So I’m sitting here in a place where I can see the beauty of Winter from a warm spot on the other side of the window. Thinking about yet another Table experience.
“And what do You do? What does your life consist of?”
We were sitting at a table for four. We were Four.
The restaurant is hip and happening and the choice had been theirs, the other two. It was a place that would not be my choice. Continue reading Overflowing with moderation
I know!
Unlikely combination. Well you won’t necessarily make them together or even on the same day.
Today I did
I just felt like eating a baked potato and I’ve been hankering (a strong desire to have or do something) some fresh cookies. I often have cookie balls in the freezer ready and waiting for baking.
Today I didn’t
So I baked some potatoes and mixed up a batch of cookies.
These aren’t just any cookies. They’re Double Double chocolate
Now, until just a few years ago I had no idea there were actually people out there who did NOT like chocolate. To me, the idea is pretty crazy. Oh well, you never stop learning and finding things out about the people you rub shoulders with. I like a good peanut butter cookie and raisin oatmeal too. But they don’t replace chocolate.
So I’m sharing the recipe for the Double Double chocolate with you and I hope you enjoy them.
I’m sure you already know, but just in case, I’ll remind you, that when we make chocolate chip cookies we always use either semi sweet or even better, bitter sweet chocolate chips. Just because they’re better. Sweet cookies and milk chocolate make,
way too much sweet.
You may say that this is my opinion but I must tell you I am quite sure there is a rule someplace, about semi/bitter sweet versus milk.
There must be!
Well, along with the cookies, I made some dinner for my husband. I had lunch out with a friend and just didn’t need another big meal. I did bake myself a potato though, which I ate while he ate his full dinner. We are fond of baked potatoes. Are you? My husband grew up with baked potatoes done in the microwave, which may well be the way you bake your potatoes. Yes, it’s quick and easy, but it isn’t the best.
Baked potatoes should be done in the oven, 400 degrees for an hour and twenty minutes. Or 350 for an hour and thirty minutes. Or microwave for five minutes and then bake at 350 for one hour. If you start with the microwave, poke the potato a couple of times on each side and wrap it in paper towel, first) Any of these is satisfactory and will give you an end result of crispy skin and soft inside. You cannot rush a baked potato. If you haven’t had a truly well baked one, you have missed out.
Potato cooked just about any Way is a favourite. Just give it time to cook.
Enjoy!
Well it seems I haven’t been doing a lot of cooking in recent days. There have been trips and cottage visits and restaurant visits and…
well I decided to try my hand at a Chicken Stew and let me tell you it was delicious. Here’s the thing. It has a FEW ingredients but don’t let that fact scare you off. Take a look and you will see that most are items you either have in your cupboard or maybe you will consider adding them to your Staples List. This recipe does have a bit of heat and you can add to, or subtract from the jalapeno amount. I popped into the local market mid afternoon to pick up two or three pieces to the puzzle that would become our dinner and we enjoyed the final outcome
Very Much!
Try it, I think you will Like it
It’s January. January 2015. It means a new year full of new mercies has begun. It means I am only four months in front of another birthday.
I stepped over rocks and around rocks and carefully watched that my feet stepped where the path was clear and free from danger. A valley and a few hills to maneuver, a bend and I kept my eyes down.
And then I looked up and right there
where it had been all along
the view
As happens often, God came to mind. God and this journey He has me on. Today I thought about how sometimes I look so carefully at the steps I’m taking and worrying about whether I might trip or step on something sharp, that I don’t even see the beauty and the amazingness God has put right next to those rocks. Well for goodness sake, if that isn’t a crying shame. To know the beauty is there and waiting to be enjoyed and still troubled about what might happen so I won’t lift my head to take a look, well, what a waste.
I’ve said it before. Not a single one of us knows what tomorrow holds so it’s certain we haven’t a clue what the year ahead will bring. No idea what will face us when we wake up tomorrow morning. Oh sure, we all have hardship, thorns, difficulties that are ongoing. It’s likely they, those dark spots, will still be right where they were when we went to bed last night and the night before, when we wake up in the morning. It would be nice if heartache could be erased while we sleep. It would be nice if hard decisions would suddenly become easy. It would be nice if decisions other people make, that hurt us, would be reversed. But then, we wouldn’t need those mercies God promises, would we.
