About the article I posted this morning...

I would encourage that if you didn't read past the first paragraph, to read through to the end.  You'll be glad you did! I realize that the first paragraph may have 'irritated' some of you, but if you keep reading, you will see why it was written and what it was leading up to.  I think Luke does an excellent job at getting his point across. 

Would love to know your thoughts!

Des

Awhile back, I read an article that, though simply written, was really a huge encouragement to me as a maiden in waiting.  A friend of mine wrote the below article and I wanted to share it in hopes that it would be an encouragement to other single ladies waiting for their Prince Charming.  Luke has given me the go ahead to post it on my blog. 

Here it is...

This comes from a young, single male.  I thought I would give you a small glimpse into the mind of a single 22-year-old guy; just in case you were wondering what to shoot for.  I hope this is beneficial.

Dear Young, Single Female,

If you are wondering what it will take for me to like you...

Take care to look gorgeous -- like very gorgeous.  By all means, be in great physical shape.  Use makeup to produce that beautiful, blemish-free face.  Wear something that will really grab my attention, even if it's a little suggestive.  Do all you can to become picture-perfect.  Be very friendly, and maybe even a little flirty towards me.  It  doesn't hurt to advertise a little bit.

Follow these instructions, and there's a real good chance that you'll get me to like you.

If you are wondering what it will take for me to love you...

First, forget all about my first answer.

Make me respect you.  Make me admire you.  Strive to become a beautiful woman on the inside.  Cling to God and let His love radiate through you.  Although it's important and certainly has its place, do not be too concerned about your physical appearance.  First and foremost, strive to be a knockout on the inside.

Be humble.  Be confident.  Be genuine.  Don't compromise.  Don't worry about the latest fads, the latest trends.  Stick to the truth, just because it's the truth.  Don't try to be anything that you're not.  Don't try to impress me.  Just be who you are, as a young woman following God.

Have a servant's heart.  Forget about yourself and your wants, but just focus on others.  Live as if their needs were more important than yours, and honestly believe that.

It's still important to be physically fit and to be attractive, but these need to be secondary to your unwavering love for Jesus.  I know the culture is screaming at you to pull out all the stops in making yourself as pleasing to the eye as posslbe.  Please, please don't buy into it.  Don't think you need to go tanning, bleach your teeth, or wear a ton of makeup.  I want to love you for you, as imperfect as you may feel.  Keep in mind that I'm human, too.  I want to be amazed by you, not your potential as a cover girl.

Also, remember your worth.  Let me apologize on behalf on all modern-day men for the cheap way that the culture looks at women.  It's really awful, and I know it's not true.  Help break that lie.  Don't sell yourself short.  Let me fight to reach your high standards.  Make me pay the high price in order to win you.  Dare to find out if it's true that there really is somebody worth waiting for.

This will take a lot of patience, a lot of self-control, and a lot of courage.  But understand that those are the three qualities that will just make me all the more amazed by you.

Finally, don't try too hard.  Have faith that I'll find you, and that you won't have to manipulate anything.  Trust God, that if you are faithfully living in obedience to Him, He will take care of the rest.  Don't worry about what kind of guy-catching power you're going to have.  As strange as it sounds, the less it looks like you are trying to compete, the more appealing you're going to be to me.  Just focus on fulfilling youre regular day-to-day responsibilities.  God will orchestrate this is we let Him.

It is very true that a woman of this caliber is rare.  But so are diamonds.  Dare to turn yourself into this kind of a woman, and just see if I won't give it all away for that one precious jewel.

Follow these instructions, and there is a real good chance that you'll find me honestly wondering jus how it is that God has blessed me with such an incredible young lady.

I hope this helps.

Sincerely,

Luke Arndt

About the author:

Luke is 23 years old and 4th oldest son in the Arndt family, a family of 14 children.  The family's website is famteam.com, so feel free to check it out to learn more about the Arndts.  I guarantee you'll be Blessed! Luke and his brother James have a computer business as well that you may want to check out.   It's arndtcomputers.com.  They repair laptops and do various types of troubleshooting and such as well.  The Arndts live on 5 acres of land in the rolling hills of Southern Illinois, not far from St. Louis, MO.

