Make new friends but keep the old. One is silver, and the other is gold. Living in the parsonage next door to my church brought with it a fierce temptation to run for cover on Sunday mornings. At war with my longing for good friends was my compulsion to avoid awkward post-service conversations. I loved…
The memory is still so vivid. Fresh out of the house after a week of the flu, with two toddlers straggling along, I made my way through a parking lot toward a playgroup on our new army post. I hadn’t met anyone, my husband was training, and I was a complete disaster. A complete disaster…
“As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend” Proverbs 27:17. (NLT) This verse reminds us to choose friends who make us better and to help shape and influence the people we love. This particular proverb is nestled in with a few others that give advice about several different kinds of relationships. I love…
I grew up with two older brothers who were not particularly fond of the annoying sister who followed them around. I grew tired of being excluded from their boys-only games and started dreaming about having a sister. Specifically, I wanted an identical twin sister. I was a chubby ten-year-old at the time, and I didn’t…
Like birds on a wire, but with our legs dangling beneath us, we sat side by side atop the blue-and-yellow monkey bars and giggled over things I no longer remember. It’s likely the conversation included music or movies or our annoying siblings. The important thing is, we enjoyed that time between the ringing recess bells…
I’ll never forget the morning I gave birth to my first son. I felt such a sense of accomplishment as the nurse laid him on my chest and said, “It’s a boy!” I cried and kept repeating the phrase, “I did it! I did it!” I had been in labor for twelve hours, in excruciating…