Book Review (Finally): The Good Wife's Guide: Embracing Your Role as a Help Meet

First of all, let me just say I am a big fan of Darlene Schacht and her ministry to women around the world, so I knew I would like this book....but I REALLY liked this book.  I was originally drawn to her blog a year or so ago because of it's title, "Time-Warp Wife".  I have said several times in the course of my marriage that I was born in the wrong era, that I would fit in much better as a housewife in the 1950's.  I don't say this because I am dying for a pink Cadillac, believe it's perfectly acceptable to vacuum in heels, or secretly hope the bee-hive makes a comeback. 


Candace Cameron-Bure wrote the foreword for this book and I believe she hits the nail on the head when she states, "I believe that families would be stronger today if we as women took back our femininity and invested more of our strength and power in our family."  To me, that is the difference between the 1950's housewife and now.  As a society in the 1950's we were still in touch with and accepting of the Biblical guidelines set for families and today our priorities are vastly different.  Men were men and women were women....and it was acceptable to appreciate the difference.

I understand that this book won't make everyone happy, especially those women out there adamantly fighting for women's liberation, but I agree wholeheartedly with Darlene's message. It is one based on Biblical principles and that is one thing that I don't want to be liberated from....TRUTH.  I knew after reading just the foreword and the introduction that Darlene and Candace both shared my heart about marriage and mothering.  In the introduction, Darlene writes, "As a Christian, I accept the Word of God to be true, and each time I apply it to my life I quickly discover that there is a good reason God put it there. His wisdom exceeds mine."  And in the foreword Candace so accurately states, "God created men and woman equally but differently.  He gave us separate roles that are of equal importance but different performance."  If you can also agree with these 2 statements and have a heart to grow as a wife and mother, you'll love this book, too!

Darlene's book is full of encouragement for all women in varying stages of life.  She sees no difference between a working mom, single mom, or stay at home mom. She encourages all women to make family their priority despite their present circumstances and encourages us not to compare one to another.  "That doesn't mean that we can't have our own interests or earn extra money, but it does mean that we are to prioritize family because that's what love does." (Pg. 32)  It's true that sometimes mom has to go to work.  That doesn't make a woman "less-than" or "disqualified", whether we work or stay home is not what defines us.  The Proverbs 31 woman is heralded for her service to her family but even she bought and sold, toiled and worked.  The point is not what you choose to do for work and if it comes attached to a paycheck.  What makes a good mother, a great help meet and a happy woman is the heart she has for her family.

I was overwhelmed by the amount of information, insightful analogies and scriptural encouragement found within the pages of The Good Wife's Guide.  I was blessed by the honesty and vulnerability Darlene possesses and her willingness to share with us.  More than that, she doesn't just leave you with some feel good stories and a can-do attitude, she is constantly leading us back to scripture and to Christ where our true strength is found.  I am thankful for women like Darlene, for the talents Christ has blessed them with and for the courage it takes to lay bare their hearts for the edification of others.

Darlene was also kind enough to include a whole section at the end of her book dedicated to the "how-to" of homemaking.  She includes organizing tips & tricks and some great cleaning schedules.  I would encourage you to order your own copy of this book.  I know you will be blessed by all she has to say, and her ministry is definitely worth supporting. 




*I did receive a complimentary copy of this book in return for my review. The opinions expressed here are my own.  Thank you!





 

My First Review!!!

I just received my copy of  Darlene Schacht's new book, "The Good Wife's Guide: Embracing Your Role as a Help Meet".  I am so excited for this book and to share my thoughts with you as soon as I finish it! Stay tuned for the full review.

The Valentine Your Husband Won't Throw Away

I know this an odd way to start a post on Valentine's Day, but let me just say that I am so thankful for the women in my life.  I have great friends that are in the trenches of toddler-hood right along with me and some amazing women that have been there, done that and are enjoying their grandchildren, and of course a great many that are somewhere in between.  I appreciate the perspective and encouragement these women bring to my life. 

I need mom friends that have grown children and can encourage me to enjoy each day and assure me that I will miss all the craziness of today. I also need mommies to share potty training horror stories with and to call for prayer when I have locked myself in the bathroom for a "mommy time out".  And sometimes, the friends I need the most are the ones that aren't quite finished with raising their little ones, but are just far enough down the road to convince me to keep going. Amen?

Ok, that being said, the following post is an outline given to me by an older, wiser woman a year or so ago about how to really write a love letter to your husband. It has been a blessing to me and I hope it helps you, too!

The Valentine Your Husband Won't Throw Away

Our goal today is to write a letter to our husbands that will communicate to him our love in a way that touches his heart.  We want to use words that speak love to him.

Take a minute and write down several things you respect about your husband.  It's not easy, because we don't think like they do.  We need to look at our basic differences so we can understand what respect really means and apply it to our lives.  

This is an important concept.  When we show our husbands respect, it motivates him to love us God's way!  It draws him to us!! Did you hear that?  Read it again. When we show our husbands respect, it motivates him to love us God's way and it draws him to us.

