What is it to be a mother?

  To me being a mother is much more than one may think. You do not become a mother instantly when they place your new baby in your hands. You don't get the title because you've changed a few diapers, had a few sleepless nights, drove your children to and from school, wiped a few running noses, or go to work everyday and provide food and clothing.
 
Being a mother is so much more than that. It's such a gift, such a joy that only a mother can truly understand. It may not always be easy and each one of us can share our own stories of how hard it can be. When are children are babies we watch has each new level of laughter & smiles come from them. As they take on new expressions. The cutiest little faces ever. Does their hair stay straight, get curly? What color will it eventually be. Then they become of age when they can talk, walk and interact. And some of the things that come out of their mouths, wow. The school aged, and all that Art they bring home for our refrigerators. I have lots in the garage from all our children, priceless. Then all the birthday parties, friends over, picking out the right outfits, weekends of sporting events, & don't forget family time.

  Then we have the teen years. Can I just say a lot of praying!! These years are the hardest but the best years of my life. Laundry seems to be my best friend. Teens like to see mothers wash clean clothes over and over again. =-) They must think we have nothing better to do with our time. HEHEHE! The days of hangin out with friends, going to the movies, liking boys or girls, the drama of young ladies, the late nights talking, the crumpy next mornings, the malls, the clothes, more clothes, make-up for my ladies, boys & theirs shoes. The new friends, old friends, the piercings, yikes! Some we approve & some we don't. School projects, grades up & down, homework, homework & more homework. Getting the honor to watch them become the man or woman that God intends them to be. It can be scary at times.

  Then they turn 18 and you have to sit back and watch them make decisions on their own. Watch some make mistakes, watch some fall, & then get back up. All while praying that they will come out okay. Wondering if all that you have taught them, all that you have poured in their lives these past 18 years will give them a good sense of directions. Looking back on the day they got their first shots, blooding nose or ouchy. That first scare of asthma & the breathing treatment at the hospital. Feeling your heart beat with so much love, your heart hurts sometimes. It has been worth every moment, every tear, every late night waiting up. Being a mother is still my greatest joy!

  As a step-mother as well, I have had the privilage to share in some of those moments with them. I wouldn't give one day back from the moments I'm allowed in their lives too. See being a mother isn't a born right to us, it's a gift from God. Some fully understand what it means to be a mother. Others may not get it right away but my prayer is that you do, soon! Don't let your children grow old & have pain in theirs hearts. But yet that they look back and remember when you looked at them they seen the joy in your eyes. They always knew you loved them, excepted them for who they are. With just a smile, you can set their hearts on fire. Be their fire mothers. Love them like only we can. Show them unconditional love, as Our Heavenly Fathers loves us.....Blessing to all you mothers!

The Purity of My Love

Love is explained as a passionate affection for another person,

a feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection, as for a parent, child, or friend, a person toward whom love is felt; beloved person; sweetheart. 

Purity is the condition or quality of being pure; freedom from anything that debases, contaminates, pollutes, freedom from any admixture or modifying addition, freedom from guilt or evil; innocence.

So to define the purity of MY love is the freedom, without guilt or evil, to have a warm  deep affectionate, unselfish feeling toward a person. I don't know how to love any different that God created me to love. If I love you, you will be loved for a lifetime. Even if you have hurt me, talked about me, or even cut me out of your life. I believe that love is something you give yourself just like forgiveness. If you love, then you will be loved. Maybe not always by the person your loving but definitly by your Heavenly Father.

I have loved all my life; from my family members, to friends, my kids & sisters & brothers in Christ. They have all brought something great to my life. I only hope that my life would only continue to add more people to love & be loved by. When all else fails.......LOVE

A time as this....

It hit me today, that our life is about to forever change. God has been preparing my husband & I for a time as this. I knew that it was coming, yet it seemed unrealistic & untouchable. It's so surreal, the feelings I have right now. My heart is filled with a peace that surpasses all understanding, I am ready & equipped for battle.

I am so amazed & in awe with my Father. You have chosen me! Oh how you love me Lord, it's undecribable. With all that you know about me daddy & yet you love me so. All that you have brought me from. My heart is yours forever more. Thank you for trusting us with this.

Children of the Lord, don't allow the devil to tell you lies. You can have peace in your life. You can be free from all darkness. Be servants unto the Lord. You take care of His business, He'll take care of yours. For I was once lost but now I am forever found. My mission will always be to help & lead those lost, back home to their Father.

I love Jesus, I love my husband, I love my family & I love you~

This life He gave me.