You know the mercies,
God With us, so don’t fret about anything.
The Father will send the comforter to remind you of all the things I have taught you, (says Jesus)
And one of my Very Favourites
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. (Jesus said that too)
Some people get annoyed, upset with God because He doesn’t get rid of all the hard and sad in the World. Those mercies though, are poured out so we remember it’s Him in the middle of all of the goings on. Sometimes the mercies are hard to see. We need to look around carefully and ponder what He’s done, doing and potentially going to do
FOR us,
IN us
THROUGH us
He didn’t ever once tell us life would be wonderful or perfect or even smooth. He told us, nevertheless
not to worry about it and to live full of joy because He truly has overcome the bad and He’s coming to get us some day.
It’s the beginning of a new year and I am glad I believe those promises. I feel sad when I think about people all over the place who don’t believe them. Some people look so hard for something to find hope in and there sit those mercies, right in front of them, waiting to be embraced.
So we all know that at the beginning of a new year, people make resolutions. They become resolute, if they weren’t already, about things they think they should
do
accomplish
achieve
acquire
accept
gain, lose, buy, sell, read…
well the list goes on. You could add to it I’m sure. It’s possible you made a few of your own
resolutions that is, at the beginning of 2015.
I must admit, I have never as far as I can remember, made a resolution at the beginning of a year. I guess speaking the words makes it more real. Maybe we’re more likely to stick to a plan if we say it or write it down or even just tell ourselves it’s really going to happen.
I’ve been giving it some thought this year though.
2015
Wondering about being resolute and determined
I want to be both of those about the things that matter. Question is, what matters?
I went tonight to a hill, here in the desert. The sun was going down and I found a green place with a clear view to the west. It was actually a golf course and I kind of felt like a trespasser, out there where in the daylight hours, people of all shapes and sizes are doing what people do out there. It was quiet and almost dark and it was beautiful and I sat on that grass and watched the sun turn different shades of red. Well I can tell you, that view was enough to get me thinking about what is important. There is nothing like sitting out in a place where all around and as far as you can see, the view is God’s doing. It’s my very favourite thing.
I’m sitting here right now writing. I guess it’s really journaling. I’m journaling and sharing it with you, not like most journals that are private. I’m writing and sharing because well, maybe you will be encouraged by some of what I share. Maybe.
Thinking more about God and what pleases Him, thinking about people and what might be helpful to them, spending minutes and hours and maybe even days looking at the beauty attributed to God,, reading books that make me smile, listening to people who have something worthwhile to say (and asking God for the wisdom to figure out which words are worthwhile)
looking people in the eye and sincerely wondering aloud at how their journey is unfolding,, talking to God more than I do now (which as it turns out is not nearly often enough), listening more carefully to what God is telling me, eating food that nourishes my body and
filling my soul with the bread of Life which is the food that quite frankly, I crave.
These things, are the worthwhile things that I am determined to be resolute about.
Happy New Year to you and may you be resolute about what is most important. I won’t tell you what that is, but if you listen, God will tell you.
Well, it seems about now, those of us who enjoy writing and like to share what we consider to be words of wisdom, have lots to say.
It’s that time of year.
You know, when amongst the hustle and bustle, we wonder about it.
Christmas.
spending, eating, giving, Pondering the negative twist of Consumerism.
Feeling guilt about too much shopping, too much chocolate, lack of sleep, too much talk and not enough
Stillness.
We reflect upon our memories of Christmases past. Happy Memories.
Or Not
Today, a few of us were sitting around a table preparing an event in honour of a new mom. Before we got to doing what we were there for, the greeting of the season passed between us.
Merry Christmas
A comment was made that most of us have heard before, A Not uncommon reply to the M.C. greeting.
Unfortunately it is not Merry for some and we all agreed wholeheartedly, knowing the truth of it.
Every beautiful, happy, celebratory event has the potential to be anything but.
It just happens. For one reason or for another reason.
