Edie Wadsworth

Pillow Talk::It’s All a Sham

February 11, 2013 by Edie Wadsworth 53 Comments

Welcome to my blog!! I recently updated my ‘about’ page which has lots of links to give you flavor and feel of lifeingrace. In a nutshell, I’m crazy over decorating, cooking, cowboy boots and C.S.Lewis. And I homeschool, which might make me just plain crazy!

This story of this pillow cracks me up.
I bought the striped pillow sham at Pottery Barn and took it to a local shop and had a 7 inch (aka ginormous) monogram added to it.
I love everything about it—the size, the color, the fanciful monogram.

But it’s not what it seems.
And everytime someone emails me and says they saw it in Better Homes and Gardens and would I please spill the source on the pillow, I laugh. And then everything in me wants to apologize.

Because the pillow is just acting the part. Just pretending. Sitting up tall and straight and hoping beyond all hope that noone figures out she’s just a sham.

Literally hanging on by a thread, or a pin, as it were.
And so it is with me too. I’m just pretending.

I’m acting the part of mother, wife, creator, writer, chef, blogger, christian.

The imitation and pretending might offend you. It offends me too and makes me want to apologize, for the rough places, the parts of me that aren’t what they should be yet.

But with all this imitation, we learn to be the real thing. We study and read and watch and imitate long enough—and pretty soon, it’s hard to see that we’re posers.

Slowly, over years and struggle and repetition, we become who we were always meant to be.

But the underside, the part of us that’s unfinished is not to be scorned. It reminds us that real, finished beauty takes a lifetime. It reminds us to be patient with ourselves and with others.

We are made in the image of God, creator or all things, so this mimesis, or imitation, is written on our hearts.

The question is not will we imitate but who or what will we imitate?

p.s. (And I say that someday, I’m gonna make a proper pillow out of this poser, but she does so good playing the part, I keep forgetting that she’s just a sham! And I think she does too!)

Lent: Learning from my Father

February 10, 2013 by Edie Wadsworth 17 Comments

Lent begins this week on Ash Wednesday and lasts 40 days with it’s culmination in Easter. This is a repost from last February {and the February before that!) and will explain Lent in further detail for the newcomer to the season. My thanks to Pastor Will Weedon for allowing me to republish part of his post.

“Lent begins with this realization. That we are a people in exile. That we are wandering far from our true home.

And thus the beginning of repentance isn’t merely the terror that one finds in wandering in a strange land; the beginning of repentance is homesickness.

Lent teaches us to fess up to how often we settle down in the land of our exile as though it were our true home; attempting to still the yearning the Spirit has created by throwing at it physical or psychological pleasure, and how it never works.”

courtesy of Pastor Will Weedon

Lent is a 40 day period leading up to Easter that is characterized by prayer, reflection, repentance and often fasting, then culminating in the celebration of the resurrection and the feasting of Easter. It roughly mimics the 40 days Christ retreated to the wilderness and wrestled with the devil.

It’s a methodical way of proceeding through the scriptures and it prevents such things as quickly glossing over the celebration of Christ’s resurrection without spending time in quiet reflection of His death on the cross, the mental anguish and suffering which took place while He was in the wilderness, and the details of the events of His life during Holy Week. It’s like walking in ‘real time’ with Him during the last weeks of His life.

Lenten discipline is not commanded or mentioned in the scriptures but we are admonished to fast and pray and forsake the flesh. We all practice degrees of discipline already. Lent is the spiritual equivalent of physical exercise for the body. The body gets stronger when we demand much from it—not when we always ‘give in’ to what it wants. The same is true in disciplining our children. Because we love them so much, we demand what is best for them—which is often not what they, in their immaturity, want for themselves.

In C.S. Lewis’ The Problem of Pain, he puts it this way:

“It is for people whom we care nothing about that we demand happiness on any terms; with our friends, our lovers, our children, we are exacting and would rather see them suffer much than be happy in contemptible and estranging circumstances. God has paid us the intolerable compliment of loving us, in the deepest, most tragic, most inexorable sense………The Church is the Lord’s bride whom He so loves that in her no spot or blemish is endurable.”

Though the analogy breaks down when taken to extremes, God compares our relationship to Him to that between a parent/child. And Lewis, in his book, compares our being brought into God’s family to a very ‘badly brought up boy’ being introduced into a decent family. When they see traits in this child that are detestable, Lewis says ‘they not only hate it, but they ought to hate it. They cannot love him for what he is, they can only try to turn him into what he is not’.

…we are at present, creatures whose character must be, in some respects, a horror to God, and as it is, when we really see it, a horror to ourselves.”

