Cara C. Putman's Blog, page 85

Simplify Christmas: 12 Tips from Sarah Sundin

Do you break out in hives just thinking about the craziness and chaos that comes with Christmas? It doesn’t have to be that way. Inspirational authors Cara Putman, Sarah Sundin, and Tricia Goyer share about Christmas’ past in their new novella collection Where Treetops Glisten . Their three stories “White Christmas,” “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” will take you back to war-time 1942, 1943, and 1944. The authors have also teamed up to give tips on simplifying Christmas this year! Join us  December 1-6 on Not Quite Amish Living for the Simplifying Christmas series.

12 Tips to Turn Chaos to Wonder

by Sarah Sundin

 

Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year! We long to make Christmas a time of joy and wonder for our family and friends, but in the process we often find ourselves depressed, stressed, irritable, and in debt.

Over the years, I’ve mourned how December has turned from my most anticipated month to my most dreaded. Last year, two things made me re-evaluate. First, I wrote my World War II Christmas novella inWhere Treetops Glisten. Christmas was simpler then. Fewer gifts, fewer decorations, simpler food—less of everything. Was Christmas less meaningful then? Absolutely not.

Then on December 14, our youngest son received a concussion in a karate tournament and needed surgery … which was performed on January 2. Those two weeks were spent nursing my son and taking him to numerous appointments. Out of necessity, Christmas had to be simplified. As a family we agreed on what absolutely had to be done and what we could live without. And you know what? It was a really nice Christmas.

So how can we rein things in and turn Christmas from chaos to wonder?

1) Focus on Jesus

In your planning, make sure Jesus gets center stage. Give priority to your personal time with the Lord so you can find the peace you crave. Read the Christmas story as a family, attend a Christmas pageant or choir performance, sing Christmas carols, or put out a nativity set. Remember why we’re celebrating in the first place.

Also make room in your schedule for charitable work. When you give to others in need, your to-do list suddenly seems petty. And doing charitable projects with kids will help them turn their focus from their gimme lists to giving to others. That alone can simplify your Christmas!

2) Evaluate

Take a deep breath, step back from the to-do list, and give it a good hard look. Why do you do each item on that list? Does it bring you joy and peace and wonder? Does it bring others joy and peace and wonder? Are you doing it due to family pressure? Peer pressure? To impress others? Guilt? Even the things we love—are we overdoing them or getting obsessed?

3) Go with Your Strengths

Do you love baking or decorating or handcrafting your own gifts? Great! Do those things and do them well! Revel in the joy you bring to others.

4) Trim Your To-Do List

After your evaluation, did you realize you do things for the wrong reasons? Look at the things you don’t like, those that bring stress, debt, pressure. Either trim them back or eliminate them.Likewise, if you love doing something, but it puts you in debt or stresses out your family, think about scaling back.

5) Family Chat

Have an honest discussion with your family. Explain which things you have issues with, and listen to their feedback. You might be surprised what matters to them and what doesn’t. Often the things we stress about aren’t that meaningful to them.

6) Teamwork

There is no law saying women need to do 100% of the work at Christmas. Enlist your family members and delegate. This might mean releasing control and battling your own perfectionism, but you’ll be less stressed and you’ll give your children a sense of accomplishment and belonging. Preschoolers can set out non-breakable decorations and help in the kitchen. Elementary schoolers can stuff envelopes and help bake and wrap presents. And teenagers can take on entire tasks as their own. Even husbands can help—I speak from experience!

To read the rest of the post and download the free worksheet, click here.

Peace in the season

Thanksgiving is a few days behind us and a new month begins. There’s something magical about turning the page on the calendar…and seeing how full the new month already is. We’ll celebrate a birthday, take classes, teach classes, celebrate Christmas and much more. Like I said the calendar is already a little intimidating. And I wonder…where do we find the peace in the midst of the chaos?

Isn’t that what we long for?

