September | Changing of Seasons Tag

Thanks for nominating me, Dollfaced Writer! 😀

Here are the rules:

1. Thank the person who tagged you and link their post to yours.
2. Link the original post so the creators can read them 😀
3. Use the original featured image and include it in your post.
4. Copy and paste the meaning of the tag into your post.
The Meaning of this Tag:
Change can be difficult and heart-breaking, but it can also cause the greatest turning points in our lives. As the season begins to change for many of us in September, let’s reflect on the changes in our life, good and bad. It’s good to be honest with ourselves and see what changes still need to be made. It is also important to recognize the seasons in our life so we cherish them despite what comes with them. We hope you enjoy this tag, that it inspires you and reminds you that much like the world around us, we go through beautiful changes too.
5. Answer the questions.
6. Tag at least one person.
7. Have fun and enjoy the rest of your month! ❤

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Here are the questions:

1. Of all the fall/autumn color shades (reds, yellows, oranges, etc.), which shade is your favorite? Probably red, but really, they are all pretty. 🙂 I don’t know if this is allowed, but I really like this weird red outlined yellow:

This is from my post, Autumn Leaves. #shamelessselfpromotion Moving along. XD

2. What fall/autumn scent is your favorite? Oohhh hard choice hmm. Maybe pumpkin?

3. What is your favorite fall/autumn drink? Can I say hot chocolate? XD I start drinking it in the fall. I had some yesterday, actually. (Thanks mom for making homemade and adding marshmallows! <3)

4. What big life changes have you recently experienced? I was given four new pets last month!

The two in the back are Tiny and Aurora, the two in the front are Amber and Morrisette. If you want to see the video this still shot came from, click here to go to my Instagram! #moreshamelessselfpromotion These guys are such sweethearts.  I plan to give them a post o their own soon where I can introduce them better. 🙂

5. How do you cope with life changes? It depends on what the change is. I LOVE the four little beautiful birds – that was a good change and I’m handling it well and spoiling them rotten. ❤ With some changes, I don’t do well, haha.

6. Who is the person you trust most? Jesus. 🙂

7. What would be a question you’d be afraid to tell the truth on? If I answer this, then people might get curious and start asking it… 😉

I tag:

Through Quiet Waters

Dreaming of Guatemala

The Blue Sky Tag

the Blue Sky Tag created by Rachael Ritchey

Thank you for nominating me for this tag, Miriam! (Sorry it took so long for me to get to it though.) This was so fun. The rules are pretty easy, as they all revolve around the number 11.

• 11 tags, 11 answers, 11 questions
• Use the Blue Sky banner
• It is sort of polite to mention the person who tagged you
• You need to answer the 11 questions set by your tagger
• You will need to make up 11 original and interesting or funny questions for those you tag.
• You need to tag 11 people

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Questions I was given:

1. When was the last time you handwrote something lengthy?
   • That depends on what lengthy is… if it means writing Bible study notes, that happened last week. 🙂
2. Does your birth order affect your achievement?
   • I don’t know and I guess I’ll never find out – I’m an only child. 😂
3. Do you listen to music while you read or write?
   • I do! 🙂 I’ve made playlists on YouTube for writing. Here is a link to my instrumental one: Instrumental Writing Music And this is probably my favorite from that list: Whisper Of Hope
4. What was your favorite childhood holiday?
   • Christmas! Not only was it a joyous time with family, but it also meant that it was Winter which meant hot chocolate, wood splitting, and no allergies. 🙂
5. Are you open to try strange food?
   • That depends on how strange it is. 😅 I plan to try couscous sometimes soon.
6. Are you a collector of anything?
   • This might get lengthy. Postcards. Stamps. Rocks. Books. Antique silver. Coins. And I’m sure there are more that I’m not thinking of right now.
7. What is your natural talent?
   • Probably writing, though I don’t know. 😅
8. Are you adventuresome?
   • It depends on what it is, but I do love adventures. Last August, I went on an Adventure in Arkansas with some dear friends. ❤
9. Sleep with the door open or closed?
   • In the winter, closed. In the summer, open, though not much this summer. (I have a heater in my room but the air conditioner is in the room across from mine and I like to be cool. 🤣) Jackie likes to come into my room in the night and knock things over. And attack my face. So mostly closed. 😹
10. Morning lark or night owl?
    • Night owl. **writing this after midnight**
11. Tea or coffee?
    • O.O Don’t make me chose! Okay… hot chocolate. 😂 Okay seriously. I’ll pick tea. 🙂

