Thanking God tonight for a weekend overflowing with blessings. It’s one of those times when I just shake my head and exhale loudly and wonder if my heart might burst. I don’t know that I can remember it all, so I’ll go backward from right this minute.

Just said good-bye to a sweet friend who came over to chat for 90 minutes on my back deck (until we moved to the kitchen table to escape the mosquitoes).

Met a new friend at church who was visiting from out-of-town and now we’re facebook friends. She asked me about Cambodia in the bacon line (you should definitely visit our church) and I knew instantly that we’d be good friends. Plus, we went to the same college and she lives (temporarily) in a town in southern Ohio that I lived in for a short while.

Got invited on a movie date to see The Help by one of the cutest girls I know.

Spent some time chatting about our next Love C-bus event with two of my Missions Team buddies.

Hugged friends at church who I haven’t seen in awhile.

Got to eat Mexican in a big, comfy booth surrounded by my little family that’s always extra-huggy and fighting to be close to me after I’ve been away for 24 hours. The food was delicious, and the love made my heart sing.

Met some of the most amazing women at the retreat I spoke at this weekend. They laughed with me and cried with me and made me feel like we’d known and loved each other forever. They promised to pray for my family and got all excited about our trip to Cambodia.

I got to hear condensed versions of several women’s life stories, and my heart is blessed. These women have been delivered from some serious stuff, and some are still fighting a good fight every single day. Praying for them.

I got to talk about Radical with 13 beautiful women Friday night, and God is moving big-time in their hearts and lives. So, so, so encouraging and gave me the oomph to keep going on this justice journey thing.

Got some thrilling e-mails/facebook messages from folks who want to help bless the Boys’ Center in Cambodia with gifts of toys and money. Stories of getting their kiddos (and even their schools) involved. Be still my heart.

Some gifts from some women who felt God telling them to bless our family and our upcoming trip. Man.

Storing up these moments and pondering them in my heart. And writing lots and lots and lots of thank-you notes this week.

Last thing: if you’ve been a Prayer Doula in the past (someone who prays for one of the expectant mamas in Haiti–Heartline Ministries) or if you haven’t, there are 8 women due soon that need our prayers. What an honor to lift up these women to our awesome God!

Happy Monday, friends!

I arrived a bit late to the texting party. Oh, people have been texting me for months (years?). I just couldn’t text back unless I had 10 minutes to spare (and the patience to click my phone buttons 2-5 times for each letter/punctuation mark I wanted to type). Besides, I had to pay like twenty-five dollars for each text or something.

Anyway. A couple months ago, Gabe got us free smart phones at Best Buy and an unlimited texting plan. But I was too lazy/intimidated to put everyone’s numbers in my new phones and/or to tell them that I had texting now. So I’ve been easing into the texting game slooooowly.

On February 22, though, I got some news that made me giddy, and I sent my first text to my friend Joanne. (for those of you who don’t know, Joanne had a stroke in January and was in a coma for 2 weeks)

Hey, girl. A little birdie told me you’ve been texting. This is Marla. I miss you!!

She texted me back five minutes later, and my heart got stuck in my throat. Miss you too!

I told her I wished Ohio and Colorado were closer. You could move here, she wrote.

Seriously, my heart was just racing. This is a woman who probably shouldn’t have survived the ordeal she went through. And she was in a medically-induced coma and her brain was completely shut down and she had swelling on her brain and a flap of her skull was removed.

I asked her if I could pray for anything specific. She wrote, Fear about another brain flap surgery is eating my lunch.

She talked about how badly she missed her girls and wanted to go home. I told her that I had cried so many tears over the past few weeks as I thought about her and those sweet, sweet darlings.

I could barely keep up with her questions. At one point I asked her, How are you twice as fast a texter as me?!?!

She told me she has thumbs of power (and I needed to practice).

One of my (selfish) fears about Joanne had been that she wouldn’t remember me and our friendship. Well, goodness. She probably remembers every single thing she’s ever said or done. Praise the Lord that her memory is completely intact, her wit and sense of humor are no worse for wear, and she’s as loving and sweet as ever.

She asked me if Cambodia had a national zoo and when we were going. I told her that the zoo book has taken a new twist and that it will have more of a focus on online community and that she is one of the stars.

And that she was totally going to have to write a book about the past few months.

We text just about every day. I tell her what I’m up to. She tells me how she’s doing and what I can pray for. We chat about the food she gets to eat and how a lot of it ends up down the front of her (see Kristen’s post about it here). We say I love you.

She’s so honest, just like always. Lots and lots of hard stuff she’s enduring. I know she gets discouraged a lot, but she’s always so upbeat and positive. My heart aches for her, and I long for her to get all the way better and be back home with her loved ones.

Joanne’s birthday is March 15. I wish I would’ve thought to mention it earlier, but I think there’s still time to get a card to her by then if you hurry: Joanne Heim (c/o Kristen Haufschild) 11004 Grayledge Circle, Highlands Ranch, CO 80130

Yesterday I noticed that we had texted back and forth over 200 times and that big number reminded me of my 1000 Gifts List (have you read Ann Voskamp’s book? you should!). And I knew that Joanne was making her own list of 1000 Things She’s Thankful For.

