6.2 What's Hiding Under the other bed?

How do you clean the room of an artist and a preteen? One pile at a time!

Step 1: The Demise of the Dollhouse - For my 16th birthday my grandparents gave me one of those beautiful handmade dollhouses you see on the top shelf at Hobby Lobby. They had actually made one for me when I was like 2 or 3, but that was the very first one they made, spent so many hours on it, my grandma just couldn't give it up (this is the grandma I inherited my packrat skills from). Anyway, my beautiful purple dollhouse has survived cousins, nieces, daughters and 7 moves - my daughters loved it to pieces, literally. The poor thing looked like an old abandoned mansion you hear ghost stories about. So one afternoon, I took a deep breath of bravery and went into the girls room with a trash bag and we tore apart the dollhouse and threw it away. I hated it and cried, but it needed to be done. Now we have a large space to add a bookshelf with containers filled with Legos, Barbies and Polly Pockets so that my 7 yr. old has her own space in the room to play with her things instead of shoving them under the bed.

Step 2: The Preteen Desk - my almost 12 yr. old has a desk with stuff piled high on top. Why? Because the drawers are filled with more stuff. (She's kind of a packrat like me.) So I used the 3 box rule and dumped everything out of the desk and we sorted together - keep, donate/sell, trash. I did it with her to help her make wise choices ("Do you really need that?") and to stay on task ("We are going to finish this pile before you paint your nails with that favorite polish you thought you lost!") Ahhh, much better - now she can sit in the chair at the desk and paint her nails on a clear space!

There's alot more to tackle here (like the closet, yikes!) but those 2 steps were huge in creating a clean, peaceful space for my girls to enjoy their room!

Freeing Tangled Hearts

Image credit: Amazon.com

"Only by taking our eyes off of ourselves and focusing on God can our tangled hearts truly be freed"

Freeing Tangled Hearts by Delores Kimball has incredible insights and wisdom for every woman I know! I didn't even get through the introduction before I pulled out my pen and started underlining. There are so many wonderful things to remember, quotes to post on my bathroom mirror and wisely used Scripture I need to memorize.

Kimball understands that the hearts and minds of women are stressed out, overwhelmed and confused, or as she puts it, "tangled". But instead of platitudes and cliches that we've all heard before, she is very straight forward about the issues women face.

Kimball challenges readers to examine their faith and then realize that the Christian life is a battle. She then tackles the negative emotions of doubt, guilt, anger, bitterness and envy one by one. Showing how these emotions can control us, she proves that freedom from them can't come from within, but only from the Holy Spirit. Every point she makes is backed up with Scripture. It is not awkwardly inserted or taken out of context, but is beautifully woven into her writing.

I love how she uses logic to disprove our emotionally based thinking and adamantly promotes living based on the truth of God's Word. As I read this book, I kept thinking how much I could have benefited as a teenager to learn to think based on truth and not  my feelings. I'm so thankful I now have this resource to share with my own daughters as they grow into young women who need to learn to navigate their emotions. I've already shared insights from this book with my oldest daughter, friends, and Bible Study groups. This is a book I will refer to and recommend often!

*A free study guide for the book is available at www.freeingtangledhearts.com

*Many thanks to Cross Focused Reviews  for providing this book in exchange for my honest review.