A reminder of that night so long ago. One filled with the lows of cows, the baas of sheep, the groans of a woman in labor, the sound of a heavenly choir.

Maybe it wasn’t so peaceful after all.

Yet in the midst of this season and everyone we experience, Christ encourages us to draw close to His side. To see the world through His eyes. To hear His heartbeat.

That’s one reason I try to put money in the Salvation Army kettles each time I walk by. If my kids are with me, it models a lifestyle of giving. But even when no one is watching, I want to thank Him for all that He’s given me — and giving to those in need is one way to do it.

It’s a tradition in our family that we decorate for Christmas the weekend after Thanksgiving. So we delved into that with the kiddos. It’s not all done, but the tree is up and the kids have trees in their rooms in various stages of decoration.

Then the card table was brought out and we set up an epic game of Settlers of Cataan. It was glorious to have a few days where we weren’t traveling and didn’t have a calendar full of activities. Having one little girl get her tonsils removed on Tuesday and one little man with Thanksgiving night stitches made it even more important to have the slow days to recover.

This week, Sarah Sundin, Tricia Goyer and I will post some ideas for how we can streamline and simplify Christmas. I’d love to hear your ideas. How do you focus on what’s most important at this time of year — especially when the calendar is pulling us so many directions?

But most of all, I wish you peace as you begin this year’s Christmas season.

Cheer for the Children: Tips to Give a Military Kid a Merry Christmas

My co-author Sarah Sundin has a wonderful post this week on how to support children who have a parent deployed overseas. I’ve attached some of it here, but to see all of her wonderful tips, be sure to click at the bottom of the article to continue to the full article. Let’s do what we can this Thanksgiving and Christmas season to support those at home!

Cheer for the Children

By Sarah Sundin

When I started writing this article, I asked my Facebook friends for ideas, and I was touched and overwhelmed by the stories they shared. Some had grown up with a parent in the military, and some were current or former military spouses. All had a recurring theme—Christmas is hard when Dad or Mom is deployed, and providing support, strong connections to the deployed parent, and a solid sense of family tradition can help the child feel loved and secure. There are two sets of tips—for parents of military children, and for civilians who want to bless military kids in the community.

Tips for Parents of Military Children

Record a Story: Jocelyn Green, author of Faith Deployed and Faith Deployed…Again , suggested making audio or video recordings of the deployed parent reading Christmas stories for the child to listen to over and over. Jocelyn also has a ministry to military wives on her website.
Record Carols: Michelle Ule, who served as a Navy wife for 21 years, suggested Dad record himself singing Christmas carols. These would be fun to use for an improvised family sing-along. Michelle wrote a touching blog article about her experiences as a military wife – “The Challenge of a Father in Uniform.”
Gifts & Cards: Michelle Ule’s husband left behind wrapped gifts to be opened at Christmas, and he mailed Christmas cards. Jocelyn Green also stressed the beauty of written letters and postcards, even in the day of emails and Facebook.
Art Project: After Christmas, have the children make an art project or scrapbook page about their celebration to send to the deployed parent—a great idea from Jocelyn Green.
Skype the Festivities: What a blessing Skype, Facetime, and other technological wonders have been! Military wife Becca Pekrul was in Germany while her husband was in Iraq, and her children loved opening gifts while Skyping with their grandparents back in the States.
Trace Hands: Jericha Kingston, a 20-year Navy wife, wrote: “He’d try to ship gifts to the boys, but one year, the best my husband could do was trace his hand on two pieces of paper and write, ‘I love you, Merry Christmas’ on each of them. I still remember the boys placing their little hands atop of their dad’s ‘paper hand.’ I’m getting misty just thinking about it.”
Consistent Traditions: Kassidy Childers wrote, “One thing military families know is change and a lot of it, so anything that is familiar makes the situation easier to handle.” She suggested consistent traditions like certain movies and Christmas pajamas. Vickie Jones, who served in the military herself, always sent home a “Night Before Christmas” box with the book, jammies, and a mug for hot chocolate. When military child Kay Moorhouse was ten, her mother told her they wouldn’t have a Christmas tree since all the decorations were in storage. Kay was devastated, found a tiny pine tree, twisted it off at the trunk, and brought it home. A strong reminder of a child’s need for stability and tradition.
Celebrate Again: Brenda Foster, a current military wife with young children, wrote: “We’ve learned to celebrate holidays when we’re together with family, not always when the calendar tells us.” So…celebrate on December 25, then again when Daddy comes home!
Collect Memories: Brenda also wrote, “We make traditions wherever we go and collect ornaments from everywhere we visit and wherever their daddy travels to.” These unique souvenirs help create a special sense of family.

