Ceasefire; Finding Peace In The Midst Of The War

Lately, my heart has been heavy. And I think that if you have heard anything that is going on in the world right now, your heart may be heavy too. Today I want to talk about how I feel. Every now and then I am going to write a post that is just my raw, real, unfiltered emotions. And this is one of those posts. 

I don't know what to do with the information that is being thrown at me. I see endless Facebook articles and posts outlining people's opinions on shootings in the U.S.A, police brutality, huge massacres in France, abortion, homosexuality, ISIS, Donald Trump, and that is just to name a few. And frankly, I am overwhelmed. I can't even begin to understand the complexity of all of these issues, and I definitely am no expert in any of these subjects. I am actually not an expert in any subject. 

I feel my heart growing weary, tired, and calloused. When I hear terrible, horrific news, my automatic reaction is to feel grief and then hopelessness. And then, sometimes, guilt. I feel guilty that I'm "not doing anything" to help. But since I have no idea what I could possibly do to help, I shove my feelings down and move on with my day. 

This only works for so long. Eventually, it all bubbles to the surface, and you get to where I am; Overwhelmed. I broke down in tears last night because I heard a song called "Ceasefire" by for KING and COUNTRY. And the song itself is pretty incredible; but it was the title that got me: 

Ceasefire.

Yes. Can we please just call for a ceasefire!? We are all hurting. We are all overwhelmed and confused and just trying so hard to do what we think we should based on our limited knowledge and convictions. None of us has this life figured out. But I know that we can not do this alone. We can not do this divided. Obviously, we are getting nowhere with our endless rants of opinion and taking sides. Please, can we just throw up the white flag? Both sides are wounded and bleeding and nobody wins when our goal is to settle the score. 

Now, I don't completely know how to deal with these feelings. I am still in the midst of it; But I know that God is trying to show me how. I know that He is telling me not to fear. And I am sure He wants you to know the same thing; Do not fear. I know this can be hard to fathom, but in the midst of the insanity and brutality, God is still in control. He has never and will never not be in control. God knows exactly what is going on and knows exactly what has happened and what has yet to happen. And despite that, he tells us, in the Bible, to live our lives with joy, peace, and NOT fear. 

I don't think this means that we should ignore and not care about what is going on around us. But if God is telling us to live in peace in the midst of the war, then he will show us how. He has to. He never asks us to do something that He will not equip us to do. 

So, this is my only advice: 

1. In the midst of the war, do not forfeit your peace. 

2. Let's call for a ceasefire. 

What To Do With Leftover Gift Cards

Recently, my husband and I were sitting at home feeling bored. We wanted to go out and do something but we didn't have any extra spending money to allow us to go out for dinner or to a movie or something we would normally do on a date. We were sitting there and Jordan was looking through his wallet (I told you we were bored!) and noticed that he had a handful of gift cards in his wallet; Some that he knew had been there for years. I grabbed my wallet and found another handful of my own. We talked about how we can never bring ourselves to throw them out because we don't know if they have any money left on them.

So, we decided to find out. We had never done this before because it seemed like a waste of time and we assumed it would be quite complicated. But we had nothing else to do. First we looked online to see if there was a way to check the balance of the gift cards without calling. For about 70% of them there was a way! We ended up finding that some of them had no remaining balance and we threw those ones in the garbage. Others had a few dollars here and there remaining.

Once we had found out which cards had a balance on them we assessed our situation. We had...

Apple Store: $8.55

Canadian Tire: $7.79

Chapters: $20.00 (Yikes!! This had been in his wallet for years!)

Swiss Chalet/Harveys: $7.01

Bed, Bath & Beyond: $2.80

Victoria's Secret: $13.38

Pretty good right? We thought so! At this point we came up with, what I think is, a brilliant plan. We decided to make a date night of it! So we came up with a game where we would go to the mall and spend all of these gift cards. The catch? We could only spend what we had. And we needed to try to get as close to the exact balance so that afterwards we wouldn't have any cards left. We had only exactly 5 dollars in our wallets and we decided that we would bring that as a way to make it a little more possible to spend up the full balance on the card. (So if we found something that was 50 cents over the card balance we could dip into our 5 dollars to make it work). But we were not allowed to use any more than that.