I’m thinking of writing a blog post called One Thousand Texts, I wrote her. You will be the star. Of course.

Only the co-star! she wrote back.

Well, okay, I wrote. (But we all know she’s the real star.)

After today, we’re at 276 texts. Well on our way to 1000. (that was Gift #514 in my journal today)

She is a living, breathing miracle. Please keep praying for her–for relief from pain, for restful nights, for God to ease her fears about her upcoming surgery (March 25), that she will continue to heal and recover everything she lost.

As soon as I finish this post, I’m going to write text #277.

I love you, girl. You’re my hero.

I often ask my online friends, “Do you remember how we first met?” because I have a memory that works in fits and starts. I’ve embarrassed myself on way too many occasions by forgetting something I ought not to have.

Anyway.

I distinctly remember the first interaction I had with Deborah. I was at a She Speaks conference in North Carolina with Gabe (well, he drove me to the conference and then made himself scarce at various NASCAR tracks and shops). This conference is where I met Sophie for the first (and only–boo!) time and Melanie (sort of, we didn’t really “meet”) for the first of three times.

Anyway. Deborah.

Gabe and I were in the hotel room, and I got all excited because a gal named Deborah had e-mailed me about ordering multiple copies of my books. I had just asked God to provide for our financial needs, and I saw this as part of his answer. I can’t remember the details perfectly, but I do know that Deborah told me she was single and was buying the books for a bunch of her married or soon-to-be-hitched friends.

Awhile later, she sent me an e-mail and said something to the effect of, “I read your Blushing Bride book and for the first time in my life, I feel perfectly content being single. Thank you for painting such a realistic picture of marriage. So many times, those of us who aren’t married imagine that marriage is nothing but amazing and dreamy and romantic. Thanks for showing me that’s not really true.”

In other words, thanks for bursting my bubble and scaring me from EVER EVER EVER getting married. Is it really going to be that AWFUL?!? Oh, the horror! (no, I’m sure she didn’t mean it like that).

Over the next three years, Deborah became such a huge encouragement to me in so many ways. For one thing, she kept on buying more and more books. The girl has a million friends. But more importantly, she would pray for me, ask me how I was doing, send little messages that blessed me like crazy.

And this past weekend? I got to meet Deborah in real life when I spoke at her church’s Women’s Retreat. (Please ignore my hair. I put it in a ponytail for my last speaking session, but when we took the pic the first time it looked like I was bald, so I took it out. Nice.)

She was even more wonderful and beautiful and awesome in person. I kid you not. This woman is a treasure. I didn’t get to talk to her before I started speaking (she and her friends were just the teensiest bit late), so I met her for the first time after I’d already gotten up in front of everyone. I paused for a big hug, and it was fabulous. We got to chat at the end, and she walked me out to my van.

After one of the sessions, a gal came up to me and introduced herself as Sharon, Deborah’s friend. “Deborah gave me your Changing the World One Diaper at a Time book before I got pregnant with my first,” she said. She now had two boys, ages 2 and baby. “I’ll be honest,” she said, “when Deborah asked me if I liked the book I told her that, actually, I thought it was kind of depressing.”

I grinned.

“I mean, I still wanted to have kids and everything, but… Maybe I should read it again now that I’m a mom. I’d probably like it a lot more.”

I told her that I understood. My Blushing book had scared Deborah away from marriage. My Diapers book scares not-yet-moms into using birth control. Deborah came over then and we all had a good laugh about it.

If you’ve read the books as a wife or mom, you probably “got” them. And you probably weren’t depressed so much as relieved that you weren’t the only one having a little bit of a rough time being married or having a baby.

But put yourself in a single gal’s shoes. Or someone who doesn’t have kids yet. A realistic picture of marriage and motherhood can be a frightening thing. That’s kind of why we don’t tell brides-to-be and expectant mamas the whole truth. We want them to actually tie the knot and bear young. Or more truthfully, we want them to suffer like we’ve suffered (kidding!).

I hope you know that I absolutely love being a wife and mama more than I could ever say. And I can’t thank God enough for blessing me with Gabe and my girlies, who make my “job” so much sweeter. They rock my world.

But I’m still gonna be real, even if it turns people off. So, I guess I should be marketing my book to my single friends. “Hey! You think you want a husband? Read this, why don’tcha?”

Have a great weekend, friends! Whatever stage of life you’re in, embrace it as best you can. I don’t mean you should settle. Just determine to be content, but take lots of big, scary, fun leaps of faith too. You won’t regret it.

IMPORTANT NOTE: VALENTINES ARE SOLD OUT!! THANK YOU!!

A few months ago, my friend Joanne called me to ask me which kind of bag I’d prefer–one with two short handles, two long handles, or one over-the-shoulder strap. “I wanted this to be a surprise,” she said, “but I want to make something you’ll really like, so I decided to let you choose your own style.” She had found some really cool giraffe fabric (and knows I love giraffes) and planned to make me a bag for my birthday (on Halloween).

That’s the kind of friend Joanne is.

