March 2013 - Page 2 of 4 - Good Morning Girls

Angela March 23, 2013

Living & Leading Like Jesus: Starts…..Monday!

I can’t believe the time is almost here to begin our next study! We have so many fun and exciting things planned for you all this session. I’m excited to get started with you on Monday!

How to prepare for Monday:
1. Enroll in our study. Click here. (think of it as our way of taking attendance….it’s nice to know who is joining us)

2. Subscribe to our blog posts. There is no cost to subscribe……but you will receive free gifts from us for doing so. Once you subscribe, all our FREE materials for this study are listed at the very bottom of the email. Click here to subscribe. (Note: Please make sure to confirm the confirmation email that will be sent to your inbox, you will receive all the materials at the very bottom of the next GMG email. Our emails go out on Mondays, Wednesdays & Fridays)

{FREE} Materials include:

Reading Plan
Living & Leading Like Jesus Study Guide
Living & Leading Like Jesus-for Kids
How to use The Dig for Kids with your GMG Study Guide

3. Print the reading plan and have one copy placed in your Bible as a bookmark and the other reading plan in your journal or study guide.

4. Print the study guide if you like to write out your quite times. Or you can purchase a journal or notebook to record your scripture, observations, applications and prayers.

5. {Optional} Print the Living & Leading Like Jesus-for Kids

6. {Optional} Print the How to use The Dig for Kids with your GMG Study Guide

If you are still looking for a Good Morning Girls group to join this session, please contact Martha at martha.gmgenrollment@ymail.com

Please join us in prayer as we begin Luke 9 on Monday…..praying over all the women involved in our GMG Bible studies, that our hearts will be softened to His truth. That we will be women who not only read God’s Word, but women who put God’s Word into action in our lives!

Love God Greatly!

Of all the resources available, which one is your favorite and why?

WhitneyD March 21, 2013

Preparing our kids’ hearts {and our own!} for Easter…

I was touched by this picture that Angela posted of her sweet girls this week. And I was reminded that instead of waiting for tomorrow to tell my kids more about Jesus, I need to tell them more about Him today.

Anybody else still thinking about this?

It’s 20-something degrees here in Indiana today (on the second day of Spring, mind you), and I just got word that we may be getting another significant wave of snow over the weekend. Aahhhhh! With crazy weather like this, it’s a little hard to believe that Easter is just a little over a week away! How did it sneak up on me so quickly?!

Spring is a busy time of year for our family. Basketball and karate are in full swing for the boys, and when the snow melts, baseball season will be right around the corner. School projects cover our kitchen table (waiting for us to find our motivation, which has been snatched up by our latest case of Spring Fever!), and I haven’t seen the bottom of my laundry pile all Winter long (please, oh please tell me I’m not the only one!). While there is much joy that comes with the choices and responsibilities in this busy season of motherhood, there’s also one opportunity I don’t want to miss this week….

… choosing to intentionally point my children to Jesus this Easter.

If I’m not careful, in the midst of doing life, Easter Sunday will arrive, and we will have missed out in the honor of preparing our hearts to celebrate our risen Savior in the way that only He deserves.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to let that happen.

So here’s the challenge: to pick at least ONE intentional Easter activity that points to Jesus in the coming week. It doesn’t have to be fancy, or centered around an expensive item purchased in a store. But one thing’s for sure… life doesn’t slow down, and there’s no use in waiting for a more convenient day to arrive. You and I both know that’s not going to happen any time soon.

We’re just going to have to do it.

There are so many kid-friendly activities out there, but something that is a favorite staple in our family are these Resurrection Eggs from Family Life (available for purchase in many local Christian bookstores).

{photo credit}

Resurrection Eggs have been an amazing tool in our home for quite a few years now. We’ve come to love the simple symbols found in each egg that are used to describe so vividly what Jesus did for us. They are a tradition that my kids get so excited about! For the twelve days leading up to Easter Sunday (you can always double up if you’re just getting started!), our Resurrection Eggs powerfully walk us through the humble story of how the Greatest Rescue ever came to be. I get chills just thinking about it.

Electronics are going to have to take a back seat these next few days. We’re going to need to rearrange our schedule a bit too. But it’ll be worth it. Because the opportunity is now, and I don’t want to miss it.

2f31f66bef061cf5a277640171a6f83e {photo credit}

Oh, I’m so ready for this Winter season to be replaced with the crisp, fresh feeling of new life – a warming not only in the forecast, but also in the spirit of our home. But you’d better believe that no amount of flip flop weather or pastel decorations even comes close to comparing with the satisfaction of the warming that the Spirit brings, when we invite Jesus to invade our homes – and our hearts – in an intentional way this Easter.

Looking for new life this time of year? Look to Jesus, friend.

What are you doing with your children to point their focus towards Jesus this Easter? We’d love to hear your ideas!!