As we wake in the morning, feeling good or bad, we are alive. Doesn't matter what happened yesterday, last week, last month. What matters is that God, our father has given you another day to share life with your family & friends. Another smile at your daughter who says, "mom you want me to open these blinds so you can wake up"? I smiled at her cause I was feeling tired & upset she woke me. God quickly reminded me, "your alive", "you get to spend another day with this precious child". So I smiled to let her know I love her. This precious child seen right through me; then offered to pray for me. To help me not be tired & crumpy today. She prayed a blessing, some strength, and peace over my day. How wonderful for the Lord to give me a child of prayer. Only for me to be able to help my other daughter to get her morning started; for she was tired too. :D Then, you get a call from your spouse from work, making sure you started your morning on time. Making sure you know he loves you. My step-son who smiles with a great big good morning. Then you get to hear some praise & worship to help start your morning just giving thanks that you have breathe & are able to thank him with it. This is just this morning. I can proclaim my afternnon as blessed as well. For God has given us life, lets smile about it more.

As I look back & yes see a lot of hurtful memories, bad choices, & very bad times, I can still see HIM. How much He brought me through, how much He loved me even when. How much He has turned my life around. My life is nothing without Him.


He continues to give me new meaning to life.....

Finally PART 2 of In Memory of Edward Cortez

So you read in the first part that my father made a lot of bad choices, drank most of his life & hurt his family very much. He watched his wife die that day and had much guilt & shame come upon him. Every part of my being wanted to HATE him but no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't. He was my father, that God the father appointed to me. Even though I didnt understand that then, I do very much now. 

My grandfather, mother's father, had much hate for my father. So when funeral and other arrangements were being made, my grandfather excluded my father from them all. He in fact hired someone to make sure my father was not to be at any part of it. I felt the forgiveness in my fathers soul as he cried to me and my brother how sorry he was to have treated our mother the way he did. I seen him on his knees asking for forgiveness from God. He knew of God but hadnt yet really called on him until this time. His brother Louie who was a Reverend, had tried many times to lead him to the Lord, but he hadn't fully made the commitment. So we found it in our hearts to forgive my father & we took my father to the funeral home against my grandfather's wishes. He got to say his final goodbye's and cry out more to God and her to how sorry for all his mistakes. For not loving her the way her should have, for not being faithful to her, for the physical abuse, for not being the father he should have and so on. It was a very painful site for me. I remember the pain flowing so fast through my veins. The pain of all the memories of the past and the love, forgiveness and peace God was replacing it with. That day my mom died I remember in the moment asking God why he didnt take my dad instead. But this day I remember understanding why he didn't. See my mom had given the last 3 years of her life to Christ. Even though she was sick most of them, she was ready to go home to be with Jesus. My father had not yet & we needed the extra time to make things right with him. While we were growing up we didn't have much of a relationship with him. Now it was that time. My father agreed to go to a 6 month program and get clean. So we visited him as much as possible. I think maybe 4 months in, and dad dropped out of program. He pretty much escaped from the place. He went back to the worst drug of them all; heroin and it was the final draw for his already diseased liver. He immediatly got sick and my aunt had my uncle come get him to take care of him in DHS, CA. He lived a total of 1 1/2 after my mother. But what is important is that we got to make things right. We made amends & my father did finally give his life to Christ on those last days. I remember talking to him the Sunday before he died, he was still trying to say sorry for things he felt he hadn't yet. My heart had forgive him & I felt at peace with us. He died that Saturday.

I didnt fully understand all this that had happened in my past until I had a REAL relationship with my heavenly Father myself. God has brought me to a place to use all my past trials & pain to make me a stronger women in HIM. To use it to help others in there life. I thank God for that last year with my father. To learn to love him & let go of all pain & replace it for love & laughter. One thing I didn't mention; my dad Ed Corte, was a very funny man.....Laugh on daddy~  

Wait for the day

I wait for the day for my family to NOT enjoy the rest of the night while I am still in the kitchen cleaning up. Like loading dish washer, putting food away, cleaning off table and so on. I mean I dont need it all the time. It would be nice every once in a while maybe 1 day a month that I can actually have us ALL clean up after dinner. It would maybe take 20 minutes tops if we ALL did instead of leaving me to do it ALL the time. Is someone bitter here?? I am done complaining. Next time I will do part 2 of Edward Cortez. Just had to get that off my chest. Goodnight all!!

~In memory of Edward Cortez ~ Part 1

Just talking to my step-son & niece in the kitchen today, while making homemade chips. I started to remember my parents used to make us homemade donuts with bisquits, cinnamon & sugar. Then have me & my brother sell them around the apartments. How embarrassing to even think about it. Well, looking back we thought it was fun so whatever. Anyway, I continued to share with them the life of my dad and what it was like being his daughter.

