I've Learned How To Crochet!

I've been looking for a new hobby.  Something relaxing, and yet productive.  My friend Shanna crochets scarves, and so I purchased some yarn, a crochet hook and took a 5 minute lesson.  The scarf pictured above is the result!  Pretty good for my first project.

The scarf needed a hat, so I went to youtube and found an instructional video from the Crochet Geek.  It took 4 attempts to figure out the first step.  Thankfully, undoing your mistakes in crochet is a snap.  I'm just glad the yarn was able to handle it.  I kept at it and the result is pictured above.

My kids are now making requests for hats!  So cool! My daughter Rachael (pictured above) wants a red one and a black and white one.  I'm excited to learn more stitches and make more things.  The crocodile stitch looks really fun.

Choose Joy

"Be Joyful Always."  - I Thessalonians 5:16

For the past nine or ten years I have worked as a peak employee at Lands' End.  My job consists of taking garments, towels, sheets. luggage and Christmas stockings after they have been monogrammed and ensuring they are neatly trimmed, folded and placed in bags for shipping.

One of the wonderful benefits they give to peak employees is the use of their activity center year round.  My husband plays basketball there in the mornings and my kids enjoy the pool and work-out equipment.  I'll have to admit to you that for many years, my attitude has been less than stellar.  I tended to complain a lot.  This year, I determined to work with joy and NOT complain.

I did things like try to imagine the reactions of the people who opened their Lands End' gifts, posted facebook posts about treating the items with loving care, and intentionally focused on smiling more and working hard while being pleasant and interested in my fellow co-workers. 

Choosing a joyful and grateful attitude made a difference.  I actually enjoyed working there...some of the days.  It really is true...joy is a position of the heart and a choice.

Christmas Pictures

We had a great time with Brian's side of the family on Saturday.  Traditionally, family photos are taken.  Our picture turned out...well, it makes me smile.  :0)  Enjoy.

Trust and the Surrendered Will

"Many who have surrendered their wills to God are still anxious to carry out their own plans and ambitions, and are greatly vexed when their plans are thwarted."  - James Gilchrist Lawson

Trust, according to the dictionary, "is reliance on the integrity, strength, ability, surety, etc. of a person or thing; confidence."   I say I trust God, but often it doesn't look like how this definition describes it to be.  Instead, when a problem presents itself, I lay out a plan, then pray and ask God to follow the steps I have carefully put into place.  When it doesn't work out the way I had hoped, I become "greatly vexed."

As I look back on my life, I am deeply grateful that God didn't follow my plans.  So often, I didn't see the whole picture, and what I wanted would not have been what was best.  How much better it would be to approach each day with hands open, my will surrendered and my heart willing to follow God's lead. 

That's the challenge - to be still enough to listen and be willing to let God lead.  He is absolutely trustworthy, and because of this, I can abandon my will to His.

When Little Becomes Much

Cassie and her family know first-hand what it like to go without.  Relocating to Dodgeville to care for Cassie’s mom, they found themselves homeless after she passed away from pancreatitis.  Camping became a way to survive for Cassie and her young family.  “It was really rough, we didn’t have a fridge, cooler or stove…it drained us emotionally, physically and lowered our self-esteem.  It’s hard to look for work when you come home to a tent and don’t have clean clothes.” 

I asked Cassie how the experience of being homeless changed her.  She stated that she was almost grateful for what had happened.  “It puts a whole new outlook on life and what we have.  I feel for other people who are in those kinds of situations…it opened my eyes that while we were camping, we were fortunate to have a tent, blankets and some cookware.” 

Cassie and her family began to attend HVCC later in the summer of 2011.  Things began to turn around as both her and her husband Bo found employment.  One Sunday she learned about Feed My Starving Children and felt compelled to act.  God has gifted her with a talent for cooking and baking.  She looked out at her father’s farm fields, filled with pumpkins nobody wanted and decided that turning them into pies and selling them was one thing she could do to save the lives of starving kids.

“Pumpkin pie is easy and everyone loves having them over the holidays.  I wanted to be able to do something that would actually benefit someone else and save a life.”  She determined that she would make 100 pies, sell them at $10.00 a piece and provide 4,000 meals for kids in need.  “I had to do it, I felt compelled.  The pictures of starving children are heartbreaking.  I have dealt with not knowing how to feed our family, I’ve been there.”

Making 100 pies was a huge task, and to keep herself motivated, Cassie would write notes to herself.  On the outside of bags filled with pumpkin pie filling she would write, “This bag will provide 240 meals for starving children. If you wonder why I’m doing this, look at the number and you’ll have your answer.”  It was a lot of hard work, but when I asked her if she would do it again she said, “I can’t wait to do it again actually – but next year, I would like to set a higher goal.”  She looks forward to recruiting others to help her with preparing the pumpkin, baking pies and donating ingredients. 

Cassie is a living example of what God can do with someone willing to offer what they have.  She saw a field of unwanted pumpkins and created delicious pumpkin pies.  God has gifted you in unique and special ways.  You also have the power to impact those around you.  It’s not necessary to have a lot, but it is vital that you give what you have.  In God’s hands, your little can become much.

It's the intangibles...

Here it is, Thanksgiving Eve.  My heart is full,  I am surrounded by amazing people and been blessed with 5 healthy, beautiful children and a husband who has been my best friend for over 21 years.  I love the Thanksgiving holiday because it is just about being together and enjoying each other around a table food of delicious food.

For some reason, this year I have been irritated by all the Christmas commercials which seem to stand in sharp contrast to Thanksgiving.  Advertisers are all trying to get your attention, sow seeds of discontentment and plant thoughts that an item will bring happiness or joy.  Truth is, all that lays at the end of that trail is a pile of stuff in the trash, attic or basement.

It's the intangible gifts that we give each other that really last and bring so much happiness and joy into our lives and into the lives of others.  Imagine if everyone strove to wear the "clothes" described in Colossians.  It would truly be amazing.  This Christmas determine to give each other one of the gifts listed below - it's a gift that will last.

So, chosen by God for this new life of love, dress in the wardrobe God picked out for you: compassion, kindness, humility, quiet strength, discipline. Be even-tempered, content with second place, quick to forgive an offense. Forgive as quickly and completely as the Master forgave you. And regardless of what else you put on, wear love. It's your basic, all-purpose garment. Never be without it.   - Colossians 3:12-14

Waiting...

"True patience is the losing of our self-will in His perfect will."       Andrew Murray

Patience is probably one of the hardest virtues for me.  I'm not talking about flying off the handle with a bad temper, I'm talking about learning to wait.  Waiting is really not my idea of a good time and often instead of resting in God, I get anxious. I liked what Andrew Murray says about waiting.

"...patient endurance is our wisest course.  In waiting on God it is of infinite consequence that we not only submit, because we are compelled to, but because we lovingly and joyfully consent to be in the hands of our blessed Father.  Patience then becomes our highest blessedness and our highest grace.  It honors God, and give Him time to have His way with us."

I love thinking of patience and waiting as a way to honor God.  Instead of busying myself with useless activity just to be able to do something,  my posture should be one of expectant waiting on God.  Waiting with a good attitude, joyfully trusting in God's ability to care for things.  Then when I act, I'm doing it with the intent of following His guiding hand, instead of frantically trying to solve things on my own.