I apologize to my readers for not updating again...I promised to introduce ya'll to two of our other furkids in the house.  Jake is my brother's boston terrier and he is three years old - will be 4 on April 10th.  He's a real sweet boy and very smart! He is great with people (adults) but is not fond of children, cats, or dogs bigger than him. He loves long walks in the neighborhood (but not too long..he'll lay down when he gets tired of walking...), being loved on like a baby (and he will let you hold him just like a baby!), and his favorite toy is the infamous lime green fire hydrant, which oddly enough, he's never tried marking on, lol~  Here's my little 'godchild' as I refer to him as with his daddy....

Sponge is my dad's maltese/mini pin mix.  He made three years old on November 12th.  He may be a 'mutt', but he's the most intellegent one I've ever seen! Now our boston terriers are highly intellegent too, but in a different way.  Sponge understands so much of what we say, what we tell him to do, what toy to get (he knows the names of all his toys and will get the one you ask for! He has a lot of toys too...), etc. He is my 'electric blanket' during the winter months.  He loves to sleep right aside me under the covers and keep me warm! Some mornings I wake up to find his head resting on the pillow aside mine while his body is still under the covers! 

On my mind:

Tomorrow afternoon's trip to Lutcher to pick my dad and brother up from work so we can go to Covington, LA to purchase yet another boat...(Dad bought one less than 2 weeks ago)

Getting my favorite sweater washed for tomorrow

How cold it is and how I wish it were Spring already!

Looking forward to:

Spring!

Planting a vegetable garden

My 25th Birthday

Dad and Mom finally finding a new home for us to live in...

Making:

A harness for Tonka (imitation Puppia)

A stuffed Boston terrier

Sleeping shorts for Dad

Learning:

How to manage my time more effectively and be more productive

How to cultivate true contentment

How to make a scrapbook page

Latest interests:

Baking different things rather than the 'norm'

Researching my parrots diets and implenting what I've learned

Reading past archives of Dad's Diary entries on Famteam.com

That's all for now~ Have a great evening!

Hi everyone!

I thought I'd finally take a moment to introduce myself, for those of you that don't already know me. Where to start???

I'm Desire', but you can call me Des if you'd like.  I am 24 years old (almost 25- birthday is April 15th) and live in Southeastern Louisiana with my parents and older brother David (he'll be 28 at the end of this month).  I live with a menagerie of pets, all of whom I'll introduce ya'll to shortly.

As mentioned, I live at home with my parents and hope to remain under the protection of my father until marriage. I am a stay at home daughter and have been for almost 5 years now. I did attend college for 3 semesters immediately following high school graduation at a public school.  My majors were Psychology, and later, when I got accepted into the technical college, Nursing.  After a few rough circumstances in Nursing school (stress being a key one!), I decided to forego a college education.  Little did I know at the time, it was God who was slowly changing my heart toward home.  It's so neat when I look back at how the last 6 years of my life have gone...and where God has me now. I never dreamed that I would stay at home and not have at least a salary job to pay my own way here.  But I never could have imagined that I would WANT to continue staying at home as a daughter and later as a wife/mother if God wills it. I have come to learn that what I am doing now is far more important in terms of significance than any salary job ever could be. I'm learning how to be a better daughter, a better friend, a better helpmeet and momma for when/if those times come.  I'm cultivating a servant's heart and a sense of contentment. Those things can't be learned in a college classroom. I'm pursuing a much higher education now....preparation for being a helpmeet/mommy! I couldn't think of anything more important! :)

What exactly do I do all day?  Well, most of you know that my mom is unable to take care of the housework and running of the household herself due to her bad condition of Rhematoid Arthritis. This is where I come in.  I'm glad to be here to do these things for mom and keep a nice home for my family.  It is also GREAT practice for when I have a family of my own and I'm learning a lot of valuable lessons here.  I also help tend to my elderly grandparents who live next door to us.  I'm so glad I'm able to take them to doctor appts., help with their finances, run errands with (or for) them, and just try to make their life a little easier in their final years. They mean the world to me and I love them so much! Here's a picture of them....Hard to believe my Papa will be 86 next month! He definitely doesn't look it. :) My grandma is 11 years younger than him...74.