He was raised in a large family with 4 brothers & 6 sisters. Some being half siblings. He had a hard life of abuse, & watched his mother being abused. My grandfather was an alcoholic. There was other horrible family secrets that caused so much pain to all the children. My father desired to have a different life than what he was raised in. In fact the very day that my mom & him met he expressed to her that he wanted a better life. The only thing that attracted her to him. Not trying to be mean but My mom told me this story often when she was alive. She said she didnt think my dad was good looking. But after listening to his childhood & his desire to have a different life for himself she felt sorry for him. She felt a compassion in her heart to help him. That lead to her loving him more than she even loved herself. That will be another story, another day.

See my dad wanted a different life than what he was raised in, but how could he expect to have that when that was all he knew? Very first days of their marriage was full of fighting, abuse, neglect, and continued to get worse as years went by. My first memory EVER was at the young age of 4, living in Stockton by the fairgrounds. My mom and dad were arguing about something and I watched my dad stab my mom on her left side of the face with the keys in his hand. It came inches from her eye. As my mother held her hand on her face, over the bleeding, my father fled the crime in our only vehicle. Nice dad! We sat under an old bar we owned waiting for ambulance to show up. I can remember sitting right next to her, not crying but rubbing my hand over her leg saying, "mommy your gonna be okay". It amazes me what children can endure.

Another memory, my brother & I being drug out of the house in our jammies by my mother to look for my father. He hadn't come home from work that day. I guess I was about 9 when that happened. How about being drove home from Stockton to Livermore by my mom who had just smoked KJ with my dad, aunts and uncles. She was driving like maybe 30 on the freeway late at night. Almost in a zombie state, while my dad is hallucinating in the back seat with my lil brother who was crying. I am in the front with my mom watching her driving. My dad was yelling, "there on the roof, they coming to get us." Who the heck is coming to get us? I can remember thinking that very angrily. There are many more of those memories but lets express  the one that I shared today in the kitchen.

My dad treated my mom horrible the last months she was alive. She had lupus and was in and out of the hospital for months. Well around September she was sent to USCF for about a month stay. My dad decides he is going to find himself another woman during that time. Mind you, he is living in our apartment, married to my mom. Had just went several weekends ago to visit her with us. I come home from college one day and my dad has hickies on his neck. He's at the house getting something and then going back over to a neighbors house where he was. He hardly worked through out the marriage. So he is off this day. I am now VERY upset and say, "Um dad what the (bleep) is that on your neck?" Remember not yet a Christian, who serves the Lord. He turns to me like nothing and says it's a hickie. Um yea, I'm 19 and not an idiot. He then proceed to tell me about this lady that he wants me to met. Who is real nice & how I am going to like her. As if him & my mom had been divorced for years, he & I have a great relationship and this is no big deal. I think he had to have been on drugs that day, for sure drunk. Cause there wasnt a day that he wasn't drinking. I of coarse flipped out on him, yelling, calling him names and kicking him out. Me, the 19 year old, kicked my dad out of our house that day. I threw his clothes in the front yard, called the police on him for threatening me, but followed him to the neighbors house while waiting for them. Where things got even better. Not a pretty site!! The woman was there and she got some of my fun stuff too.

After that day he still lived in the apartments with some guys, like a building away from us. I had to look at his face daily and let me tell you, ever chance I got I was yelling across the yard, parking lot and or in his face. He ceased to hear what I thought about him. So lest bring it up a few weeks. My mom gets out of the hospital and I am now taking care of her at home. She is taking like 12-15 medications a day and just not the same. Almost in a quiet, depressed, sickly state. It was very sad to see her that way. I still had to go to school so had friends help when they could. I didnt have someone to help this one day and when I came home from school that day my mom was gone. I went walking around the apartments only to find her by the carport talking to my dad while his lady waits in the car. I guess my mom was giving him money. WOW, how low can this guy go! Imagine in your head for a second what you might be feeling in that position and times it by 100. THAT WAS ME! I took some of the anger out on my mom, yelling at her to get back in the house as if she was a child. Then tore my dad a new one & his nice female friend, kicking the car as they drove off. Then back in the house I went only to share with my brother what had happened. Now we are both mad and telling my mom, what is wrong with you? She's crying and apologizing, not to ever do it again. She also shares with us that she loves him. She was just trying to help him. Why? Why, does this beautiful woman not love herself enough to not allow this man to treat her this way?

