Brave Heart, Brave Soul. She who is brave is free.

“Fear is a reaction. Courage is a decision.” ~ Winston S. Churchill Life is full of ‘wait a minute vines’ as my daddy has always said. All you have to do is walk outside to learn this lesson. Just take a stroll down the street or around the corner and something or someone is bound to snag, grab or trip you up one way or another. Just making the choice to open your front door every morning is a chance. If my daddy has taught me anything in my near 45 years it’s this: inhale courage and exhale fear. My daddy was a lifetime soldier. He jumped out of planes with the 82nd Airborne. As a child I thought he had no fear. I watched him wear his uniform with pride. I was in aww of his wings. I loved when he walked out the door with his Green Beret on. In my eyes he's always been a man's man. My boys would tell you their Paw Paw is a bad ----. And though those aren't the words I'd chose, they are right..He really is. But he's also funny, kind, humble, loving and gracio...

"Today is a perfect day for opening new doors." ` Anonymous We talk so much about our past, the what could have been and the chapters we've left behind locked doors we often forget to focus on the new doorways waiting for us to unlock. We have this knack of collecting old keys and wearing them around our necks like chains. Maybe we think we'll get back one day, maybe we'll W-40 that lock and jimmy our way back through or maybe we just feel better knowing we have a link to all the doors we've passed through at one time or another. I don't really know, but what I do know is life is full of doors either we have closed or God has locked . Honestly many more times both of those statements are true. I think as human beings we just get stuck in-between doorways, caught between the past and present, one foot over the threshold while the other one's stuck on the doormat on the opposite side. The truth is many times God has already shown us the way, unlo...

"It's not what's under the tree that matters. It's who's gathered around it." ~ Anonymous So Christmas is almost here. School's out, the malls are full, ugly sweaters are back in style and admit it, you're singing along to the sounds of the season on the radio. Our tables are filling up, our trees are lit and prime real estate under the tree is not only at minimum but almost impossible to find the closer we get to Santa's big day. And with all that fun, also comes the stress and worry.This year our family has taken a new approach to celebrating this season of merriness and shall I be honest, should I dare say it, of anxiety and pressure. So what is our new technique, it's simple, it's a little something called slowing down and actually being merry and bright, not stressed and strained. As Christmas began descending into our household following Thanksgiving I began taking inventory of the little things, and soon I was reassessing ...