The Joy Sisters

We are grateful to end our month with our JOYsister Michelle from MommerForever on  Instagram.  We are inspired by her art and wisdom.  We hope you will be too, as she shares about the ways she has been renewed. ~JOYsister Christine I was asked to contribute my thoughts on a word beginning with “re-“ meaning again & again, repeating, or repetition.  The word RENEWAL came to me.  With Easter being just a day away, I reflect on the ultimate sacrifice made by Jesus Christ so we could be at-one with Heavenly Father AGAIN someday. RENEWED.  I’d like to share a journey of mine with you. I used to get so stuck in my junk. Like I just couldn’t do this or that, I wasn’t good enough or perfect enough, worthy enough, and I let that define me for a VERY long time.  A VERY LONG TIME! I was sick because of it, I was paralyzed from progress because of it.  How did I get out of this state of mind? I started to pray. I started doing ...

We decided to post every day in March.  It has been a stretch.  Sometimes guest bloggers that wanted to join us ended up with plates way to full.  Though we know they will be back with us in future months, we had to dig deep to meet our goals.  We are almost there.  As I sat tonight without the original plan, and knowing to meet my goal, I would need to come up with a post... the word RESOLUTE came to my mind.  I looked it up:   admirably purposeful, determined, and unwavering.  Yes, that is what we strive to be! I can't possibly start at the beginning because I don't have enough time.  {Date night!}. This JOYsister thing, this brainchild, we don't know where it is going, but it's filled with passion and love, and really it's a God thing.  It has grown with us and on us.  The original JOYsisters... Heather, Renae and Lori were like the three musketeers.  They share an amazing history and friendship.  They named th...

Sometimes we get to step back through the portal of time and relive a moment, experience a place, recall sweet memories.  Last weekend I got together with life long friends.  Friends that began my adulthood with me and have stuck by me ever since.  We have laughed together and cried together.  Experienced sorrow that rocked us to the core, and inexplicable JOY.  We borrowed a church building where our boys could play basketball and sardines and we could sit and visit.  The particular building we gathered in brought back sweet memories of childhood, teen years and my early years as a young adult.  My sister and I used to sit on that very stage and watch our then boyfriends (her's became her husband) play basketball.  That gym stage that we once sat on while we dreamed of all the possibilities tied to youth, on Saturday had a bag of diapers, wipes, bottles, basketballs, and carseats on it.  Life has changed, evolved and progressed.  B...

I first met my husband when we were seniors in high school.  We didn't go to the same high school, in fact, we grew up almost 45 miles from each other in rural North Dakota. It was a chance meeting in the hallway at a basketball game in Edgeley, ND where we first made a connection. That connection has lasted over 31 years. As our relationship evolved from dating, to engagement, to marriage, to becoming parents. Through all our milestones, we have had to consciously make a decision to reconnect. We have changed so much as individuals in this process, especially considering we started dating as teenagers in high school! ​ We didn't know when we first met how our lives would unfold or what the future held for us. We didn't know the amazing joys and heartbreaking sorrows we would experience together. Yet, we do make the choice to continue to reconnect on a daily basis. As I reflect on how we evolved as a couple over the years, I am struck by the common thread of reco...

We are grateful to have Danelle join us this week for a guest post.   She shares some of her insights on regret. She may only be 19, as she states,  but she is already wise beyond her years. We'd love to hear your thoughts  about regret and how you manage it in life. Comment below. People often say, “live your life with no regrets”. While a nice concept, I believe the only way you can live your life with no regrets is if you can see into the future. Because few “can” the rest of us have to content ourselves to our lives full of mistakes and regrets. The feeling of regret is learned at a very young age. Toddlers will break a rule, get scolded and break the rule again. When they break it a second time however, they remember the scolding and regret their choice. While toddlers may not see their actions in such clear terms, the older they get the more they understand. I’m only nineteen years old. To most people I’ve barely lived my life, and yet I can’t coun...