At His feet,

**Check out these links for more kid-friendly Easter activity and craft ideas!

Thriving Family (a Focus on the Family website):

http://www.thrivingfamily.com/Features/Magazine/2011/easter-activities-and-crafts.aspx

Courtney shares her ideas today at Women Living Well:

http://womenlivingwell.org/2013/03/3-meaningful-easter-activities-for-kids/

Filed Under: Being Intentional, Holidays, Intentional Parenting, Kids 5 Comments

WhitneyD March 21, 2013

{Luke 9-16} Your Spring Session Preparation Checklist!

Good Morning Girls!

We are just days away from the start of our FIRST EVER Good Morning Girls Spring Session, {Living and Leading Like Jesus}, and we want to help you to begin well! Here are just a few quick things you can do before Monday to get prepared for this exciting next session:

1. Many of you have already done this, but if you haven’t yet, make sure to ENROLL in the study! This helps us to know who is studying with us as we prepare to serve you well! It takes just a few seconds… you can head on over and enroll here.

2. Now is a great time to print off the {FREE} materials provided to you for this study! When you subscribe to our blog, you will receive an email in your inbox each time a new post is submitted here on the blog. Scroll down to the very bottom of those emails, and you will find the links to the {Living and Leading Like Jesus} Study Guide and Reading Plan. The Study Guide – in journal format – is a wonderful, interactive way to record what God is teaching you throughout the study. Not subscribed yet? No problem! You can do that here.

3. In the same email mentioned in #2, we have some fabulous {NEW} Children’s Resources making their debut this session!! Oh, we couldn’t be more thrilled about what the Children’s Resources Team has put together with your children in mind! If you are a GMG subscriber, both of these resources are listed at the bottom of your email as well. We suggest that you go ahead and print and share a preview of the study with your children, letting them know what exciting stuff will be waiting for them on Monday! Look for: {ENGLISH} Living & Leading Like Jesus-for Kids, {ENGLISH} How to use The Dig for Kids with your GMG Study Guide. You can read more about our Children’s Resources here.

4. Still looking to join a Good Morning Girls group this session? Martha heads up our Enrollment Team, and would be THRILLED to connect you with a group that best fits you! Simply email Martha at martha.gmgenrollment@ymail.com (note that this is a corrected email address if you’ve had trouble getting through to her previously!) with your request to join a group (please specify if you are interested in an email or facebook group). Check out yesterday’s blog post for more info about the different types of groups available!

5. It’s not too late to consider inviting a friend to join us this session! Maybe, just maybe, God has already laid someone on your heart, and you’ve been meaning to share this study info with them. Don’t wait another day (you’ll never know their answer unless you ask, right?!)! This post summarizes what Good Morning Girls is all about, plus it outlines what to expect in our upcoming study… so share away! It’s never too late to get into God’s Word!

6. Finally, and most importantly, will you join us in PRAYER as we humbly come before God, asking Him to protect, bless, strengthen and empower us as we seek to know and love Him more throughout this study? We are asking for God to prepare and soften hearts to receive truth from His Word, so all who participate might walk away from this study living and leading more like Jesus.

Oh friend, we cherish our time spent together with you in God’s Word! Thank YOU for being a special blessing to the Good Morning Girls community! {Luke 9-16} Living and Leading Like Jesus begins MONDAY, March 25! Get excited!!!

At His feet,

Filed Under: Kids, Living & Leading Like Jesus: Luke 9-16, Luke 19 Comments

Angela March 19, 2013

Special Announcement: Tricia Goyer is joining our GMG Team! {plus info on finding a group}

I am so excited to announce today that the very talented and inspiring Tricia Goyer will be joining our contributing team this session! Tricia will be writing on Tuesdays and will be sharing with us practical ways we as moms can lead our families like Jesus! Tricia recently wrote a book with authors Ken Blanchard and Phil Hodges entitled: Lead Your Family Like Jesus: Powerful Parenting Principles from the Creator of Families.

Between her recent book and our upcoming study…..well it looks like a perfect fit to me! I can’t wait to begin our new session with Tricia and learn more about leading my family like Jesus! Welcome to GMG, Tricia!!!

Tricia Goyer is a busy mom of four (with two more in the adoption process), grandmother of one, and wife to John. Somewhere around the hustle and bustle of family life, she manages to find the time to write fictional tales delighting and entertaining readers and non-fiction titles offering encouragement and hope. A bestselling author, Tricia has published thirty-six books to date and has written more than 500 articles. She is a two time Carol Award winner, as well as a Christy and ECPA Award Nominee. In 2010, she was selected as one of the Top 20 Moms to Follow on Twitter by SheKnows.com. Tricia is also on the blogging team at MomLifeToday.com, TheBetterMom.com and other homeschooling and Christian sites.

In addition to her roles as mom, wife and author, Tricia volunteers around her community and mentors teen moms. She is the founder of Hope Pregnancy Ministries in Northwestern Montana, and she currently leads a Teen MOPS Group in Little Rock, AR. Tricia, along with a group of friends, recently launched NotQuiteAmishLiving.com, sharing ideas about simplifying life. She also hosts the weekly radio podcast, Living Inspired. Learn more about Tricia at triciagoyer.com.

Please join me in welcoming Tricia to GMG!

