to bless me with things I have been wanting. I realized something: Why should He even bother giving me something now when I don't have my full faith in Him? I'm not trying to say that once I'm back on the right path and with Him 100% that he will grant me all my dreams & wishes. He may & he may not. I do know that as long as I'm off by myself & on vacation from Him then He won't. Life is hard & not easy at times but with God I can do it. Without Him, I am nothing. I don't want to be nothing, I want to be something. I want to be Katie. I want to be a Godly women not only for me but for my family, friends, & future Husband that is out there somewhere. 

Sorry if that made no sense at all or was just a mess. I was mostly writing things from my heart. It feels good to have that weight lifted off of me!

Pictures

Today I got out my camera and how some fun! Took pics of the first flower in the yard this year, my dog, and one of the cats. Then I played around with photo editing software. Enjoy!

Lola's pics will come another day. Hope you enjoyed these! I had fun playing around with them!

Ten in 10 Week 2

Hope you have had a good week. How did you do for week 2 of Ten in 10? I didn't do so well. I failed big time. Notice there is no list of foods I had or how much I walked. Yeah it was bad. I went way off this week. I'm happy to say that tomorrow is another day and a brand new week! I have 8 weeks to get back on this train and lose weight! For week 1 I ate better. I had salads for lunch, cut back on food intake, and walked. During this past week I didn't do hardly any of those. I ate junk food, didn't walk at all, and ate what I wanted. I think part of the reason I failed is that during week 1 I had a root canal. I couldn't eat much for about 5 days and what I could eat was nasty soft foods. It helped me lose 5 pounds during that first week but then when I could eat normal foods I just stuffed them in. I craved them. Like I said before I'm happy that tomorrow is a new day and a new week. A chance to start fresh! That is just what I'm going to do!

Here is my plan for week 3:

• Go back to having a salad at lunch. Put some turkey or chicken on it, a few nuts, and a boiled egg.
• Start walking again. I felt so much better when I was moving.
• Tuesday I'm joining a weight loss challenge group. This will be my fourth. I have gotten 2nd and 3rd place before and now I want to be 1st! I know I can do it! I just have to set my mind on it and go!
• Keep a food diary to post next week.

One new thing I did this week was to add a weight loss counter at the bottom of my blog. I have to say I didn't want to put it up. I think having it there where the world (and me) can see it will help encourage me to want to get this weight off so I can take that thing down!

I didn't want to get on my scale this week but I did. I knew I hadn't lost any weight. I could feel it. I was right. I gained 2 pounds. Yuck! This next week I want to get those back off and lose some more! I hope you all have a great week and good luck!

January Update

Wow this year is flying by already!! I hope that you are all having a great year! This next Tuesday I start back at collge. Last semester I was at TJC but this semester I will be at Kilgore College. I will miss TJC but it is not in our district and since Dad no longer teaches there it has just gotten too expensive for me to go. So back to KC I go. Last time I went to KC(about 5 years ago, yikes!) I didn't enjoy it that much. I hated it! Of course I had just graduated and school of any kind was the last thing on my mind! With this being a new year things are bound to be better! :) I'm just going to enjoy my last week off before school and stay positive about it all. Monday I will start helping out at the school where Mom works. I did this about 6 years ago and LOVED it! I'm also going to get on the Sub list so that I can possibly make some money. I'm excited about that! I think that is the latest news for me. Life is just flying by way too fast!

Stop back by on Friday for a coupon giveaway! :) It will be my first! 

Something Magical

Got your attention didn't I?? :) Yes, you read that correctly. Something Magical. I'm sure your wondering what it could be. Well that something magical is...Magical Peanut Butter Cookies! These magical cookies are easy to make and taste great! I wish I could say I came up with the recipe but I didn't. Another wonderful chef(in my opinion) is the one that came up with these Magical Peanut Butter Cookies. Let me give you a hint: She LOVES and I mean LOVES to cook with butter. Hmmm...you can think about who it is and I will tell you later. Sorry no prizes to give out just a magical recipe. 

Magical Peanut Butter Cookies:

1 Cup Peanut Butter, creamy or crunchy
1 Cup Splenda Baking Blend
1 Egg
1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract
Optional: Splenda to coat your fork with and to dust cookies

Preheat oven to 350. Grease or foil a large baking sheet.

In a mixing bowl, combine the peanut butter and Splenda. Mix together with a fork. Add the egg and vanilla, stir well. Spoon or roll the dough into balls the size of walnuts(or your desired size). Place the balls on the baking sheet. With a fork, dipped in Splenda(prevents sticking), press a crisscross design on each cookie. Bake for 12 minutes, remove from the oven, and sprinkle with Splenda. Cool slightly before removing from the pan. Makes about 18 cookies.

Note: I used natural crunchy PB and it worked just fine. I used the full cup of Splenda and it was too sweet. Next time I'm going to try just 1/2 cup of the Splenda. Also I didn't dust the cookies when they came out of the oven. I'm glad I didn't since I thought they were a little too sweet tasting.

These cookies would go great with a glass of milk. I hope you enjoy them! In case you didn't know, these are from Paula Deen.