Loco Diversion

Sometimes I go a little crazy!  No really I mean it.  I head off on a tangent.  Yes, those who know me have heard me ramble, but that is not the kind of tangent I am referring to.  It is sort of like a snowball effect of sorts.  My mind spirals from the table, to the curtain, to the area rug, to the wall color, from the kitchen, to the living room, to the bedroom, and on it goes.

We built and moved into our new home in Florida just less than a year ago.  We moved one thousand and sixteen miles to another tan rectangle as I call it.  Please do not take me the wrong way.  We have a beautiful home and have been beyond blessed to build our last two homes.  Yet, I have affinity to the depths of my soul for older homes that ooze character.  But this post is NOT about how we chose this home.  I am digressing, please allow me to redirect!  Tan rectangles take extra time and effort to develop the character than their elder counter parts sometimes do not, intertwined with the fact that the neighborhoods are made up of homes that mimic each other with minor variations.  I also can not remember a time since I was a wee, small girl that I did not enjoy decorating myself through fashion and yes as you can imagine that love for decorating later translated to decorating my home.

I love when a home reflects the owners character and style.  A casa that is warm and inviting, one might even say homey is what I long for within.  Imagine my little blonde son's chubby, sun kissed hands on an ever so big, fuzzy blanket and these words coming out of his mouth, "This is sooo cozy!"  That's how I want our home to feel and how I want to feel in our home.  Somehow in an effort to feel that, I sometimes, well really all too often, I go a little crazy.

I will allow myself to spend hours creating the perfect home through pins (aka Pinterest.com), waste a whole Saturday looking at furniture at stores who offer zero percent financing for X,Y,Z months, watch HGTV with a mouth that is beginning to resemble a dog with rabies, and fervently peruse this one, then that, and oh do not forget that website looking at the homes for sale trying every combo from new build, subdivision and no subdivision, new neighborhood, renovation, you name it to find just the right, house.  No, no, no, not house, HOME!

Please do not take me the wrong way.  None of these things are inherently bad in and of themselves.  Who knows, maybe not even in combination.  It is attitude I have when I am done of discontent, the time missed with family, the seeds of jealousy and envy that are planted or watered, and the idea that a home is made by what decorates it rather than who lives in it and the memories made there.

Crazy, just crazy how far I allow myself to meander down these roads and lines of thinking.  Somehow, someway I always come back to my senses.  Reason and the Holy Spirit's leading seep to the surface and sort of give a gentle and loving, get it together slap!

Things I know for sure:
-No amount of superficial hodge podge will make a physical house a home.
-Debt only brings guilt and is not God honoring.
-Joy is unconditional and found only through God and within.
-When I am spending myself on behalf of others I am not focusing on what I do or do not have in my possession and as a a matter of fact become much more grateful.
-The temptation on this earth will remain, but it is not worth missing one day in God's house!

So I am not going to give any prescriptions for you or myself on how to stop this crazy.  Today is just about getting it out there.  Being transparent with myself and you.  Keeping it real that I long after Jesus and to become more like Him and yet I still find myself focused on a diversion sometimes.

What is your diversion? How does it steal your joy?  How does it keep you from seeing what God really has for you?  Be honest and repentant if you need to be, but whatever you do be REAL!

Schedule Cleared

Last week Marc got a call from an old friend letting him know that a mutual friend and former co-worker's cancer had returned.  Not only had it returned, but it was back with a vengeance in her liver, lungs, and so on.  The old friend had just learned of the news himself and let Marc know that she was at this point unresponsive.  The doctors believed she may have up to two weeks.  Later that evening Marc received a second call that she had passed.  It was startling and deeply saddening.  I felt bad for Marc and his inability to say goodbye, for his friend and the pain she had suffered, but most heart breaking for me is the family she leaves behind.  You hear it all the time, but she was too young, her children just college aged.  They will not have a mother to see them get married, be a grandmother to their babies, or just pick up the phone to chat with about meaningless nonsense.

The following day was deemed Cuddles & Cartoons Day at the Dittmer residence.  The little men and I retreated to the sanctuary of our king size bed.  We threw out the confines of clocks and to do lists and were just present with each other.  How often do I allow myself to just be present for a whole day with my sons?  Not often enough!  Repeatedly I find myself saying, "Just a minute, when I am finished, or not right now."    It is normal I know.  Life is busy and with age comes responsibility.  Sometimes something stops us in our tracks, slows us down for a minute.  It reminds us that if this was it and tomorrow was not to come the to do list would be for naught.  Our little people would remain however and what would they remember about me?  I hope that they would know and believe that they meant the world to me.  That nothing mattered more than God their father, their human father, and each of them.  That their Momma would drop everything just to cuddle and watch cartoons.  To make them brunch in bed!

