Proverbs 31: Day 7: Hey Rachel :)

"Write a blog to encourage another beautiful woman."

Most of you know my sister, Rachel. Even though she is 29 years old, she will always be my baby sister to me! God knew what he was doing when He put our family together. My parents struggled with infertility for 6 years. They prayed and prayed for just 1 daughter.....and God blessed them with 2! God also blessed me by giving me my little sister, although I am not sure all growing up that I would have said that. It took nearly 20 years for us to get along.....and we still have our moments. BUT, you will not find 2 closer sisters in spite of our inability to "get along" sometimes!

When you put two people together, it is not likely that you will find two people as opposite as my sister and me....in ALMOST every way (oh wait, I married an opposite too :) Rachel and I have 2 very different personalities. She is quiet and more laid back, I am not quite so quiet and highly emotional. She is EXTREMELY creative. I am creative in a totally different way. I am can only copy people when she can come up with the original ideas! Check out her AMAZING work. She is truly an artist! In my opinion, her biggest spiritual gift is empathy. She has such compassion for people it is convicting to me! She also has a servant's heart that I sometimes struggle to have!

Growing up we bickered a lot. We fought all the time, most likely because our differences were magnified when we were living in the same house and eventually the same room as teenagers! But, God put this special girl in my life for some of the hardest things that I went through as a child. We both were diagnosed with a rare colon disorder. There are hardly EVER 2 people in 1 family who have the same thing. She was 8 years old and I was 10 and there was a period of time when she was in the same room as I was in the hospital, and my parents lived in the Ronald McDonald house. We both have matching scars on our stomachs....and they aren't small. Our husbands don't even notice them anymore....and I hardly do, when I look in the mirror. But, if someone has never seen my stomach and they see it for the first time, I must know that they are quite shocked! I was always happy to have someone else understand what it was like to have so many scars.

Another thing that God allowed us to share was infertility. Our battles were different....and hers were longer and harder. But, I think that we would both say we were glad that our sister knew something of what we were going through. She and her husband tried for 4 years to have a baby. Doctors were pretty grim on her prognosis......but then God overcame and now she has a beautiful son. Blake is a gift and a miracle like my kids are!

She gets overwhelmed sometimes having a husband in the Coast Guard. He gets deployed a lot and though the missions aren't usually overseas, they are long and hard. She is getting ready to be done with this latest deployment, the first one since they had Blake. But, through it, I get to see her faith in God. To watch her bloom into a wonderful mother and a wonderful woman of God has been a blessing to me.

It gets hard sometimes living so far apart from my sister. But, perhaps it is better that way....because when we are together we rarely fight ;) and the time is so much sweeter. I keep telling myself that, anyway. Plus, you can't beat the wonder of skype! Our kids will never grow up together, but I know that they will still be close and I am so thankful for that!

So Rachel, I hope that this blog encourages you this morning. You are loved, as if you didn't know that....and you are doing a GREAT job as a mommy and wife to a Coast Guardian of the Seas :)