God our Father, despite our unloveliness, has given us everything we need and has clothed us with the righteousness of Christ, but we, like Adam, want to ‘clothe’ ourselves. Lent is a time to strip down; to take off the filthy clothes of our own righteousness and to let our Father give us from His hand what He knows we need.

It’s like the picture of Stevie teaching Emme to fish. We learn from our Father by spending time with Him. There is much He wants to teach us and much that needs to be changed in us. But more than all that, He wants to give us Himself—-knowing that we were created for relationship with Him. And nothing will satisfy the deepest longings of our soul save Our Father’s perfect love. Lent is time to retreat with Our Father. To confess to Him that we have wandered so far from home and that we have become far too ‘comfortable’ in the pleasures of this life. To confess to Him how utterly dependent we have become on everything, but Him. And He will gladly ‘receive’ us back with open arms: not because we demonstrate to Him our growing discipline and holiness, but for the sake of Christ and Him alone.

A few stray thoughts:

1. Lent is a time for penitence and reflection and the practicing of christian discipline. It does not make God ‘more pleased with me’ and is not a ‘good work’. God is pleased with Christ alone and good works are those things which I do in service to my neighbor.
2. If I purpose to ‘give something up’ for Lent and then two weeks later find that I fail and can’t keep my lenten discipline, God is not disappointed in me. God is pleased with Christ and thus pleased with me when I have faith in Christ. I am a sinner who fails and sins constantly. And my failing is not a surprise to God.
3. If I keep my lenten discipline to the ‘tee’, I must be careful not to try and convince myself that I’m ‘more spiritual’ or holy than before. I have been freely clothed with the righteousness of Christ and am only learning to ‘fit’ into clothes that were given me by God.
4. We must also be careful not to view our discipline as ‘suffering’ and remember that Christ suffered on the cross for our redemption and we do not get to choose our own suffering (by giving up, say diet pepsi for a month).
5. It is a good exercise to occasionally deprive our bodies, to not give in to every fleshly desire. We are so often slaves to our own bodies and teaching ourselves discipline in any area is often met with resistance.

I leave you with another quote from Pastor Will Weedon who kept me from seeing Lent as a season where ‘I work hard to become more holy’;

The holiness into which you seek to grow has already been given to you, whole and entire! It’s yours in Jesus Christ, the gift of His righteousness fully bequeathed you in Baptism, and constantly renewed in you by absolution and the Holy Eucharist. Through these wonderful gifts, we get to GROW in the apprehension of that which is already our own, learning to live more and more from it, more and more from union with Christ and less and less from the old self. So it is not that holiness grows in you; it is that you grow in holiness! Getting used to whom God has made you to be in His Son. There’s real effort here, of course, but the effort is working at resting in Him who works all things through us. I don’t overcome sin by my willpower (ha!), but by the strength of Him who has united Himself to me.

You might find these podcast links helpful. The Gospel-Driven Church, Dr. Micheal Horton , Ash Wednesday and the Season of Lent, The Sermon on the Mount with Carl Fickensher, The Parable of the Lost Son with Bill Cwirla all brought to you via my favorite radio program Issues,Etc.

This podcast on Lent with Pastors Todd Wilken and Heath Curtis is one of the best I’ve heard.

Blessed Lent to you, dear friends!

Broccoli Soup {with cheese}

February 6, 2013 by Edie Wadsworth 45 Comments

I ain’t gonna lie, this broccoli soup (with a generous helping of cheese) will knock your socks off and make you take back all the lies you’ve spread about broccoli.

4 tablespoons melted butter
2 T. olive oil
1/2 medium chopped onion
1 stalk celery
1/2 cup flour
2 cups half-and-half cream
4 cups chicken stock
1 head fresh broccoli
fresh grated nutmeg, to taste
6 ounces grated sharp cheddar cheese
4 oz fontina or gouda, shredded
salt and pepper

Sauté onion and celery in butter and oil until onion is translucent. Then, add flour and whisk over medium heat for 3-5 minutes. Add the half & half and chicken stock and stir well and then add the chopped broccoli and cook over low heat 20-25 minutes. With an immersion blender, blend the broccoli until it’s the consistency you like. We like ours to have larger chunks of broccoli but also some nice smaller bits. Just blend until it’s the way you like it! Add salt and pepper and nutmeg. The nutmeg is key!! Don’t leave it out. If you don’t have fresh nutmeg to grind, just add about 1/2 tsp. of ground nutmeg. But don’t leave it out. I’m bossy like that. Return to heat and stir in cheese, heat until melted and garnish with a little shredded cheese.

