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From Susan Merrill

The Blog

Marriage

Is Your Marriage Slipping into the Future?

Most people (myself included!) spend their lives in the Someday Zone. We say things like, Someday, I’ll… And we fill in the blank. Someday I’ll apply for that dream job. Someday I’ll take my spouse to Europe. Someday I’ll try marriage counseling. Someday I’ll get away for a long weekend with my husband. And before we know it, someday has turned into if only. Take it from me, a mom of five. If you’re not careful, the demands of raising a family will push your marriage to the back burner and someday will never come. Then you really will be stuck in if only.

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Parenting

Anger Management 101 for Moms

How can someone so small make you so angry? I mean, really, did you ever think a four-year-old would be able to push your buttons so expertly? And why is it that you can control your temper with 99 percent of the people you interact with, but your kids can have you pulling your hair out and trying to hold your tongue in about two minutes flat?

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Marriage

What Men Have to Say about Romance

I did a test survey of fifty men on a retreat. When I asked the question “Do you yourself desire romance?” one of the men answered, “Yes, very much,” but added in the margin, “but we have different definitions.” That led me to want to find out what definitions of romance women may have missed. Men and woman have different definitions of what love feels like and looks like. {Tweet This}

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Encouragement

5 Things to Remind Yourself When You Fall Short of Superwoman

Have you ever experienced mornings that are perfect for comedy shows, but not so much for reality? These chaotic, sometimes even humorous mornings, may consist of walking the dogs, making breakfast, packing lunches, getting dressed, packing sports gear, and somehow managing to drop kids off at school on time. Mornings like these are already exhausting, but what finally tips the scale are unexpected incidences like spilling hot coffee on your white blouse or getting pulled over for speeding.

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Lessons I Learned

3 Musts to Hearing the Voice of God

Have you ever been praying and all of the sudden, you are prompted in a way you have never experienced before? I think moms, in general, are intuitive; however, we doubt ourselves. We wonder if what we heard was from God or from our own flesh. Here are three things to put into practice to identify God’s voice from all the other voices that are coming at you daily.

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Lessons I Learned

3 Things You Must Do to Let God Breathe Life into Your Desert Valleys

One morning, during one of our content meetings, I asked our team if they had been reading anything interesting in their Bibles. After a few minutes of quiet, our intern spoke up and mentioned a passage in Ezekiel 37, which talks about the vision of the valley of dry bones. This creepy vision produced an intriguing conversation. We learned that dry bones represented Israel when they were in captivity to Babylon. Like unburied skeletons, the Israelites were in a state of living death, pining away with no end to their captivity in sight.

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Parenting

3 Reasons Why God is Not Answering Your Daughter’s Desire for Marriage

“It is better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all” was once said by Shakespeare. You may have a daughter who is desiring marriage, but it seems as though God is not answering her as quickly as she hoped. It seems to her that all her friends are getting engaged and married and she is far from those milestones in her own life. Being a mother myself, knowing that our daughters feel like this can be heartbreaking. However, you can bring understanding to your daughter’s journey of waiting for marriage and her lifelong partner by reminding her of these three things.

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Encouragement

Don’t Let Addiction Thrive in Darkness

Do you know of a family member or a close friend who suffers from addiction? How has their family reacted? Have they been open about their struggles with the mental illness or have they kept them hidden in the dark? I understand these can be emotional questions to answer because I have family members who struggle with alcoholism. Most people, when they hear the word addiction, automatically think of the social and behavioral problems. However, the root problem of addiction is really physical and psychological. For example, I have a heart condition. My heartbeat is often irregular. When this happens my brain steps in and I take action. I lay down and call the doctor. A person who suffers from addiction has a brain condition, a mental illness. The very thing they need – the brain to take control – is the physical body part that is sick. The struggle for addicts is so daunting. Can you imagine how difficult it must be to psychologically fight a behavior when your brain physically craves it? It is hard to put ourselves in the addict’s shoes, but Samantha Fowler did in the video below. I have known the Fowler family ever since Sam’s mother, Elizabeth, …

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Encouragement

How to Love Your Kids Without Losing Your Mind

This week, I heard a viral recording of a hilarious high school answering machine. The options for the parents to choose in the recording were ridiculous. Some of the options included were, “To make excuses as to why your child did not do his homework, press 2” and “To request another teacher for the third time this year, press 8.” The teachers of the school unanimously voted for this message because they were just fed up with the parents’ demands. While the answering machine recording is funny, it is also convicting. Once you have a child, it is tempting to lose your mind and become one of the many overprotective parents. If you feel like that is you, just know you are not alone. The face of parenting has changed in America over the past couple of generations. Our culture has become extremely child-focused, and some parents find themselves losing proper perspective on their children and what parenting should look like. The following guidelines can help you maintain your objectivity and take a balanced approach to raising your kids without losing your mind. 1. This is not your second childhood. Are you familiar with those reality shows with the pageant …

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Marriage

9 Ideas for a Summer Romance with Your Husband

Frank Lutes romanced his wife Mary far beyond flowers and candy. He was recognized by Woman’s Day magazine as being the world’s most romantic husband. Probably his most romantic gesture of their 65-year marriage happened when he found out the hotel where they spent their honeymoon was set for demolition. Frank bought the door to their honeymoon suite and hung it in their bedroom at home. So every night, they slept in room 564. Frank must have inherited some ‘romance supergene,’ right? Well, even if your husband lacks that gene, you can help him express his romantic side. Try some of these 9 ideas for a summer romance with your husband. 1. Model Home Date Take a tour of model homes and talk about how you would decorate it. What do you like about the house? What would you change? Discuss your favorite rooms. Perhaps you’ll get ideas for the future. 2. Summer Concert Summer months are full of different concert series. No matter what your preference of music, a city near you is sure to host some fantastic music festivals and concerts for any budget. Bring your lawn chairs—or better yet—a blanket, and park your cabooses under the stars. …

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