To read the rest of her article which is loaded with many more tips, be sure to click here.

Thank you

Somehow the calendar has flipped enough pages that Thanksgiving has returned. In just a few days, many of us will share huge meals with family. In some of our homes, we’ll even take a few minutes to remember why we’re celebrating. We’ll think back to those early Pilgrims, and pause to remember how they celebrated what little they had in the midst of immense loss. We might stop and think about the 1789 Thanksgiving Proclamation that George Washington wrote. Or maybe it will be the words of Abraham Lincoln in 1863. Or some of us may remember Ronald Reagan’s Thanksgiving messages.

One of the things I am most grateful for this year is the community God has placed me in. Whether it’s the amazing family He planted me in years ago, or the family Eric and I have created with His blessing, my life is richer because of the people who know me best and love me still.

I am also thankful for the greater communities He has placed me in. The writers who I call friend. The readers who bless me as they read my books and then let me know how much they enjoyed them. The church family that challenges me to chase God with all of my heart, mind and soul. And the community of homeschooling moms who let me know that I’m not alone on the hard days and cheer with me on the good days. The friends and neighbors who are woven into the rich tapestry of my life.

So today, I thank God for you. Thank you for being part of my world. For challenging me and blessing me. I pray that I bless you as well.

6 Ways to Spread Love This Holiday Season to Military Spouses

I remember all too well the challenges that my family faced when my dad’s National Guard unit was called to active duty for Operation Desert Storm. I was 16 when my dad got activated — two days before Thanksgiving. But I was 17 when he returned right around Easter. I didn’t recognize my dad — might have had something to do with the squiggly mustache he’d tried to grow, and he didn’t recognize me.

My siblings and I the Easter Dad was gone

Today, when a service man or woman is called to active duty and deployed, that solider or sailor is often gone for much longer than the few — excruciatingly long — months my dad was gone. As one of my friends put it, being a supportive spouse when you’re loved one is in the active duty military is not for the faint of heart. When you’re loved one is deployed during the holidays it becomes even more challenging.

Now that I’m a mom of four active kids who homeschools them, I have a shadow of an idea what my mom endured while my dad was away. However, she also had to keep the family business running. That’s not something I need to do.

Same Easter with my Mom and sister (1991)

When I asked my friend Hannah Conway, a military wife who’s husband just ended his service, about what it’s like to be a military spouse, she had some great insight. As she puts it: “Many of us try to go it alone…no one wants to ask for help or admit they need it, and military wives have a lot of pride to some degree…a good thing, but it can also be very harmful.” She would encourage the military wives “to be a friend to others and look for ways to serve in and around their community. I have found that I’m able to keep my perspective when I’m serving.”

But how can we serve them? More specifically, how we can help women (and men) who find themselves facing the holidays alone? I asked my mom, Hannah, and another friend Kimberly what they would have found helpful when they were living those times. There are some simple ways we can come alongside these men and women and show love in meaningful ways.