NOW. Here’s where I have to admit a little creative license. I am crazy over cheese and we have about 75 varieties at any given time. That might be slight exaggeration but not much. When a recipe calls for cheese, I just shop the fridge and see what I have. I would definitely use some cheddar in this but add something else for variety. Gruyere would be amazing. I had gouda and fontina and added those and it was AMAzing. It might have helped that the broccoli came out of my winter garden. That garden beats all I’ve ever seen. We’ve been eating out of that little garden since May. The goodness just won’t stop!!
Serve with crusty bread and prepare to be crowned Queen of the Kitchen. Or in my case, Queen of Bean Station. And even if you think you don’t like broccoli cheese soup, give it a try. This one might surprise you.

Need more help with menu planning? Subscribe to my newsletter and get a monthly meal plan. Just find the black subscribe box in the sidebar!

I also wrote a post about the spiritual aspect of feeding people. It’s my favorite way to change the world.

broccoli cheese soup

Mwahhhhh!!
Check out some of my other recipes!

Spicy Tomato Soup

Fish Tacos

Old Fashioned Griddle Cakes

Blucberry Coffee Cake

Strawberry Dream Cake

Late Summer Vegetable Soup

Chicken and Dumplings

Cheese Tortellini Soup

Grannie’s Fudge

Chipotle Pumpkin Barley Soup

Rocky Top Chili

Italian Sub Soup

Cheeseburger {in paradise} Soup

Taco Casserole

Cherry Chocolate Chip Cookies with Sea Salt

Potato Corn Chowder

Roasted Zucchini Lasagna

Broccoli Soup {with cheese}

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Ingredients

4 tablespoons melted butter
2 T. olive oil
1/2 medium chopped onion
1 stalk celery chopped
1/3 cup flour
2 cups half-and-half cream
3 cups chicken stock
1 head fresh broccoli
fresh grated nutmeg to taste
6 ounces grated sharp cheddar cheese
4 oz fontina or gouda shredded
salt and pepper

Instructions

Sauté onion and celery in butter and oil until onion is translucent.
Add flour and whisk over medium heat for 3-5 minutes.
Add the half & half and chicken stock and stir well.
Add the chopped broccoli and cook over low heat 20-25 minutes.
With an immersion blender, blend the broccoli until it's the consistency you like.
Add salt and pepper and nutmeg.
Return to heat and stir in cheese, heat until melted and garnish with a little shredded cheese.
Serve with crusty bread!

your real, new self

February 4, 2013 by Edie Wadsworth 71 Comments

“Your real, new self (which is Christ’s and also yours, and yours just because it is His) will not come as long as you are looking for it. It will come when you are looking for Him. Does that sound strange? The same principle holds, you know, for more everyday matters. Even in social life, you will never make a good impression on other people until you stop thinking about what sort of impression you are making. Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it. The principle runs through all life from top to bottom. Give up yourself, and you will find your real self. Lose your life and you will save it. Submit to death, death of your ambitions and favourite wishes every day and death of your whole body in the end. Submit with every fibre of your being, and you will find eternal life. Keep back nothing. Nothing that you have not given away will be really yours. Nothing in you that has not died will ever be raised from the dead. Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look for Christ and you will find Him, and with Him everything else thrown in.”
― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

C.S. Lewis’s words have been my company this weekend because I’ve read him so much that he’s like a father to me. I leaned into him while I worked. He has an unparalleled way of articulating his thoughts. After reading him, it’s almost ridiculous to think I should keep on writing. Why should I write anything when the world has Lewis’ words? But perhaps my words could in some way be a bridge to him—the way he has been a bridge for me to so many authors I wouldn’t have read otherwise like George McDonald , G.K. Chesterton and John Milton. What if Lewis had said, “Well, maybe I shouldn’t write because the world has Homer and Milton.”

So, I kept on tapping the keyboard.

And he’s so right, too. We need not try so hard to be original. We just need to tell the truth.

With our art and with our lives.

Tell the truth.

But truth-telling is dangerous because if you give it an inch, it’ll take you over.

You begin to know truth in one corner of your heart and it takes like wildfire.

Pretty soon, all the lies you’ve been harboring about yourself and your life will crumble right down, in a heap of ashes.

And at that very point, when you’re tempted to despair, remember Lewis’ words,

” Nothing in you that has not died will ever be raised from the dead.”

The Father of all truth will take your ruins—your ash heap of pride, pretense, selfish ambition, greed, hatred and hopelessness—and He will make the great exchange.

He will give you life. He will teach you humility. He will make you generous. He will make you selfless. He will give you hope.

He will raise you up and make you blessed.

You will know the Truth and the Truth will make you free.

**************************

If you haven’t read Mere Christianity , don’t delay—I can’t think of a better way to start the week. Or the month. Or the year.

Are you afraid to be who you really are? Have you insulated yourself from truth to protect your house of cards?

