(Jodi and Curt)

For many months now we’ve been posting Love Stories on Mondays. We’ve read how beautifully God is writing His story in the lives of His people; men and women who are consciously making choices… and watched God honor those choices.

Most of our stories have been young and fresh… recent glimpses into how God is working.

Today’s story is about love that has lasted… and grown… and thrived.

Jodi is a dear friend of mine- a sister in the truest sense. I love this crazy girl who runs marathons and triathlons and packs more into her week than I’ll ever accomplish in a lifetime.

Most of all I love Jodi’s resilient faith in a God who can do anything. And more than she’d ever dreamed…

Click HERE to read her story.

From My Heart,

Diane

I love burgers. There I said it. Its not the meat that does it for me, in fact I eat very little meat. There is just something about the bun, the patty (veggie and salmon are my favorite) and the toppings that just make the perfect combination! Thus, this salmon burger recipe was born.

I was perusing the isles at Costco when the package of frozen salmon burgers caught my eye. I read the ingredients, looked at the price and tried to decide if they were worth it… the good thing about being on a strict grocery budget is that you really do think through every item (more posts on budgets and meal planning to come). It suddenly occurred to me that I could in fact attempt to make my own salmon burgers using the salmon I had at home and some fresh ingredients. Decision made.

I also love potatoes. Of any kind. Especially french fries. Combine a healthy burger with healthy french fries and you have one happy mama. We eat these baked sweet potato fries quite often and they can be added to just about any meal and cut into any shape.

If you are on the fence about salmon and or sweet potatoes, here is some fascinating information about them both that just might make you want to give them a try.

Salmon

Sweet Potatoes

ENJOY!

Elizabeth

FRESH SALMON BURGERS

(serves 4)

12 – 14 oz. Fresh Salmon – bones and skin removed – cut into 1 inch cubes

1 chopped leek (about ¾ – 1 cup)

1 cup chopped fresh spinach (2 cups un-chopped)

3 T teriyaki sauce

*if you need to go gluten free, Whole Foods and New Seasons both carry g/f teriyaki sauce options

1 egg

*if you need to go dairy free, use 1 Tsp of ground flax seed mixed with 3 Tsp of water

*if you want to reduce the fat a bit, you can use two eggs whites

1 T dried or fresh basil

1 T minced garlic

¼ – ½ tsp red pepper flakes

Sea salt and pepper to taste

Splash of olive oil for cooking

Combine salmon, leeks and spinach in a large bowl.

Whisk together teriyaki sauce, egg, basil, garlic, red pepper flakes, sea salt and pepper.

Pour wet mixture over the salmon mixture. Using a pastry knife, mash the mixture until all the pieces are pretty small and combined. You may also try to use a food processor to combine the mixture… I have never tried it because I only have a mini one but I bet it would work well!

Heat a splash of olive oil in a pan over medium heat. Once the oil is hot, use your hands to form patties with the salmon mixture and place them in the pan. You will have to arrange them and form them in the pan a bit. Once they start cooking, they will stay together (if you used flax seed or egg whites, they won’t hold together as well so be careful when you flip them!).

Cook for about 8 minutes on each side or until they are brown on both sides.

I usually serve them on a whole or sprouted wheat bun (Dave’s Killer Bread Buns are the best!) and topped with sliced avocado, Trader Joe’s BBQ sauce (sounds weird but it tastes amazing!) and fresh spinach.

*If you need to go gluten free, they are great on a bed of fresh spinach too.

On the side we love steamed veggies of any kind and baked sweet potato fries (recipe below).

BAKED SWEET POTATO FRIES

(serves 4)

4 medium sweet potatoes

1 T melted coconut oil or olive oil

1 tsp garlic powder

½ tsp sea salt

¼ tsp pepper

¼ tsp cayenne pepper

Preheat oven to 400F

Wash and cut sweet potatoes into ¼ inch rounds (You can cut them in regular fry shape too. The rounds just make for easier cutting due to how fibrous they are).

