Promise Me This by Cathy Gohlke

As soon as I seen Promise Me This I knew I had to read it.  The Titanic has always captivated my interest and to read a christian fiction book from that time period was a pure delight.

This book has everything you can imagine from love, hate, bitterness, forgiveness, action, fear, guilt, grace, and honor.  There are lots of suprises and twists and turns that are sure to keep your interest throughout the entire book.

Annie Allen is a beautiful young girl who we see blossom into woman hood as she experiences tragedy, love, acceptance and forgiveness.  Life does not always turn out like we planned and we journey with Annie as she comes to accept and grow from the hand that life has dealt her.

Michael Dunnigan is a young Irish orphan who does whatever it takes to survive.  When Owen, Annie's brother befriends Michael, his life is forever changed.  When Owen puts Michael's life before his own, Annie and Michael's lives become forever knit together.

I loved the character of Michael and to see this young man transform from a boy who will lie, steal and cheat to stay alive to a man who loves God and other's, and who has such a true love for Annie that he is willing to lay down his life, was a pleasure indeed.

One message that came through loud and clear in this book... "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."  John 15:13  This book reminds me that we should strive to be more like Christ and that our lives, (just like the life of the character Michael Dunnigan) should be a reflection of God's love.

One of the best books I've read!

Who is Cathy Gohlke?  Cathy Gohlke is the two-time Christy Award–winning author of William Henry is a Fine Name and I Have Seen Him in the Watchfires, which also won the American Christian Fiction Writers' Book of the Year Award and was listed by Library Journal as one of the Best Books of 2008. 

Cathy has worked as a school librarian, drama director, and director of children's and education ministries. When not traipsing the hills and dales of historic sites, she, her husband, and their dog, Reilly, make their home on the banks of the Laurel Run in Elkton, Maryland.  You can find out more about Cathy at her website  http://www.cathygohlke.com

If you would like to purchase Promise Me This you can do so from the publisher at http://tyndale.com.  Your favorite book retailers are sure to have it too!

*This book was provided to me from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

Beyond Molasses Creek - Book Review

Ally Green is an older woman in her 60's that returns to her childhood home to bury her father.  While there she faces many memories from her past.  After making a lot of bad choices in her life her past seems to be something that she can't escape from.  She has deep feelings for her black neighbor who she has loved since she was a young girl, but his heart has always belonged to another and growing up in the era that they did it was forbidden anyway.

Vesey Washington is Ally's friend who has always been there for her, but who does not return the deeper feelings of love.  Once again he is proving to be a good friend to Ally in her time of need.

Sunila Kunari is a middle aged woman in Nepal who has lived her life in slavery working in the rock quarry.  She escapes her past after finding out that she is not who she thought she was.  She begins a journey to find out the truth.

The author writes the entire book from a first person narrative for all three characters.  At the beginning of each chapter the author states which character she is.  I personally did not like this set up.  I had a very hard time getting into this book.  I did not like the main character Ally at all.   Just when I felt like the book might redeem itself, Ally tells a lie.  I won't say about what since I don't want to be a spoiler, but it was a pretty big lie.  I waited through out the whole book for redemption, forgiveness, something good to show God's love but it never happened.  I would not even consider this a christian book.  Spiritual things such as reincarnation, Buddhism and other such things are discussed, but not much is said about the ONE TRUE GOD.  I would not recommend this book to anyone.

This book was provided to me by the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

Herb Roasted Chicken

Tonight I fixed another pinterest inspired recipe for supper and it was so delicious!  As always I took the recipes from a couple pins and tweaked them to what works best for me.

The chicken was so tender and juicy and just fell off the bone.

I took a whole chicken and stuffed it with a two lemon halves, a quartered onion, and a few cloves of garlic.  I took 3 Tablespoons of canola oil and mixed that with some lemon thyme that I had dried from my herb garden.  I rubbed that mixture all over the chicken, put it in a shallow pan, covered with foil and cooked on 350 degrees for about 2 hours and 45 minutes.  I checked it often to make sure it wasn't getting too brown and about an hour before it was done I added some potatoes and carrots.  It will definitely be a meal that will be added to my monthly menu plan!

Kale Chips

This week was our produce co-op week and one of the things we got was kale.  I have never had kale before and I was not sure what to do with it.  After looking at a couple recipes for kale chips I decided to tweak the recipes I seen and make my own.   They were scrumdiddilyumptios!   The kids even loved them!!  The taste reminded us of pumpkin seeds.  This is a new favorite of mine and I believe it will help me on those evenings when I have the munchies and want something salty.  Now I will have a healthy alternative!

