Morning, folks.

Happy Friday!  Last night we had a friend in town, so we went out to dinner.  We hit up a restaurant that I haven’t been to in forever:

I seriously haven’t patronized a Red Robin since college, which was before I was a little more conscious about nutritional and healthy eating.  But I was pleasantly surprised to find a little corner of their menu labeled “Customize Your Order” with a ton of options for free substitutions!

A lot of places charge extra for swapping out things like bottomless fries for bottomless veggies.

I got the whole wheat bun (it was a tie between that and the lettuce-wrap), with the veggie burger, and I upgraded to sweet potato fries!  (A treat for me, since making them at home never turns out the same).

(Also, I’m not a vegetarian, I just had had plenty of meaty protein for lunch, so I opted to try out the Gardenburger.  It wasn’t to shabby, coming from a meat-lover :)

FITNESS
I was up with the rest of ’em at 6am this morning and heading to the gym through Chicago’s wintery snow.  My brosef-in-law, hubs, and myself traded off picking an ab exercise until we were feeling the burn…  Then we repeated the circuit. ;)

FOOD
It was our bro’s birthday today, so we took him out for breakfast to an old-school, out-in-the-sticks, Ma & Pa’s kind of restaurant:  Red School Café.

It’s actually an old, one-room school house turned restaurant.  Very quaint.  We like visiting diners like these when we have the chance; they just don’t exist in more urban areas where everything is more chain and hipster, (like when we lived in San Diego).

I had a breakfast sandwich, made right in front of us, behind the breakfast bar.

(Jason got to it before I could take a picture. I’m quite used to opening my eyes after praying to a Jason-sized bite missing from my meal… Now we hold hands while thanking God for the food).

Happy Birthday, Tommy!

FAITH
During today’s reading I came across this in Titus:

“People who follow Christ should not have unproductive lives.  They must learn to do good by helping others who have urgent needs.”  -Titus 3:14

I like to think that I often help people when the opportunity arises, but I would say that most of those needs aren’t “urgent.”  I think to find people with truly urgent needs, we’d have to dig a little deeper and actually reach out to those kinds of people.  It takes being intentional and visiting shelters or food pantries or teen mom centers, etc.  Or keeping an extra eye open for friends or co-workers that are struggling to make ends meet, buying groceries, affording a babysitter.  It definitely isn’t the most convenient thing in the world, but something that Jesus requires we make a priority.

I’m going to challenge myself to meeting an urgent need before the month is through.  That’s only a week away, but I trust that God will provide a window of opportunity.  Feel free to hold me accountable.

QUESTION OF THE DAY
Have you met any “urgent needs” lately?