Happy Birthday Hannah Grace

Jeremiah 17:7-8

Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.

It was a cold morning of 10 years ago, when at 5 o'clock am I started having strong contractions. 

Our first baby was getting ready to come see us :)

Hannah's pregnancy had been good all the way until the 7th month. Then contractions and worries on the doctors part made the end of the pregnancy a continuous trip to the hospital. Hannah was small in the womb and doctors couldn't figure out why. Her length was at the standard but her body was petite. After many check ups, threats to take her out with an emergency C-section and then bring her by plane to a different hospital with intensive care, shots to help with the development of her lungs. Finally things calmed down and we made it to the 9th month.

There were two doctors that I still remember, one was a female, long time doctor and well known who told me "everything is ok with your baby, you are small, maybe that's why she is small too". 

Those were the words I wanted to hear, I wanted my baby to be fine and didn't want to give birth earlier. 

The other doctor was a young guy that would always look at me like I was going to die and once told me " if you don't feel your baby move, just run to the hospital."

He was right, there were problems. Hannah's umbilical cord was wrapped twice around her neck, she was suffering in my womb and that's why she was so petite. 

I can't image if the Lord would have taken her in that last trimester, we would have remained with a dream of a daughter and lots of hurt. 

The Lord was so gracious to us because he protected Hannah and taught us a lesson on Sovereignty. 

He had her life under control. 

Her name is Hannah Grace, double grace, because we have been given the grace of her life twice, once He allowed us to get pregnant and second He kept her in our life. 

We have been truly blessed by this little bundle of joy, she weighted less than 5 pounds when she was born, but grew up fast becoming now almost as tall and big as her mommy. 

Looking back in our life helps us see the goodness of God

and helps us remember that God is really involved in our lives. 

Being reminded of His blessings is an encouragement in dark days, because we are never alone. 

The Great and Almighty God always stays on our side!

Hannah is 10 today, she is almost as tall as her mom, loves reading, can speak, read and write in two languages, has traveled around the world and is an amazing girl. We have been blessed by her life this past ten years and can't wait to see what she will become.

God's blessings never end.

Happy birthday Hannah!

Happy 2014

Happy New Year from the Daugereau girls!

In reading the Psalms and in many parts of the Old Testament, we see often how Israel is reminded of the great things that God has done in their lives. 

As we start a new year we can get a chance to look over the year passed and see what God has done in our lives and how he has blessed us even through those moments that at first didn't seem to be the greatest.

This past year for our family was full of blessings. 

As we started the 2013 with a second semester at the seminary we got to meet new people and deepened our friendships. 

In 2013 we struggled financially but, because the Lord has brought us through similar  experiences in our lives, we were able to make it through, to use what we had wisely and make the most of it. Because of this however, Josh looked started looking for part time jobs. He was blessed with an internship and another awesome part time job that he is going to start this semester. 

God does't leave his kids uncared for!

As a parent I try to give my kids the best and God is such a perfect Father and we were able to experiment how he takes care of us in such a perfect way, providing what we needed at the right time. 

What are some of my blessings?

He gave me such an awesome husband who does love me as Christ loves the Church, and three wonderful kids. One of them is turning 10 just in a few days. My kids are just as challenging any kid is but they do bring a  sunshine in my days. 

I got the joy of seeing my family from Italy coming all the way to the States. The got on  a plane for the first time and landed on US soil which they loved, spoiled the kids with Kinder chocolate eggs (now my little one thinks we can just go to the store and buy them and doesn't understand that instead we have to go all the way to Italy to find them!). I got to see their amazed faces in Santa Monica or Hollywood and Beverly Hills.

Benedetta was blessed to get into a special piano program and proved to be an amazingplayer.

Hannah was blessed with wonderful teachers. 

We were able to go up to the mountains and got to see a bunch of animals that we had never seen before.

We got to go to the Ocean and see a dolphin swim by.

We got to spend a weekend alone in Malibù.