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Wanting to join a GMG group?

I also wanted to let you know I have heard from a few of you that our new forum isn’t as easy to use as our previous one. Let me first say that I am so sorry for the inconvenience it has caused you and for those of you who are having trouble with it, we have come up with an alternative way to join a group. Below you will see the different GMG group categories. If you would like to join one of our groups and can’t seem to get on our forum, please email Martha at martha.gmgenrollment@ymail.com and let her know what type of group (from the list provided below) you are interested in joining. Martha will then place you in a group and get you connected with the group leader. We have tons of new GMG leaders trained this session who are eager and excited to help get women into God’s Word! We would love for you to join us this session and get connected with some new friends who will help you dig into God’s Word…….together!

If you would like to study God’s Word together with a small group of new friends, please contact Martha today!

GMG Group Categories:

Open to Anyone
International
Regional
Single
Divorced
Widowed
Empty Nesters
Women without children
Working Moms
Military Wives
Missionaries
Pastor’s Wives
New Believers
Homeschooling Moms
SAHM
Young Moms

As always, if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask!

Don’t forget, our new session starts on Monday!

Love God Greatly!

Filed Under: Living & Leading Like Jesus: Luke 9-16 Tagged With: Good Morning Girls, Luke 9-16, Online Bible Study, Tricia Goyer 5 Comments

Angela March 18, 2013

Living & Leading Like Jesus- For KIDS! {Free Subscriber Download}

Children are not the church of tomorrow, they are the church of today.- Rosilind Jukic

Before they celebrate double-digits they have already formed a world-view that will shape their attitudes, habits, and moral values; and as parents we play the most important role in what that world-view looks like.

It is so easy to allow our lives, our busy-ness, our deadlines, and even our children’s various activities to determine what our daily and weekly schedules look like. So often what is most important is demoted on our list of priorities.

It is difficult to put into words how deeply passionate I am about children and training up a generation of men and women who will change the world for Jesus Christ.

This is why I am so excited to be able to share with you what the Children’s Resources team has put together for YOU, so that you may share with your children what you are learning in the Good Morning Girls Living and Leading Like Jesus study.

First of all, we have put together a manual that gives you practical tips on how to have a Bible time with your children. We have divided this up into two areas: Bible time for small children and Bible time for pre-teens and teenagers.

For smaller children, we have included SOAP charts where you can write down or illustrate your children’s comments or reactions to the SOAP study. We have also included daily activities for them to do. Some of these activities are art projects, others are family activities, assisting in community/church projects, and games. All of these activities are geared to reinforce the daily Bible passages.

Moms with toddlers are able to do them as well. For the more difficult activities we have provided an alternate activity for toddlers.

Once again we have paired up with the author of The Dig. This study will use the remainder of The Dig Volume 1 and part of Volume 2. There is a separate manual that shows you how to use The Dig and provides reading charts for your children.

Additionally, we have provided colorful memory verse cards for each week in the following translations: KJV, NIV and NLT. They are sized for you to attach them to index cards (Hint: there is a special activity in the first manual for this). To help with memorization, we have provided a number of tips and activities that aid in memorizing the weekly verses.

These manuals are packed full of helpful advice, fun projects, and colorful graphics. But best of all, they are FREE! I can guarantee that you will find them useful, not only for this study; you will certainly refer back to them over and over again.

I pray that this material will be a blessing to you and your children. Every child is born into this world with a destiny already written down by the mighty hand of a loving and creative God. We are blessed with the awesome task as parents to guide them, teach them, and train them to follow that destiny; to seek God and desire all that He has dreamed and planned for them and to fix their gaze on the prize – the high calling of Jesus Christ!

- Rosilind Jukic

Note: If you are a GMG subscriber, both of these resources are listed at the bottom of your email. Look for: {ENGLISH} Living & Leading Like Jesus-for Kids, {ENGLISH} How to use The Dig for Kids with your GMG Study Guide.

Not a GMG subscriber? Subscribe today and you will receive these documents tomorrow morning in your inbox along with our Living & Leading Like Jesus study guide, reading plan and all our translations!

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I would like to send out a special thanks to the GMG Children’s Resources Team for making these wonderful resources for our children!

GMG Children’s Resources Team

Rosilind Jukic
Edurne Mencia
Linda Wells-Harr
Bethany Grove
Catina Klinzmann Pendleton
Nikki Rosenzweig Hinkle
Erica from Confessions of a Homeschooler

- Angela

Filed Under: Kids, Living & Leading Like Jesus: Luke 9-16, Passing On Our Faith Tagged With: Children's Online Bible Study Resources, Good Morning Girls, Luke 9-16, Online Bible Study, The Dig for Kids 20 Comments

Living & Leading Like Jesus: Starts…..Monday!

Preparing our kids’ hearts {and our own!} for Easter…

{Luke 9-16} Your Spring Session Preparation Checklist!

Special Announcement: Tricia Goyer is joining our GMG Team! {plus info on finding a group}

Living & Leading Like Jesus- For KIDS! {Free Subscriber Download}

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