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Questions for my nominees:

1. What is a book you have read recently?
2. Do you like thunderstorms?
3. What is your favorite genre to read?
4. Do you have a pet?
5. Do you have a favorite song or a song you’ve been listening to on repeat?
6. Do you like to travel?
7. Cats or dogs?
8. Would you rather take a walk in nature or a walk in the city?
9.  Favorite book or chapter in the Bible?
10. What is your favorite season?
11. What has God taught you lately?

The Nominees (no pressure!):

Maggie at Dreaming of Guatemala

T.R. at Inside Cup (or Peeking Beneath)

Dollfaced Writer

Carly at Message In Stanza

Efua at Grace Over Pain

Margaret at The Word

Diana at La Petit Muse

Tammy at God Inspired Art

Shae at BibleBloggerGirl (or Shae’s Days)

Lily at Retrospective Lily

Teresa at Hope For Today

August | Back to the Basics Tag

Thanks for tagging me, Dollfaced Writer! 😀 Looks like a lot of fun! 🙂 Finally getting to this before the month is over.

Rules:

1. Thank the person who tagged you and link their post to yours.
2. Link the original post so the creators can read them 😀
3. Use the original featured image and include it in your post.
4. Copy and paste the meaning of the tag into your post.
The Meaning of this Tag:
For many people here in the United States, August means the beginning of a new school year, or at the very least time to prepare for school to begin in early September. It can be very stressful and chaotic. “Back to School” is all over advertisements, television, the internet, grocery stores, department stores…pretty much everywhere you look. It’s a combination of excitement, anxiety, and stress that our society dreads yet looks forward to every year.
In this month’s tag, inspired by the nostalgia of “Back to School” season, Purple Rose and I want to go “Back to the Basics” and reflect on our education and early life. Join us in remembering the sweet smell of freshly opened crayons, the sound of pencils sharpening, and the sight of red ink on the most recently graded assignment…
5. Answer the questions.
6. Tag at least one person.
7. Have fun and enjoy the rest of your month! ❤

Here are the questions:

1. Did you (do you) go to public school or private school? Or, were you (are you) homeschooled? (Please do not share the name of your school XD) I was homeschooled. 🙂

2. What was (is) your favorite subject in school? My favorite was Science. 🙂

3. What was your favorite grade in school? Probably 9th grade because that was the year that Arkansas stopped testing homeschoolers so I didn’t have THAT stress afterward. XD

4. Do you prefer pens or pencils? Why? Pencils so I can erase mistakes. 🙂

5. What was (is) your favorite school lunch? I didn’t have a favorite lunch, as long as it was lunch and I got out of doing my schoolwork while I ate it. XD

6. What is the biggest lesson you have learned in life? God is always there no matter how badly I mess up. 

7. What do you wish someone taught you a long time ago? This one took me the longest to answer for some reason. Time is fleeting. I feel like I’ve wasted so much time on things that really don’t matter.  I want to redeem the time (Redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Eph 5:16) and not let days go by. Also how to control my tongue. (“But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment.” Matthew 12:36) And control emotions. Because if I get a handle on that, it would probably help with the rest, haha. 