It wasn't but maybe a month after that incident that my mother died in the front of those apartments. Again that day Deanna loses her mind. Like really, I had my one and only blackout! She died of a blot clot while walking to the car for a doctor appointment.  I blacked out right when my mom took her last breathe. I was told I stood next to her until the ambulance came, then feel to my knees in tears. Then my father showed up around the corner, I jumped up yelling, "he murdered my mother!" The police officer on scene was confused to what I was talking about so the apartment manager had to feel him in on all the abuse my mother endured. She knew our family since we lived there for 14 years. The whole apartment complex was out there when the ambulance came. It was a mess! The best part of the story is coming next.

Arguing with God

I think one of the dumbiest things to do is argue with God. Some may not believe in God so I'm guessing this isnt for you. So before some of you get offended, or tell me what you may think of my God; He's YOUR God too! I just choose to believe He is. I am not ashamed to be a God fearing, BOLD women in Christ and NOTHING will ever change that. So despite what you may feel, here is my view.

God our creator knows best. We may think we can control our lives, our marriages, & our kids but the creator of the world definitly has it all in control without a shadow of a doubt. He has a GREAT plan for our lives (Jeramiah 29:11) and fighting it will just take you longer to get their but you will eventually get there. I'll give you an example; my husband Richard Jason was called to be a Pastor at a very young age but took other roads in his life but yet that calling stayed within him all these years. After much darkness, he will finally be a Pastor this coming year. Not really that he argued with God about being a Pastor but he definitly didn't embrace the calling then. 

Just as it says here in this scripture; Everything has already been decided. It was known long ago what each person would be So there's no use arguing with God about your destiny. Ecclesiastes 6:10

As for me, well I honestly never really felt like I had a calling on my life. I was raised semi - catholic, meaning my parents would go at the regular holidays & when they needed advice in their marriage. I did feel a special thing with God from a very young age but nothing more than a need for safety. I can remember praying to God from my closet at like age 7, to stop my parents from fighting. I seemed to meet Him there often.

I first became a born again Christian in 1996 and ever since then God never stopped coming for me. Oh that would be because I fell away three times. I first started a relationship with the Lord in my first marriage. I wanted help to change my husband so our marriage could be better. Yea well when He didnt work in him in the time I thought it should take, I walked away.

Even now, about to become a Pastors wife. My tongue still tries to argue with God saying, "Um are you sure I am to be a Pastors wife?" "Lord I know you heard me try & manipulate my 19 year old son just tonight to get back in church cause he doesnt know whats good for him" "Oh and remember me yelling at the 9 year old daughter 3 weeks ago for trying to sell our DVD's". That is just some of the crazyness in me. Much more where that comes from. I'm a real person with a real family. "Yes you heard all that & still you want me & my family to do great things for you Kingdom" Okay done arguing for today. Dumb of me to even try. Lol!  

Look your not going to do it right all the time. But the less you arguing the closier you get to Him & the more time you can actually enjoy the life He has for you.

~Conversations~

So day two to blogging. Why Conversations IN Deanna for my title? I titled my Blog Conversation IN Deanna because thats who I am. I am a person who has lots of conversations with myself....in my head of coarse. My husband just bought me this series by Joyce Meyer. Conversations is the title & its a compilation of teachings to change your joyless, painful and scarred life to a more beautiful, fun, peaceful life. As I continue to express my life and what I conversate about, you will understand my hurts, pain, & reason why I am the Deanna today. You will also understand why God is so important to me. In fact the most important thing ever. My life before Christ was all those things but now they are being traded for joy, love, peace & understanding.

Your will also understand that I am no different than any other normal person who lives any other normal life. People just process things differently. So unique, yea, you can say that. We are all created SEPERATLY in HIS image.
So we all have good in us but we have some bad too. That's what I want more than anything for all bad to be gone but it's a process. So here's to the road of process.

Nothing like...

Nothing like waking up knowing God gave me another day, a new week & much still to learn. All that was yesterday stays yesterday and today is today. So today wanted to start off right. Took care of like 5 of my 8 to do's, all before 12 noon. Yea ME!! One was pretty important; like taking my Savan Ban a pizza to school to share with all her friends at lunch. I guess like all her friends parents have done it and it was like her turn. So it was pretty important for this event to happen today. Standing in that office with 3 colored markers writing her a message on the pizza box brought the biggest smile to my face. I didnt relize it until the office lady said, "aww is it her birthday?" Then I looked up and was like, "Nope she's just that special to me, my angel". Man I love this child. Not that I don't love them all but Savannagh Clarice is definitly an Angel from above.