Fall Styling Tips and my first ever Noonday Collection GIVEAWAY!!!

Hi there cyber world! 

Today I am jumping on the blogger train as part of the Noonday Fall  Release. During a blog train, various ambassadors get to share their favorites from the new fall line and YOU have the chance to enter to earn free Noonday!

  Each day a blog {or two} are posted and each blog has a giveaway!  Check out Marijoy Horton's blog and Erin Stark's blog for the previous days post. 

  

Coming up !

If you haven't seen yet, Noonday Collection has launched their
                        NEW FALL 2014 COLLECTION!

www.amandacollins.noondaycollection.com 

I'll be talking about styling with the new line next week!
{Tuesday the 26th to be exact!} I will share my personal favorites, new arm parties, budget friendly options and a few looks for a variety of style tastes - so keep an eye out!

By the way - do you like FREE Accessories?

Well, if you do, stay tuned for my next blog post, because I'll be giving away

 a $50 Noonday Collection Gift Voucher!

Also, follow the Noonday blog train for even more stories, styling and giveaways! 

Here's a fellow ambassador from yesterday!

             -Amanda 

Growth in the hardest of times

 Sitting here yet again in another waiting room of the emergency room waiting for a surgeon. 

I am reminded of my time with Gene just a few years ago that really was the catalyst to our adoption. My husband went from a healthy, active man to a very sick just barely missed death kinda man in a matter of hours. I watched as he deteriorated before my eyes and would drift in and out of consciousness because his pain was so great. 10 days later I brought him home, being as careful with him as I did when our babies were newborns. 

God choose to use those days to show us how important family is and how precious life can be. It grew us closer and our family has not been the same since. We all had to lean on God and trust in his plan for our lives. 

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths."  

            -Proverbs 3:5-6 ESV  

In times like these, where I feel myself scared and afraid and unsure, I am CHOOSING to lean on HIM. I am CHOOSING to trust in his plan. I am opening my heart to what God is teaching us through this. Not at a trial of faith or a justification of our belief. I think God allows things to happen in the world because he set it in motion and we have free will. However, I do believe that he uses those experience to grow us closer to him and allow us to trust him. My anxiety and fear struggle are real. It is HARD, and I mean HARD some days. That darkness peaking through my consciousness. 

But, i had a wise woman once tell me not to long ago ...God doesn't want you to suffer, what he wants is you to trust him. He wants to pull you into a relationship closer with him...

So here I am, drawing nearer to him. Trying my best to stay focused on HIM so I can be there for my husband rather than be consumed with fear. And this song keeps playing in my mind.

An expert from Dennis Jernigan's  It's gonna be alright.  

It's gonna be alright here

If you will let Me hold your heart near

I'll even use your sorrows

To teach You how to love Me

It's gonna be alright, child

I'll hold you really close and tight child

I'll even use Your woundings

To help you know more of Me

Hear Me. I am calling,

"Child, come falling deeper in love with Me."

Trust Me, you must let go

Or you will never know any deeper love in Me

          http://www.dennisjernigan.com

                                   

    

A Reflection on the tragic death of Robin Williams

Actors, , musicians, scientists, congressmen, mothers, fathers, sons, daughters. All died too soon because of a thing called suicide. It leaves a void where a person use to be. A loss in another's world. And it happens all too often. 

Suicide is due to an underlying cause of depression, anxiety or other mental illness. As a counselor, I have worked with this for many years and seen first hand the struggles and the affect. This can be situational like a divorce or loss of a job, but it can also be a chemical imbalance in the brain. You don't choose it and you don't cause it, it simply is. 

This thing called Depression. It can consume you and take away all the things you love. Then adding Anxiety, that overwhelming feeling of loosing control and the world falling in on itself and the depression compounds. 

 I know because I too have struggled. Now, I am not going to share my inner most feelings and issues here because:

         1.that's something you do with whom you love and trust over a good cup of tea and tissues 

             NOT on a public blog 

          2.you are not a therapist 

          3.they are mine and we each have our own thing we are dealing with. 

But what I do want you to know is what it feels like. This is my own experience as well as those I have heard in my eight years of working in mental health....

Anxiety puts you in a place of panic. Things are spiraling out of control and you can't seem to think how to stop it. Life becomes overhwhelming and scary. You can't focus and you can't think and then you just want to explode. You feel like your not you anymore, but you can't figure out how to feel normal again. Every day you struggle to remain calm but things continue to build up. It builds and builds filling you, making your nerves tense,your heart rate speed, your hot and cold and you can't stop the panic feeling welling up inside. You feel so out of control. 

Depression feels like a deep sadness in the pit of your stomach. You fake it by smiling and laughing but you really don't want to smile or laugh. Each day is a new task of pretending your happy when you really feel like just crawling in a whole.  You begin to loose interest in the things you once loved to do. It's like someone turned out the lights on life and everythg feels dark and lonely. The motivation starts seeping out of you and before you know it, nothing seems interesting. This deep sadness grows in your stomach and begins to take hold. The world is now dark and and you feel all alone in this empty space. 

When you are in that place of darkness and dispair you just want out. The weight of the work is so heavy and sucks you down into this black pit of existence. Then you spiral deeper and deeper into this darkness and you feel as if it will never end. You don't want to even keep trying. Your done and you just want it to stop. 

This is where suicide indiation rears it's ugly head. You don't want to die, you just want it to end. Your tired of the pain of dispair and the lack of hope. You want it to stop and you want to be done. 

It's a myth that if you talk to someone that is contemplating suicide that will cause them to do it. In fact, talking about it can sometimes stop a person from attempting suicide. Most times the person contemplating suicide really just wants to stop hurting and doesn't see any other way. 

