This tickles!

My mom sent me this and I laughed and laughed. God give me grace! And yet I'm so glad that He's equipped me through His Spirit to say more than these phrases--things like, "I'm sorry, will you forgive me?", "what a gift", "did you see what God did?", "let's pray for this situation", and other things that point my littles to Him. Enjoy!

Mist

I was driving into town by myself (that's a rarity!) this weekend and happened to really read one of the signs in front of the high school. Underneath the school name it had a given in memorial sign of someone I'd never heard of. It made me realize life really is a vapor. When that sign was erected people were remembering and mourning the loss of someone of impact, but now if we even recognize the memorial, few know the name. How quickly time passes and how soon we are truly like the grass--gone.

And yet somehow equally incomprehensible from a human perspective, God is good. Today I stumbled into a post on John Piper's blog. His son Abraham and his wife were due to have their second child yesterday. She was perfect and healthy--and on Saturday confirmed dead in the womb, probably strangled by her own cord. What sorrow God gives us and how we don't understand! But in the words of a mourning grandpa, " This seems so preventable. By God and by man. Yes. So easy. But neither man nor God prevented this. Man, because he did not know it was happening. God, because he has his wise and loving reasons that we wait to learn with tears and trust."

I don't know what God has in store for me, but I do pray that He will give me the grace to love Him more through it. Pray for the Pipers today.

Knit Wit

My little girl is learning to knit. Her Grandmother and Great Grandmother should be pleased. Her mother is!

Apple Picking Time

We went to the orchard today with some homeschool friends--what a great day! As you can see, it was quite sunny...


...and buggy! The mosquitoes were out in droves! We each picked a small bag of apples, had an apple donut and some cider, and the kids fed the animals in the small petting zoo and played at the playground.
(Notice Sissy's missing tooth--she finally pulled it out last night!)

Of course we couldn't come home without cider, honey, and a bag of wind-falls for sauce. A good time was had by all.

Thrifty

Found this fun guy at the thrift store the other day. He looks like he has a purpose,like he should hold something, but I've no idea what that would be.

Also decided that after five years the kitchen needed some curtians. I made these out of dish towels from Big Lots. The whole ensamble, rod and all, was about $13. My kind of price.

Mercy!

I've been thinking a lot about mercy lately. We beg for it. We use it as an expletive. But what is it, really, and am I a very good example of it?
I think part of my problem with mercy is that I don't really think I need it. I'm not that bad, after all. Oh, there's a huge example of my pride! (Thanks Cheri, for pointing me to Nancy Leigh DeMoss's pride test.) I seem to think I can slide by on my own goodness because I am--in my own opinion--a nice Christian lady. The truth is, just today I've been rude, self-centered, prideful, lazy, and the list goes on. And what's worse, thinking I'm above God's mercy necessarily keeps me from extending it to others. It is only when I come to grips with the ugliness in my own heart, how far I fall short of God's standard, that I can confess it, be cleansed of it, and be gentle with others as He has been with me.
I need the gospel everyday. I need to see salvation is daily not on my own merit, but on His.