Your courage to step into the light might be the nudge someone else needs.

What is one thing you can do today to inch closer to truth.

What’s holding you back from finding ‘your real, new self’?

(I’m asking myself all the same, difficult questions. I’d love to talk about it in the comments.)

Lisa Leonard Designs {and a giveaway}

February 2, 2013 by Edie Wadsworth 401 Comments

We are starting love month off with a bang here in my little corner of the world.

This was my first Lisa Leonard necklace. Or was it my third. Anyway, I’ve loved her since the beginning of blog time.

I met Lisa and her sweet sister at Blissdom and I’ve so loved watching Lisa’s business grow. She is an artist, creator, entreprenuer, and beautiful mother and wife.

And she makes the most unique, hand-stamped jewelry I’ve seen. You can’t see it because of my badge but I’m wearing one of her necklaces!

It seems that Lisa’s talents know no end. She’s speaking again this year at Blissdom and I can’t wait to hug her neck! Just look at her adorable self.

She’s got some great pieces for Valentine’s Day! My favorites are listed below but it’s so hard to pick. I just want one of everything!

My favorite is the gold connected bracelet.

I love the aqua nugget necklace…..

And this one is such a Lisa classic……

I’m also thinking of getting this bracelet, personlized to say, “dazzled by amazing grace” or something lovely like that. As a matter of fact, I want everything on this page, please.

And then in huge news, she announced this fall that her family is working with a production company on reality show. This trailer below wrecked my world this morning and I could not stop crying.

Watch it. You’ll fall in love with her family. You’ll be blessed by her struggle and by her faith.

Okay, if you can compose yourself, enter a comment below telling us which piece you would buy and you will be entered to win one of 3 $50 gift cards to her shop!!! She’s so generous!

And if you order before February 6th, you’ll get delivery by Valentine’s Day.

Also, she’s giving my readers 20% off their entire purchase if you order by February 7th. Just enter ‘edie20’ when you checkout.

LOVE you, Lisa and thank you for your commitment to beautiful, creative art.

Happy Love Month

February 1, 2013 by Edie Wadsworth 17 Comments

1. I don’t know about you but I’m gonna be holed up all weekend working on a writing project that’s due Monday. More on that later.

2. I love winter weekends, where hunkering down and reading and writing and baking are not only allowed but encouraged. And ? Happy Love Month! Although, I always hate to see January go.

3. I have a date with my sister tonight, for dinner and laughing and a CABi party with friends. I love sister dates. They’re the best.

4. I’m going to Blissdom again. You knew I’d follow Alli to Texas, didn’t you? Ruth made me do it. And Heather, too. I can’t wait. The Blissdom team was so kind to to take down my “Blissdom is amazing’ quote and put it right up on their website. You should totally try to get there. I’ll hug on you and feed you something with buttercream.

5. I’m slowly rehab-ing my leg. Which means I’ve been back to the gym. ON THE DREADMILL. (read curses and huffing and sighing). I don’t like the gym. I like to run outside. Soon enough, I guess.

6. I loved all your link-ups this week. I’m slowly making it through them but Monday’s deadline has me all in knots. Thanks for joining the party! Check them out if you haven’t yet.

7. I’m listing my ebook with an affiliate site next week, which means if you’d like to be an affiliate, you can list it on your sidebar! That also means that getting both the pdf and the epub version for $5 will probably only last through the weekend. You can purchase here!

8. I was supposed to post my daily schedule this week. Looks like that won’t be happening. I’m working on it, though.

9. Do y’all know Myra from My Blessed Life. Preciousness, I tell you. Visit her blog and plan to stay a while. I happen to adore her.

10. My espresso machine is temporarily out of service. Which means I’m temporarily out of service. Just thought you should know.

11. In my ebook, I posted about the tank top of all tank tops, Sugar Lips. ( Sugar Lips Seamless Rib Tank Top 409, Black, One size fits most.) Of all the things I talked about in that ebook, y’all have been emailing me like crazy about them. I know, there’s nothing quite like just the right tank top. It’s all JamieKnoxville’s fault. But this is one addiction you need. Never buy another kind of tank top ever again. They’re one size fits all. They’re fitted and clingy and the best undergarment I’ve ever owned. You can thank me later.

12. While you’re thinking about stuff you need, check back this weekend for a great Valentine’s Day giveaway from my very favorite jewelry maker!

13. I’m so behind on the Aeneid. What else is new, right? I hope you’re behind too. Then, I don’t feel so bad.

14. Did y’all see Melissa’s new kitchen. Oh, my is it beautiful!!! I LOVE IT. Great job, Melissa!

See y’all this weekend for the giveaway. What are your weekend plans?

Well, let me suggest some Stubborn Love to get you started!