Some of my personal highlights of the past year were being an assistant leader for the seminary wife Bible study. I love working with ladies and just when I thought there would never be a chance for me to do any women's ministry here in such a big church God proved me wrong.

I love the chance He gave me.

And the other highlight for me has been taking classes at the college. I love learning more things that I can use in ministry but I also love being around college students and being able to impact their lives as they impact mine. 

In the past year I met so many wonderful people and made new friendships. I still miss the ones I left in Italy and hope to be able to see them this coming summer.

God is good and great!

We had so many difficult times but we learned to be closer to each other and close to God and by looking back I am reminded that God loves me so much and blesses our family greatly. He does bless us even through the difficult times. Infact it is in the hard times that our faith gets refined, we learn how to trust God more and to walk with Him. It is in the hard times that our character changes and our pocky corners get smoothed out.

All this to say that if you are going through a difficult time take courage, look bad at what God has done in your life and remember that He loves you and will take care of you. Sometimes he needs to bring you down so that you can learn to trust Him. But stick to Him, follow Him and don't abandon Him and he will life your head up :)

May this new year bring many blessings to your lives.

Trusting in Him

Proverbs 3:5-6


"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight."

A few weeks ago there was a Women's Conference at Grace Community Church. 

That weekend  Josh and Hannah were also gone at Junior Camp. As you know the weather is great here in California but that weekend was particularly cold and rainy and the temperature was very low. 

There was supposed to be ice on the road.

  If you know me, you know that one of the thing that scares me is the unknown and driving with bad weather on California Highways was not something I wanted to do. 

I had promised my 7 year old that I would have brought her to her Sunday School Christmas Party and I really wanted to go to the Conference but I was scared to drive in that weather. How was I supposed to balance everything?

I have to be honest, I was ready to give up and stay home. 

But as I was praying I realized that I was being controlled by my fears. My fears were the one deciding my actions and I was not living in God's sovereignty . 
I needed to learn to rely on the Lord, to trust him with my life and the life of the kids and trust him to the point that it would overcome my fear.

I prayed and prayed and finally started getting ready to go. 
I prayed as I was getting ready to go, I prayed as I was getting close to the car and while driving. Mainly my prayer was that He would keep us safe and that if something would have happened to us to remind me that He is sovereign. I cannot control my life nor the one of my kids. But whatever the Lord pours over my life, our life, it's good. 
 If we believe that He is sovereign we also need to live in such a way, knowing that He takes care of us and if he allows certain things in our life is because He thinks it is good.

It wasn't easy but it felt good to trust the sovereign God.
I went there and back and the Lord did protect us and nothing bad happened. It felt good not being controlled by fear.

At the Conference I was also reminded that He is the King. 

What does that mean practically?

Well a king rules!

 And he wants to be the ruler of my life and I have to be ready to let him rule. 

It was a good weekend full of encouragement in trusting the Sovereign God and let Him reign into my life.

And everything went well despite my fears!

Merry Christmas

I want to wish 

a very Merry Christmas 

and 

a wonderful New year 

to you all reading this blog.

It has been good to share with you

 all the things that have happened into our lives.

May God bless you greatly 

and

 give you peace and joy 

and

 many many blessings

in 2014.

“The Lord bless you

    and keep you;

25 

the Lord make his face shine on you

    and be gracious to you;

26 

the Lord turn his face toward you

    and give you peace.”’

-Carmela

The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer!

Psalm 18:1-3

"I love you, O Lord, my strength.

The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer,

my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge,

my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.

I call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised,

and I am saved from my enemies."

In this Psalm David is praising God who delivered him from the hands of his enemies and especially Saul. 

David was a good man and loved God. Because God had anointed him as the next king, Saul wanted to kill him, so David had to run away for his life. 

In the midst of trials he could still praise God, worship Him, because he recognized that God was all he had and God was taking care of Him. 