This turned out to be one of the most fun dates we have ever had! We spend hours running around the mall trying to find things that were the exact right price. Not to much, not too little. It was a huge success and we didn't even use up our entire 5 dollars! Here is what we got:

1. This is an AUX adapter that we bought from The Apple Store! It was the cheapest thing in the entire store and the only thing we could afford and, as it turns out, the one thing we really needed at that time!

2. These candles were all we could afford at Bed, Bath, and Beyond since our card only had $2.80 on it. We had to dip into our 5 dollars for this one. I would say that this card proved to be the most challenging, but we love our candles!

3. This is a makeup bag from Victoria's Secret. I looked for a long time in this store. There were lots of pairs of underwear I could have purchased that were within the card budget, but none of them were close enough to the full balance. I ended up having to purchase this makeup bag because it was the only thing that was the exact right price and would leave me with an empty gift card. I actually use it so much! Though the pattern is not my style, it is such a handy little bag!

4. We couldn't find a book that we both agreed on at Chapters so we decided to split the balance down the middle and both look for something worth 10 dollars. I ended up finding this wonderful candle, which has been one of my all time favourites, and Jordan found a cute little strawberry plant starter kit.

5. On our way home we went to Canadian Tire, but it was closed already. But, to our great joy, the Canadian Tire gas station was still open! We decided to buy snacks with our gift card and then go home and watch a movie to finish off our date! So we got a few little bags of chips, candy, and chocolate milk!

6. In the middle of our shopping trip we stopped in at the food court to spend our Swiss Chalet/Harvey's gift card. We ended up being able to purchase a decent lunch for ourselves!

We had so much fun on this random-yet-productive date night! We spent all our gift cards and were able to clear that space up in our wallets. This blurry picture is the only one we took of ourselves that day!

If you have a bunch of mystery gift cards stashed in your wallet or elsewhere, give this fun activity a try! You may have more money left on that old, decrepit, gift card than you realize! 

Let me know what you think of this idea and if you are going to try it out! Do you have any other cool tips for leftover gift cards? I would love to hear about them! 

How My Cat Pulls Me Out Of Anxiety

I have a grey and white tabby cat named Floyd. My husband and I adopted him 1.5 years ago from the animal shelter as a senior cat. He is technically only 9 years old, which isn't terribly old, but getting there. He is very fat and very lazy. And I love him like he is my own child, most of the time (except when he scratches my couch).

As I have mentioned before I have an anxiety disorder that affects my day to day life. Floyd plays such a huge part in managing it, so I want to tell you about that today.

I have read many places online and heard from many people that cats don't care about their owners. I mostly agree. I don't think my cat necessarily "cares" when I have an anxiety attack, but I believe that he is at least curious about what is going on. So, he usually investigates.

When I have anxiety attacks they usually manifest themselves in me laying face down on my bed basically immobile. I get "stuck,” as I am sure many of you can relate to. I can't get out of my head and out of whatever thoughts I am drowning in. So I just lay there silently or crying for quite a while. Most of the time my husband, Jordan, is right there with me trying to comfort me and talk me through it. And then, out of nowhere, Floyd always appears. And he gets close! He just stands/lays right on my face, which though slightly intrusive, grabs my attention.

My theories? I think that he either sees my husband and I sitting together and wants to be a part of the party or God sends him over in some God-to-cat-telepathy way.

Either way, he shows up and it helps.

There is something about the demeanour of Floyd that calms me right down. He is relaxed and moves so slowly and carefully that it is a little mesmerizing. So, I pet him and it usually distracts me enough to pull me out of the hole I am stuck in, at least long enough to come back to reality.

Now that I know Floyd has this effect on me I utilize him.

This last picture is from a day about a year ago when I had been at a campfire gathering with a decently large group of friends that drained me. Even if I have fun with groups of friends I still get completely drained. So I walked in the door and grabbed Floyd and collapsed on the couch. He doesn't fight me or try to get away. He just lets me hold him tight until I feel better.

I realize that every pet may not be quite so helpful; some pets are just less loving than others. But my cat is loving and helpful, and for that I am thankful. It may have something to do with the fact that he is a senior so he is too lazy to fight me and just rolls with it.

But to all of you who have a loving pet and deal with any level of anxiety or stress, perhaps you would benefit from using your furry friend as a comfort in anxious moments. (And if you don’t have a pet but live with anxiety, maybe you should look into bringing a furbaby home!)

Do any of you already use your pets for comfort this way? Think you will try it? Tell me about your experience!