Place sweet potatoes and oil in a zip lock bag and shake until the potatoes are fully coated.

Add spices and shake bag well.

If you have pans that fit, place a cooling rack inside/on top of a cookie sheet and place potatoes on top. This will make it so they will brown on both sides evenly and you won’t have to flip them. I wish I could take credit for this genius idea but I stole it from a blog. Life changing!

If your pans don’t fit, spray a cookie sheet with olive oil spray and arrange potatoes on the cookie sheet. Flip potatoes half way through.

Bake for about 45 – 55 minutes. Allow them to brown on both sides and start to crisp up. We like them pretty crispy so sometimes I turn up the heat to 425 for a few minutes at the end.

What if God were to call on women to gather together to pray for their family, their friends, the people in their lives and community?

What if God were to call an army of women to engage in intense, purposeful prayer?

What if hundreds of women answered that call and came together all at once to pray in one massive all-at-the-same-time gathering?

What if every daughter, son, husband, friend, neighbor and work associate of every one of those hundreds of women got saturated in prayer?

What if we prayed all night?

What would happen?

Several years ago a group of ordinary women set out to find out what would happen if we had enough faith and determination to venture out of our comfortable beds and pray all night for the people in our own circles of influence.

We were excited, a little nervous, and filled with the hope that God would show Himself to us in tangible, powerful ways that we could understand.

And He did!

Since that first Night in Prayer, seven years ago, the number of women who come, pajama clad with pillows and goodies and hearts full of faith, has snowballed.

Women want to come! They bring burdens too great to bear alone: people they love who need Jesus, messy relationships they cannot fix, co-workers who are cold to the Gospel, teenagers taking terrible risks, and a great burden to see hearts rescued by the Redeemer.

We have seen those impossible prayers answered.  Really! We have seen our own minds and attitudes and thinking changed dramatically. We have seen healings of bodies and perhaps even more miraculous, healings of relationships.

More than anything, we have experienced Jesus in a way we never understood possible.

This year would you join us?

We are inviting women from all around the state, the country, and the world to spend the night of February 24^th- 25^th in prayer.

Rather than all try to cram into one building and do things exactly the way we do, we are asking you to consider gathering women in your church or ministry to pray at the same time as we do. We’ll link together via video at some point in the night to cheer each other on and be amazed at God’s movement.

And if you’re a part of Solid Rock, we’ll be gathering both on the Westside and Downtown this year. I’ll be leading on the Westside and Tammy and her team will guide you Downtown. If you plan on being a part of the Sunset campus church, join us on the Westside in especially set aside groups.

Together we will sing:

I love the LORD because He hears and answers

My prayers.

Because He bends down and listens,

I will pray as long as I have breath!

Psalm 116:1,2

(NLT)

Will you join us?

Filled with His hope,

Diane

P.S. If you are part of another church and want to organize your own Night in Prayer, contact Jodi (Jodi@ajesuschurch.org) and she’ll send you whatever might help.

For the next few weeks, in between some great Love Stories, we’re going to be taking a fresh look at four reasons for marriage… and four questions to ask yourself while looking for The One… and four areas which must align in your relationship in order to make a marriage great.

Way back in the book of Genesis, God created this thing called marriage.

Right after filling His world with light and land and sun and stars and every kind of creature imaginable, God saw Adam’s aloneness. Every other creature had a match, but Adam, charged with the immense task of managing God’s creation, had no one.

And so God created Eve. Her name means “life”, and with her came a life giving relationship for Adam as well as a beautiful means of perpetuating life throughout God’s massive creation.

But it’s Adam’s aloneness that I want to address today.

“It is not good for the man to be alone;

I will make him a helper suitable for him.” Genesis 2:18

God saw Adam’s solitary life as a “not good” thing. As in negative… a detriment… a strike against him.

But instead of exhorting Adam to let God be his everything, or to find satisfaction in his aloneness, God decided to create a counterpart for him.