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I try to be an intentional person, but it is hard.  I get tired.  And I too, too often loose my patience and my cool.  I began reading a blog this am called The Orange Rhino: 10 Things I Learned When I Stopped Yelling at My Kids.  She took a 365 day challenge to yell less and love more.  Wow!  I have a feeling I will be sharing more with you about anger and parenting in the future.

How I wish I did not have to be reminded to clear my schedule.  To be present, to slow down, and just be, especially with Thing One and Thing Two.

What do you need to clear your schedule for?  Or is it who?

Im·print verb \im-ˈprint, ˈim-ˌ\

: to create a mark by pressing against a surface
: to cause (something) to stay in your mind or memory 

Each life that we touch and in turn touches us has the opportunity to leave an imprint. Some of the the imprints that are most embedded in my mind and on my heart have taken place in a country that holds part of me and is one of the places I call home. Five years ago as a way to live out my love for orphans and  God's mandate as set out in James 1:26-27 "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world," I journeyed to Zambia for the first time. I embarked on this pilgrimage praying that God would use me as a vessel to share His light and love. How these trips and the people that I met along way would shape and change me was not my focus, but God does not work singularly and impressions left by two lives touching effect both parties. The following is a journey through pictures of the lasting imprints of those touched by God's work through Horizon International, Inc. and those that are permanently etched within me.

Trip One, October 2010

A gentleman who is in his eighties, his wife, and his granddaughter, they proudly stand with a hippo roller used to transport water from the well that was provided through Horizon International, Inc.  His prayer is that he may live long enough to raise the three children in their care. 

This day  we were visiting children in their homes.  Children joined us as we traveled by foot through the bush.  Seems like one of the closet experiences I will ever have to journeying like Jesus did.  

Kenneth, our former sponsored son, and I.  I can not express how wonderful it was to meet each other for the first time.  I had the opportunity to meet him twice before he relocated.  We are no longer able to sponsor him, but our family will carry him with us always and pray for him every day.  I have been able to continue a relationship with his grandmother and former caregiver.

Trip Two, 2011

As we hosted a Health and Hygiene Workshop in the church in an urban setting of  the capital city Lusaka called, Chaisa, we had let those attending know we would provide childcare for the orphans and children in their care.  Since we were under a tent in a highly populated area, children kept joining us.  We were thrilled to share stories of Jesus with them, music, crafts, etc.  Yet when it came time for lunch we only had enough for those children we were expecting.  The situation quickly got out of hand as we asked the children to line up whose caregivers were attending.  Somewhere along the way we tried to feed them all.  Children pushed in line, were joining the line over and over, and the older kids were getting switches and trying to stop the younger ones.  I can not explain to you how helpless we felt!  How desperate we felt to have so much and in this situation to be able to provide so little to meet such a basic need.  Without being there, I am not sure you can understand that it was literally traumatizing.  Some teammates actually experienced post traumatic stress.  This trip as a whole was the hardest of the four that I have been on.  I can not say that I truly enjoyed it.  There were amazing moments, but as a whole it was just plain hard.  Yet God used this journey to teach me what obedience really means.  Living out God's mandate on our lives even when it makes us uncomfortable, even when we do not get the warm fuzzies.  

Third Trip, 2012

These are the bags of eleven women headed on a mission trip to Zambia and some to South Africa following.

These are the bags of over one hundred women attending the first ever Women of Worth Conference we hosted in Chongwe, Zambia.  The women slept on the floor of the church and bathed in a make shift shower made of plastic.  To them this was like a retreat!

Trip Four, 2013

During my time in Africa I have seen poverty and brokenness in ways never before and yet I have seen and felt joy to the marrow of my bones and the depths of my soul.  Here we  freely danced, fellowshiped, worshiped with abandon and joy.

