36 Blessings
Today I am 36. I started a new birthday tradition in 2009, and have done it each year since. And of course I couldn’t resist doing it again in 2012.
This was a good exercise this year. I have been a bit down and frustrated with how under the weather we have been. This was a good reminder of all the blessings I have.
Some of the blessings are the same, as they always will be. But as with each year, things change and there are new blessings.
So here is this year’s list of 36 Blessings…
1. a gracious and faithful God
2. my husband who works hard everyday to provide for us
3. Grace- for her sweet spirit, her imagination, her compassion
4. Owen- for his determination, his rough and tumble boyishness, his strength
5. my parents- always supportive in any way they can be
6. my sis- I only see you every six months, but it is always as if no time has passed.
7. my in-laws (the whole lot of them)
8. 2 Timothy 1:7 (NKJV) For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.
9. that my husband, my mom and my sister are my best friends
10. that I have a small core group of friends who I can always turn to
11. that overall my children are healthy- we have had a rough two months and we are still in the thick of it (germs that is) but it’s just normal childhood stuff, nothing serious.
12. my job. I love my co-workers and my boss. I love that it is a safe and caring place and that Owen is just down the hall, at least for two more months:(
13. that I am able to be home with my kids after school, I can get Grace at the bus, when they are sick I can be home with them and I don’t feel too guilty about missing work.
14. that my only living grandparent (Dad’s Mom) just celebrated her 92nd birthday earlier this month
15. that our BELOVED Oregon Ducks went to and won the Rose Bowl. What a fun game to watch and what a fun season this has been. GO DUCKS!!
16. that we live in a safe community
17. Grace’s school- she is loving it this year and seems to be blossoming and learning a lot
18. that I have found a welcoming Bible Study group that I have been a part of in the last year.
19. that I am going to be an aunt again this summer
20. Isaiah 26:30 “You will guard him and keep him in perfect and constant peace whose mind [both its inclination and its character] is stayed on You, because he commits himself to You, leans on You, and hopes confidently in You.”
21. a couple of super nice neighbors that I have enjoyed having nearby
22. health insurance – that we have it, and it is sufficient…if we had to pay out of pocket for Owen’s asthma medicine each month it would cost us $2600…instead we pay $85…such a blessing!
23. that food is plenty for us – Proverbs 30:8 “Give me neither poverty nor riches,” he asked, “but give me only my daily bread.”
24. that we have a nice library in our town- didn’t have one in the last place we lived, libraries are cheaper than buying all your books!
25. that Grace loves to read. I love finding her new books that I think she will like and then hearing “I love this book! I knew I would love it when I read the first sentence!”
26. Mochas…yes, this will always make the list!
27. that Danny and I have been able to reduce our debt and are on the same page with our goals and have made a big dent this past year
28. the kiddos in my classes at school-we have smaller classes this year and I feel like I have bonded with a couple kids in particular and it has been fun
29. that my sister-in-law is getting married this summer to a wonderful man, and the kiddos will be flower girl/ring bearer, they will be so cute!
30. that we have two cars that run and have just been blessed with a vehicle that will make Danny’s commute much nicer
31. that Owen asked me if I was 13. When I said “no”, his next guess was 14, not 90, or 52 like one of the kids in my class
32. I have enjoyed our home in a new town that is a little ways away from HOME, but HOME is just a quick drive down the road
33. watching Owen have his first best friend
34. James 1: 2-3 (NIV) Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.
35. that my little man is ok after a trip to Urgent Care and a high temperature yesterday. He likes to keep Mommy on her toes…
36. another year with my sweet family
The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore
“The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore”
on Vimeo from Moonbot Studios
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Owen and I watched this short little film today called
Absolutely enchanting. Books are so powerful.
Reminded me of the first few minutes of “Up”…
Irony…
So, I apparently lost a week on the blog…oops:)
Maybe next week…
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Danny and I decided to open a credit union account. Back in the end of December (the 27th to be exact) I went in to one and opened an account. Ordered checks. Ordered debit cards.
As of Tuesday, nearly 5 weeks later, we had not received our debit cards. We have been dancing between two accounts because we had transferred direct deposit, bill pay, etc. to our new account but still need a debit card for so many things.
Well, as of today guess how many debit cards I have?!?!?!
8. eight. EIGHT.
Seriously.
Four arrived yesterday and another four today, by Fed Ex.
It’s funny how something you lack can be so frustrating. Ahh, but an excess of the same thing can also be a bit frustrating just a few days later…
It makes me want to go out and use them a bunch, but unfortunately, 8 debit cards doesn’t mean 8 times the amount of money…
Finding Some Rhythm
As some of you can tell, I have been a bit absent from the blog lately.
Not sure what is going on, but I just haven’t had the posts running through my head like I used to. I am sure a lot of bloggers go through periods of time where it just doesn’t seem like there is much to say…That is where I am…
My mind used to think in posts, or I’d grab the camera knowing that I would want to post pictures of what was happening. I haven’t felt that way in a couple of months.
