Tips for a Bride

In one week I will be walking down the aisle to marry the most wonderful man in the world. We have been engaged almost a year and it has been one of the best experiences of my life. Planning a big wedding really stretched me. It took a lot of patience and time. It took a lot of looking at our relationship and deciding what color napkins best reflected our undying love for one another. Whatever.

There were so many decisions to make and it was difficult trying to stay true to ourselves when everyone has an opinion about how you should do things.

All this to say I have held my composure really well. I kept it together when Kays' lost my ring. I didn't lose my cool when my dress seams were coming apart. I remained calm when the florist couldn't find the boxes. And I didn't say any curse words when our musician backed out two weeks before the big day. I expected to have a few "bridezilla" moments. But alas I held it together! Here's how you can do it too -

- Make sure to have a balanced diet of Cadbury eggs, lots of Panera bread, and jelly beans.

- Have a weekly dose of margaritas. 5 oclock not necessary.

- Surround yourself with friends who will throw amazing parties for you.

- Surround yourself with family members who will bend over backwards to make sure everything is nothing short of perfect *cough*mom*cough*

- Surround yourself with friends who will drop off "secret" cards full of money and kind words to get you through.

- Go to Florida. Lay on the beach. Walk on the beach. Drink tea and eat ice cream everyday. Do nothing else.

- Do not get fitted for your dress until a week before the wedding. Then you have no figure you must maintain.

- Marry a man who insists every other night that you deserve a treat and he would like to take you out.

- Breathe regularly.

- Ignore anyone who tells you you HAVE to do anything you don't want to do at your wedding. Or at any other time in your life.

- Surround yourself with people that insist you are doing too much. No matter how empty your plate is.

- Do lots of crafts. Get your hands dirty. Make something for your wedding.

- Let yourself be spoiled.

I got teary when I threw my bridal magazines away yesterday. This has been so much fun. I will be sad when it's all over but thankful for the beautiful new chapter I get to start in my life. I'm thankful for the friends and family who have loved me so well through this. If it were not for them - I would have been a nightmare.

Lessons I Learned From the Strip Club #3

There are times, in desperation, when I want to shake my friends at the club and say "If you want to leave I will find you another job and you can live with me and you can go back to school and you never have to come here again." And they might say "O.K." and leave with me.

And then what? Then everything would be handed to them when they didn't really want it. Maybe they wanted it but they didn't get it themselves. They didn't ask for it. They didn't say "Will you help me find a new job?" or "Can you help me go back to school?".

They have to say "I want out" even though I just want to drag them out.

I think God is like that. I think sometimes He probably wants to shake me and say "Emily, do this for yourself. Please listen to Me".

But instead He just lets me continue doing what I am doing. In the end I learn that all I wanted in the first place was for His will to be done and for Him to be present in my life.

So in the mean time we break His heart. We continue drinking too much to hide our pain, spending too much money to find joy, numbing ourselves with reality t.v., consuming enough caffeine so we can stay away for 21 hours to live our superhuman lives. We forget to breathe. We forget to take moments for our souls instead of our flesh. We ignore our hearts' desires and then defend our actions. All the while His heart breaks because He knows we really just want "out", we want something better. We want peace and salvation, solace and comfort, Christ in our lives.

Sometimes we have to spend time in the pit before we can look up from inside of it, reach our arms to Heaven and say "I want out".

Dream Catcher

A few months ago I was telling my sister about one of my "wedding nightmares". This particular dream involved me showing up to the wedding, forgetting it was THAT day, not having a dress or make up on, and my fiance stood me up at the altar. I woke up in a cold sweat. Thankfully these nightmares haven't popped up much more.

Along with planning a wedding I am planning a future. There are so many questions in my life during this time. They are questions that keep me up at night. That terrify me and give me nightmares. Questions that wake me up and wont let me sleep. Naps have been my best friend these days.

A few days ago I found a beautiful  handmade dream catcher sitting on my bed with a note from my sister. She told me she hoped it would help with the wedding nightmares, reassured me that the big day would be beautiful and reminded me that she was there for me.

Reassurance.
Family.
Love.
Promises of a happy future.
A shoulder to lean on.
Support.

That is what Erin gave me when she gave me the dream catcher. I doubt that sweet piece of art will catch my nightmares but knowing she is there for me will help me sleep a little better at night.


I don't know what the future will bring and I can't stop my mind and heart from fearing it. However I do know that those who love me will wrap me up in their love and arms, remind me that God has a plan, things will come together and that I'm not alone.

Whatever is keeping you up at night, disturbing your sleep, and terrorizing your thoughts - I hope that you have someone there to offer you peace of mind. I hope you have someone to remind you of the happiness that will soon follow, people who will wrap you up and and in some ways offer you a good night's sleep.
Sweet Dreams.

Lessons I Learned From the Strip Club #2

Tonight I am thinking about our Tub Team. Our wonderful Tub Team. Every time we go in to the club we bring this tub with us. It is, as Natalie put it, like a perfect diaper bag. We can toss everything in it at the end of the night and know that the Tub Team will restock and reorganize the tub for next time. It has everything we could need. Clorox wipes, plates and napkins, a table cloth, first aid supplies, serving utensils and heart shaped post-it notes, even glittery butterflies to hang from the Miller High Life sign.