I also have a menagerie of kiddos that take up a lot of my time....they are soo worth it though and I wouldn't have it any other way!

This is Tonka, my male boston terrier.  He is the very first (and only) dog I've had the privilege of 'owning' thus far.  It's really the other way around though, isn't it? Our pets really own us! Hehe! He is going to be 5 years old on October 6th.  He's the absolute joy in my life (after Jesus) and I consider him more like a son than an actual pet.  Even though, yes, I do know that he is a dog.  Shhhhh though! He doesn't know it and I'd hate to break his little heart. :)

Momma and her little Prince (Tonka):

Oh! And yes, he loves to wear clothes! :)

See what I mean???!!! :) He's stylish, lol!

Then we have my little Matt, my bunny rabbit. :) He joined the family May of 2006. He will be 2 years old sometime in April.  I don't know the exact date of his birth though. He's very intellegent and hides his little head when he hears the words 'rabbit stew' mentioned.  I hope that doesn't leave the little guy traumatized. He's pretty cuddly and loves to be held! He's very spoiled! :) Introducing Matt...

Back in September, I acquired three feather kids to add to my furry family. My mom's friend has bad arthritis like she does, and is unable to care for her birds, so she rehomed them with me since she knew I'd love them dearly and take spectacular care of them. :) What a Blessing these birds have been to our family!

Meet Joey, the eclectus...He's more so the family bird. He doesn't bond with just one person.  He has a special relationship with each of us.  He talks A LOT and is very entertaining! It is not uncommon to wake up at 3 A.M. and hear Joey barking like one of our dogs! LOL!

Honey is my Congo African Grey parrot. She's sweet, but a very nervous bird. It takes her quite awhile to get used to new surroundings, new toys, etc.  I am finally able to start handling her after having had her for 3 months now. AGs usually are one person birds, but Honey seems to take to both my brother and I.  At first, my dad and brother were the only ones that could hold her. In her former home, she was my mom's friend's husband's companion, so mom's friend didn't bother much with her. Well, I'm persistant and was not going to have a bird that I couldn't at least hold when I wanted to, ya know? I guess my persistence paid off! Honey adores me now and I'm learning more and more just how sweet she is. Honey loves her new home! You see, she's a feather plucker, but lately, we are seeing less and less feathers at the bottom of her cage.  When she first came here, she pulled out her red tail. It finally grew back shortly after Christmas and now a 2nd red tail is growing. She's a lot more comfortable here now and just talks up a storm! We were told she doesn't talk, just whistles. We know the opposite of that! I especially love when she says "Whatcha doing, Joe Joe?" She and Joey the eclectus are known for carrying conversations across the room to one another. It's sooo sweet!

And last, as far as *MY* kiddos go...I'll get to the other two furries in the house on my next post.  But anyway! Last, but certainly NOT least, we have my little quaker parrot, Mikey.  This little guy is my heart! He and I are very much bonded, probably too much sometimes. He sleeps in the room with me at night and likes to be on my shoulders while I'm busy around the house.  I will put him on a stand sometimes, but he screams if I have ot leave the room! He says things like , "Kiss kiss", "Whatcha doing?", "Good Boy", "Ouch", etc.  Out of my three parrots, I'm a bit partial to him! ;)

There is Mikey, snacking on popcorn, a favorite amongst my fids. :)

That is all for now! I hope you enjoyed the 'first edition'! Stay tuned! :)

Des and kiddos