“Wake up Sarah Sunshine,” I teased by 2-year-old daughter Sarah Joy.
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She gave me a sunny smile and hopped out of bed, eager for the day. She was my easiest baby. When she was tired, she just wandered back to her bedroom, pulled the toybox over to the crib, climbed in, and fell asleep. 

​Sarah Joy followed quietly along with the flow, the fourth child of five. After her younger brother was born, she found great delight in giving direction to her baby brother’s life. Today, they are great friends.
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I started calling her Shine because she brought happy sunshine to our home. She smiled cheerfully and quietly participated in all the busy chaos of a large family. 

As years went by, she developed her own spunky style.

“Here, go buy Shine a hat,” my dad would say, handing me a 20-dollar bill. He loved her quirky fashion sense: the hat tilted at just the right angel or the boots adding just the right touch to one of her outfits. I never knew how she would come down the stairs, but I knew she would be adorable. I kept calling her Shine because she had her own unique light and eclectic style. 
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As the teenage years were approaching, Shine was torn between two worlds: God’s Kingdom and the world. I saw the struggle, but things were often tense between us, and I couldn’t say the words she needed to hear. So, I knelt by my bed and cried out to God to protect and rescue my daughter, to open her eyes to Jesus. 

Love is in the air! St. Valentine's Day has just been celebrated and all the chocolate in pink and red wrappers in 50% off. My favorite time of year! Pink and chocolate combined...at a great deal! The roses are still lovely, gracing the dining room table. Heart shaped cards are on the buffet, a reminder of being loved by my family.

Love is an emotion that wells up inside my heart when I watch my children sleeping, see them win an award, listen to them. or hear them talk about the Lord. So often, I am proud of them, not just for their achievements, but for who they are and who they are becoming.

Love, of course, is more than an emotion; love is a choice to do good for someone else at cost to your own personal comfort. Love is all about the other person, giving them your best, trusting God to take care of your own needs. We are commanded by God to love one another deeply from our hearts, to seek their good, to lay down our lives, to care about their interests, to honor them above ourselves.

So, we experience love as a daily decision and we experience love as a delightful emotion.

But, of course, there are those times, when it is hard to sing the songs of love and devotion, when I must cry out to the Lord....

Teach me to love when my son walks around the house in his socks, wearing them out and getting them filthy dirty, after telling him at least 877 times to put his socks on or go barefoot. After all, we live in Florida. We really don't need to wear socks and shoes.

The stores are filled with hearts, chocolate, and roses in every shade of pink and red imaginable. As a lover of pink, chocolate and roses, this just may be my favorite time of year to shop!  It's St. Valentines Day! Yes, St. Valentine's Day--I know that sounds a little odd to your ears. When I was a little girl, that's what we called it. But in recent years, as all holidays are secularized and materialized more and more, St. Valentine's Day became Valentine's Day. 

Who was St. Valentine and why do we celebrate love on the day we've set aside to remember him?  Valentine was a priest who lived in Rome during the reign of Emporer Claudius. He was know for his kindness and selfless love. He was arrested for his faith and imprisoned, but managed to send and receive letters from his friends and fellow Christians. Emporer Claudius tried to convert him to Roman paganism to spare his life, but Valentine shared the Gospel with the emporer instead. Before he was martyred for his faith in Jesus, he healed the eyes of his jailor's blind daughter.  

In the Late Middle Ages, when courtly love and romance became the rage throughout Europe, St. Valentine's Day became associated with love and romance. Both romantic love and Christian martyrdom are things to celebrate.  St. Valentine stands in the "great cloud of witnesses," in Hebrews 12, cheering us on! St. Valentine's Day can be celebrated in either direction, or both directions. We can celebrate the romantic love we share with our sweethearts or we can remember those who have given their lives for the Gospel of Christ.

If we are celebrating St. Valentine's Day with our sweetie, there are many options.  He, of course, can buy us a dozen long-stemmed roses and a big box of Godiva chocolate.  We can go out to a lovely dinner and gaze into each other's eyes.  But, of course, those things cost money.  So, what are some inexpensive ways to celebrate the romance you share with your husband?  Here are some things Mike and I have done:

• Pack china, crystal goblets, a tasty lunch, and sparkling grape juice. Go on a picnic in a pretty spot.  Bring a beautiful comforter to sit on and be careful with the china and crystal!
• Buy a package of Valentines for children.  Write little notes to your husband on each one and hide them throughout the house.  Make most easy to find, but hide some so that they won't be found until later
• Make a CD of romantic songs and dance outside on the patio in the moonlight
• Make a scrapbook of your relationship from its conception until now. Look at it together. 

• Tell your children how you met, how your husband proposed, and other fun stories. Your children will love this!
• Wait until the children are in bed and have a romantic dinner by candlelight ALONE!
• Read old love letters out loud to each other!

"Have you finished typing your paper, Shine?" I asked yesterday.

"Almost..." she replied sheepishly. 

I looked over at the computer to see her Facebook page filling the screen.