Gift them free time for Christmas shopping. The year my father was deployed all of my gifts came from the same store. They were very nice gifts, but my mom didn’t have the time to shop around town like she normally would have. My friend Kimberly’s husband has been in the military the entire time of their marriage. She remembers many times Christmas shopping with her kids, because they were too young to be left at home. So she took a blanket and tried to hide the gifts from her children – while they were shopping with her. Imagine what a blessing a few hours to go shopping along would be.


Take the family a meal and include them in your holiday meal. I can remember times when we were far from family that my parent would fill the table with others. Why not make it a service member’s family this year. Let them be part of your celebration. The next time you’re making a lasagna for your family, double and freeze the second for a military family. Kimberly said that being included in a meal when you’re alone and not near family is a blessing. You can organize meals for the family through services like com.

My Dad is the handsome man in the uniform — April 19, 1991

Invite the family over for a meal and game time.

As Hannah put it, “I can’t tell you how nice it was for my friends to invite me and the kiddos over when [her husband] was gone. I didn’t have to cook, clean, or think about dinner…all I had to do was enjoy my time.” That would be a gift for anyone, but how much more for a military spouse serving at home alone.



Yard work or snow removal. Depending on where you live, the military spouse may be blessed with help in the yard. For example, right now the trees are dropping hundreds, thousands, millions of leaves. If you and your family helped with raking it would be a huge blessing. And if the winter is like that of 2013/2014, snow removal would be an immense, practical help.


Offer to babysit for any reason. Gift the spouse with time to do whatever they want – not just Christmas gift shopping. Let them have time to relax from the duties of being a single parent. As Kimberly said, military spouses are strong, but t’s hard to feel alone.


Give them the opportunity for adult conversation. If you’ve ever had a period where a spouse was traveling or you were a single parent, you know how much you crave real conversation. Have them over for a cup of coffee or meet at a bookstore. Invite them to join you at a Bible study. They need community even more when their spouse is deployed.

They’re home!

Can you think of other ways you can serve our active duty military’s spouses?

 

 

When Life Knocks You Down

Saturday I was watching my college’s football team  play. It worked out great that my MBA classes ended as the game was slated to start. I got home, talked to our friend who’d been babysitting, then rushed into workout clothes and hopped on the treadmill. We were ahead, and the first quarter and a half were fun to watch.

Then the other team figured out how to decimate us. It was ugly!

What should have been a close game became a disaster.

Doesn’t life feel that way sometimes?

Things are going along well. Life may not be perfect, but it’s not a disaster. Then all of a sudden we’re getting hit left and right by a team that seems determined to wipe us out. Here are a few reminders and encouragements if this is where you are right now.

Our fight is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world. Ephesians 6:12
No weapon forged against you will prevail, and you will refute every tongue that accuses you. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and this is their vindication from me,” declares the LORD. Isaiah 54:17
The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still. Exodus 14:14
When you go through deep waters, I will be with you. When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown. When you walk through the fire of oppression, you will not be burned up; the flames will not consume you. Isaiah 43:2
We use God’s mighty weapons, not worldly weapons, to knock down the strongholds of human reasoning and to destroy false arguments. II Corinthians 10:4

So whether it’s one game that’s going terribly or a season of life that’s beating you down, no that God is for you and ready to fight on your behalf.

What scriptures do you pull out when you’re in the midst of a battle?

Use Me, Lord

This week has been a week of vulnerability. Last night I spoke at a local church for their book club. I had a BLAST! But as I walked into the room, I realized the PowerPoint I had on a flashdrive wasn’t going to do me any good. It was a great exercise in relying on God!

I love those times when I’m pushed out of comfort zones and into a place where I have no choice but to rely on Him. Really.

It’s a chance to demonstrate how I’m only enough when He shows up. Who doesn’t need that reminder? I know I do!

And the Holy Spirit moments of writing just the right word in a book for a reader or praying with someone who is overwhelmed by life is what makes it all worth it.

Yes, I love books. I love talking about books. I love signing books. But I love reminding people that we have hope in God and because of what Jesus did. And if a bit of my story can do that, then I’ll speak where I’m asked.

