Words to Live By

 

 

 

Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him
and He shall direct thy paths.

             -- Proverbs 3:-5-6

 

 

 

picture credit
original post idea from  Christine

She Made It!

No more pillows, no more 'looks'

No more wheelchairs or stacks of books.

No more leaning, no more pain

No more surgery, or feeling drained.

No more doctors, no more ...

.

...ah, forget it -- you get the picture! She made it! Say hello to our healed up girl! 

She is busy and active, and a member of the school's winterguard team (you know, a team that does routines with flags?).  Her ever-present pillow has been retired. Woo-hoo!  This has been a long time coming (details here and here and here), and I'm SO counting this as a belated Christmas present! Life is good. ♥

Chugging Right Along...

So, how's your 2010 so far? Mine is chugging right along!

When I think of the new year,
<-----  this is the image that pops into my head. The new year has been busy, busy, busy!

I feel like I'm a passenger on a train and life is whizzing by the windows, and the train is carrying me along, like it or not!

I got a new job at church -- after 10-plus years of working with children and their leaders in Primary, I'm now in the women's organization (RS). Talk about a mind shift! I've been scrambling to learn the new duties, but I finally feel like I'm starting to get the hang of it now.

Those aren't the only changes. As my 'Words to Live By'  have been hinting, (click  here and here ) other mind-shifting changes are looming for me. Perhaps at the next station, even.

In spite of many calls and interview opportunities in the past couple of months, nothing has really panned out, and it's time to make hard decisions. I'm pretty good at making things stretch, (almost to a magical level, I was told...LOL) but it can't go on forever. Resources dwindle down, even with the tightest budgets.

Our plan of having me go to school, and then jump into a career of my choice once the Sweet Girl's flown the nest, has changed. It's time to enter the workforce now and help out the family. I am more than willing to roll up my sleeves and do what needs to be done, but privately, quietly, deep down in my soul, there is heartbreak over this.  I don't want to give up any part of my labor of love.  I could write a post all by itself on this, but I won't.  Just know that words like "infertility", "you'll never have children", "you're expecting!", "I only have one", and "Mr. H, being able to be a mother is a gift to me from heaven", and "I don't want to miss a *minute* of this!" ... are involved. Enough said.

So, I tuck these feelings away and give myself a good talking to --  I'm trying to be positive and proactive and see what's around the bend for me. The challenge will be to see if I can trust in the Lord's will, and be open to this journey -- and stop checking my ticket to see if I got on the wrong train!

I've found out by experience that when you do what's right, good things happen. Even when it's hard. I have to believe that good things are just around the bend...

Wish me luck.

picture credit

Words to Live By

 

Time does not change us. It just unfolds us.

                                               - Max Frisch

picture credit

Killing Time

The last day of 2009. Hey, there's something to celebrate, and it's not even midnight yet!

As you can tell, Mr. H and I are not sorry to see old 2009 go.

The Sweet Girl's off at a neighborhood New Year's Eve party tonight, but Mr. H and I have elected to stay home and have a special party of our own. No guests over this year. 

Best not to have witnesses.

I don't know if I can describe our 2009 without using a four (or maybe even a *five*) letter word. Tonight's all about therapy payback. The theme? Killing Time. Take that,  2009! (yeah, that would be Mr. H's pin stuck where the sun don't shine!)

We went out on a fun date earlier today, to pick our mascot for this past year. Here he is:

official 2009 mascot

Oh, the things we're gonna do to this guy at the stroke of midnight. The beatings will commence. (heh heh) We will then take a special pleasure in kicking this guy out our front door,  and slamming it behind him! Goodbye forever, 2009! It's gonna be a great night. Ya think Martha Stewart will steal my party idea?

Before you think today's all about murder and mayhem, take a look at what we did earlier this afternoon:

We made giant chocolate chip cookies, wrapped them up, and delivered a round of "midnight snacks" and New Year's best wishes to some of our favorite people here in the neighborhood.

We're very much looking forward to a new year. Bring on 2010!

:::

Best wishes to you, too --  Happy New Year!!!

Words to Live By

 

For last year's words belong to last year's language
And next year's words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning.

                                                                                   -- T.S. Eliot

picture credit

Neighbor Gift: Christmas Star

 

Way back in November, I asked our family about Christmas. I knew it was going to be a different holiday this year; the budget would be very tight --  so I asked them to fill in the blank: "It's just not Christmas without ______________."

One of the things that went on that list came from Mr. H -- it was really important to him to do neighbor gifts. So he and I put our heads together and came up with a couple of ideas we just loved -- a little nicer than usual -- and decided these would be our Christmas gifts to each other.

For our empty-nester neighbors, we made the Stress-Free Apple Crisp. We kept one bag/kit for ourselves and had it on Sinterklaas Day. Yummy! We had guests pop in that night, and I was able to offer them warm apple crisp with vanilla ice cream on the spot. I *totally* looked like some kind of Martha Stewart that night! Ha! If they only knew....I'm not telling! :-)

For our other neighbors with kids, we made this Christmas Star. The idea is that someone takes the star, does something nice for someone else and leaves this star on their pillow. Then *that* person does something nice for someone and leaves it on *their* pillow....get it? A whole lotta nice going on during the month of December.

I copied this idea from a scrapbooky book I found at the library. That's where I got the text for the tag. To make the tags, I picked up the kind you see in the picture at the office supply store and used an old-fashioned font for the words and then mod-podged it all to make it a little more sturdy. (Click on the picture to see the words more clearly.)

For the star, I went to Michael's and picked up some flat paper-mache star ornaments. I looked and looked for Christmas scrapbook paper to decorate the star with  that would go along with what I had in mind, but I could never find it. So... I made some myself:

Christmas words: ...believe...merry and bright...star...celebrate....Savior...service
...good tidings of great joy...peace...love...wonder.... you get the picture.

I painted the stars to match the color used in my words, turned the paper over and cut out a star shape. I antiqued it a little, and then attached it and mod-podged the whole thing. Later, we packaged them up and went out together as a family early in December delivering stars and wishing all our neighbors (who were are *very* thankful for) a very Merry Christmas.

There have been many variations on this idea -- you don't have to go to the extra effort I did this year -- I've seen it in elementary schools with simple cut-out foam stars and a little note; here's one that was delivered to us a few years back. It looks like a magic wand! Cute!

This Christmas star was a fun project for me. A labor of love.

:::

Gifts of time and love are surely the basic ingredients
of a truly merry Christmas.
                                                                    ~ Peg Bracken

The neighbor gifts, the 12-day nativity -- all of these projects were ingredients of a merry Christmas for me. ♥

I hope you and yours are having fun December days -- Merry Christmas!!