"I'll exit out," she offered quickly.

"You're grounded from the computer for the rest of the day," I admonished.

Wisely, Shine said nothing in reply.

In the last few years, homeschooling teenagers has taken on a whole new set of problems in our house. Internet has been around for a long time, but never really affected us too much until the last few years. There have been times that my children have opted to "research" on the internet, rather than using the books and resources we have checked out from the library.  But the real culprit in our house has been Facebook. My teenagers love it.  All their friends love it and have pages too. I have a Facebook profile myself and have enjoyed finding old high school friends and keeping in touch with distant family members. But, these online communities can be addictive and consuming. Can any of you moms say “Amen”?

Yesterday & Today

Back in my day, we talked on the phone for hours on end. My teens prefer texting, which I like because it saves minutes. Yes, as a teenager, I spent time on the phone with friends having conversations my parents could not hear, but Facebook takes it to a whole new level. Why do teens love these places online? Well, teens have always wanted to connect with other teens with a great desire to build relationships and to feel close to others. Plus, there is that build in "radar" for attractive members of the opposite sex. No matter how godly your daughter or son is, they will notice when a handsome boy/pretty girl walks into the room.

Facebook is a large social network on the internet. Your child has a profile page where she posts notes, pictures, and personal information. Yes, these pages can be made private so that only his "friends" can see them. But, here is the important thing to keep in mind:  Who are all these people your child is adding as friends? Are they really who they say they are? Predators are a huge problem online, but this article is not about that! (I'm not dismissing predators as a huge, scary problem, just not tackling it today.)

Profile Pages

Profile pages give children the opportunity to put their best foot forward with the prettiest pictures, exaggerations about accomplishments, and all kinds of "little white lies" meant to impress. Friends add friends of friends and give access to their personal information to young people they don't even know. I'm sure if they met these young guys and gals in person, they would be shocked to find out who these people really are...rather than the image portrayed on their page.

_  "Hi, Mom. How was your meeting?"

"Well, it didn't go quite as I had planned?' I answered my middle daughter, Jenny-Rose, a senior in high school.

"I'm so sorry," she replied empathetically. "What happened?"

"If you don't mind, I don't want to rehash it. Needless to say, there were several people who did not see eye to eye and the meeting had many awkward moments."

"Can I pray for you?"

"Yes, thank you, Rosie. Please!"

Yes, this is a real conversation that took place in our home. My Rosie is gentle and sweet, noticing when I need some encouragement. When she is discouraged, we talk and I pray for her. I have four daughters and we all pour our hearts out to one another. There is always one of us girls who needs to talk and another who is willing to listen.

Strong relationships are built upon healthy communication. How can we improve communication with our teens?

Put a Tent on Their Forehead

_ "Place a ten on their forehead," Pastor Mike was explaining. "Let people know that on a scale of one to ten, they rate a ten in your eyes. When you look at your children, picture a ten on their forehead."

Laura had a puzzled look on her face.

"Is something wrong?" my husband asked.

"Well, I understand your point, but I don't see how picturing a tent on Zack's forehead will help me value him more," Laura answered referring to her son.

We all laughed and, to this day, we speak of putting a tent on someone's forehead.

Place value on your teens! Let them know that they are A-#1 in your eyes. Remind them over and over of how much joy and blessing they bring to your life.

Speak Respectfully to your Teens

Treat your teens with respect as people. Thank them, apologize to them, and honor them whenever it is appropriate to do so. Try saying, "Would you please take out the garbage?" instead of "Are you ever going to get this garbage out?" Talk to your children they way you would talk to friends that you really admire.

Respect is really a heart issue. No matter how hard we try to cover it up and how good of a job we think we are doing, teens can always tell when you are frustrated with them. The only way to overcome frustration and anger is to go to the Lord and keep praying until His love floods your soul!

Control your Voice Level

One of my favorite stories about Jesus takes places after He is baptized by John the Baptist.

Two of John's disciples show interest in Jesus and ask Him where He is staying. Jesus invites them to come and see.

​The three men spend the day together and when the day is over, Andrew says to his brother, Peter, "I have found the Messiah. You have to come and meet Him." Well, Andrew says something like that.

Jesus' heart was: Welcome to my world! He opened His heart to those who wanted to know Him.

​I want to imitate that day in this blog. I want to invite you to come home with me and see where I live. Meet my family, meet my friends, meet my precious Savior, Jesus.

So, welcome to my world! Sometimes, my world is a gentle, peaceful place of pink roses, white picket fences, and cheerful smiles. Sometimes, it is a rough-and-tumble place of conflict, mess, and confusion. Most of the time, it is both. My life is filled with sticky kisses, mistakes, successes, good books, walks around the block with people I love, and new lessons learned all the time.

Here is my new blog and website. Make yourself at home here. Take a look around and get to know me. I hope to get to know you too. Hope that this is the start, or rekindling, of a beautiful friendship.

Recepcion a mi mundo!
With love & affection,
Merey
(Meredith Ludwig Curtis).