One full month of 2023 has ticked away. I love this idea of living as an observer of beauty. Paying attention to details. Noticing shapes and nuances. Giving gratitude for aesthetics and texture.Our lives are stories.Our stories are a constantly changing pattern made up of a mixture of excitement and pain, new and old, adjustments […]
Because Love Works That Way
We wend our way through the show room.Keys shine, ivory gloss and polished ebony.They urge fingertips to sweep across them. The ambience of the room casts a spell, makes believe that all one would need to do is begin to play with a flourish and concert pianist music would flow forth. But I know better. […]
Light Always Pierces Darkness
Palpitating. Pounding. Penetrating.Creeping. Crawling. Corrupting.Foreboding.Disturbed. Dismayed. Discombobulated.Anxious. Agitated. Apprehensive.Troubled. Snaking around and under and through.Shrouding everything it encounters.Sinister limbs lurch and reach.Fear pounds in brave chestsAnd courage claws surfaceward.Breath breaks in scant bursts. It wears oppressive doom as an accessory.A snarl, menace, sneer as make-up.Shadows as eyeshadow to overshadow.Spines tremble. We cringe. Hearts falter.Souls shudder and […]
The Text Bible
Twelve days into 2023. I’m in a mess of organizing, re-organizing, decluttering, and hauling a few piles to Goodwill. It’s good to do. I even sorted out some books to go find new homes. 🙂 I’m always reluctant to let books go, but the need for space demands a sorting! It makes me happy to […]
My Favorite Delightful Books Read in 2022
Another year of reading is almost to the finish line.And then we get to begin again!Reading forever! 🙂I’m quite convinced my TBR and TBRR {to-be-re-read} stacks and lists are going to long outlive me. On the one hand this is so sad, on the other it’s so good to know I have so many books […]
Bits and Pieces to Delight In {December}
Friends in the Fog Sometimes the fog in the wilderness obscurs the beauty still abounding around us. At first glance a wilderness looks bleak. Feels forsaken. Even a deeper look brings confusion and lack of direction. Barrenness has a way of disorienting. Broken places pierce. Brambles, sharp with thorns, menacingly snarl.Our feet catch, knees buckle, […]
We Are Messengers
Our in-the-flesh experience begins suddenly. The world opens to us bright and cold and startling. We wail and blink, stunned by the suddenness, the shifting from warmth and comfort of a watery womb to an overstimulating awareness and newness. Lungs gasp air and breath pumps in, out, in, out. Legs and arms thrash and pump […]
Breathing Life
What breathes life into you? What offers an exhale of refreshing? Who do you breathe easier around? Here’s one of mine: Spring of 2022 brought the formation of a Book Club Society into my life. It’s been one of my very favorite parts of this year. Life-giving + breathing joy in + delight = a […]
Casting Your Character
“It’s ready!” the sweet barista sets the mug in front of me. Whip settles on the foam and caramel drizzle runs ribbons disappearing into the cinnamon latte depths. I express my gratitude, smile, reach toward the warm mug. I’m ready too. I lean in, toward the latte, toward conversation. Flickers from the gas fireplace combine with Christmas […]
The Three-Fold Gift of Waiting
The calendar days do have to creep. Agonizingly.They tick along as if they have all day, meandering, ambling, lethargic at best.I press my nose against windowglass, focus on the snowflakes falling in flutters. This was the part of anticipation I didn’t appreciate. It meant awaiting, abiding, attending.As a child, the culmination of Christmas couldn’t come quickly enough. […]
Makers Are Chance Takers
Scooping the dough from the bowl, my hands shape it into a ball, smoothing, rounding, rolling. Flour dust hovers as I sift it across the silicone pastry mat. I pat. Flatten the ball into a disc, reach for my french rolling pin. The rolling pin, made by artisans in India, sold by Mercy House, with […]
Lifeway Women’s Bible
I’m delighted to bring us another Bible giveaway! Isn’t it lovely? This yellow-gold made me so happy. It’s beautiful for Christmas, but feels like it encapsulates all the seasons! Bright daffodils in spring, sunshine yellow for summer’s heat, autumn-gold of brilliant leaves, and the gold of Christmas.The Lifeway Women’s Bible would make a meaningful Christmas […]
Explorer Bible For Kids
The second week of Advent is upon us. Sunshine beams happy out my window this afternoon. I listened to Annie F. Downs’ Advent podcast on my way to Bible study this morning. This second week focuses on peace and last week’s centers on hope. Thought-provoking and beautiful. Let’s look inside the Explorer Bible for kids!It […]
Standing Steady
The branches bob, nod, rustle. Snow lays in powdered blankets accentuating green needles. Pinecones poke their heads above this winter coat. The pines spread their graceful skirts along the snowy path. A squirrel scampers around the trunk and a quick flash of cardinal red appears above our heads. In winter landscape or summer bloom, evergreens […]
Cradling Togetherness
It beckons. Draws with magnetic pull. Urges togetherness. Lights twinkle soft and pink mixes together with gold, silver, cream, amber. We gather in the room. We bring books and knitting and hazelnut coffee laced with cream. Miss Jackie sits outside, ears perked, eyes peering in the window. We grin at her, sip coffee, gaze at […]
Walk to the Waiting Manger
With a scraping, a scuffling, a bit of entanglement my son wrestles my Christmas tree down the attic stairway ladder. The fir branches engulf him, teetering one way and another. They poke from the flimsy plastic enshrouding them. Thanking my son profusely for his grunt work, I begin circling our tree, straightening branches, fluffing fake […]
Bits and Pieces to Delight In {November}
Gazing around the circle, joy and delight tighten my throat and wrap warm right around me. Fifteen faces. Voices mingling. Eyes closed. Open palms. Raised hands. “Holy Spirit, You are welcome here. Come flood this place and fill the atmosphere. Your Glory Lord is what our hearts long for. To be overcome by Your Presence, […]