All you need is some Kale, 1 Tablespoon of Olive Oil and 1 teaspoon of Sea Salt.  

Mix the oil and salt together in a bowl and then remove the kale leaves from the stem and tare the leaves into bite size pieces.  Add the kale pieces to the bowl and toss until the leaves are coated with the salty oil.

Put your  kale on a cookie sheet or shallow pan and cook at 375 degrees for 10-15 min. or until the edges are brown and crisp.

This is what the edges of the leaves should look like when it is done.

Other variations you could try:  Seasoned salt,  herbs and spices, lemon juice.  These are all alternatives that I am going to try in the future!

Pinterest Inspired Doggie Bed for Daisy

I am so in love with Pinterest!  It has such wonderful ideas for cooking, crafts, homemaking....you name it.  If it can be done, it has been pinned.   

One thing that quickly got my attention on Pinterest was the many ideas of things to make from wooden pallets.  There are so many neat ideas that I had to make a board just for that!   Lucky for me my brother-in-law gets tons of pallets with his business and he is saving a bunch for me.  He has already sent me some nice slabs of wood.

One of the ideas of "things to do with wooden pallets" was to make a dog bed.  Well, if you know me you know how much I love my sweet dog Daisy and since it is too cold to make some of the outdoor wood pallet ideas I decided to start with an indoor project.  So I took two of the boards and cut 2 pieces 2 feet long and 2 pieces 18 inches long.   I used a table saw, but I'm sure you could use a regular saw. 

Next I painted the wood black.  I had some black spray paint already so that was perfect!

I had seen a really cute idea on pinterest where you take your dogs paw and dip it in paint and then make a paw print.  The pin I saw was a framed puppy print, but I decided to use the idea for the bed.  Here's what I did:

I put her paw print down the two side boards and the back board.   Daisy was not too fond of this process and was very glad when it was over.  ;)

I knew on the front board I wanted Daisy's name with a daisy (the flower) on each side.  I am not good at free style painting, but guess what???  I found this great tutorial on........wait for it.......PINTEREST that shows how to paint stencil-like letters on wood.  It is so easy!  I loved it so much I want to do more.  I'm seeing wooden signs in my future.

After that was finished all I had to do was put it together.  Tools needed:  hammer and nails.  :):)  

For the bedding I used a couple pillows that were already designated for Daisy use and covered them with black fleece and voila....

Daisy LOVES it!!  

So that's it!  I took 3 different pins I seen, mushed them together in my own way and created the cutest little doggie bed ever!  Well, at least in my own opinion. ;)

If after reading this you are pinspired you can head right over to Pinterest and check out all my boards by clicking here.

Mountain Rose Herbs Giveway

Love Herbs?

Love Green Living?

Love free stuff?

If you answered yes, then good news!  Mountain Rose Herbs is having a Green Spring Clean Giveaway and it's a good one.  Oh how I would love to win!!  You can go check it out here and see how you can enter to win too!  Be sure to have a pencil and paper handy because you are sure to want to write down the handy dandy spring cleaning recipes to replace your store bought cleaning products.  Hurry! Time to enter runs out tonight!

The Sisters of the Quilt Series Book Review

I previously was able to read and review the first and last book of the Sisters of the Quilt Series and was super excited when the chance to review the whole trilogy became available to me.  The book includes:  When the Heart Cries, When the Morning Comes and When the Soul Mends all in one volume.  If you have never read any books by Cindy Woodsmall you are in for a treat and I am certain you will love her style of writing!

The only negative thing I can say about this series is that you are sure to lose some sleep because you will not be able to stop reading. This is the best series I have ever read. EVER. It is so good. It keeps your interest from start to finish and each book starts where the last one ended so there is no time lapse of wondering what happened. As the book comes to a conclusion all questions in your mind are answered and nothing is left unsettled. It truly is a great book of love, forgiveness and redemption. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!



Book Descriptions:

When the Heart Cries


Her life among her Amish community brutally interrupted, seventeen-year-old Hannah Lapp faces questions neither family, nor fiance, nor even faith can easily answer. The first book in the Sisters of the Quilt series, When the Heart Cries will ignite a broader understanding of others’ beliefs and a God-given strength to deal with pain we all experience.
When the Morning Comes

Rejected by those she loves, Hannah Lapp leaves her Amish community and seeks refuge in the world outside, leaving her family and friends to wrestle with the painful truths that emerge in the wake of her disappearance. As she struggles to find her place in the confusing Englischer world, her community deals with the turbulent aftermath of her departure.