This young boy, Moses, was afraid of the mzungu, or white person, when we first met.  He is the grandson of a lovely spitfire woman named Bessie who knows English quite well.  Over the duration of the conference he began to warm up to me.  During the dance session above he was my partner for some time (his little head is at the bottom of the picture).  On the last morning of the conference he sat on my lap.  Moments prior there had been two little guys, but as soon as the other little man vacated he fell asleep.  I sat holding Moses as he rested peacefully on my lap and felt pure joy.  At one point his mother, Bessie's daughter, offered to take him and I said that it was okay.  Later as the conference wrapped up, his mother and I embraced.  She began to cry.  Such a small thing to hold someone's son for them as they attended a conference, but such a big gesture to her.

These trips have changed me and shaped me.  They have left imprints, those pictured above and so many more.  I can not know in full how God has used them to imprint others, but I know that they have as two lives do not touch without leaving lasting marks on each.  Thank you to all who have supported me through these journeys and those to come.  You are part of making the prayer, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven," a reality.

Blog Overhaul

From Dittmer Daily Times to Transparently Worthy...

My last post on my personal blog, The Dittmer Daily Times, was in 2011 to announce my becoming a resident author for the decor and gardening section of a faith based blog.  Somewhere along the way, I found myself frustrated by the need to have a post ready at the the same time each week, scrambling to get it done, and no longer even decorating, just talking about it.  Needless to say that trickled over to my lack of sharing about the happenings of our family on my personal blog.  Lately I have found myself inspired to write about my Zambian adventures to not only share my experiences but also as a thank you to all of the people who have supported me in various ways to make the trips happen.  It became abundantly clear that I had no real great way to share what I was writing.  Long e-mails that show up in an inbox that was slated to be cleaned out last March and posts that take up your whole Facebook feed were not ideal.  A friend suggested I create a blog.  I thought been there, done that, past that fad.  No offense to all of the amazing blog authors out there.  I just was not really ready to jump back on the bandwagon.  Besides what to I really have to say and who really wants to listen?  Yet, the more I thought about it the more it made sense and the next topic in a series of topics I wanted to share only really made sense to share through a blog layout.  So that "post" halted and I began pondering what the so called overhauled blog would be entitled, what I wanted it to be about, even breath.  It needed to be something that could allow me to share about my family because now more than ever as we live many miles away from most of our loved ones a venue to do that seems reasonable, but it needed to be more than that.  It should be a place where I could share all things Africa, but it should be more than that.  Faith, parenting, transparency, transition, fear, grace, hope, love...yes, yes, and yes, it would encompass all of these things.


So here it is Transparently Worthy?

Every part of me is permeated by my faith in God and His son, Jesus, my savior.  I slowly grow and am pruned, my faith is not static.  Yet it envelops me, infuses every part and piece of me, and therefore flows from me in my thoughts and actions.  Authenticity, what you see is what you get.  It may get disheveled in my head for a minute, but I always come back to it. Along the way some beautiful, joy-filled women have shown me there is really no other way. One particularly wise individual in this category has allowed me to see for my own eyes time after time, that He truly does overcome by the blood of His son and the word of our testimonies (Rev 12:11).  Across oceans, skin pigments, cultural divides, and much, much more, He overcomes.  My name is of course Amanda, which is Latin meaning "having to be loved," "deserving to be loved," or, simply, "worthy of love."  The word worthy tripped me up for a minute.  Where is the humility in calling yourself worthy?  Yet I know God and who He is as well as who He says that I am in my head.  Sometimes I know it better in my head than in my heart.  I am worthy.  So are you!  I mean I give my life to inspiring hope, living grace, and loving fearlessly all because I believe you are worthy, God believes you are worthy, and I want YOU to believe.  So with that, I am worthy too and our stories are worth being told.  In that vain I begin this blog and invite you into my crazy, messy, broken, but beautiful journey.  No promises on how often, how long or short, but promising to lay it out there authentically praying that it inevitably brings Him glory.

Disclaimers
1) I am really not that great of a writer and will likely have many grammatical errors and typos along the way!  Yet, I feel inspired to write and who knows from time to time someone might be interested in reading what I share.
2) My sweet friend, Melanie Spring, came up with my blog title.  She is gifted and just darn amazing like that, both personally and professionally.  Check her out here http://www.runninggrace.com/home and here http://www.melaniespring.com/.  She also coined and "owns the rights" to inspire hope and live grace. You will find the copyrights written beautifully on her body.  Still, as two women on a pilgrimage of faith both uniquely different, but beautifully similar, God has taught us through our various circumstances and these words symbolize seasons weathered and bits of clarity.  In addition, these are words that we try with every part of our beings to live by.