 If you or someone you know is struggling with these feelings. Help them get connected. A therapist, a physician, a pastor. Sometimes therapy can be an aide but other times is may be necessary for medication to aide in balancing the brain chemistry. The key is knowing you are not along and that there are people who love you and care about you. There is a life past this darkness. Group therapy can also be helpful in dealing with these thoughts and feelings. Take some self care steps. Start journaling the thoughts that don't seem to stop. Tell someone. Stop the stigma of mental health. No one chooses to have a mental illness and having one does not define who YOU are it is simply part of your health just like diabeties or cancer.  The suicide hotline at: tel:1-800-273-TALK is also another good resource. 

Reach out, be Jesus with skin on because you never know what someone maybe dealing with. 

An Invitation

Join us
August 15th at 6pm at
 SIMPLICITY COFFEE SHOP
In Lebanon, Missouri
and hear the stories of
EMBRACING HOPE ETHIOPIA 

I introduced you to EHE just a little over a year ago when we were in Ethiopia and saw first hand the work they are doing. We want you to come and experience the work they are doing too. 

 I'm telling you, you MUST come and hear their stories, learn about these women and see what God is doing to restore their lives.  Trust me, you don want to miss it! 

The {well} call

Yesterday I had the honor of being featured on The Well Studio! This site is there to encourage and support women like you and me who want to live{well} while balancing work and pursuing God's plan for us. (check them out- you will be inspired plus the share these adorable work place Wednesdays- adorable I tell you!  I discovered The Well Studio  around the same time as the IF:Gathering and felt God pushing me.

Y'all know, seriously-I am not a writer. I have awful spelling (and by awful I mean terribly hideous) and horrible grammar ( I blame the grammar on 3 years in England during the prime years of elementary but now that I'm in my 30's and have a masters degree I am told I cant use that excuse any more). If you have noticed, I also tend to write run on sentences and use these things { } or ( ) way to much!

But, the more I read the Well blogs the more I felt "the nudge". Until finally in April I wrote from my heart and submitted it with some crazy please accept this written piece and know I am no professional. (Note- my amazing best friend Ashlee who happens to have a degree in English did me the honor of editing for spelling and function. However, I didn't hear back so I thought- Okay, not my thing, maybe the nudge was wrong.

Then last week, I got this awesome e-mail....

love love love this post! thanks for your patience in us getting back with you!!!!! we are going to get this scheduled within the next week

WHAT????????   I could not believe it....Me- the horrible speller and whacked out grammar typer... Published!!! I realize this is not like a novel or a series, however here is the deal. I was inspired, felt "the nudge" went for it and BAM... out of no where validation and confirmation! God is indeed teaching me and growing me bigger then I ever though imaginable. Now, this growth is hard, hard stuff and causes lots of anxiety for me but oh so good too. Love how God has my life in his hands!
 {Can someone please tattoo that on my forehead and my heart so I will remember
 my life is in HIS hands?-thank you}

I was super excited to share it with you. Hope you check it out and for those entrepreneurs and business peeps out there, may this encourage you to grow too!

5 ways to work a full-time job and grow a side business {well}

July 24, 2014 By Amanda Collins   <-----THAT'S ME!!!!! 

5 things that make me beautiful

Disclaimer:this is not to offend or condem, simply my own self examination of beauty. 

I saw this trending line on facebook and it stumped me. Post 5 pictures that make you feel beautiful. Facebook became plastered with women posting selfies and glammed out pictures. They tagged their girlfriends asking them to continue on the thread of posting "pictures that make you feel beautiful".

That is until one of my sweet friend really put some thought into the question. She choose not to focus on her beautiful pictures but instead the things in life that make her beautiful.

                              [While at first I avoided this knowing isn't my beauty 

                               I decided to share what I feel is.  I challenge any lady 

                               that would like to show off their beauty]

                                              -keeping her anonymous in case she wants to remain so. 

You know what she shared? 

     God's opinion
      Her church
      Her family
      Time with her daughter
      Sleep

This made me question, what does make us "beautiful" and what is "beauty". How often do we see beauty as this outward appearance- how the world sees us and defines us, rather than who we are? 

I really appreciated her take on this thread and the thought she gave to it. I think we so often times loose sight of what really makes us beautiful and instead get in our heads that our worth is created by our "beauty" and our "beauty" created by our looks. That this outward appearance defines how beautiful we are and thus how valuable we are. 

Because last time I checked I didn't pick out this face. I didn't choose to be born a red head or choose to have freckles, nor can I change having freckles. It has no determining factor on who I am or how I act other than the simple fact of melanin gathered in my skin. Why should my "beauty" be determined by something I didn't determine? 

   

                            

                                    

You know, yesterday I had an amazing evening getting to honor and pray over a sweet 13 year old girl. During this time of sharing with this new woman, the theme of beauty kept flowing in and out of our conversations. The verse was shared that really hit home with me and I hope it will hit home with you too. 

1 Peter 3:3-4

Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear— but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious.

Then I went searching with my hand dandy glossary and found this too-

1 Samuel 16:7 

....For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but The Lord looks on the heart.

       

2 Corinthians 4;16 

So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.

I am one of the worst at worrying about how I look and certainly a personal offender of using more than one filter combined before I post a selfie or two. I'm not saying having pride or self respect is bad. Just thinking that maybe our looks don't really define who we are and what we can do which is our REAL BEAUTY! 

After all, at my funeral they are not going to talk about how pretty I was or stunningly georgeous, instead I hope they will talk about the impact I made and how I made people feel. 

So...What makes me beautiful???


         I am who God says I am. My family makes me a beautiful person.  The impact I may have on others. The the way I make others feel. My ability to laugh constantly {which may often time lead to snorting} 

                    

Until next time, 

   

          -Amanda