The Zielke Hut

The day after Christmas we flew to Montana to celebrate with our great friends The Musfeldts, Laura and Caleb Walker’s wedding.  (We missed Michael though, who had to stay home for City work ) :(

Let me tell you, Montana is beautiful.  I don’t think I ever got used to walking outside of Target and seeing huge mountains surrounding me.  Unfortunatley for all you blog followers of mine :), I didn’t have my camera with me on this trip (gasp!) But I did manage to steal a few photos from my sister Christina’s album.

I only wish you could see pictures of Elli, Trevor, Dakota, and I skiing.  Picture this: all four in skiing lessons (2 adults/2 four year olds), Trevor breaking down crying an hour into it because his feet hurt, and me falling out of the end of the ski lift.  Elli says all she has to do on a bad day is picture my ski poles flying into the air and me sliding off the chair and she starts laughing hysterically.  It was really fun though, and I’m really glad we got to do it!

Another plus of the trip was that my parents shared a room at the hotel with Trevor and Elliott, leaving me to have time with my sisters.  The boys had a blast at “Grandma/Grandpa Camp”  and Christina, Elli, and I spent countless nights laughing so hard until we peed our pants.

For the first time ever, I was asked to do a photo montage video for a wedding.  I love to do videos for my kids each time they have a birthday, but I was really nervous about doing it for someone else, let alone for hundreds of people to view!  But I was honored to do it, and it made it all worthwhile when I looked over while it was playing and saw these expressions on Dr. Chuck’s and Nana Nu’s faces:

I am so blessed by them!

I tell you though, I wouldn’t have been able to pull it off with out my wonderful future brother-in-law, Tyler!  He is the mastermind of all things audio/video cables, music mixing, and projector operating.  I love you Ty!

Laura and Caleb, we are so happy for you- thank you for allowing us to be a part of your special day!  We love you and I hope this video was a blessing to you. :)

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…since I last posted!

Hmmm…so much has happened since December, where to start?

For Christmas, my family came into town from Texas.

They boys loved introducing everyone to IL snow.

We celebrated Christina and Tyler’s engagement!

We played Rock Band pretty seriously.

Michael and I hosted our 2nd Annual Birkeneder/Braunsky Christmas Eve Brunch!

My boys love Grandma Julie and Grandpa Bob.

The whole Tyrer clan!

The boys loved playing Peanut Butter Playdough and Kazoos with Grandma Lanie on Christmas Day.

Merry Christmas Everyone!! :)

Five years ago, when I was first married, I joined the Southern Living at Home team and absolutely loved my job! However, because of the increasing demands of full time parenting and school work, I needed to take a step back for a little while. This spring, however, I am excited to jump back into the Southern Living at Home phenomenon, and I couldn’t be more thrilled!

Imagine the end of a long day. You juggle grocery bags, step into your home and immediately you feel better. The air smells fresh with a hint of herbs and flowers. There’s a designated place to rest your bags, a bowl for your keys, a tray for mail waiting to be sorted. Pretty colors and fresh flowers surround you. You’ve hardly taken a step, but your day is already so much better. That’s the feeling we strive for with every Southern Living at Home product. Each product is designed for functionality and to compliment pieces you already know and love.

That is what I like most about the Southern Living products: -they inspire you to decorate and reinvent your style -they make entertaining easy and fun -they help you organize and simplify your life

I also love a bargain! Southern Living at Home has a fantastic hostess rewards program – hosting a party is a must! Hosts receive a multitude of products for free and half price, and also get to choose from exclusive monthly specials. It is easy to host, too! I coach you through everything; all you need to do is open your home to your close friends, provide a light snack or dessert, and I’ll take care of the rest!

I love my new business. It is fun, flexible, and fabulously rewarding! I feel blessed to be able to own my own business and work from home while I care for my family. Experimenting with all of Southern Living’s products and combining them with my own is so much fun. Come, experience true southern living with me!

****Out of town guests: First off, I miss you! Many of you encouraged and supported me in my first round of Southern Living at Home, and I am so thankful for your continued support! If you would like to order products, you are welcome to do so on my website (www.southernlivingathome.com/jennizielke). Or we can plan a catalog party! You still receive comparable benefits as a host without actually having an in-home party!

Thank you all for your love, encouragement, and support!