In the midst of trials he relied on the Lord for strength and deliverance.

I am amazed by David's attitude and humbled for the many times I don't respond in the same way. 

An encouragement for today? 

Praise Him, no matter what is happening in your life, He is the only one worthy of praise. 

He alone has our life in the palm of his hand.

Becoming a Woman of Spiritual Passion

     This past semester I read several books, one of which is "Becoming a Woman of Spiritual Passion" written by Donna Morley.
     The book has been a real encouragement as I was reading it. It was very practical. 
     It is divided in two parts, the first sections tackles several promises that we have in God, one at the time. Most of the time the concepts are not new, but I think very often we need to be reminded of those promises so that we can face life in a different way.
     For example, in the very first chapter  "The Promise of a Better Future" the author talks about our hurts and bitterness and how those things often stop us from living a passionate life for Christ.  We are called to focus on God and instead we focus on the things that hurt us, we focus on ourselves.
     The second section has five important things that we need to do or to have in order to deepen our relationship with Christ: living out our marriage vow to Him, experiencing uninterrupted joy, giving Him all of our love, telling others about Him and so on. 
     I love how Donna starts every chapter with a story to draw you into her point. Those stories are real and detailed and you will  become part of them. There was one that kind of stuck with me. It was a story of a couple that were traveling on a ship. During their trip, they find themselves, along with the rest of the people on board, in the midst of a storm. The storm was so bad that they had to start to get rid of their food but slowly people start to die for many reasons. The woman never gave up her faith, she knew her God and knew to trust Him, she kept sharing God with those that were not saved yet and remained strong in her faith even when her fiancé died. All of this difficulties she could handle only because she trusted God.
     I know the way I retell the story it doesn't make it sound good, but that's why you should read the book. As I said this book is a very practical one. Full of encouragements for our christian walk. 
     I found the book at our church bookstore but you can also find it on Amazon and probably the book will be cheaper there.
     So I would say that this book would make a nice Christmas present for others or for yourselves. 
     Have a blessed time :)

My Little Pianist

Since this is the season, I want to mention something else that I am thankful for. 

Even if being in the States has been hard and an adjustment, I want to share how thankful I am for being here. God has done so many wonders while being in the US. There are so many things I can mention but today is a special day and I want to be thankful for Benedetta and the possibility to let her play the piano.

I know it may seem not so spiritual but it is. Growing up I have always wanted to play an instrument but my family could not afford it. I think music is just one of those things that helps espress yourself, if you are going through some difficult times or if you are rejoicing because of the great things the Lord is doing in your life. 

When we were in Italy I had looked and looked for piano lessons for the girls but they were just insanely expensive.

Once here in the States, we met this young lady at our Bible study. After a few meetings we overheard this conversation about a pedagogy class at the College and the need of some kids so the college students could practice teaching on the kids. There were only two spots left and one of them was almost taken. So basically only one was available.

We prayed and prayed and if we would have known what we knew a few months later (our support dropped) we would have probably not signed her in. But the Lord made everything possible so we were encouraged to sign Benedetta up into this program. The Lord provided financially for the first and second semester, He even provided for an incredibly old, used clavinova electric piano. 

We have been so blessed to see our little talented girl play for fun, play for us and compose her own music and songs.

Today she had her fall recital and it was just amazing being there and seeing those little hands moving around the piano keys, and those eyes concentrated on her music sheet. 

Benedetta played "Italy My Home," I don't know if it is the true title of the song, but I love it and Benedetta plays it often for me to remind me of the beauty of my homeland.

So one of the MANY blessings of being here is being able to get Benedetta to take lessons. On the other side their school provides a good music program and Hannah gets to play the flute. 

When you look at it from a human prospective, it doesn't seem that big of a deal. But when you look at it with the eyes of faith you can see that the Lord takes care of us in every little details and gives us things that are unexpected, from the big ones to the small ones. He gives gifts that sometime we wouldn't even be able to imagine!