Help Me, Please! Pick a Rocking Ordinary Book Cover

Are you ready to hear me squeal really loud? My book is coming, my book is coming, my book is coming!

And are you ready to laugh out loud with me? I have the title. Grasp your coffee mugs tightly, because here it comes:

Rocking Ordinary

Holding It Together with Extraordinary Grace

 

Wow. It just gets you right here in the gut, right? And then spills out your nose with your coffee, then makes you snort, then before you know it, you want to buy the t-shirt. Am I right?

Why Rocking Ordinary? Of all the titles of all the books in all the world, why is this one rockin’? I’ll tell you why: it’s about you. It’s a real truth about real women with real lives and real problems and real struggles who make a difference and they don’t even know it. 

That’s you I’m talkin’ about.

So here’s what I want to know. What kind of cover would you like on your book? My oh-so-awesome-and-patient publisher gave me a moment to press the big PAUSE button on the fast-moving publishing machine to throw this out there to you. Because I want you to like your book, right?

So, here’s the deal. I’m showing you three ideas that we’re bantering about. We may or may not end up with one of these covers. But I really, truly want to know what you think. Just pick one of them (even though there’s only one right answer and I’m not telling you what it is even if you DO buy me a new super-large Keurig machine, the one that has a carafe on it).

I can’t promise that your exact favorite will be the cover, because I am not the President of All Things yet. But I do promise that I will read every answer and that several executives with suits and ties will also read them while I email, “I told you so.” And we’ll see what happens then.

AND THIS FALL –SQUEEEEEEE! — YOU’LL HAVE YOUR BOOK! YAY!

I’d love to keep in touch!

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Giveaway: 5 Minute Devotions for the Homeschool Mom

I’m deep, deep into my book about #OrdinaryIsExtraordinary this week. The manuscript is due to the publisher at the end of this month, and I’m making a last effort to cram extra awesome into it for you. So that’s why I’m not around her much; I’m buried in pages and notes and heavy red marks. Send coffee.

While I’m gone, my friend Tina Nahid offered to stop by and give you a special gift of encouragement. Tina is one of those rare friends–someone who has watched me eat and still likes me! I can really chow down, and I will fight you for the chips and salsa, but Tina doesn’t let that intimidate her.
We no longer get to share the chip basket at Homeschool Moms Dinner Club, because Tina up and moved on us. But she left me this devotional, Five Minute Devotions for the Homeschool Mom. Tina knows we homeschool moms need a grab-and-go encouragement, a quick meditation to pray over as we work through our day.
So be sure to sign up at the end to win your own copy of this devotional! Or just go ahead and grab yourself a copy for less than a dollar. You’ll be glad you did.

Today, Tina is giving us a new perspective with a sample from her book. Pray over this as you teach your children.

The Divine Spark

If you have anything really valuable to contribute to the world it will come through the expression of your own personality, that single spark of divinity that sets you off and makes you different from every other living creature.

-Bruce Barton

Every human being has been created in the image of our Creator God. Thus, we all carry a unique “spark” of the Divine within us. How amazing is this? How awesome! But, oh, how often we miss this truth in our daily lives, in the lives of not only our children but ourselves as well. Sometimes we are so bogged down and conformed to the world around us that we become only a shadow of who we were really meant to be.

Educating our children at home offers a unique opportunity for us as moms to capture the “divine sparks” of our children and harness their potential in countless ways. Yet, sadly in my case, I find that my need to “control” their behavior often snuffs out the creative “sparks” that make them who they are. I am becoming more and more aware of this controlling tendency, and I am thankful the Holy Spirit is illuminating this issue in my life.

Our children are not cookie-cutter people. We don’t really want them to be, do we? Not deep down. We want them to flourish and thrive as the unique and special individuals they were created to be. Yet, forcing them into a “box” when it comes to their learning will not achieve this end. Allowing them more freedom to direct their own learning and giving them options and choices in exploring the world around them will prove far more beneficial to them as they mature.

Let’s allow this paradigm shift to begin to sink in today. Let’s not only allow their differences to manifest, but let’s celebrate those distinct differences in our children, and in ourselves as well! Let’s think about how their education could be tailored specifically to their own personalities and gifts. There are variety of ways in which we can do this. Let’s just follow the Holy Spirit’s lead.

Scripture of Meditation:

You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body
and knit me together in my mother’s womb.
Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex!
Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.

–Psalm 139:13-14

Prayer:

Dearest Abba, thank you for creating me with a spark of who you are. Thank you for your amazing love to create human beings in your image. Help me to become more aware of my children’s unique personalities, and help me to give them more freedom and self-direction in their education, and to trust you instead of trying to control. Amen.

Tina Nahid is a wife and stay-at-home, homeschooling mother of 16 years. She has 3 children ages 14, 12, and 9. She serves in her homeschooling support group and is very active in the community and her church family. Tina has a Master’s in English and enjoys reading, travelling, mom’s night outs, dates with hubby, field trips, her pets, and mission work. Tina lives in Bowling Green, KY.