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We had a gingerbread house making party last weekend with some of our playgroup friends from The Orchard.  Between the 5 of us moms there, we have NINE boys!  Can you imagine the energy!  My friend Abbi added some more pictures and wrote about it on her blog, and she got it spot on I must say!

http://ourlaughterandnoise.blogspot.com/2009/12/its-rainingboys.html

It was a fun day!  Thanks Abbi, Ryan, and Griffin!! XO

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And if you missed last year’s video:

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God has really brought me to a deep place in my relationship with Him.  It all started this summer when I was really faced with the  unknown things out of my control, having to choose to really put my faith in action.  I really feel God was leading me out of complacency and into a deep, meaningful surrender.  So many things have been flooding through my heart the last few months, and I just really didn’t know how to put it into words.  I still really don’t, but I’ve been wanting to blog about this for some time now.

A lot of the stirring inside me has been the direct result of what God is doing through our church home, The Orchard.  God has really ripped up my heart through Scott’s teaching and leading.  We have been doing a series called, Not Like Me, and Michael and I both really feel like this series was created specifically for us!  We have been so challenged.

At the close of the series today Scott asked three questions.  The verses he presented us with resounded in my soul and I felt God calling me to action.  Not just part of my heart, but my WHOLE heart.  All of it.  To me that means, my everything- my time, my talent, my treasure, my family.  All of it should bring Him glory.  That is all that really matters.  That is the heart of the gospel.  To bring Jesus glory.  So I thought about those questions…I wanted to respond to it and not just go about my life as usual.

James 1: 22-25 (NIV)

²²Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. ²³Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror ²⁴and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. ²⁵But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.

1)  Where is your Nazareth?

John 1:45-46 (NIV)

⁵Philip found Nathanael and told him, “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”

⁴⁶“Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?” Nathanael asked. ”Come and see,” said Philip.

Nazareth was not looked on as a great place, it was really looked down upon and avoided.  But it is from Nazareth that God did a beautiful thing- He brought out of it the Savior of the world.  For me, I feel like my Nazareth are the places that I am afraid to take my kids, or where I am afraid to go alone.   It is the area with not the best schools or nicest houses.  It is where everyone tells me to avoid because I can do “better”.

2) Where is your Pain?

1 Corinthians 1:18, 22-25  (The Message)

⁸For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. ^22-25While Jews clamor for miraculous demonstrations and Greeks go in for philosophical wisdom, we go right on proclaiming Christ, the Crucified. Jews treat this like an anti-miracle—and Greeks pass it off as absurd. But to us who are personally called by God himself—both Jews and Greeks—Christ is God’s ultimate miracle and wisdom all wrapped up in one. Human wisdom is so tinny, so impotent, next to the seeming absurdity of God. Human strength can’t begin to compete with God’s “weakness.”

I realize that to some reading this, you may think I am crazy, and that is fine.  I have struggled with the doubts before wondering just how “real” this Jesus can really be.  I understand the scepticism.  But also know the real, tangible power of Christ in my life and ultimatley the fire burning in my heart and my soul as He brings me deeper.  That is something that my critics cannot take from me.

3) What is in your hand?

Exodus 4: 1-5 (NLT)

¹ But Moses protested again, “What if they won’t believe me or listen to me? What if they say, ‘The Lord never appeared to you’?” ² Then the Lord asked him, “What is that in your hand?” “A shepherd’s staff,” Moses replied. ³ “Throw it down on the ground,” the Lord told him. So Moses threw down the staff, and it turned into a snake! Moses jumped back. ⁴ Then the Lord told him, “Reach out and grab its tail.” So Moses reached out and grabbed it, and it turned back into a shepherd’s staff in his hand. ⁵ “Perform this sign,” the Lord told him. “Then they will believe that the Lord, the God of their ancestors—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob—really has appeared to you.”

Many of you know our house hunting woes (but really, they aren’t woes.  We are grateful that we are fortunate enough to have the means to be able to purchase a home and to be house hunting…)  What looks like loss, Michael and I really feel like has been gain.  When we chose the house in Montgomery, we were looking for the best schools, the safest neighborhoods, and really the nicest house we could afford.  All the “appearances”.  When we lost the bid on the house 5 months later, little did we know what greater purpose God had behind it!

It was just about the beginning of the Not Like Me series and we were really bummed about losing the house.  But then God started tearing apart our hearts.  Why were we looking in the areas we were?  Because we thought God could protect our kids in those areas only?  Because we wanted to be around people “like” us?  Because people in our lives were telling us to avoid certain areas due to demographic and stereo type?