When the Soul Mends

Hoping to help her sister, Hannah Lapp reluctantly returns to the Old Order Amish community she fled in disgrace more than two years earlier. When hidden truths are revealed about her former fiance, she must choose whether to return to the Plain life or to the Englischer man who adores her in this captivating conclusion to the Sisters of the Quilt series.
 
Now what are you waiting for??  Get the book!   You can buy it here through Amazon. :):):)
 
***This book was provided to me by the publisher in exchange for my honest opinion.

Healing is a Choice - Book Review

Healing Is a Choice: 10 Decisions That Will Transform Your Life and 10 Lies That Can Prevent You From Making Them.  By Steve Arterburn.

I received this book from the publisher through booksneeze in exchange for my honest review.

Everyone, at some level, needs healing. In this book, Stephen Arterburn outlines ten choices crucial to receiving healing and ten lies that can prevent us from making them.  It includes workbook type questions at the end of each chapter.

When I chose this book I was very anxious to dig into it in hopes of finding a book rich in the word and spiritual direction.  I was disappointed.  As soon as I read the preface red flags began to go up.  I was instantly concerned about the author and his beliefs.  He talks of his divorce, but through out the book he tends to lay the blame on his wife and paint her in a negative light. 

Right from the beginning of chapter one I knew that this was not the book I had hoped for.  The author stresses over and over again that in order to get the healing you need you HAVE to connect with other people, to tell them about your problems, to get help from friends, family etc.  This I disagree with.  There is no biblical foundation for this.  If you have a support system of friends and family that is great, but not everyone has that.  There are some people that have no one.  Our trust, whether we have people to connect with or not needs to be in God.  He is all you need to receive your healing.  He has done it for me many times. God does hold back healing or give healing based on our relying on others.  We must rely on Him.

I did not feel as if the author gave much help or good advice at all for the healing process.  He includes lot of stories of other peoples problems and like I said before a lot concerning his divorce, but no real direction.  I would not recommend this book to anyone. 

Christmas Happenings

Been busy making sweet Christmas memories the last couple weeks with more to come this week.  So far it has included a trip Silver Dollar City.  It truly is the most wonderful time of the year celebrating an old fashioned Christmas.  Our favorites to see is The Dicken's Christmas Carol, The Living Nativity and The Homestead Pickers.  There are so many lights throughout the town and the hot chocolate is dee-lish!  If you didn't have the Christmas spirit when you came you are sure to have it when you leave!

We had our 2'nd annual gingerbread house decorating day at my sisters.  Of course it's just us girls that participate in this since Dakota no longer has an interest in decorating gingerbread houses.  hehe!  He did join us after he got off work  and we all enjoyed a nice lunch together. :)

We also made Christmas cookies, have been watching lots of Christmas movies and wrapping presents.  We've been having our Advent devotions and we decided to open our "Jesus gift" this week.  We were all surprised at how much money was in our box and really enjoyed looking through the World Vision Catalog to pick out gifts to send.  We decided on a Bible translated in a child's language, vegetable seeds for 1 family, and a rabbit.  We decided that our Jesus gift is definitely a new family tradition!  This week will be filled with my "mom's only" homeschool Christmas party, cleaning, grocery shopping, baking, and finishing up school for Christmas break, and somewhere in there I've got to take my car to get looked at.  Then Saturday begins the family festivities!  Can't wait!  God is good and has been blessing us greatly!  Hope you all are enjoying the Holiday season as much as we are!

When the Soul Mends by Cindy Woodsmall

Cindy Woodsmall has done it again.  She has captivated me with another great book.  She has a writing style that speaks right to my heart and pulls me right into her writings as if I am a part of it.

When the Soul Mends is the 3'rd and final book in the Sisters of the Quilt Series.  The book begins right were book 2 left off.  Hannah Lapp returns to Owl Perch after receiving a desperate call from her sister.  Hannah finds herself facing the people, community and family that hurt her so badly two years earlier.  She is forced to come to terms with her feelings.  She becomes torn between the Englischer world that she has settled into with Martin Palmer and her old lifestyle and former fiance Paul Waddell.    Which will she choose?    The Englischer world and the man who restored her hope, or will she return to the Plain Life and her first love?

This book takes you on a journey of healing, redemption and forgiveness.  Hannah faces her past and the people that hurt her and realizes that some things were not as they seemed.  Before anyone can move forward in life they have to face their past, find closure and healing and that is just what this book is all about.  I could not of imagined a better ending for this series.  Cindy Woodsmall left nothing "wanting".  She answered every question, did not leave anything "hanging" and ended it in a way that is sure to please every reader.

**This book was provided to me by the publisher in exchange for my honest review.