 

BOGO: Books for the Military

I am so very excited about a promotion my publisher is running for Where Treetops Glisten. I knew Waterbrook/Multnomah was a great house to write for, but this promotion just sealed it for me. We’re partnering with you as readers in an exciting opportunity to buy a copy of Where Treetops Glisten and then the publisher will send one of five books to someone currently serving in the military.

How awesome is that!

Sarah Sundin, Tricia Goyer and I are also writing a series of blog posts with practical ways we can help the families of active duty military. As a daughter who well remembers her dad’s tour in Desert Storm, I am so THRILLED we are doing this.

Each of us are writing special blog posts about how we can support the military, their spouses, and their kids. This series starts today at Tricia’s blog with great ways you can help spread holiday cheer to the troops.

The form below has all the details. But here are the key ones:

You can buy up to 5 copies of WTG, and the publisher will give 5 books for free from the list.
The list of available titles is excellent–seriously these are awesome books. The publisher is not clearing out books that nobody wanted to read:

Radical by David Platt
The Next Christians by Gabe Lyons
In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day by Mark Batterson (I LOVE this book! If you can’t choose, this is a great one!)
Thief of Glory by Sigmund Brouwer (A WWII novel!)
Where Treetops Glisten (I’m kind of partial to this one :-))

All you have to do is order or buy Where Treetops Glisten between 11/11 and 11/26, then fill out the form below. Books will be sent out the first week of December to make it there in plenty of time before Christmas. Here’s an important note, too: This offer is first come, first served…while supplies last.

I’m pretty excited! What a great way to get some great books to share with servicemen and women you know.

 

The Face Me Challenge: Dare to show your Beauty

Today I’m participating in the Face.Me blog tour. If you’re here from other blogs, you’ve probably heard that this is a risky venture. As I’ve prayed about why, God showed me that at least for me make-up is part of my mask.

Me without anything — not even my hair :-)

That stopped me. I mean — I’m low maintenance. If I can’t get up and out the door in less than 30 minutes (shower included!), it’s an odd day. Still there are certain minimal elements I want to have when I leave the house (if I’m at home, I’m lucky to get lipgloss on): foundation (a quick brush of my favorite Mary Kay), some sort of lipstick, a swipe of eye shadow and some mascara. Low key, right?

So why does the thought of posting pictures of what I really look like scare me?

Because now you’re seeing the real me. The one with bags under her eyes from doing toomuch. The one who needs to drink a bit more water and a bit less coffee. The one who’d love to have more me time so I could exercise. The one that gets introduced like Wonder Woman, but still wonders when people will see that I’m just trying to juggle it all exactly like they are. What we’re juggling is just different.

An attorney has a certain image. A college lecturer has another image. An author has yet another one. And I fall somewhere in the venn diagram where they all mix.

Now my hair’s as styled as it gets…Have I mentioned I’m low maintenance most of the time.

I’ve long accepted I don’t fit a stereotype.

I refuse to be shoved into too many boxes.

Maybe being a homeschooled student before it was cool helped with that. But I still struggle with wanting people to like me, really like me.

Maybe you heard the message like I did that you only have one opportunity to make a first impression. The corollary is that each time you leave the house, you need to look pulled together. Hence, I hated sweats. I’ve only in the last couple years decided there are some cute workout clothes I will be caught out of the house in because a decision is made about me in the first ten seconds someone meets me.

This is the minimum that I like to wear: Foundation, lipgloss and a bit of eye shadow. Usually, I’ll add mascara and eye liner if I’m going to be out for the day.

Challenges like this remind me to come back to the core. My identity should be firmly grounded in the reality that I am a child of the Most High King. The Ruler of the Universe calls me His. He created me exactly this way — I am fearfully and wonderfully made because He designedme. That’s enough. That’s more than enough, because my value comes from being His.

