This Blog Has Moved

Woes of the Single Christian Female has moved to a new domain and name. Please update your RSS and Google Reader feeds to the new site:

Reveries and Soliloquies 

I am sad to see this site go but I am so excited to start a new blogging journey on this personal site. A lot has changed since I started Woes of the Single Christian Female and it is time to bid adieu for one last time. 

Overcoming the "S" Word

Joke of the Day: Old people at weddings always poke me and say, "You're Next." So, I started doing the same thing to them at funerals.

The title of this blog is Woes of the Single Christian Female, and one word-yes, that word-has become a bone of contention of late. I picked this title because when I created this blog at the spry age of 20, it described my situation and point of view: single, Christian, and female. Only one of those words is a variable, but at times it feels like more of a branding. Almost five years later so much about me has changed, but that "S" word is still there and making its presence known. 

If I told you this hasn't started to bother me, I would be lying. As younger acquaintances and family members enter in to relationships, get married, and start families there is always that well meaning person who pats my knee and says, "Don't worry. There is someone out there for you too." Who was worrying? Well, geez thanks, now I am. Was the age of old maid lowered without my knowledge? Please God, don't let my inner Marissa Tomei ever come heel stomping to the surface! 

Well honey let me out of the pressure cooker because God has given me a revelation (via my not so little brother Matthew). Somehow a destructive lie has weaselled itself in to my brain (well, that's a lie-I know how it got there) that the ultimate pursuit in life is to fall in love, get married, and have children. While that is still very much the desire of my heart, it shouldn't be the first desire of my heart. I have let the dream of the Happily Ever After take over the dream of the Happily Starting Now. 

I have been following the series for singles by Rich Wilkerson Jr from the Rendezvous since my brother posted a link on Twitter. I was so convicted! I have allowed Satan to play up to my greatest insecurities on the battlefield that is my mind. Consequently, my relationship that is the most fulfilling and overflowing with unconditional love and intimacy-my relationship with God-has suffered.  I have unconsciously turned this into a selfish, Godless pursuit. Selfish in the sense that it is all about me (my wants, me needs) and Godless in the sense that I have pulled this area of my life out of His hands by worrying and complaining. 

Let's be honest-I'm no preacher. I have linked the 3 part series below and hope that it will bless you and speak to you as much as it has to me. I am actually excited again about this time in my life and looking forward to the endless possibilities for growth and maturity! 

Part 1: As It Turned Out

Part 2: The Single Benefit

Part 3: Love Won't Wait on the Wounded

So I have made a choice, a choice that I am going to have to re-choose every morning. I am going to live full out for God and let Him be the love of my life. Anything He chooses to add will be a blessing, but I refuse to put the life He has called to me on hold. 

Like A Thief In The Night

We had an attempted burglary of the four-legged kind last night.

Picture It: Sunday December 18, 2011. 7:15pm, Suburbia, British Columbia

I am sitting in the warm and toasty basement reading a book when I hear bloodcurdling screams followed by "LYDIA! GET UP HERE NOW!" Once my heart has descended back down my esophagus, I take the stairs three at time to find two hysterical females standing in pitch darkness.

Me: "What is going on?!"
Mom: "Shhhh!!! Someone just tried to break through the patio door. They were pounding on the glass and shaking it on its hinges."
Me: "What?! Call the police."
Rebekah: "NO! Look through the blinds and see if there is someone there."

Have you been smoking oregano?! What makes you think I want to crack a shutter and stare in to some masked man's eyes? Nevertheless, I tentatively creep towards the window, crack the shutter, and then hit the lights hoping to illuminate said intruder in the spotlight. 

Nothing. Just our backyard and the the forest beyond. Thinking I could get a better look from the third story, I run upstairs and peer in to the backyard while my sister calls dad to tell him what is happening. Mom and I hear some rustling behind the fence but see nothing, until:

Mom: Part of the fence is missing!
Me: A human couldn't do that! It must have been a bear.
Mom: Shaking the door?
Me: Your screaming must have scared him and he charged the fence.

Now, I like shabby chic but this is not what I hand in mind for our backyard:

Downstairs a semi-hysterical Rebekah is still spying out the window holding the cordless phone like a baseball bat. 

Me: I have to go next door and tell the Lee's not to open their door if they hear banging.

Well, the sent Rebekah over the edge from frantic to crazy ranting that I was going to become pre-hibernation dessert or end up with my face on a milk carton. I ran next door in my father's slippers and sweatpants to warn my neighbours while Crazy and Crazier stood on the porch twitching at every sound. Turns out, our neighbours don't speak a stitch of English. The conversation went a little like this:

Me: Hi, you have a bear in your backyard that crashed through our fence.
Teenage Girl: My daddy not home. You come back tomorrow.
Me (with appropriate miming actions): No, No. BIG BEAR. In your backyard. Don't open your door.
Teenage Girl: Yes, you talk to my daddy tomorrow at 10:00am.
Me: It is very dangerous.
Teenage Girl: Happy Holidays. You come back tomorrow. (shuts door)

I get back in the house in the knick of time before Mr. I Should Be Hibernating comes lumbering around the corner.  And he is HUGE. He must have tapped the fence with his pinky claw and sent it crashing like dominos. By this point most of the neighbours have been alerted to the bear and are yelling at everyone to get inside.

I call 911 and inform them that a bear is terrorizing or neighbourhood and can they please send Conservation out ASAP. 

Dispatch: Ma'am can you please tell us what the bear is doing now?
Me: Staring at my neighbours through their front window and clawing at their garage.
Dispatch: Ma'am, please keep the bear in your sights. I have alerted Conservation.
Me (in my head): Sure, with my night-vision binoculars and tranquilizer gun.

Anyways, Conservation never showed so now I have been Googling bear intervention methods:

Seattle, My Tastebuds Thank You (Part 2)

Sunday morning we slept in until 7:30 and decided to spend the morning exploring Pike Place Market (yes, the place they throw fish). At 8:00am the city was still covered in a fine blanket of misty fog, the streets void of its usual hustle and bustle, but the air was charged with venders setting up shop in anticipation for the masses that would descend in a couple of hours. 

Le Panier Very French Bakery

Whenever I am homesick for Montreal, this is where I will come. When you step over the threshold of Le Panier, your senses are assaulted by the sweet smelling pastries, fragrant coffee, wildly gesturing French expats, and the rustic setting of an authentic boulangerie and patisserie. Probably the best coffee and viennoiseries on the West Coast and for a moment I forgot where I was and just embraced the ambiance. 

(cafe au lait avec cannelle, chocalatine, amandine)

 Serious Pie

I was first introduced to Serious Pie last summer when I came to Seattle for the day with my Dad. Now, no trip to Seattle is complete without a pit stop. In fact, we ordered a potato pizza to take home to Vancouver because we felt for poor dad who had to endure my raving text messages. Strolling around the market and Nordstrom Rack builds an appetite so we were relieved to find Serious Pie lacking its signature hour wait. Our last hurrah to Girls Weekend was two thin crust brick oven pizzas that make this Italian girl bow in reverence to the chef.