We’ve been in a stressful season, one filled with big decisions about where we live, how we live and what we want to do with our lives. There’s been tension, joy, anxiety, hope and fear radiating through us. With the help of God and the support of our family and friends, however, I think we’ve navigated these storms well so far.

During this time, I’ve been learning that a large part of surviving the waves when you’re exhausted — physically, mentally and emotionally — is refreshing your soul. I feel like I can tackle anything when my soul feels full and healthy. However, that requires time and attention. Just like our bodies, if you don’t feed it with nutritious food it craves, then it becomes weaker. Just like a muscle, if you don’t work it out, it won’t get any stronger.

The times I get the most stressed out or distraught or depressed are the times when I haven’t taken the time to hit the refresh button and given my soul time to breathe and recover. It’s weakened by life’s barrage of demands. It’s having a hard time sustaining me because I haven’t taken time to invest in it, strengthen it.

How we do that differs from person to person. Everyone’s soul finds rest in a different way, but it’s important to know how to rest your soul and then take time to do it. These are a few places and ways that I can find some peace for my soul.

• I love sitting on my patio with some iced tea and just being still and taking in what’s around me.

• Even though I love it, reading feels like a waste of time since I spend most of my work day reading and there is always something to do around the house. But reading something for fun really does feel like a jolt that gets my heart pumping again.

• Not always the case, but sometimes exercise can be refreshing if I imagine my stress, anxiety and fear is leaving my body in the form of sweat. Then I just start working harder to sweat more and get rid myself of all those toxic emotions.

• I know yoga can be an intense workout, but I prefer my yoga to be a peaceful time to clear my head and meditate.

• I love a good conversation, one where people are dreaming together, collaborating, giving little bits of themselves, being known and knowing others. That is the stuff, right there!

• Cuddling and being an absolute goof with my husband is one of the most refreshing things of all.

How do you refresh your soul? How do you find rest?

This book is an oldie but a goodie. It is definitely in my top five favorite books of all time as evident in this post about how I don’t have one favorite. It has a special place in my heart, No. 1  because my co-blogger and BFF extraordinaire Ash gave it to me, and No. 2 it completely changed my perspective on Jesus, his ministry and how we interpret the Bible and approach faith. I recently, read it for the second time, and I think I loved it even more — to the point where I had to tell you all about it.

The book is a fictional adaptation of the Biblical story of Jesus. It follows the story of Marcellus, the son of a Roman senator and the soldier who won Christ’s robe at the crucifixion. We also closely follow his slave and friend Demetrius who I like to pretend is the same Demetrius from 3 John. We meet Marcellus and Demetrius well before the crucifixion and live the event through their eyes and come along their journeys to learn more about the man they executed. Author Lloyd C. Douglas, a pastor turned novelist, takes the reader to Rome, Athens, Jerusalem and throughout Galilee, learning about Jesus straight from the men and women who knew him and were touched by his life. The stories are told in such a personal way that I’m not sure I really understood them before.

As someone who has grown up reading many different versions of the Bible, it’s words sometimes are too confining to convey the emotion and gravity of what is actually happening. Even The Message doesn’t tell Jesus’ story in a narrative way that today’s reader can connect to. The Robe takes these familiar Sunday School stories and puts them in a narrative the reader can invest in as you might have invested in Pride and Prejudice, The Hunger Games or even (gasp) Harry Potter. But if you believe Jesus’ story to be true, this book becomes so much more powerful than those.

I know that The Robe is one man’s fictional interpretation of what might have been, but it served an important purpose to me. Because I believe Jesus was a real person and divine, this booked showed me that his story was not a stuffy Sunday School lessons on felt boards. It was organic, real and personal. Just as much so as the relationships and stories we all live today. I’m not sure I ever saw it that way before reading this book. I know this book is probably not what actually went down, but it definitely opened up my eyes to see that maybe what went down was bigger than what we hear from the pulpit or in a history book. It had flesh, bones and blood. It had friends and enemies and fans. It sweat, laughed and cried. It was beaten, killed and then came back to life again.

If you want to explore Jesus’ story in a new way or just this time period, I highly recommend this book. If you just want a wonderfully told story with engaging characters and plot twists, I highly recommend this book. The Roman politics can get kind of long and complicated, but they have to be there to set the context. Do NOT under any circumstances watch the movie version of this book. It is awful.