Our husbands need to hear how we respect him, expressed as just that.  Make a list, "I respect you for...."  Keep in mind his masculine characteristics.

Are you READY?  Write him a LOVE LETTER and use the word Respect.  Tell him in words he will understand.  When you touch his heart, he will bend over backwards to show his love to you!

You could say something like, "I really respect you for ________", "I admire you for ___________", "Signed respectfully, ______________", "The one who admires you, ________________".

A big word of caution.  You are going to get a very positive reaction if you choose to speak his language to him so it needs to be from your heart and not just a one time thing.  Trust me, if you pray about it and continue to grow in this area, your marriage will be so richly blessed! It may feel like you are manipulating him, but if you are honest in what you write, and your only intention is to have a better marriage, I assure you that you are not.  You are learning to speak his language. Your words will touch his heart, just as his "sweet nothings" can touch yours.

I admittedly only wrote one love letter like this to my husband, however; I have let this advice change the way I communicate with my husband on a daily basis. This small piece of advice has enriched our marriage in so many ways.  I have been blessed to learn how to better communicate with Eric, and learned to avoid many arguments that had centered around him feeling disrespected at times because of my approach to certain things.  I love my husband. He makes me feel safe, secure, loved and cherished. Why wouldn't I want him to feel the same?

So, if you have waited until the last minute to think about Valentine's Day (or not), why not take a few minutes and write him a love letter now? I promise you will not be disappointed, and neither will he!

Today's post is linked up with Time-Warp Wife



The Year of the Surgery

It started with Logan in April, then Max in August and now my sweet little Maggie in February. What a long 12 months this has been. 
I vividly remember the exhaustion of all those trips to Doernbecher.  I spent the better part of the month of April between pre & post operation appointments, way too many hours in the car, and trying to simultaneously comfort an unsure 2.5 year old boy with one arm while nursing my barely 2 week old baby with the other. 

Max's surgery to remove his tonsils was much less tiring in many ways, but I was not at all prepared for the recovery time and process. There was very little sleep for either of us the first week after the procedure.

Now, here we are 10 months later and I can't sleep the night before Maggie's surgery.  She is (finally) getting tubes in her ears after 4 months and 12+ ear infections. My poor girl needs relief, and so do I! 

I am so thankful for all the ways the Lord has provided for us this year and given us more grace for one another as we have been stretched to our limits & navigated these trials.  I praise God daily that my children are (for the most part) healthy and we do not have to wake up everyday and face losing one of them to a disease.  I know all too many mommas that do, or have. 
That being said, I am more than ready to say good-bye to "The Year of the Surgery" and (hopefully) hello to "The Year of Great Sleep".  Hey! A momma can dream, right!?!

Bleary Eyed & Battle Weary

The last 3 weeks or so of this momma's life have been full and long.  I have been to at least a dozen doctor's appointments, comforted my sweet baby girl through 4 ear infections, made 3 visits to an ENT, 2 visits to Urgent Care, collected one "sample" (yuk), had to cancel a much needed date night, spent hours in prayer and had way too many nights with little to no sleep.  I am battle weary. I am tired. 

I have missed out on the quiet of nap time, since Maggie has been too fussy most of the time to really rest. I have missed blogging, having coffee with friends, talking on the phone with my mom, sewing, spending alone time with my husband and the list goes on.  I have sacrificed and I have cried out in frustration. But I have realized something.  As much as I try, I can't have it all.  At least not all in the same season.

  To everything there is a season,
A time for every purpose under heaven:

² A time to be born,
And a time to die;
A time to plant,
And a time to pluck what is planted;
³ A time to kill,
And a time to heal;
A time to break down,
And a time to build up;
⁴ A time to weep,
And a time to laugh;
A time to mourn,
And a time to dance;
⁵ A time to cast away stones,
And a time to gather stones;
A time to embrace,
And a time to refrain from embracing;
⁶ A time to gain,
And a time to lose;
A time to keep,
And a time to throw away;
⁷ A time to tear,
And a time to sew;
A time to keep silence,
And a time to speak;
⁸ A time to love,
And a time to hate;
A time of war,
And a time of peace.

~Ecclesiastes 3:1-8~

What a comfort this passage has been to me. I almost always hear it at funerals.  When time is gone and we are searching for comfort to see us through the days ahead. But only recently have I considered the application of these verses to my everyday life.  What about the days we only feel dead, but our hearts are still beating? The days that seem so dark and long and full that we aren't sure we will live to see the sun rise?  Don't we need these verses then, too?  I do. Maybe even more. 

I can't have Spring flowers in the dead of winter any more than I can have an immaculate house with kids at home.  I can try my best, count my blessings and enjoy the season I am in now...whether the brightest Summer day or the darkest Winter night. Someday I will be able to write in peace, use the bathroom alone or have an uninterrupted phone call and I am certain that I will wish for just one more day of craziness.  A too-loud house full of wrestling boys and up all night snuggling with my sick baby girl.