And God has blessed me with beautiful Godly friends who reflect to me who I really am when the mirror gets cloudy and my visions morphs. It’s in those moments that God whispers to my heart that I am beautiful just because.

Isn’t that the message that every girl longs to hear — no matter her age?

So today, dear friend, remind yourself of the truth. You are fearfully and wonderfully made. God created you perfectly…just the way He imagined. And you have immense value because you are His. *Revel in who you are. ** Take great pleasure or delight

There are many more women and men are embracing their God-made beauty. I encourage you to pop over to their blogs today and be encouraged. Follow the #FACEme Tour!!

Nick Kording 

Lindsay Harrel

Joseph Courtemanche

Gabrielle Meyer

Jaime Wright

Carrie Wisehart

Emilie Anne Hendryx

Andrea ‘Dia’ Nell

Sarah Baker

KristyCambron

Rachel Britz

Stacy Monson

Laurie Tomlinson

To celebrate beauty, I’ve added a giveaway of Shadowed by Grace.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

5 tools I use for Social Media Efficiency

One question I am asked periodically is how to make sense of the immense pressure on authors to build a platform. Many people will tell you the best marketing an author can do is to write the next great book. That’s so true.

But we can’t ignore the reality that there is pressure on authors to have a platform. A way to actively engage with readers. Many of us want to do that. But as we balance family, jobs, writing, and life, it can be overwhelming to consider one more time demand. So here are a few tools I use to help maximize my time. I hope these tools help you, too!

1. Buffer.com:

Chances are you’ve heard about Buffer. It’s a great little tool — and can be added to your web browser to make it even more friendly. Basically, it allows you to add content that will post to multiple places. I can post from my phone with the app or from my computer. It has a free and a paid version. So far, I use the free version to schedule 10 posts for twitter and 10 posts for my Facebook profile. Then if life gets busy, I’m covered on social media for 5+ days.

2. Klout.com:

I use Klout (and Buffer to a lesser extent) to see if what I’m tweeting/Facebooking matters to the people I engage with. When I started monitoring my Klout score as a tool it was around 40. Over the next year or so the score climbed to 70+. Then in January I split Facebook into a profile and page. Now the Klout score tied to the page is 67 and the one tied to my profile is 60. That’s great you think, but why do I care? Because the score is a gauge I can use to see if what I’m saying matters to the people who “listen.” Buffer also gives me some really cool analytics, telling me the reach of retweets, etc. I don’t spend enough time on either, but when I do, I usually get cool insights. In fact, it’s a lot like Insights on Facebook Pages.

3. Twitter:

Twitter is about efficiency for me, so I use Twitter to feed fresh content multiple places: my Amazon author page, my Goodreads page, my Facebook profile, etc. At one point it fed to my blog, too. I just readded it — what do you think? Should I keep it?

 Then my blog feeds everywhere through a RSS feed through Twitter: Amazon, Goodreads, Twitter, Facebook, etc. I still have to pin and Google+ it. Google + is a complete mystery to me. I’m there because I’m supposed to be. Instagram is also a wee bit of a mystery to me, but I’m also keeping it intentionally small so I can have photos of my kids there.

4. Picmonkey: I LOVE picmonkey! This is another site with a free and paid version. So far I’ve been able to do everything I want/need via the free format. You can upload a photo and add filters, frames, words, etc. The image in this post is one I created in a few minutes and then saved to a good size for a blog. These make great pinnable images. And when I remember to add my website, it’s a great way to point people back here. One of the things I’m playing with now is creating images for books I’ve read that contain the book cover and a favorite line. Here’s an example from Lizzy & Jane. The hardest part is selecting a favorite line.

5. Tweetdeck: I also use Tweetdeck, which has the ability to preschedule unlimited tweets…I use it to post promo tweets that I need to schedule in advance. It will also allow you to develop lists so you can see the posts from people you really want to follow. I’m not so great at using that part of the site.

So there are a few tools I use. What do you use? Are any of these new to you?