Gravel Road Musings

5 Game-Changing Insights about Your Relationship, Your Money, and Yourself This is a very timely book to read right now with the world in chaos and the future looking uncertain and a bit scary. However, if you are looking for a how-to book on finances, go find a different book to read. This book is not on how you should handle your money, but rather your perspective of money and the value you place on certain things that pertain to money. We often do not value things the same way our partner values things. And that can cause a lot of issues in a marriage. Jeff and Shaunti do extensive research for their books and the book has lots of charts showing the percentages of things based on their surveys, etc.  It's kind of fascinating to see the difference between men and women. They are quick to point out that these things are not true straight across the board, but can be a generalization of how the majority sees it. "If you aren't thriving in the 'love' part

Adventure, family, loyalty, intrigue, and of course romance mark this book. And while that is just the norm for this sort of book, I really think there are some good takeaways from this book. The two main characters, Arabelle Denler and Philip Camden could not be more opposite. One is all light and goodness and compassion and the other is called Black Heart for a reason. And yet, when you dig below you discover that Black Heart has a heart that is packed full of loyalty, a loyalty that will take a bullet to protect his men and their families. That is an impressive quality to have and one of the takeaways I encourage from this book.  Let's be loyal to our friends and family: don't be nice to their face and then stab them behind their backs. Arabelle was a nurse and full of compassion and grace and faith in God. She was always out to take care of the disadvantaged, comfort the hurting, and just show love to the world at large. And yet, the book showed her to be human, she w

A True Story Heartrending, amazing, horrific, redemptive, abuse, forgiveness. This book has it all. I feel like this has to be a true story because you can't make stuff like this up. Debra is a foster mom and takes in a family of five. I don't want to give a lot of details, but there was an unprecedented order to send the children back to their mom. This caused great concern and well it should have for the end result.  But then Debra is asked to do a really hard thing and she wants to say no so very bad, but she feels God telling her to say yes and it leads to something beautiful, but still hard. I don't know how to describe this book without giving any spoilers, but it was so good and so sad and so redemptive and so heart-wrenching. But it was amazing to see God at work in changing lives and providing forgiveness even though there are still consequences for sin. "But life isn't a fairy tale, and we are not owed blissful happy endings. We are called to

It's been a long time since I've had the opportunity to review a hardback children's book and I jumped at the chance to do so now. I just feel like you can't have too many good quality children's books in your library. This is a sweet book about a little boy who thinks he is too old for his mom's kisses and too big for his dad's hugs. It's humorous as the mom and dad come up with animals and how they hug or kiss. The boy really doesn't want hugs or kisses like that, so of course, he decides that he isn't too old or too big for kisses and hugs from mama and papa. My daughter also wasn't a big fan of getting a kiss like sloth or a hug like an elephant either, so it was fun to read it to her and tease her a bit with it. I think the story is really cute and the theme of family and love is right on. I wasn't as big of a fan of the illustrations, especially of the people. The illustrations of the animals were cute, almost whimsical even

Nome, Alaska and dairy farming don't seem to go together real well and yet this is the story of Chuck Bundrant and his daughter and three granddaughters who moved to Alaska to escape the past and have settled down and worked hard to make a dairy farm successful. There are cows to milk, chickens to feed and talk to, sled dogs, and even sheep by the time the book is done. There seems to be way more work than can be done in a day especially after illness and tragedy strike. This book does a good job of showing the resilience of men and women. The phrase from the Bible, "cast down, but not destroyed" comes to mind. While it's taken out of context here, this family was determined to make a way when times were tough. The Pastor preached on contentment and joy in all circumstances and Havyn (the main character of the main characters) really wanted to do that in her own life. I needed that reminder myself that even when life is throwing a curve ball, I can choose contentm

How God uses our dreams and disasters to accomplish the impossible. I will read anything Kristen Welch writes. This is her fourth book and I've read three of them and I need to read her first book, Rhinestone Jesus . Her books are easy to read, practical and full of stories that help make the lessons come alive. We all face mountains in our lives and everyone's mountain is different. Some are big, some are not so big, but they all need to be faced and climbed. Perspective can make such a big difference in how these mountains are handled. Kristen is honest about her life and her mountains. She has chosen to dedicate her life to helping empower impoverished women around the world by creating things that are then sold online, in store and through Fair Trade Friday subscription boxes. It's a fascinating work called Mercy House Global.  It started as a dream to help young, pregnant women in Kenya have a safe place to have their babies and it grew from there. There are

How to Minimize Meltdowns, Reduce Conflict, and Increase Cooperation I started reading this book pretty cynically, thinking this was going to be all about talking in the right tone of voice and feeling like my child would walk all over me because I couldn't actually give consequences for bad behavior.  And if I would just talk right my children would all listen. Yes, there was definitely an emphasis on changing the way you talk to a child, but there was so much more too. Respond instead of react. Hear what they are saying. Put the phone down and give the child your full attention. Apologize if you make a mistake. Instead of just telling them to stop it and grow up, use kindness and try to understand what they are feeling. Look what's behind your own reactions. I finished this book at the beginning of a potentially hairy week. I had a good conversation with a friend about different styles of parenting and I finished this book and I tried to be more understanding with my