The stories are a bit different with an almost 5 and almost 8 year-old (yi.ke.s) but I still want to record their little lives! I’ve been blogging for almost Owen’s entire life and I know what has been written down will be priceless to them when they are older as it is to me already.
So I am not sure how this will translate…I am not sure if I can be “good” and do posts every day like I did for so long…I just know I also don’t want to feel guilty when I don’t post…cause that sure won’t help!
I am going to start by documenting Christmas…Our decorations are down…and it’s practically spring…maybe I should post some Christmas pictures/stories?
Hang in there with me?
Monday Links for Labor Day
Internet reads I’ve enjoyed lately:
Johann Hari: How to Survive the Age of Distraction In his gorgeous little book The Lost Art of Reading – Why Books Matter in a Distracted Time, the critic David Ulin admits to a strange feeling. All his life, he had taken reading as for granted as eating – but then, a few years ago, he “became aware, in an apartment full of books, that I could no longer find within myself the quiet necessary to read”. He would sit down to do it at night, as he always had, and read a few paragraphs, then find his mind was wandering, imploring him to check his email, or Twitter, or Facebook. “What I’m struggling with,” he writes, “is the encroachment of the buzz, the sense that there’s something out there that merits my attention.”
-What I Learned About Mothering from Millionaire Matchmaker “When joy and peace guide me in my mothering, my heart is set free to enjoy my family. It takes faith to keep walking in that direction, even when we fall short and feel like we are failing.”
-Grateful for Home “My hope is in heaven. And being sure of this makes it all the easier to be content with the myriad earthly homes God has given me… They’re all temporary, even if I live in this new one of ours for the rest of our life.”
-Top Ten Ways to Manage Your Family Vacation My favorites are #10 and #6
-The Great Evangelical Endangered Species “Listen friends, no matter what age or experience we are in life, we need old people sitting in our pews. We need them. We need to learn from their wisdom. We need to engage their stories and honor the value of their history. Do we have to always agree with them? No. Do we have to let the old rule how we do all things. Of course not. But we must honor them. We must respect them. We must create healthy spaces for them to worship God among us, and not in some separate building as a part of the “non contemporary” service.”
Beverly Cleary at 95: A Talk With the Author Who Created Ramona Quimby
Q: As a former librarian, how do you think libraries can or should respond to the declining resources and shifts in usage today?
A: That’s something I can’t solve, but I don’t think anything will ever replace the pleasure of holding a book and turning its pages.
I’m A Big Fan of Blogs: Jones Design Company
” My best friend says that blogs are like pornography for women… It all looks so good and attractive, is inspiring and encouraging {even addicting}, but you often walk away feeling inadequate, let down and unsatisfied with your true reality.”
ETA:
Looking Back at Life’s Decisions, Large and Small
“God can teach you what you need to know either here or there,” she said, a shocking idea to someone who was sure God had one and only one specific Perfect Will for you, and you’d better hit that Will dead center, or else.
Elephant in the Room
I just saw this post on the Inspired Room (that refers to this original post) and I just had to post a picture of my elephants in the room…Please excuse the quality of the picture:(
This little wooden family of elephants sits on my windowsill in the hallway at the bottom of our stairs. It is between the doors to our laundry closet and under-the-stair closet.
My in-laws brought these back for us from Niger. They had traveled there to visit my sister-in-law when she was in the Peace Corp a couple of years ago.
Year-round School
I found this article the other day. It has some interesting points about year-round school and the US’s (in)ability to compete globally….
My favorite quote…
“We used to be a nation of entrepreneurs and trailblazers, but now we’re just dogmatic consumers. We want problems to be fixed but we don’t want the solution to be an inconvenience. So we look for silver bullets, which in our culture usually means tossing more money at things. But guess what? We spend on average about $30,000 more per student than the other Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries, yet the best we can do is middle of the road.”
I added the boldface in the middle of the paragraph. I think those lines in particular sum up so many of the problems in our country. Whether it is in our education system, our government, or even what we have to have to live our daily lives, money always seems to be our first answer.
I certainly don’t know if year-round school is the answer, but I do think 180 days out of 365 doesn’t seem to be cutting it!
Technical Difficulties
I have been AWOL for a few days as we have been experiencing some technical difficulties with our phone/internet.
It is finally up and running so…hopefully I can get my act together and post:)
‘yote Sighting
I know the above picture isn’t great, actually it’s terrible…but just below the green grass and slightly to the left of the middle is a black thing…
It’s a COYOTE!
Our neighbor spotted it one morning so as we were going to the bus stop we drove around to take a look. This field is behind the houses that are right across the street from our house. This guy was wandering around looking for a snack until we left around 8:40.
I was surprised to see him out so late and he didn’t seem to be bothered by us at all. Although he didn’t get very close to us. He seemed to be about the size of a German Shepherd. After we saw him we stopped back by the house and put May inside…Don’t need a repeat of poor Bob (he was a good boy!).
This was about a three weeks ago and I haven’t seen another one…I think he just hadn’t adjusted to daylight savings time…