Christmas though, the celebration of the birth of the Saviour, brings strong feelings of happy or sad or even depression. Broken hearts, difficult families, financial strains, emptiness, loneliness, are the sad reality of Christmas, for more people than we think.
Joy is part of the bouquet of fruit that God says we are to BE. We are to BE joyful, along with loving, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle, self-controlled. When we feel like it and when we don’t.
If only it wasn’t so hard, To Be what we are intended to Be.
Thorns.
Prickly, painful, aggravating, troublesome, tormenting and
sent for a purpose.
Paul was a hard worker. Gave his life following Jesus, showing the fruit he preached about. He had a thorn and nobody knows the particulars about it. I know enough about thorns though, to have an idea of the pain he endured, living with the one God saw fit to bless him with. Paul said he had asked God to take it away and God said No.
Where in the World do we ever get the idea that God will make our lives easy and free from hardship? Certainly not from his guidebook, His instruction manual, His Love letter to us.
God told Isaiah that even before the people cried out He heard them. While they were still speaking He would answer.
We are His creation, made in His image. From the beginning, His chosen ones have suffered and lived and died and cried out to Him for help.
He has always listened, at the ready to wrap His arms around and walk alongside.
Thorns make us dependent upon
HIM.
I have a thorn.
Oh it isn’t anything near as bad as some people live with. It isn’t sickness, or abuse, or chronic pain, or an empty stomach when I go to bed.
My thorn is
Darkness. Gloom. Melancholy and some refer to it as
Depression
Stormy weather for no reason.
The sun shines and that prickly, thorny, dark cloud rolls in, from pretty much nowhere. Sounds insignificant but believe me, I can get fixated on that pesky thorn to the point where I forget Completely
About Joy and the other fruit.
I start to concentrate on the grey and gloom and before you can say storm cloud, that joy joy joy down in my heart has vanished.
Joy is a choice
Bloom where you are planted
Be anxious for nothing
Just the time I don’t feel like praying is the very time I need to throw myself down at the foot of the cross. My thorn is different from yours, nothing like the ones in the crown eventually worn by the man who started out as the baby in the manger, but I can tell you it hurts like crazy. It’s part of my life. Likely will be forever, as long as I’m here.
I have been blessed, abundantly. Far above and beyond and that thorn of mine, when it rolls in, blinds me and binds me and robs me of the joy that is actually Mine. It’s mine because of the gift.
The greatest gift.
The baby, perfect and sinless, came.
He came so that even though there are thorns here in this World, His Joy could be mine. it could be yours.
Maybe you do a good job of hiding your thorn. Maybe you live fully, wholly, despite it.
If I can admonish you, encourage you today, this advent season, let it be with this.
Don’t let your thorn rob your joy. Carry on. Talk to God about it. Pour your heart out to Him. I can tell you chances are big that He won’t get rid of it for you. He won’t give you a life free from thorns. They bring you to that place where you kneel before Him and tell him what He already knows. You are sad, sick, weary, angry…needy.
He won’t take it away but He will do something better. he will remind you that He will never leave you. He will never turn His back and tell you to manage on your own. He will give you peace along the way. You can do it. We can do it. I can do it.
He will Do it.
He has done it.
Your joy is your choice.
I have so many favourite Christmas songs but this is one that brings me to my knees.
The babe in a manger
His life for ours
Love all encompassing
His Love is
More
Memories make for fascinating conversation. You likely have some great ones.
Maybe you have some sad, unspoken, even regrettable
ones.
It’s ok
I do too
Have good ones and sad, unspoken, even regrettable
ones. They all get mixed up together. Good and not so good. God can take all of the mixed up good and bad and do remarkable, even miraculous things with it.
It’s Sunday evening. Not late really, but
dark.
I made us, him and me, just two of us
muffins and fruit salad. Not just any muffins. This is a recipe from the past.
Thirty two years ago just about right now, we, the two of us, were new together. Far from home. That was before my heart adjusted to this place. Before I could think of calling this new land HOME. It was just beginning to turn cold and we lived in a dark place, in our hearts and in a little basement that was dark most of the time and he was learning how to do what he does so well and I was
well, I was learning to be grown and joy filled and God was showing me what it meant to Bloom Where I was Planted. I wanted Him to plant me back, where He had transPlanted me From. He said
No.