If you’ve read it or do read it, tell me what you thought. I would love to talk to you about it! If you like this one, I highly encourage you to read another good Lloyd C. Douglas book Magnificent Obsession.

It’s been a while since we had a party, and I’ve got the itch. I love having people over, and some experiments with popcorn has inspired me. Without a microwave, we’ve resulted to making popcorn on the stove. My favorite thing about making popcorn this way is that the popcorn has zero added flavors, so it’s a completely blank slate. John opted for season salt instead of regular one night, and a whole new world of possibilities opened up. Since then, I’ve been pinning some popcorn recipes  (If you’re on Pinterest and not following me, by all means, walk this way. If you’re not on Pinterest yet…why not?), some savory, some sweet. I want to try crushed roasted kale popcorn.

But I think this outlet for creativity screams for a movie marathon party with a popcorn bar, complete with all sorts of awesome toppings that people can help themselves to. I’m thinking something smart, funny and a bit gritty, maybe a Guy Ritchie marathon? We’re talking about pre-Sherlock Holmes. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. Snatch. RocknRolla. Yes? Alright, who’s coming over?

I’ve been wanting to do a weekly inspiration post, kind of a photo or link collage of things that are inspiring me that week. However, when I sit down to write this first post, I realize, sadly, that I’m not finding anything all that inspiring lately. Between today’s news cycle filled with polarized political rhetoric, school shootings and far away wars and unrest, it’s hard to find something that motivates me to try, to be creative, to be better.

I haven’t been inspired by too many images or blog posts lately. I’ve been inspired by words…words full of hope. Enjoy these instagrams, and maybe they’ll bring you some peace in the midst of whatever muck you might find yourself in. If you follow me on Instagram, sorry for the redundancy.

P.S. These prints of Mumford & Sons lyrics are pretty great and inspiring too. Anyone feel free to snag something like the middle one as a birthday present for me

P.P.S. Read this post by Matthew Paul Turner on the creative space during my lunch. Motivation to get back on that creative writing horse!

We are nearing our one-year anniversary of moving to KCMO, and that means our lease on our little one-bedroom cave of apartment is almost up. Initially, the plan was to downsize to a one bedroom on the cheap to save as much money as possible for a new car and buy a house this April, but then, life happens with it’s unexpected expenses, and the house will not be happening this year. But I refuse to see this as defeat, and we are upgrading to a two bedroom apartment.

In our one-bedroom, I knew the living situation was extremely temporary, so even though I decorated the place, I’ve put off a lot of ideas that I’ve been saving for our first house. Well, since the house is on hold, I’ve decided the best coping mechanism is to implement some of those ideas in our new place and really make it feel like home. I think making your home cozy and uniquely yours is a great way to make any living situation better. Whether it’s your very own house or an apartment you’re renting, it’s still home sweet home, right? I lost sight of that a little last year.

So here’s to projects!

• Right now, painting is on the agenda. We’ll see if I follow through. One thing is certain, I love these colors.
• I’m moving into a bigger living room that is more entertaining friendly, and I want to fill with a second bookshelf and arm chair for more seating (because right now our guests struggle to find a place to sit with two pups and only four seats).
• Right now, a lot of our wall art is framed wedding photos. I want to swap those out for more recent pictures and focus most of our common room art less on us and more on artsy stuff. Maybe frame some Instagram photos (Currently obsessed with that app. More on that later). Or these DIY art projects: framing a letter, painting a favorite quote, stamping your puppies paw print on a canvas.  I love the idea of filling our home with encouraging, loving, funny, sarcastic words. I might need to invest in a a chalkboard.
• I’m hoping I can get John to make us this beautiful headboard.
• We’re going to need a few more pieces of furniture: a desk, end tables, new dressers for clothes. I love the idea of picking up wood pieces at flea markets and garage sales and dry brush painting them.

Have you tried any of these projects or similar ones? Got any tips?

Remember my NaNoWriMo novel from 2009 that I actually finished? Well, I’ve been editing it, cleaning it up, trying to make it more presentable and dynamic. I finally feel like I’m to the final section that needs an overhaul before I can focus on fine tuning. Unfortunately, I’m stuck again, and I want your help.

One of the basic principles of story telling is conflict. Conflict drives a story. A character has a desire or need and an obstacle stands in their way. Conflict. But what about the part of the story before the conflict comes? How do you drive those parts of the story where there is no conflict?