I always feel so well prepared, so organized and put together when we walk in. I feel as though we are ready for anything! If a dancer trips and hurts her ankle we can come to her aid! If someone wants to take food home to their grandma we are ready to make them up to go boxes! We have notepads and sanitizer and mints to pass out for garlic breath.

So I walk in feeling like all our bases are covered because we have EVERYTHING. But there is nothing in the tub for when a girl says "I miscarried the baby and lost my job and that's why I'm here". I want to rush to that tub and pull out the perfect band aid to fix it. But we can't prepare for everything and even if we could prepare for this I'm not sure what would fix it. So we sit in quiet and awkward silence. We offer ourselves, our sympathies, maybe a prayer, and the hope of Christ and a better tomorrow.

We prepare for everything. We stock our pantries with food for the week. We pack diaper bags and hoard useless items "just in case we might need them". We carry purses that weigh 10 pounds just because we never know what will happen. And if you're like me, you buy 3 bottles of lotion because you want to be prepared when you run out of the first bottle. We do everything we can to avoid emergencies and disasters. But sometimes the bottom falls out, we lose the baby, our bodies fail us and we get sick, the bills and paychecks don't match up and we feel so helpless. There are things we can't prepare for. That's when all we have for certain is Christ and if we are blessed, a friend to sit in awkward silence with us.

Lessons I Learned From the Strip Club #1

I have written this blog 5 times and erased it. I have a really hard time expressing beautiful and holy moments.  That is what I experience each week that I walk in to the strip club - I experience a beautiful, sacred moment. I don't have the perfect words to express it, which is why it seems silly for me to blog. Blogging is about words and I don't usually have the right words.

However, I feel like these moments are too amazing not to share. So this is my attempt to let you walk in to the club with me and experience the light of God filling a dark place that seems as though He has forgotten it.

I feel like that teacher or missionary that goes in to an inner city school or the slums of an African village. They always say "I went there to teach them something and offer them something, but they gave me much more than I could ever give them".

It sounds so cliche but it is so true. I have learned a lot from these women. My first experience in a club was during a trip to Dayton, Ohio. The small stretch of road was littered with strip clubs and motels. I went in to a lounge with three women who I did not know. They were going to teach me how to do this type of ministry, how to operate things and keep my eyes off the naked bodies surrounding me. After twenty minutes of excruciating discomfort, I started talking the dancers. I learned one thing very quickly. It's one thing that stuck with me on the ride back to Anderson as I bawled my eyes out for the dancers we left behind. It's one that thing that sticks out to me when we go to the club in Anderson.

These women have hope. I have yet to meet a girl who isn't living for something. They all look forward to things. They have hope in the fact that they might find a new job. They have hope in their new boyfriend, hope that they will be able finish school, hope in the government, hope in friends, hope in their grandmother or they money they make. There is no shortage of hope in this place. Everyone is hoping for things and placing their hope those things.

This is not what I expected. Maybe I was naive but I expected them to not know what to live for, to wander aimlessly and be... well ...hopeless. Instead they dive in to their hopes and dreams and that is what keeps them going. I learned that we are hard wired to hope. We are created to hope and dream and wish and pray and long for things we can not see. Sometimes we don't know what to hope for so we hope for just another tomorrow that was a little better than today.

I pray - I hope - that I can show them something better to place their hope in. One thing I feel when I walk in to the club is pressure. This is my chance, this is my shot to be Christ. This is my opportunity to be hope.

Colossians 1:27 "...Christ in you, the hope of glory."

i hate blogging

i don't know why i continue to do this. i wish i was good at this. i wish i cared. this reminds me too much of when i was 14 and owned a livejournal and gave the interworld way too much information.




i'm warming up to this.

gluten free cupcakes

My littlest sister, Grace, is allergic to wheat and gluten.

So it's a challenge to find tasty gluten free baked goods! We usually buy a Betty Crocker cake mix to make cakes and cupcakes and they taste alright but they just lack something.  We decided to have a baking night and try a new twist on things. Here is the recipe.

1 package of Betty Crocker Gluten Free Cake Mix

1 package of Jello Vanilla Instant Pudding

1/2 cup of sugar

4 large eggs

1/2 cup of canola oil

3/4 cup orange juice

1 tablespoon and 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350


Mix wet ingredients in a large bowl and slowly add the dry ingredients. Using a mixer is best because the gluten free mix tends to clump up.


Bake for 20-25 minutes. They should be golden brown.

We also decided to make a buttercream frosting

1 pound of confectioner's sugar

1 stick of soft butter

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1/4 cup of milk

Mix half the sugar and the other ingredients in the bowl. Then slowly add the rest of the sugar. Mix for about two minutes.

We doubled the icing recipee and had a little left over but not much.

I bought some disposable icing bags and tips at the grocery. We had neon food coloring and I picked three colors and started mixing!

The confectioners sugar makes the frosting look pearly. After the cupcakes cooled I started icing them.

I wish I would have chilled the icing before bagging. Mixing the colors and mushing the icing into the bag causes the frosting to become melty and it doesn't hold up well once it's on the cupcake. So my first few looked like this after two minutes.

The end result was so tasty and some of them turned out really nice. Grace said they were the best cupcakes she had ever had. Period. I loved them and couldn't even tell they were gluten free!