The Author of this post is Velma Baird

You should have seen my husband and I trying to figure out what our password should be for our security system. You would have thought we were picking out a child's name or something. It actually got pretty heated! He thought all of my picks were stupid and I thought all of his picks didn't make any sense or were too hard to remember. It needs to be something that I won't forget and it can't be something random or I will forget it! I thought it needed to be something memorable but not something too obvious like out street address number. It shouldn't be either of our birthdays because it could be something that knows when our birthday is that is putting it in! We finally ended our argument by going and looking up home security tips. It is sad when we can't even agree on a code for our security system! It really does make me worry about when we have kids. How are we going to pick their names? Maybe we should just say I can do the first kid's name and you can do the second!

Guest written by our friend Katie Callahan

I saw a terribly disturbing show on tv last night. It’s called “To Catch a Predator.” It was basically a hidden camera show where the tv producers have been pretending to be underage children in chat rooms online, and pretending to be children, allow themselves to get lured in by sexual predators. They agree to meet with the predator, who thinks they are meeting with someone under the age of 18 for sex, but when they get there, it is not a kid, but the tv show and the police. They are arrested, and taken to jail. The really scary part is they look like regular guys! It was so upsetting to me to think that those people are out there on the internet, just lurking around, trying to get a child to meet them. It’s awful, and I want to make sure I’m protecting my girls from this danger. I’m going to satellite star internet.com to see if they offer any tips, or parental controls, to help prevent this kind of thing from every happening to our family.

It’s so easy to lose yourself to motherhood. In fact, it’s almost impossible not to lose yourself. The love for your children is so consuming that everything you do and every choice you make leads back to your kids and their needs. It’s pretty incredible!

But just because I’m a mommy…

…it doesn’t mean that I don’t long for just one day to sleep until 11:00 a.m. in my bed.

…it doesn’t mean that I should allow myself to become a tired-looking frump. Makeup never hurt anybody.

…it doesn’t mean that my sense of humor needs to fly out the window. Kids are supposed to make us laugh more!

…it doesn’t mean that I don’t have dreams of my own or things I’d like to accomplish. And yes, maybe I can even do some of those things while being a stay-at-home mom.

…it doesn’t mean that I don’t love a nice, silent car ride. By myself.

…it doesn’t mean that I have any idea what I’m doing when I find myself in new territory. Or old territory.

…it doesn’t mean that I’m nothing like I used to be. Motherhood has certainly changed me in major ways. But I’m still myself.

…it doesn’t mean that I don’t crave days spent with girl friends or a nice, quiet afternoon in a movie theater.

…it doesn’t mean that I have all the answers or don’t need my own mommy on a daily basis.

…it doesn’t mean that I know how to be strong when my heart breaks and when I’d like to just take a time out and cry.

…it doesn’t mean that I became a domestic goddess overnight. I need a live-in Ina Garten!

…it doesn’t mean that I don’t lose my temper and behave the way my toddler behaves every once in a while.

I am a mommy. And I have a very large responsibility on my hands. There are a lot of really fun, superficial things about being a parent. There are a lot of not-so-fun, challenging things about being a parent.

The rewards trump both of these things, though. It’s not about cute nurseries and adorable matching outfits. And it’s not about tantrums in public that make you want to crawl into a hole and disappear.

It’s about what I’m expected to teach them. The things that will grow them into the people that I’ve asked God to help me with in raising them. And then finding out, in their time, what they’ve learned. It’s about seeing the sweet souls that they are and hearing from them just how much they love you when you tell them how much you love them.

This guest post from Lewis Beck

They say that everything is bigger in Texas and luckily for me, the job market is bigger in Texas too. After searching for three months for a job close to where I currently live and have grown up, I opened myself up to the option of relocating and was pleasantly surprised with the opportunities that I found. It also just so happened to work out that my new position wouldn’t start until the second week of January. So not only did I get to spend the holidays with friends and family, but I also got two weeks to get moved and settled in before I had to start. So I did it, three days after Christmas, I made the move to the great state of Texas. First order of business, after finding a place to live of course, get internet service hooked up so that I could stay in touch with all of my loved ones back home. After a quick search for Satellite Internet Texas I found a great provider and within a couple of days, I was online.

Today I'm thankful for a husband that makes a conscious effort to lead his family toward Christ. He is our spiritual leader and rock. He works so hard and sacrifices so much, yet is always there to give us 100%. He's our superman.

Posted by Virgil Burks

So we found out the other day that there is a varmint living in our basement. Here is how it all went down. I was at work doing my work thing the other morning when I got a call from Home Security SYSTEM letting me know that my alarm had been set off and the police were on their way. I freaked out of course and ran out to my car to meet the police at the house as I was instructed to do. On the way over I of course called my husband to let him know and he hopped in his car to meet me at the house. When we got there the police had already arrived and had walked around the perimeter and didn’t see any signs of break in. We gave them the key and they went in through the basement first because that is the motion sensor that set off the alarm in the first place. What they found down there is both embarrassing and a relief at the same time. There was no their but there was an intruder. A mouse. A freaking mouse had set off the motion detector! Thank goodness it wasn’t something worse but it looks like we need to get a few traps at the store tonight.

Do you ever struggle with worry?

Worry used to be the biggest strong hold on my life.  I was gripped in anxiety and worried constantly for years. I would wake up every morning sick to my stomach and go to bed worried. I can't even tell you what I was so worried about.  It was horrible.  After struggling forever - I finally came to realize that worry is a sin.  It is not trusting God. 

Isn't the God who made the heavens and knows the name of every person on this planet and the number of hairs on each head of each person  big enough to take care of my silly little problems? Do I really not trust Him? And what good does worry do? All it was doing was making me physically ill and stealing the joy in my life. 


I prayed and prayed over my anxiety and God finally took it from me.  Sometimes it comes creeping in but for the most part - I have had so much peace in my life. I still have the same things to worry about - but I know that God is in control.  

I never really watched Disney movies until recently.  I was just never was interested in seeing a cartoon and I'm sure I saw some when I was little but I don't remember them too much. 

But thankfully at our house......we have moved away from Elmo, Mickey Mouse and Barney (although they still make an appearance every once in a while) and we have entered the world of Disney Movies.

So far our very favorite is "Tangled" or as David calls it "wrangled".  I have to admit - it's my favorite too. I love the songs in that one ......especially "Mother knows best".  ha!  He also loves "Beast" (Beauty and the Beast).  Lion King came out today and I think he has seen so many ads for it on his own videos that he was excited about it.  So we plan to get that and I recently got on ebay and ordered "The Jungle Book".  David likes movies that have music in them. 

Contributed by Milford Woods

I logged onto securitychoice.com when I was eating lunch the other day. I had been promising my husband that I would look into the price and compare them. We are not allowed to work on personal things at work, so I had to use my lunch time. I packed what I usually do for lunch, a ham and cheese sandwich with Campbell’s tomato soup. I always bring the soups in that are in their own bowl and you just heat up in the microwave. I sat down with my lunch and was eating and surfing. I remembered that I did not get a drink so I ran to the vending machines and got a diet coke. I opened the drink on the walk back to my desk and sat it down. Somehow, my cell phone started ringing and fell out of my purse on the floor. I picked it up and realized that my drink had knocked all over the keyboard! Frantically, I tried to collect my papers and clean everything up. My keyboard started smoking. I am never eating lunch at my desk again.