I tag:

T. R. Noble (Inside Cup or Peeking Beneath)

Maggie

Yesterday’s Liebster Award Error – An Apology

I must apologize to T. R. Noble and Faye  – I somehow copied T. R.’s questions to Faye in the award post yesterday (Liebster Award).  And then went I went to grab the correct questions to answer – and I wasn’t a nominee!  I realize how this could come across, and I promise I wasn’t trying to pretend that I was nominated when I wasn’t. 😮 When I am nominated, I save a link to my “awards” bookmarks to remind me to make a draft, copy the rules and questions, etc. Somehow, Faye’s post ended up in my “awards” bookmarks instead of my “Posts to catch up on” bookmarks, and I thought I was nominated for that reason. My mistake! 😊

I also bring this up so that anyone who saw the Liebster Award portion disappear from the post yesterday would not think they are crazy.

I ask for your forgiveness, T. R. and Faye, and I’ll double check before posting from now on. 🙂 Love you guys and see you around the blogging community! ❤

The Blogger Recognition Award (Twice!), and The Mystery Blogger Award

This week, since I haven’t yet written the next Wonder Wednesday, I decided to accept these awards that I should have accepted… months ago… **crawls under desk in utter shame** So I guess this Wonder Wednesday, you get to find out more about me. I’m not sure how I feel about that… I didn’t want to be the subject of a Wonder Wednesday, but I do like awards, so…  😆 Here we go. 🙂

(Also, I am very behind in responding to comments and I’m slowly getting to them all, just in case you have commented and I haven’t responded yet. 😉 )

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Thank you to Carly and Gail for nominating me for this award! 🙂 It means a lot to me that you think I’m deserving of this award. ❤

The Rules:

1. Thank the blogger who nominated you and provide a link to their blog.
2. Write a post to show your award.
3. Give a brief story of how your blog started.
4. Give two pieces of advice to new bloggers.
5. Select 15 other bloggers for this award.
6. Comment on each blog to let them know you’ve nominated them and a link to the post you created.

My blog started in April of 2016, mostly because my friends had WordPress blogs. I started it mainly to share things with them – I never expected so many people would visit my little blog and that I would meet so many wonderful people here. It has been a blessing. ❤

Two pieces of advice…

Firstly, let God lead you to write. When I started blogging, I never really intended to share my poetry and photos. I thought I wanted to alternate between book reviews and Bible studies. Not that there is anything wrong with those. I had put myself and this blog in a box when God obviously wanted me to do more than just that and trying to fight against it caused unneeded writer’s block and stress about writing the next post. Once I opened up and followed Him, things worked out so much better and blogging was much easier.

Secondly, read other blogs. Like the posts. Comment if you want to.  (But please don’t like and comment if you don’t actually read, haha.) The community is amazing. I was so shy at first, that I didn’t comment much. I try to comment more now.

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Thank you to Amazing Tangled Grace for nominating me for the Mystery Blogger Award! 🙂 It means so much that you thought of me. 🙂 Again, I am skipping the facts part because after answering all these amazing questions, I don’t know what else I can say about myself. 😆

What is a Mystery Blogger Award?

Okoto Enigma created this award by being what she calls “creatively bored”, obliquely naming it after herself, which is both clever and cool! This award is for “amazing and ingenious” bloggers alike, who find “fun and passion” in writing.

Here are the Rules:

Put the award logo/image on your blog.
List the rules.
Thank whoever nominated you and provide a link to their blog.
Mention the creator of the award.
Tell your readers 3 things about yourself.
You have to nominate 10-20 people.
Notify your nominees by commenting on their blog.
Ask your nominees any 5 questions of your choice; With one weird or funny question (specify).
Share your link to your best post (s).

The questions I was given:

1. What is your favorite dessert?
   • Mmm, I like so many… maybe cheesecake. 😀
2. What is your favorite work of fiction?
   • Just one? 😮 At the moment, I really like Once Upon A Summer by Janet Oke. I read it for the second time and it was wonderful.
3. Pepsi or Coke?
   • Coke! Haha, Pepsi is good too, but I have such fond memories of visiting my grandparents as a kid and they always let me drink a Coke in a glass bottle, and it was so special. ❤
4. What was something that made you smile today?
   • Writing this post and seeing these wonderful people who thought my little blog deserves these awards. ❤
5. What are your three favorite things about blogging?
   • Talking to the community. Reading posts by the community. Adding my own posts to the community. ❤