As a woman and JOYsister, I have spent much of my life living under umbrellas of unrealistic expectations, mine and others.  Mine for myself and mine for others.  And other's unrealistic expectations of me.  When we talked about developing the JOYsister community we wanted to cultivate and nurture a place where women build women.  Where women pray for or sent positivity to other women that need it.  Where women look for the good, lift and love.  AND... a place where a sink of dirty dishes, an enormous pile of laundry, a craft room where no surfaces are easily discoverable, a broken heart, depression, tragedy, hurts...are all safe here.  We wanted to live by the motto, Have Courage and Be Kind.   Recently my niece came to visit and took family photos.  She left me with over 1700 images.  Yes, you read that right.  But I wanted to pick for myself and I am the blessed recipient of my generous and talented niece.  Of those...

I once had a counselor tell me that one of the most important reasons for us to keep a journal is for our own recollection of events. She said that it is very common among once happy couples to completely REwrite their history together and distort it according to how they are currently feeling. That is where language like ALWAYS and NEVER come in, as in "he NEVER complements me", or "she ALWAYS nags".  If we are writing down tender moments, kind feelings, happy memories and recording the good times, instead of our current negative thoughts and circumstances swaying the past, the opposite can actually be true. Isn't that cool?  We can reread, revisit and actually {RE}WRITE our current script. The one that is happening right here and now. We can write JOY into any circumstance by looking at past happy events and reminding ourselves of previous good and happy times. We can remember what we loved about our spouse, a friend, our home, the scriptures, the church...

re·joice v.   re·joiced ,  re·joic·ing ,  re·joic·es v. intr. To  feel   joyful;  be  delighted:   1.  To  feel   joyful   about   (something):   2.  Archaic  To  fill   with   joy;   gladden. I was born and raised in Southern California and lived inland for most of my life. We didn't have seasons there. I felt like I was living in a never ending cycle of blah. When we moved our family 1900 miles away to Minnesota 15 years ago it was like my senses were awakened to seasons and I suddenly felt like REjoicing. That first Spring I had hope, hope like I had never had before. After several LONG, cold months of Winter, Spring had finally arrived. I REjoiced at the first bud that pushed it's way up from the dormant ground. Suddenly I had several buds and I remember feeling overJOYed as I REjoiced in this season. Spring is a time to REjoice!  Easter is in the Sp...

It's been a hard month.  We all have them.  Some days are just better than others, some months, some years.  I recently was struggling and told a friend I was so overwhelmed that I just wanted to stay in bed and pull the covers over my head.  She said, "YOU CAN'T! There is too much to do!"  She is right.  But sometimes I give myself permission to Retreat.  Even though I know it is temporary.  Even though I know the four day headache will eventually subside, or the children will stop their five day bickering streak, or the dog will get well, or the baby will stop teething and sleep through the night again, sometimes, occasionally... I need to retreat.  I need to pull the covers over my head and metaphorically put my hands over my ears while chanting "lalalalala" So I can block out all sound from the world, for a moment.   As a JOYsister, one of the things I appreciate is that life is REAL for us.  On any given day you will p...

Photo Credit Kelsie Andrus Photography  The past four years of our lives often remind me of a story a friend shared... "Welcome to Holland" {click on the link to read the story by Emily Perl Kingsley.}  My life had a course.  Things were busy, good and beautiful.  Then I got to an airport and it was like there were no flights to my intended destination.  Instead of going where we thought we were going to go, we had to REROUTE.  We had to make new plans, see things with new perspective, trust God and leap.   I have come to believe, though my details are specific to my family, the truth is rather universal.  We rarely get what we want, or think we want, in just the way we want.  Plans rarely turn out just like we expect them too.  College takes longer.  For some catastrophic illness occurs.  Death. Divorce. Lay offs.  Frankly life happens.  And even the trials aren't all bad.  Unexercised muscles can do ...