The days are still long and full. I am still bleary eyed & battle weary, but I am renewed at this thought. My heart is a little lighter as I head into tomorrow. I will enjoy this season and the next....and the next.  I will praise God for every one He gives and every way He uses them to minister and teach me more about who He is.  God is good.

This post is linked up at

Student or Teacher?

A while back, a young woman in our congregation brought me a journal and explained that she was asking women in our church to write in it for her. She was hoping to gather bits of advice, encouragement and/or words of wisdom from those that had gone before her into this crazy world of womanhood.  Pretty smart of her, yeah? I thought so, too....what I couldn't figure out was why she was asking ME. 

I was a little taken back by the request and unsure of how to respond, so I laughed nervously and said, "Yeah, I'll take it, but if it's wisdom you're after you should ask....".  I didn't open it until I got home and only then did I realize just how little I had to offer.  There was great advice from Godly women already filling the pages and I only felt less adequate for the task at hand, so I avoided it.  I put it on my headboard and put it off until the ever-elusive "later". 

I am pretty sure I had that thing for months, all the while wrestling with the idea of it.  It wasn't so much that I couldn't come up with something to say, I just wasn't really sure that I should have been asked.  She was looking to those she deemed to be wise women, and I just didn't measure up. She had pages upon pages of advice from amazing women that had travelled much farther down this road than I.  Mothers and grandmothers, pastor's wives and missionaries, Titus 2 women and long time lovers of Christ.  What could I say that would be even remotely relevant or worthwhile compared to what these women had already shared?

You see, I was not much older than her when I decided that the plan God had for my life wasn't working out quite like I'd hoped and I could handle this life on my own.  I got pregnant with my oldest son, Max, that year. I was 17.  How could any advice I give to this girl be anything but hypocritical considering the choices I made at her age?  How could I encourage her to stay the course and follow Christ when I myself had been too weak to do so? I struggled with that one.  I cried out to God these same questions and for a while no answer came. 

And when the answer finally did come, it was one that surprised me.  God hadn't laid it on her heart to ask me because I had lived my life perfectly and made all the right choices, it was because I hadn't.  I wasn't being asked to measure up to the advice of other women or claim to have it all together.  I simply needed to share with her the Truth of my testimony and the words I wished someone would have shared with me at her age, had I been mature enough to ask. 

My life is a beautiful picture of God's grace.  He has redeemed me and made it more beautiful and blessed than I ever thought possible.  I am so thankful He decided that the tattered pieces of my life were worth His breath of life and that I have been made new.  I bet your redemption story is just as beautiful.  Whether you made it through life always walking the golden path, or like me have arrived to this day with a few more scars, you are loved & cherished just the same. 

Thank you, T, for asking to hear my "words of wisdom".  God has used you to stretch and grow me, to test my limits and increase my understanding of His love & mercy.  I am forever grateful ~A. Dancer

Do Over or Do Better? - Gentleness Challenge Week 2

Here we are, heading into week 2 of The Gentleness Challenge.  How did your week go?  Anybody out there wishing for a "do over"?  I'm raising my hand!  That's not to say the week went horribly, but it sure didn't go perfectly.  I had some really great days and some not so great ones.  I have learned to recognize the time of day when I am most tired and pray up as those hours approach.  I feel like I had victory in some areas, like choosing playtime over household chores a few nights this week. It has alleviated a lot of irritability on my part and has helped give structure to our nighttime routine. Max has benefited from this the most.  He is much less whiny after school, because he knows that I will make time to sit down with him (and ignore the dishes, if necessary) before he goes to bed and do something fun.

"Yelling at a bud won't make it bloom"

That being said, I still have a LOT of work to do. I really liked what Courtney said on her original post, "Yelling at a bud won't make it bloom".  I read that, and think...duh! But isn't that the goal of parenting? To help our kids bloom and blossom into the person that God created them to be?  I cannot control or will a flower to bloom or grow by screaming at it anymore than I can my kids.  So why would I yell at them and expect different results? I think that might be the definition of insanity, folks.

I really appreciated the video that Courtney shared as well.  I tend to be the mom that nags and points outs faults. I don't want to be that mom. I want to speak words of life into my kids. I want them to know what Grace really means, and how in the world can they when I give them such a small margin for error?  I want to be more like the Lord and let my kindness lead to repentance.  I want them to be convicted by the Holy Spirit, and for that to happen it may mean I have to step back a little and quiet down a lot.  They will never hear the Holy Spirit whispering to their hearts if I am screaming at them. Although I have been very encouraged by these realizations,  I am only now realizing how little self-control I have in this area. Grow me, Lord!

So, as much as I would like to erase the not-so-great mom moments of last week, that is just not the way life works. I think instead I will settle for a "do better", I will give myself & my kids more Grace and I will pray that we can learn from every success and failure in the future.