Someone who could and would partner with him in his life’s calling.

Someone to spend time with, to talk to, to be friends with.

Someone to chase away the loneliness.

And it gets even better! Scroll down a few verses to Genesis, chapter 2, verses 24,25:

“For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.

And the man and his wife were both naked and not ashamed.”

Can you imagine? Two people so at ease with each other that they bare it all. They not only shed their clothes, they take off all those fabrications we wrap around ourselves to hide the imperfections we are so ashamed of.

And that is one of the greatest aspects of this thing called marriage.

Oneness. A complete melding of two people into one. A melding that can only happen as both Adam and Eve trust each other enough allow themselves to be utterly and entirely stripped bare.

And because there was no sin in the Garden, this oneness was able to happen without pain or immense amounts of angst—and it happened instantly.

But because there is so much sin in our world, that kind of oneness can only happen between a man and a woman with a great deal of risk and trust and commitment and trying.

It is this unashamed oneness that is God’s goal in every marriage.

And very few marriages ever get there.

But the ones that do start with real honest-to-goodness friendship. They like each other.

When Phil and I first started dating I was painfully uncomfortable with him. I was so afraid of saying the wrong thing that I could hardly choke out a word!  But before much time had passed, I found myself relaxing in his presence. I got caught up in knowing him and listening to him talk. I asked questions to keep him going, to find out more of what made this fascinating man tick.

Before I ever fell in love with him, I fell in like with him.

And even better, I felt fully myself with him. He was the first guy I ever dated who wanted me to be just who I was.

He liked me!

My quiet reticence didn’t worry him at all. With him there were no long awkward silences with me racking my brain on what to say next. He just carried me along into the conversation and somehow elicited more words from me than anyone had before.

But he also let me be silent. As if somehow he knew that my silence was just a way of processing and chewing on all he had to say.

I loved it!

In fact, I thrived with Phil. I came alive in his company. And for a raging introvert like me to crave another’s companionship is a miracle indeed!

And I saw this same thing with each of my children as they got to know the people who would eventually be their spouses.

When John Mark was with Tammy, he was more real and fully himself than I’d ever seen him be with any of his friends. With her he didn’t need to be cool or upbeat or always his best. I saw him relax, laugh a lot, and talk more than I think I’d ever seen him talk in his entire life!

And with Elizabeth, I saw her blossom. She was more herself with Brook than I’d ever seen her be. He brought out aspects of her character that I hadn’t even known existed.

With Rebekah and Steve, I see a more measured Rebekah. She gauges her responses by looking to his judgment of any given situation. Its made her relax, bringing out all the delightful joy that has characterized her contribution to our lives. It’s as if she needs him in order to be who she really is.

And that’s what I think this idea of oneness and friendship is all about. The freedom to be who you really are.

And so, my advice to anyone and everyone who is dating or thinking about dating…

• First be friends. Be sure you can be friends. Be sure he likes you— and you like him. Not the him you think he could eventually turn out to be… but him just as he is.

• Resist the urge to pretend to be something you’re not. There is no way you’re going to be able to keep up that façade for a lifetime!

• If something makes you uncomfortable about his personality, pay attention. Isn’t that the purpose of dating? Ask yourself, “Can I live with that?” Be honest.

• Date long enough to be sure you know the real person. See what he’s like when he’s mad. Or tired. Or discouraged. Can you live with that man?

• Ask the people who love you the most if you seem to be yourself around him.

• Ask yourself if you are thriving emotionally and spiritually and intellectually and socially when you’re with him.

• Do you match up comfortably? Remember, its not sameness you are after, but oneness.

• Examine your disagreements. What is snagging you up time and time again? Are they fundamental things? Or just the awkwardness of two people trying to meld their lives together?

I can honestly say that my husband is my best friend. In fact, I am absolutely convinced that he is the only person in the world who really knows me as I am.

And the most amazing thing about that is this: he still likes me.