“Over-the-shoulder,” I said. “I’ll take it to the library with me and fill it with books.” A love affair with the library is one of the many things we have in common.

I’ve probably gotten close to a dozen packages in the mail from Joanne over the course of the last four years. Things like vintage vocabulary cards and an old kids’ book about Ohio from the library close-out sale. Handmade zippy pouches and Beth Moore study guide covers.

And on Friday, January 7, the mailman delivered a package to my door. It was from Joanne. When I opened it up, I gasped at this amazingly gorgeous bag.

The attached card reads, “Happy birthday, Merry Christmas, Happy birthday, Merry Christmas!” And on the back: “I didn’t forget–it just took longer than I expected! Love, Joanne”

I smiled and shook my head at her amazing-ness and thoughtfulness and then I reciprocated in the only way I know how–I sent her a thank-you note with sticker-Scrabble magnets that spelled L-O-V-E, her “word for the year.” I mailed it Saturday morning.

On Tuesday, January 11, at 9:00am, Joanne had a stroke. And thus began a 2-week fight for her life. I still have a hard time wrapping my mind around it. But she did it. She made it. She woke up. PRAISE JESUS!! And now begins the most difficult journey of her life.

In the past 3 weeks, thousands and thousands of people around the world have rallied around Joanne’s family and prayed their hearts out for our sweet sister in Christ. And she is making remarkable, miraculous progress.

She’s been moved to a LTAC (long term acute care) facility where she’ll be doing the long, hard work of getting better. Toben (Joanne’s husband) has been faithfully updating Joanne’s blog, and Joanne’s amazing sister, Kristen–a mama of 3 and a fabulous photographer–has written some really moving posts on her own blog. I love this one where she took pics of a bunch of the mail Joanne has gotten and this one where she shared pics of Joanne’s new room all decorated with her goodies.

I know so many of you have already sent Joanne cards/letters/gifts, but I’d love for all of us to completely BOMBARD her with LOVE this Valentine’s Day. Whether you love this holiday or hate it, you’ve got to admit it’s a perfect opportunity to show Joanne (and her family) that she is loved.

You can send your Valentines to Joanne Heim (c/o Kristen Haufschild) 11004 Grayledge Circle, Highlands Ranch, CO 80130

I’ll bet her daughters Audrey (12) and Emma (10) would be tickled to get some Valentines too!

Speaking of Valentines, my friend Holly messaged me on Facebook yesterday and said “You should make handmade Valentines to raise money for your Cambodia Trip!” Ha! What Holly didn’t know is that I’d already started making some.

IMPORTANT NOTE: VALENTINES ARE SOLD OUT!! THANK YOU!!

If you need some Valentines AND want to help us get to Cambodia all the faster, you can purchase your own set of 4 for $5.01. (the penny is to distinguish Valentine orders from Cambodia Photo Card orders in our Paypal account) The $5.01 includes shipping and you may choose the 4 cards you want (or let me mix-and-match for you). The only “rules”–no 2 cards can be the same, and U.S. addresses only.

DO NOT SEND THESE VALENTINES TO JOANNE. I want her to get a million DIFFERENT Valentines, not a ton of the same. Plus, I’m sending her one of these!

The cards are 5×7 and each one comes with a red envelope. *Limit 2 orders per person.* You can pay via Paypal here or e-mail me if you’d rather send a check. You can also e-mail me with your custom order (which 4 cards you want).

So, there you have it. Buy some Valentines for your loved ones. Send a Valentine to Joanne and her girls. And have a Happy Wednesday!

My heart is especially burdened for Joanne’s little girls tonight. Toben wrote a wonderfully long and informative blog post just a little bit ago, and at the end, he asked for prayer for Audrey and Emma. After a year-and-a-half of being home-schooled by their amazing mama, they’re going back to school on Wednesday.

I can’t even imagine. Tears sprang to my eyes when I read that the first time. Then again when I read it the second time. And now again.

Can you imagine being 9 or 12 and your mommy is lying unresponsive in a hospital bed (and has been for almost a week), and now you have to gather up all the courage and strength you can muster and go back to school where you haven’t been for 18 months?

The good thing is that this is a Christian school, and it’s filled with old friends. Everyone will have heard about Joanne and will love on her girls in amazing ways. Thank you, God, that their teachers and classmates know you and can encourage these beautiful young women with your truth and comfort. And I think it might be just what they need instead of sitting at home with nothing to do but miss their mommy.

But it will still be hard. Friends, please pray for God’s peace and strength to just envelop these little girls as they go back to school. They are so precious.

Joanne’s blog has been updated (I’m so thankful for you, Gabe) with tangible ways you can help her sweet family during this hard time.

(These pics are from the Phoenix Zoo, July 2009. Toben and Joanne had an appointment that morning, so we took Audrey and Emma with us. 115 degrees before noon. Wowzers.)

^Audrey, Ava, Nina, Livi, Emma. (and some sweaty lady pushing the stroller)

^Audrey and Ava.

^Emma and Livi.

^I love these people.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart, friends, for praying for Joanne and her family. You are AMAZING. See you here tomorrow for our discussion of Chapters 5, 6, and 7 of Your Secret Name.