Sunday Meanderings

Thank you, Microsoft Clipart


FOOD FOR THOUGHT - A DEVOTIONAL

A STATUE OF LIBERTY

If the Son makes you free,
you shall be free indeed.

~~ John 8:36 ~~

During the national observance of the one-hundredth anniversary of the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor, I was struck by the great emphasis on the number of immigrants who had often left everything behind. Coming to America with nothing but the clothes on their backs, they risked their lives for something they valued more highly than everything they had left behind: freedom. They did not take their adopted country's hard-won freedom for granted - and neither must we.

Their experience is a picture of what we must do when we come to Christ. We must forsake our allegiance to this world, leave behind all that it offers, and become citizens of a new kingdom - the Kingdom of God. His statue of liberty is in the form of the Cross.

The statue in New York Harbor lifts her lamp "beside the golden door." The statue of liberty on that hill outside Jerusalem lights the way into eternal life.

The Reverend Billy Graham in Hope for Each Day - Words of Wisdom and Faith, J. Countryman, Publisher


THE WEEK IN REVIEW

I love short weeks like this past one. Krissy was off on Friday so I had no grandchildren that day. Of course they came down here to visit, but she was with them and that's different. Short weeks keep things interesting, don't you think?

Happy Birthday, yesterday, to America AND to my mom. We're a holiday family. My mom was born on the Fourth of July, my youngest brother was born on New Year's Day and my youngest brother-in-law was born on Christmas Eve. The next birthday we celebrate is Krissy's. She'll be thirty on the 17th. I have a thirty year old daughter. Unbelievable. Sigh.

You know, I mentioned in the previous post that my sister Bev and I email each other about six times a day, every day, every single day. I also mentioned that she's kind of stranded at her lake house in Texas, without connections to the outside world, including Internet. So in addition to the week seeming strange because it was shorter, it seemed even stranger to not talk to my sister constantly. I haven't heard from her since she called me Thursday morning to let me know she can't come visit next week. It seems like something's missing, not talking to her every day.

If she ever gets this move completed, and believe me that's a big "if," she now plans to come visit early this fall. So although we were both disappointed that next week's visit isn't going to happen, when she comes out this fall she can bring my mom with her. My mom couldn't have come with her next week - she had knee replacement surgery two weeks ago. But she'll be able to travel this fall. So see? More lemonade. :-)

Lately, I haven't talked about what I'm reading nearly as much as I used to, but you can bet that I'm still reading every spare moment I can find, which is mostly first thing in the morning (before Avery arrives) and last thing at night, in bed.

Since I got my library card a few months ago, I always have an extremely optimistic stack of books waiting to be read. Honestly. I check out eight books at a time, just because I can, knowing I'll have to renew at least half of them. Do you do that?

Anyway, Debbie Macomber is a favorite author of mine. Her books aren't rocket science. They're just very pleasant, entertaining and relaxing. I love Debbie Macomber.


But I LOVE Dorothea Benton Frank. She's one of the very few authors whose books I actually buy in hardback and collect. Jodi Picoult and Nicholas Sparks are a couple of others. I may or may not ever see all my Jodi books again. I turned both my daughters on to her. They borrowed all my books, traded back and forth with each other and then asked me if they could loan them to their friends and you know how that goes. My Jodi books are all over creation right now. Sigh.

But look! Dottie Frank has a brand new book. And I bought it. Yes I did. I may take all my library books back and just start over again, after I read my new Dottie book. She writes exclusively about the low country in South Carolina and I swear, every time she writes a new book, I tell Rob we simply must leave Colorado and move to South Carolina. She makes me want to be there. If you've never read one of her books, she's hysterical. I'll bet she'd be a really fun person to know in real life.

Remember when Krissy and Mandy and I all went through our Twilight frenzy? All three of us read all four books - all three of us bought Twilight - and all three of us are anxiously awaiting the second movie. So naturally Krissy decided to get addicted to the whole True Blood series. So here we go again. She's passing her books to me as she finishes them and I'll be sending them to Mandy. For the record, if you read Twilight, let me tell you, it's baby fiction compared to the True Blood books. Good grief! Steamy!


A FEW UPDATES

I finally finished Mandy and Aaron's advent calendar. I started this for them two years ago, just before I decided to open my on line shoppe. I actually finished one of these for Krissy and Andy (really, for Cameron and Avery) and started the second one but I put it away to make a boatload of burp cloths, Santa stars and sock monkeys. It was bothering me, so I got it out and I finished it. I see absolutely nothing weird about posting Christmas photos on the Fourth of July, so.....


If you click on this photo you can see all the little toys that are hanging in the toy shoppe windows. Those were the part that would drive most people nuts, but I love working with miniatures. I have several one-inch scale doll houses that I built, stored in my garage, to prove it. Sigh.


Here's a closeup of the bottom of the calendar. It's very sweet and the photo doesn't really do it justice. It feels very good to have this finished and ready to give to Mandy when she arrives for a week long visit, next Sunday. (I.cannot.wait.to.see.my.daughter.)

The moment I finished hers, I started a nativity advent calendar for myself.


So really, this shouldn't be surprising.

I probably should have known this was eventually going to happen. When it finally reached the point that my wrist burned all the time, day and night, and almost had me in tears, I broke down and bought this wrist support. It's designed for people with carpal tunnel of course. And I'm pretty sure that's what's going on here. The wrist support helps immensely. I even sleep in it.


On a much happier note, check this out. I do believe I'm growing a tomato! I promised updates and here you go. Look how big it's getting. I'm being so careful with this first tomato, you'd die laughing. I've gotten all kinds of advice on how to grow perfect tomatoes and I'm following it.

This is beyond exciting to me. Every time Rob sees this tomato he says, "Fry the bacon!" LOL I have more than one tomato growing but this is the first one that's going to ripen so it's extremely special.

You'd have to be me to appreciate how special this is. :-)


OBSERVATIONS

So 10,925,331 people play Farm Town on Facebook. I'm the "one" at the end of that number. My daughters got me involved in this game and it's addictive. I'm not kidding. I haven't been addicted to a computer game since Spider Solitaire, which I've been way over for ages.

I'm still not a whiz at Facebook. I'm not doing a whole lot with it until Mandy gets here next Sunday and shows me some things.

Rob and I didn't do anything special at all yesterday. He worked in the yard all throughout the day. I worked on my nativity advent calendar and sat quietly and read. Mostly, we just enjoyed a day of complete peace and quiet because really, our days are usually not peaceful and quiet. We live three doors down from our grandbabies. :-)

We had everything for a cookout and decided to heck with it. We've discovered a new delight. I buy each of us our favorite half gallon of Breyer's ice cream (mine is coffee, his is English toffee). And we do completely away with the bowls. We just sit in front of the TV with our ice cream and spoons and eat it right out of the carton. Because we're old and live alone and we can do that. Rob says not bothering with a bowl is very liberating. LOL

Three guesses what we're having tonight!

I hope you're all having a nice holiday weekend. Ours has been great. Hot and dry and very fourth of Julyish. Next week everything gets back to normal.

But...after a very normal week, my daughter Mandy and my sweet son-in-law Aaron arrive next weekend. You know what I love? I love always having something special to look forward to.

Happy new week, everyone!