Wanting that with all my heart for each of you,

Diane

BREAKFAST:

JM’s Granola

Maple Apple Cinnamon Baked Oatmeal

Day Off Pancakes

DINNER:

Fresh Salmon Burgers

Mexi Bowls

Butternut Squash Tacos

Cashew Pesto + Pizza

Smoked Paprika Rub

Grandma’s Chili

Cashew Cream Pizza

Grilled Salmon+Veggie Bowls

SIDE:

Baked Sweet Potato Fries

Quinoa Salad

DESSERT:

Lava Cakes

Maple Apple Crisp

BAKE:

Banana Bread

SAUCES:

Cashew Cream

Cilantro Lime Peanut Sauce

G/F Teriyaki Sauce

Hello and welcome to The Kitchen! I am so excited to share with you and learn with you as we embark on this journey of cooking, eating, giving and whatever else comes across these pages.

For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Elizabeth Mosser and Diane is my amazing mom. I have been married to my incredible husband, Brook, for 5 years and we have a 2.5 year old son, Duke, and a baby girl due in April.

(Brook, Duke and I)

One of the greatest gifts my mother gave me was allowing me to be at her side in the kitchen as I grew up. My mom made a meal for our family every single night and she allowed (and sometimes required) my sister and I to help her in the kitchen everyday. I’m sure there were times when I was anything but “helpful” and yet she patiently taught me and encouraged me to love and serve people through cooking.

As soon as I got married, I realized what a gift that really was. Men love to eat! The past five years have been a journey of relearning and rethinking what I thought was a healthy way of eating and learning how to eat REAL foods, the way God created them. I plan to share bits and pieces of that story with you over the next few weeks and months and share with you what I have learned… and am still learning.

My goal on these pages is to encourage you and inspire you to feed yourself, your family and everyone who eats at your table with really good, real, whole foods.

Here are a few things you should know before we start cooking…

I am a total perfectionist and I love to follow the rules. However, for some strange reason, I hate to follow recipes. I like to think of recipes as “ideas” and then create whatever comes to mind. I also hate to measure ingridients. There is one major problem with these two things: how do you share a recipe on a blog when you don’t write it down or know how much you used of anything?! So, I am turning over a new leaf and vowing to give you all actual recipes… therfore I will measure… most of the time… and record what I do in order to share with you all.

With that said, I want you to have free reign to change, substitute and adapt any of these recipes to your taste and accourding to what is in your pantry. Feel free to send in questions as well and I will do my best to answer them.

Lastly, Duke and I have some food sensitivties/allergies so you will find that most of my recipes are dairy free and often wheat/gluten free. I will try to always give you options to make every recipe with OR without dairy or gluten so you can modify them to fit who your are feeding them to.

I hope you have as much fun with these recipes as I do!

Elizabeth

JM’S GRANOLA

This recipe was born out of my brother, John Mark’s, request for some hearty granola. He wanted one with lots of nuts and real ingredients. After a few batches that were only “so, so”, I finally arrived at this recipe and we have stuck with it ever since.

Ingredients:

5 cups old fashioned rolled oats

¾ cup raw almonds

¾ cup pecans

*you can use any kind of your favorite nuts. Just make sure they don’t contain any added oils or salt. If you don’t want it quite as nutty, simply use less nuts.

½ cup organic brown sugar (optional)

3 t ground cinnamon

1 t sea salt

¾ cup unsweetened applesauce

¼ cup maple syrup

¼ cup honey

2 T of coconut oil

1 T real vanilla

1 cup raisins

Preheat oven to 300F.

Mix together applesauce, maple syrup, honey and coconut oil in a small bowl.

Combine oats, almonds, pecans, brown sugar, cinnamon and salt in a large bowl.

Pour wet ingredients over dry ingredients and stir until completely combined.

Spread over two cookie sheets in a thin layer and bake for 25 min, then flip over with a spatula and put back in the oven.