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Picking nominees is sometimes the most stressful part of the awards because I don’t want to leave anyone out. So I’m going to leave these open to anyone who wants to participate. 🙂

Questions for the nominees:

Same as the ones in the awards above. 😉

The Light Of The World Award

Credit

Thank you to T. R. Noble for nominating me for this award! ❤ I’m so honored! And sorry it took me a while to get to this – I’m behind again, haha. I look forward to catching up with everyone. ❤

The Apostle Paul said, “Pay everyone what is owed: taxes to whom taxes are due, revenue to whom revenue is due, respect to whom respect is due, honor to whom honor is due.” (Romans 13:7). I believe that true believers and followers of Jesus Christ are actually like lighthouses for God. For this reason and because Jesus himself said that we are the “light of the world,” I decided to create The Light of The World Award to honor authors (bloggers) whose presence on the web serve as a shining light for Christ and His Gospel of salvation. If you have been nominated to receive this award and chose to accept it, here is what you need to do.

The Rules

1. Save and add one of the award images (pictured above) on your blog.
2. Create a page/post to mention the award nomination and thank the person/blog that nominated you. Make sure you provide a link to their site.
3. Give credit to the creator of the award (Lighthouse Devotions) and provide a link to the site as well.  (http://www.Lighthousedevotions.blog)
4. List the rules.
5. Answer the next four questions on the same post:
   1. What three words would you use to describe your blog?
   2. In what way(s) can a Christian shine for Christ?
   3. What bible verse (quote it) talks about being a light in a dark and lost world?
   4. What Christian song do you know that has the word “light” in it? Provide a link if available.
6. Nominate 7 or more people/blogs to receive the award. Briefly explain why you think they should receive it and provide a link to their sites.
7. Contact them and let them know that you nominated them.
8. Provide them with a link to the Rules page.
9. Say a prayer thanking God for His light and ask that He continue to shine it through you and your blog.
10. Keep shining the light of Christ wherever you go and in whatever you do!

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“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. – Matthew 5:14 (NAS)

1. What three words would you use to describe your blog?
   • Jesus, Poetry, Nature
2. In what way(s) can a Christian shine for Christ?
   • Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. (First Corinthians 10:31 NKJV)
3. What bible verse (quote it) talks about being a light in a dark and lost world?
   • You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. (First Thessalonians 5:5 NKJV)
4. What Christian song do you know that has the word “light” in it? Provide a link if available.
   • I hope that “lighthouse” works. XD It has light in the word “lighthouse.” 🙂

Nominees and why I picked them:

The nominees are below, and the reason is the same for each of them – as far as I know, they have not been nominated for this award yet, and they brighten my Reader with each post they publish. ❤

Faye

Melani

Dreamer’s Outlet

Cavelle 

Lisa Beth

Sharon

Linda

Carly

Natalie

Diana

Leigh

Tammy (I know that you don’t plan to post for the month of June and that you are behind in getting to award and tags, so no pressure, haha. 😊)

The 3 Day 3 Quotes Challenge Day Nine

The grand finale! 🙂 I’m going to go in depth as to why I like this quote – er – poem. I hope that you enjoy it as much as I did. ❤

Make us of one heart and mind – For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. (Romans 12:4-5 NASB)

Courteous and kind – But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:23 – 24 NASB)

Lowly, meek in thought and word – Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. (Matthew 11:29 KJV)

Never by fretful passion stirred – And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. (Galatians 5:24 NKJV)

Free from anger, free from pride, – He that is slow to wrath is of great understanding: but he that is hasty of spirit exalteth folly. (Proverbs 14:29 KJV) When pride comes, then comes shame; but with the humble is wisdom. (Proverbs 11:2 NKJV)

Let us in God abide – “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me.” (John 15:4 NKJV)

All the depths of love express – “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35 NKJV)

All the height of holiness – As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, “YOU SHALL BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY.” (First Peter 1:14-16 NASB)

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Nominee:

Shakiyasmessage