I'm laughing as I read my last post.  My journey to health is just going to be never-ending.  And by "health" I mean losing 20 pounds.  I know health is not just about losing weight, but sometimes it feels  more concrete to think of it in terms of poundage.

Sidenote...I can make a smoothie now without the kitchen looking like it got slimed.

It's been a crazy few days and I don't have anything new or insightful to say about the terrible loss of life in Newtown, so I won't.  My first prayer was "No!", followed by "Jesus, please come back soon."  That's all I could think and all I could pray.  I wanted to jerk my kids out of school and keep them at home for the rest of their natural lives.  Rational, no...but neither is someone killing 20 first graders and their teachers.

I settled for going to visit two of my three girls during lunchtime in their cafeteria.  Wow.  That place is crazy town and every single time I walk in and sit down with a table full of fourth grade girls I am reminded why I am not a teacher.  They are presh, but man can they talk.  The kindergarten table is a little different.  Boys and girls still mix it up and sit together, and the conversation is super random and hilarious.  Quote of the day from Zoe's table: "When my Dad and my Uncle get jobs we are going to move.  I want to move to California.  That's where Katy Perry lives."

For the past week I have been reading the BEST book evs...and I'm not joking.  When I read it I can go from gut laughter to extreme conviction in about two seconds.  It's just so good and you need to go get it right now.  The book is 7 An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess by Jen Hatmaker.  Do not pass go...just buy it and trust me.

In the book, Jen takes seven months and tackles seven different aspects of excess.  She spends the first month eating only seven foods, the second wearing only seven pieces of clothing, and on and on.  If I read that last sentence I wouldn't want to read this book because frankly anyone who does that seems a little cray.  But let me just tell you that she is NORMAL.  She is a mom of three, she loves food, looking cute, and watching Modern Family.  They could run an Apple store out of their house, and she's never really recycled before writing "7."  That's why I love it...it's just real.  And she has a group of hi-larious friends she calls "The Council" who help her through each month and come alongside her to keep her sane.  Great picture of the body of Christ at work in our crazy lives.

Reading this book makes me vacillate between extreme joy that someone is speaking right into where I am, and extreme jealousy that I didn't think of it and write it first.  I want Jen to come speak at our Women's Weekend at Windy Gap next year, but she is already booked up for that weekend.  Not that I would ever wish any retreat would fall apart, but if the weekend of September 6-8, 2013 happened to open up I would be thrilled (yeah I'm talking to you "IF" Conference in Austin, TX).  I'm joking.  Not really.