Extreme Home Makeover Judy Style

Well, a week has passed and I haven't posted this yet. I am sorry I have been at camp with the students from our church. Let me tell you about the pics below. Judy works at my office. She is pretty wonderful. She just moved into an apartment by herself. The girls and I at the office thought it would be fun to do our own version of Extreme Home Makeover. Here is what we did. We secretly talked behind Judy's back (the good kind where we were planning). We all got together last Saturday and brought all of the things we had brought from home. Gayla came armed with her sewing machine. We kicked Judy out for the day while we did our thing. When we were finished we call her and told her to come on home. It was a wonderful day of serving the Lord and loving on our friend.

The below pics show what we did!

Here is the before:

This might look like madness to you...but to us it was full of the treasures we used to decorate Judy's apartment.

Drum roll please......... The After!

Here she comes! Check it out!

Here is our crew (minus Julie).

We had so much fun helping Judy with her apartment. We love her so much and were overjoyed to help her make her apartment a home!

Princess Dreams

I vividly remember digging through my toy box turned dress up cloths box in the corner of my childhood bedroom. I must find the perfect princess outfit. Everyone knows a princess must dress the part.

Like most girls I grew up with dreams of one day being a princess. I don't mean the kind of princess our world has twisted the word to define. I mean the kind of princess you read about in fairy tales. I dreamed of beautifully handcrafted dresses made of pink satin with empire waists and a full shirt that floated on the floor, perfectly matching jewels, white gloves, and of course the perfect crown. I was keenly aware that the princesses I read about in storybooks no longer existed, yet I held on to the dream that someday a prince would come a take me away to his castle. He would call me beautiful and cherish me forever. And of course we would live happily ever after. I mean what princess doesn't?

I think that most women hold to this dream in some form or fashion. Whether it is an intense desire to be loved, cherished, and called beautiful, or to be the belle of the ball all dressed up.

If I were completely and totally honest with you I would whisper that I still have princess dreams. I still desire to be seen as special, to be loved and cherished, and to dress up for the ball. I desire for a handsome prince to come and sweep me off my feet.

These dreams have been reawakened the last few days. I believe I have imposed these dreams and expectations upon others in an unfair manner and when I saw they couldn't be met I grew disappointed and let my dreams fade.

I must say I am completely wrong to do so, because there is One who sees me as special and loves me and cherishes me. He has swept me off my feet yet again these past few days. I hear Him whisper his affection for me and ask me to spend time with Him. Yes He desires to be with me and to love me and the time I have spent dwelling on that has brought me to my knees. He has proven His love to me far more than any prince I have ever read about.

You see instead of seeing my prince for who He is, I have stuffed Him away and only allowed Him to be my prince when I wanted. I have declared Him as prince to others, but denied Him full rule on the throne on my heart and life.

He is reawakening my heart to Himself. So often the past few days my heart longs just to be with Him and spend time with Him.

If you are still reading and still have no clue who this Prince is, please let me introduce Him to you. He is in fact my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. He is the One that has been calling me to draw near to Him.

You may think I am crazy and if you do, well you just don't get it. You are missing what a relationship with Jesus is really about. He is not an accomplishment I set on the shelf declaring I have "done that."

I say all this to declare that I know I am not perfect. I know there are areas of my life that I fall short on. But I refuse to allow those things to define me and to keep me from reaching for my tiara. You see I am a daughter of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And I will press on to be defined by my King and Prince. I am not who others perceive me to be. I am not who I think I am. I am who the King tells me I am. You see because I am in Him, I am who He declares me to be and I will allow Him to define me.

So as I mentally dig through that dress up box I won't struggle with finding the perfect princess dress to wear. Instead I will put on His Word and allow who He tells me I am to be my princess gown.

While I know this is just the beginning and I still have alot to unpack in my brain and I work through this process. I couldn't not tell you what God is doing in my life. I couldn't not share with you what God is developing in my mind and heart. So to those of you who are still looking for that perfect princess dress, please stop. You will never find it. To those who are still looking to an earthly prince to fulfill all their dreams and desires, please stop. No earthly prince is able to fulfill you the way the Heavenly Prince can. And if you are somewhere in the middle, please hang on, please run to your Heavenly Prince. Please trust Him fully with all that you are. Please know that we all struggle and that some days we are trying to find the dress instead of allowing the Prince to clothe us. Some days we are relying on an earthly prince instead. You are not alone.

So please hang on with me as we walk together. We will unpack this, my Prince won't let me not unpack it. :)