He took years to patiently show me, where He chose was better. Oh I have stomped my feet and that is certain. Back then, at the beginning of the learning to be a wife and then a mother, I decided to attempt some traditions,
Some “we always” for us.
I look back now and wonder at the miracle of trying and succeeding and failing and trying again and some ideas didn’t work and others stuck.
One of those ideas was for a Sunday evening refreshment, informal lunch.
You see, where I came from,
not geographically but historically, my upbringing, my original family, we did things in a different way.
Well, maybe not different from how you did it but different from how it’s done now. Our family, the preacher’s family, went to Sunday School and then worship service and then we came home to our Sunday meal. For a few years we lived in that little community surrounded by farmer’s fields. We walked to church and walked home and my brother was sort of shy. He was a middle schooler then and he would walk home first. When we finally got back to that little house because some of us have not changed much and even then we liked to stay until there was nobody else to talk to, until everybody else had gone home to their own Sunday meal,
he, that brother, had the potatoes boiling on the stove. The roast beef or roast chicken that our mother had put into the oven before we walked to church that morning, would be ready to pull out of the oven. We ate, we cleaned up, we rested, one of us wrote letters to her loved ones living a whole country away. We had a light snack and then went back to church for evening service. Sometimes there was a Fellowship time after but if not, we would come home and eat toast and drink tea and go to bed.
That was Sunday. It was good. It was simple. It was quiet. It was love.
We don’t do it that way anymore but back 32 years ago, at our beginning, we still had our meal at lunch time. Sometimes we went to Swiss Chalet, when we could afford it and sometimes we would come home to the roast I had managed to get into the oven early. In the evening we had a snack. Something light. It was sometimes muffins, sometimes biscuits(scones but in the 80’s they were more often called biscuits)sometimes grilled cheese and most often with fruit salad. As we welcomed little ones and they joined in our tradition of a big lunch and small dinner, we continued. One of my husband’s very favorites and one he asked for regularly over the years, was this one I am sharing with you tonight. They didn’t really have a name. They were just The Good muffins.
I am calling them Muffin Scones and I made them tonight along with a fruit salad. They are still a hit and I was told that if I made them again, they would be well received. I wonder if my little ones would still like them. I think I will check one of these days when they come back,
come home.
The senses were created for us, by Him,
God,
for our pleasure.
So kind of Him. Really.
Memories are brought back from the archives of the past, to here and now
when I smell, or taste, or see, or hear.
When it happens I am thankful. Even the ones that cause one more crack in my heart, I know they have been
pebbles, boulders maybe, on the journey God chose for me.
As I often do, I am listening now to
music.
Right this minute I am hearing Steven Curtis Chapman sing about loss and heartbreak and he is wondering as he sings, about God and His choices.
He says We don’t understand God’s higher ways
And I agree but wonder if the hardships from my past and within my memory are God’s higher ways or my foolish ones.
Whichever
He is so good to redeem my foolishness and make it into something beautiful.
Steven is also saying that Without this hope in Jesus there’s no way we could survive.
I know people who say those words through tears gliding down their faces. Those who have
lost
children or jobs or husbands or friends.
Just this week I said to someone that the thing about sad and hard is that mine might look not so bad to you and yours might look not so bad to me. We all know though,
that it is.
Whatever causes hurt or sad or weary or broken or desperate
hearts
knocks us over. Can appear disastrous.
As much as we wish,
we cannot heal each other’s hearts. I told this friend that it’s okay though.
God made and holds and heals and embraces
hearts
Traditions are good as long as we hold them in open hands. It’s okay to do it differently. Things change and even so, to try something from
Back then
can bring back good memories and good memories are a gift. Dig deep. Are you sad? Are you full of Joy? God has done great things.
God says that we don’t understand Him. That’s because He is God. We don’t need to know everything.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD.
For I, the LORD your God, hold your right hand; it is I who say to you, “Fear not, I am the one who helps you.”