The journey God has brought me on has really forced me to address all of these issues in my heart.  Really, the number one thing God wants from me is my heart.  He wants me to know Him and bring Him glory in everything I do.  So what do I do primarily?  I am a wife and a mother.  If my sole purpose is to bring God glory so that the others around me will see a glimpse of Him and hopefully fall in love with Him as well, then won’t He take care of the rest?  Isn’t God sovereign no matter what part of town we live in?  Aren’t Trevor and Elliott ultimately in His hands no matter what school they attend?

So Michael and I have changed our home search.  We are looking in Aurora, the very place most have lead us away from.  I want to come along side other moms and love them.  Really just love them.  No matter where they are coming from in life.  I want my boys to embrace diversity and see beauty around them in everything.  I want us as a family to have one mindset- to bring Jesus glory by loving people like He did.

They showed a video today at The Orchard in which our pastor, Scott, and his friend Caleb took us to a part of Aurora that is looked down upon.  A lot of the kids are in broken families and just want to have an adult presence in their lives to truly love them.  Caleb said something that really hit home, he said, “This is where Jesus would be.  This is where He would be hanging out all the time.”  And Scott said, “What really gets me about that is that, yes, this is where Jesus would be…but yet it is where I am not…”

I want to be where Jesus would be and where He is at work currently…I want to embrace the little children that aren’t ever embraced.  I want to show people the real Jesus that isn’t judgemental and doesn’t discriminate.  When I die I want there to be Christ followers and those that don’t know Christ to say, “She loved people.  She lived her faith that she proclaimed.”

So I am praying for a home in Aurora, right where God wants us, so He can do mighty work through our family, so that people would know Him, and He will be glorified.

“….So what could I say?
And what could I do?
But offer this heart oh God
Completely to you

So I’ll stand
With arms high and heart abandoned
In awe of the one who gave it all
So I’ll stand
My soul Lord to you surrendered
All I am is yours…”

The Stand by Hillsong United

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately.  I kind of always thought my family was the norm, but the older I get the more I realize that isn’t really the case.

I kind of always thought parenting came easy and breezy, but as I navigate through “the terrible twos, the trying threes, and the freaking fours” (my Parents magazine), I wonder how to get through the next day.

So thank you, Mom and Dad, for raising the three of us girls without giving up.

Thank you for always instilling “family first” into our heads from day 1.  Thank you that you continued to do all those family game nights, even when I thought they were so lame at age 13.

Thank you for making everything fun, so we would have all our stories to tell now.  Thank you Dad for making us laugh when Mom took taking Christmas pictures so seriously.  Thanks Mom for taking Christmas pictures every year (even though it usually took 3 hours and 5 rolls of film to get 1 good picture) and making sure we had the cutest coordinating outfits.

Thank you that we always went on a vacation together, no matter how extravagant or how simple.   Thank you that you taught us to laugh and strive to be “the least of these”- that we didn’t have to be the best at everything.  Duct tape window on the van?  Sure, what’s wrong with that?

Thank you for being such hard workers.  Thank you for giving your all to provide for us.  Thank you for always displaying integrity, even when nobody was watching (we were).

Thank you for being involved.  Thank you that you came to all the preschool performances, ballet recitals, mother’s day teas, band and choir concerts, piano practices, gymnastics olympics, and everything else.  Thank you for taking interest in our friends and loving them.  Thank you for getting involved in what we were involved in.

Thank you for my sisters.  Thank you that through you guys, we have become best friends.  We have the best memories together, and now the best relationship because of it.

Thank you that because we are all so close that there is never any awkwardness.  Thank you for making us honest.

Thank you for always encouraging us to do what we feel passionate about.   Thank you for taking on our passions as your own.  Thank you for always being positive and finding the good in everything.

Thank you for putting us all through college.  Thank you for forcing me to stay in when I wanted so badly to quit.

Thank you for being in love with each other.  Thank you for being affectionate in front of us and being 100% committed to each other through thick and thin.

Thank you for falling in love with Jesus.  Thank you for presenting Him to us, but allowing our own faith to take form.  Knowing Jesus is the most important and best thing you did for me.  By letting Him spill into every area of your lives, He was evident in your parenting.  And the three of us are better because of it.

Thank you for loving me and investing in me.

I love you.

We had fun with our little Captain Hook and little Peter Pan on our 2nd Annual Zielke/Jenison Halloween Extravaganza.

Or, as some homeowners said, the “pirate” and the “jolly green giant”.  Bahaha. :)