In Lord of the Rings, we have the Shire, the agricultural utopia that’s very existence is jeopardized by the conflict. We’re supposed to fall in love with this place before we even know about the conflict, so that we are willing to trudge through The Two Towers to make sure that the Shire is okay.

I’m trying to write my story’s Shire, and I’m running into a wall as to how to make it interesting. I need to bring the reader up, show them how good life is for my characters so when the impending doom comes, the reader is just as devastated as the characters involved. But how do you set that up in a book?

In movies, it seems easy. Stitch together a montage of smiling, laughing people with a peppy indie song in the background, and you’re done. You’ve simultaneously showed the passage of time and conveyed the feeling of carefree, blissful life with a simple marriage of images and music. All I have are words. So how do I convey that same feeling without the story getting bogged down and the reader getting bored. What drives that part of the story?

Any ideas? What books do you think do this well?

It’s been a while. Well over a month, actually. It’s been a season of a lot of reading and reflecting and waking up my heart, growing closer to God and the people dearest to me. It’s not over, probably not by a long shot. But the weather is getting progressively warmer, and I am hesitantly hopeful that spring is just around the corner in my heart and in the physical world around me.

All that to say, coming out of hibernation comes a rediscovery of things that I am passionate about — people, storytelling and writing, God, food. I’d like to be more diligent with this space. I don’t want it to get in the way of my life (which in this season I’ve discovered needs a lot of care and attention if I want to live abundantly). But I don’t want to completely neglect this space either. I want to get back to writing outside of work, get back to creative writing and blogging. At least on the blogging side of that, the writer’s block is crumbling and the courage is growing stronger.

I hope you’ll bear with me as I’m waking up.

This time of the year is not welcome in the Atchley household. Winter after Christmas seems like an unnecessary trial. We hate the cold…hate having to get bundled up just to take the pups outside…hate having to wake up early to scrap ice off the cars…hate having the season’s perpetual cold or cough. Fortunately, since Christmas, the weather has been mild, more like spring than winter. But I don’t trust it to last until actual spring arrives, global warming or not.

To adapt to our hatred of the cold, we stay inside and take part in a sort of hibernation. I become quite lazy. Most of my time is spent watching movies, reading, baking and cooking, eating soup and drinking tea. It’s this time of year where I fall back on my old favorites…The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe; The Robe; The Hobbit; Jane Eyre. Anything that will take me far away from bare trees and monotony.

Right now I’m re-reading The Robe. John’s reading The Hobbit. This weekend I watched the movie Jane Eyre, which my parents bought me for Christmas (love that movie so much). What are you doing to cope as winter settles in? Or are you one of those people who loves this time of year?

Roskoe's got the right idea.

John had the day off on New Year’s Day, so we decided to start our own little tradition. We woke up, fixed a breakfast of Lindy’s Delights scones (banana chocolate chip, thanks to a good friend’s Christmas gift) and Trader Joe’s coffee and sat down on the couch to watch all three extended editions of Lord of the Rings. Despite my love of all things Lord of the Rings (as evidence by the name of this blog), this was not my idea. All John’s! And I have to say it was a great lazy way to spend the first of the year. Roskoe was content to be my cuddle buddy throughout the movie. Lucy couldn’t take her eyes off the screen when Gandalf fought the balrog (it was her first time watching). I do have to admit though, about halfway through The Two Towers, which was about 2-3 p.m., we were starting to doze off. And despite the epicness of Return of the King, we both decided we think The Fellowship of the Ring is our favorite. All this traveling to Middle-Earth made us stoked for The Hobbit, which the first part comes out at the end of this year! I’m not sure I can wait after watching this trailer! The Hobbit

How did you kick off the new year?

I want to be more intentional in all things. That is my goal for 2012.

I want to be more intentional in my relationships — with my husband, friends (near and far), family, co-workers, strangers. I want you all to know that someone is here for you and wants to be a part of your life.

I want to be more intentional in my life — my job, my writing (including this blog), keeping my home, exercising, eating right. I learned in 2011 that all the things I say I want to do in my life won’t happen unless I make them happen. A house, a job, travels to Europe — none of that just falls into one’s lap (usually). I want to try to give my life my best everyday so one day I can look back and say, “I did good.”

I want to be more intentional with my pups. They deserve better from me. Don’t worry, they haven’t been neglected, but we could go on longer walks together and learn some more tricks instead of cuddling on the couch all the time. Then maybe I won’t need to be so intentional about exercising

2012 is going to be an over-achieving kind of year.