As women we are givers. Givers of life, of ourselves, our time and talents. I have noticed in myself and those around me, we are not quite so good at receiving and we have to put effort into being receptive to the service and gifts of others talents and time.  "I'm fine" "We're fine"....."it's ALL fine", seems to be a standard refrain. But. We aren't ALL fine. WE NEED EACH OTHER.  We need to be able to serve and to receive service. We need to be able to give love and receive it...AND EVEN ASK FOR IT! *gasp* Yep. I said it. Ask for what we need. When we need it. And then allow it to be given. It will likely take some work for some of us to get there, but I think we will all be better off for it. Together we are bringers, sharers and spreaders of JOY! Yes, this is likely the shortest blog post ever, but it's all I have in me for tonight.  ~JOYsister Heather

She Will Find What is Lost by Brian Kershisnik   Sometimes we have someone in our lives who hears the tears that fall only on our pillow, in the dead of night.  The tears that make no sound.  The tears that break hearts and leave us questioning everything that ever filled us up with belief.  In 2014 I had a friend that heard those tears from 667 miles away.  Or angels whispered in her ear, maybe a little of both.  I was in my 9th pregnancy with 5 living children. (I AM SO BLESSED, I know what a gift I have, I don't mean to minimize the grief of anyone that hasn't been given that gift... we all carry grief though, and those losses were mine).  I was pregnant.  I had lost 2 pregnancies in a row and this one was NOT looking good.  We were elated to learn that we were expecting a son, a beautiful boy who happened to have Down syndrome.  But there were other complications hydrops (fluid throughout his body threatened an almost certain ...

Today we are so very blessed to have another guest blogger here at theJOYsisters. I have known Elizabeth for more than 10 years, we used to live in the same town. Elizabeth and her family have since moved away, but I love keeping up with her on Instagram and by following her blog. She is a gifted writer and I am so glad she agreed when I asked if she'd add her voice to our collective over here. Today she talks about the JOY in reunions. Thank you Elizabeth! Eleven down.  Five to go. This is when it gets easier for me.  Easier for me to acknowledge that I miss him like crazy.  Easier to not just do the days, but to find some joy in the days.  Easier to think about him coming home - because that day isn’t so far away.   I’ll tell you something, though, when it’s five days down and eleven to go, it’s not so easy to see our way through.  Days four, five, six, seven . . . that’s when it seems like he has been gone so long already, but ther...

Our JOYsister friend Debby is an avid gardener.  I have learned so much from her over the years and she often shares the fruits of her labor for which we are so grateful.  She also has a beautiful flower garden.  She had an experience one year in her garden that doesn't just teach a powerful lesson about gardening, but also about how all things can be redeemed with work and effort.  Thank you Debby for sharing this powerful story. The Parable of the Calla and the Canna- My neighbor offered me some “calla lilies- just like the ones you have.” She said her friend has a lot of extras and the neighbor knows how much I love flowers!  About a week later, they arrived and I planted them in several spots in my front flowerbed. I LOVE calla lilies because they remind me of my former home. Over the next month or so, the leaves began to grow and I thought, “They don’t look like my calla lilies…????”  But I kept them and they grew among my ca...

One of the stories in our family that has achieved legendary status is when our hairdresser asked a then 12 year old Danelle (during the Christmas season) if our family has any traditions. Danelle replied "not really....." , to which I nearly passed out. It has been one of my main missions as a momma to carefully build and craft traditions for every major holiday and nearly every minor one as well. My girls always know what to look forward to and there is often tumultuous consequences for messing with our traditions. But Danelle wasn't finished with her sentence. She continued, ".....we just do the SAME things over and over again, EVERY year." And then we (Miranda, Carla and I) busted up laughing while Danelle sat there bewildered and a bit confused.  So now we tease about how we don't have traditions in our family. We just do the same things OVER and OVER again! One of these SAME things is to host St. Patrick's Day dinner in our home. It is M...