Giveaway is over!

Congratulations, Shavat!
Tina is giving away a copy of Five Minute Devotions for the Homeschool Mom to one reader! Enter below. Each additional share and sign-up gives you another chance to win!

Randomly-chosen winners will be announced here Thursday, March 24 and contacted via email. Good luck, and happy sharing!

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Let Go of the Pain

 

Let us not be so consumed with the past that we forget we are here now.

Let us not be so bent on self-protection that we never speak our innermost hurts.

Speaking one’s deepest regrets does not change the past; it does something far greater. It connects us to the One who loves us despite our faults and failings so that we are free to connect to the person sitting beside us. This type of vulnerable connection, born of a place of deep pain and authenticity, is the kind of connection that is strong enough to transform individuals, families, communities, cities, and worlds.

Let us surrender the failures and pains of our past so that our love is not separated and weakened but instead united and strengthened.

— Rachel Macy Stafford. Hands Free Life, p. 50

This post contains affiliate links, which help support this site.

I’d love to keep in touch!

I send a monthly email to my friends. It’s full of goodies like great books, interesting information, exclusive content, and coffee chats. Wanna’ join us?

Get the book!

Now available on Kindle — Homeschool Made Easy!

{Freebie AND Giveaway!!!} Questions Jesus Asks

This week, I have something really special for you. My friend Israel Wayne and the great people at New Leaf Press have put together some gifts for all of us! First off all, we are going to give away TWO copies of this wonderful book. And even more…EVERY SINGLE PERSON gets a sample devotional to enjoy. How cool is that?! Read on to find out more.

Many of us have questions we would like to ask of Jesus. The new book Questions Jesus Asks reminds us that He has many for us as well.

Author, apologist, and homeschool graduate Israel Wayne follows up on his popular book Questions God Asks with the compelling sequel Questions Jesus Asks: Where Divinity Meets Humanity. Published this year by New Leaf Press, the book covers twenty separate questions Christ posed during His life on earth in 186 pages, including two appendices explaining the doctrinal terms hypostatic union and communicato idiomatum.

And that’s about as complicated as it gets. Israel’s purpose—to explore the deep truths Christ reveals through pointed questions—is crystal clear through each brief chapter. “For some Christians, tossing around big theological words can be a way to seem intellectually superior to everyone else. For others, it’s more a sign of being so immersed in a sub-culture that we forget to show proper consideration and inclusion to others who aren’t part of our little club” (from page 114). Israel avoids both of those extremes brilliantly and humbly with this practical study.

Read the rest of my review for Home School Enrichment Magazine here.

I love this book. I read it, as well as the companion volume Questions God Asks, as personal devotions. But this book would be very effective for a Sunday School class, Bible study, book club selection, or family devotional.

Watch author Israel Wayne explain more about the book here (and keep viewing to the end to watch him vanish into thin air!).

FREEBIE– Sample the book

Enjoy the introduction and first devotional in this unique book with this sample, complements of author Israel Wayne and New Leaf Press. Download it now.

GIVEAWAY — Two winners!

I’m giving away a copy of Questions Jesus Asks to TWO winners this weekend! Enter below. Each additional share and sign-up gives you another chance to win!

Randomly-chosen winners will be announced here Saturday, February 13 and contacted via email. Good luck, and happy sharing!

This giveaway is over! 

Congratulations, Kassi and Karie! I hope you enjoy the book as much as I did.

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One Bonus Entry Each!

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SHARE this giveaway on YOUR facebook page!

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Share each day for additional entries! 🙂

I’d love to keep in touch!

I send a monthly email to my friends. It’s full of goodies like great books, interesting information, exclusive content, and coffee chats. Wanna’ join us?

Get the book!

Now available on Kindle — Homeschool Made Easy!

This is Your Brain on Wheat

 

The effect of wheat on the brain is more than just influence over mood, energy, and sleep. Actual brain damage is possible, as seen in cerebellar ataxia. but the cerebral cortex, the center of memory and higher thinking, the storehouse of you and your unique personality and memories, the brain’s “gray matter,” can also be pulled into the immune battle with wheat, resulting in enc3ephalopathy, or brain disease.

Gluten encephalopathy shows itself as migraine headaches and stroke-like symptoms, such as loss of control over one arm or leg, difficulty speaking, or visual difficulties. On MRI of the brain, there is characteristic evidence of damage surrounding blood vessels in cerebral tissue. Gluten encephalopathy will also show many of the same balance and coordination symptoms as those that occur with cerebellar ataxia.

— William Davis, MD. Wheat Belly, pp 172-173

Did you know…

I send a weekly recipe newsletter, sharing family-friendly gluten-free recipes. To find out more, go here.

This post contains affiliate links, which help support this site.

I’d love to keep in touch!

I send a monthly email to my friends. It’s full of goodies like great books, interesting information, exclusive content, and coffee chats. Wanna’ join us?

Get the book!

Now available on Kindle — Homeschool Made Easy!