Bake for another 25 min. Then turn up the oven to 315F for about another 10 – 15 minutes (this allows it to brown up a bit more and get crispier). Keep a close eye on it and take it out when it is evenly brown on top and feels dry.

IMPORTANT: let it cool completely on the trays before you move it! This allows the clusters to stay together.

Once it has completely cooled, move to a large bowl and stir in the raisins.

Store in an airtight container.

We eat ours with unsweetened vanilla almond milk and fresh fruit or sprinkle some on greek yogurt… or eat it by the handful!

ENJOY!

Early this morning I woke up to all that delightful snow melted away.

Rain.

Again.

And my soul felt as heavy as the skies outside, dripping with too much dreariness. I wasn’t depressed, not even sad. Just not happy.

And since it’s normal for me to wake up happy and full of energy and zest for the day I was kind of concerned.

What’s wrong with me?

The Lord had been speaking to me recently about how serious I am all the time.  After over a year of mind-boggling drama in my extended family, I’ve lost some of that hope-filled part of me that keeps me seeing every glass filled more than half full.

And so this morning I asked God how. How do I lighten up?

Ignoring the problems that persist doesn’t work; every phone call and visit brings it all back.

And I’m not really much inclined to what most people consider fun. I’m a pretty boring kind of person. I racked my brain for something fun I could do to help me lighten up a little, but couldn’t come up with anything.

Well, at least anything that wouldn’t cost money…

My idea of fun can’t be done in an afternoon. I love to hike high in the Sierras, lounge by a lake, take off on a road trip with Phil in his mini— top down of course!

Not much chance of any of those things today.

So what God whispered to my listening this morning surprised me:

Sing.

Sing? Really? Me?

But I’m deaf. I sound terrible. Toneless.

You want me to sing?

Mmh-hmm.

Well I waited until my son, Matt, left the house to get us both a treat of really good coffee from Peets. Even lightened up enough to order myself a cappuccino. Nonfat of course.

As soon as he left I started to sing. As quietly as I could and still call it singing, I tried.

It’s hard for me to remember songs since I really don’t hear them very well, but one old hymn kept coming to my mind and so I sang it over and over again.

Great is Thy faithfulness

New every morning…

Dah dee dee dah, dah dah dum dee dee dee….

Great is Thy faithfulness Lord unto me.

Strength for today

And bright hope for tomorrow

Thine own great Presence

To cheer and to guide…

My breath caught.

I’d forgotten… again. He is my strength for today. He is my bright hope for tomorrow.

Not my solutions to what everyone ought to do to straighten out the mess they’ve made.

Not the elusive dream of having every cupboard clean and organized, a pristine garage, and all my photos neatly ordered on discs.

It’s Him!

His Presence.

He is the One who cheers me despite real life stuff going on all around me.

He is my guide.

I am not a victim of other’s choices.

I’m following Jesus.

By now I was singing louder.  At least I think I was. Without my cochlear devices on, I can’t hear a thing… including me. (and that, dear friends, can be a good thing at times!)

There I was, folding laundry, belting out His faithfulness and believing every word.

I felt as light as those doves that feed every morning on our back deck.

Dancing a little now, I sashayed out into the hallway… and ran smack into Matthew.

Opps.

If you’ve ever sat next to me in church you’ll know that when I “sing” during worship I keep my voice very, very soft. Oh yes, I’ve seen those stares. I have a good idea of exactly how a deaf girl singing must sound.

But Matthew swooped me into his arms and said, “Mom, that’s beautiful! I’ve been out here listening. So beautiful, it’s made me cry.”

And sure enough, tears had gathered in my almost twenty-year-old son’s eyes.

And of course, tears started spilling from mine. Happy tears of pain conquered and hope tinkling bells of sweet sounds that I hear.

I can sing. I will sing. Loud and free and with a little dancing thrown in! Because It’s not about me…

Great is His faithfulness… new every morning… Lord, unto me.

Will you sing with me… no matter how you sound?

From a heart that’s feeling lighter with every note,

Diane