Do not be afraid, I am with you

This past weekend has lit a fire in me.  I ventured out of my comfort zone and shared myself with so many strong, beautiful women.  While I can not go into details about my specific experiences, I can just say that my perspective on my life, my religion, and my relationship with God is forever changed!  I am so lucky that I was called to attend the retreat when I am just 26 years old -- I was definitely one of the youngest there.  My wonderful sister, who prayed for me to go, was a on the team putting on the retreat.  It was such a blessing to go through this with her.  Jim just attended 2 weeks ago and kept a lot of secrets from me about the experience, so I was so excited to finally be able to talk with him about it.


I can not believe how my faith has been transformed in the past few months.  I honestly used to dread going to church on Sundays.  I was ashamed of that, but I could not feel that excitement that Jim always has about it.  I even let him go alone sometimes which was so selfish of me.  God brought us together and there I was totally shutting Him out of my life.  I was envious of Jim's faith and my sister's excitement to grow in her faith.  I did pray that I could feel the same way.  I knew they weren't making their feelings up, and I wanted the same.

Looking back, I can see how He answered my prayers.  He brought me another beautiful daughter for just 5 days so I could see Christ through her and learn to trust Him completely.  I felt His presence with me and could not possibly believe that He was not there.  He made me feel so calm and at peace that my Madelyn would be venturing to Heaven before me.  Since then, He has continued to place people in my life to help me.  I look forward to mass and partaking in the sacraments.  Everything is just starting to make sense, when in my mind, I feel like I should be falling apart.

I need to go pick up the house and get ready for a class at KissZCook tonight with my sister.  We are going to be learning the art of making pies!  Yes, you should be jealous! :)

Here is the theme song for our CRHP weekend: