serenaded

my fifth grader willingly came to me (fully on his own accord) and asked if he could play a song for me on his violin. i love it!

thankful in all things...

i truly appreciate the thanksgiving season and its' reminder that we have so much to be thankful for. (actually, i think that thanksgiving gets short-changed...christmas has been set out since before october and thanksgiving is just squeezed in an aisle between halloween and christmas. grrr.) anyway...

i have been trying to be intentional and think about all that i have to be grateful for each day. big things. little things. even the stuff i don't necessarily like, but can still be grateful for. and then this week has happened.

i learned about divorce in extended family that we didn't have a clue that was coming, praying for a friend's health and tests that give more concern than answers, some tension in some relationships that you feel like you need to be switzerland to, but you feel more on one side than the other...and then i had read a book about some of the social injustices in the world and the news and...

and then the reminder to stop. breathe. remember that God is God of this world and works in all things, has a plan that is above all things, and never EVER leaves our side (even when we think the difficulties are more than we can bear.) He is King and i am grateful, thankful, appreciative that He is over it all.

brilliant thought...gone

as i was sitting in study this morning, i had a brilliant thought. it was an a-ha moment and i was inspired. during our coffee break, i thought of an entire post that i wanted to type. i was sure that i would remember it all when i would have time to sit down at the computer this afternoon.

and now...clueless. cannot remember a fragment of what it was about. i remember who i chatted with this morning. i remember the talk that the speaker gave. but not a clue of what my thought was.

lesson learned--reach in my bag, pull out a piece of paper and jot down a few words so i will not forget!!!

silly tears

i am feeling a little silly. i just spent about fifteen minutes just looking at a website of a place i would love to live near. i have scoured their website and looked for possible jobs (of which i am definitely not qualified for, but oh, it would ROCK!) and searched all of their visitor tips.

but here is where i felt silly...i was looking at their photo gallery and teared up. okay...i cried. an honest-to-goodness cry. it is just so beautiful and the idea of even looking at that every day, not just maybe once every few years...that overwhelms me...in a good way. it is a dream and what i wouldn't give to make it a reality.

is this the beginning of taking a step of lifechange? the desire to be someplace different and breath-takingly beautiful? to want to go someplace that would be a risk to my 'normal'? the thought of this place is daily (and often more than once a day). i wonder why this draw is so strong...

hmmmmm...

do i want to...

read? write? take pictures? craft? think? watch? play? build? dream? walk? talk? eat? drink? snuggle? search? clean? (ummm...not in the mood for cleaning.)

feeling indecisive but wanting to do something big.

we will see where today goes.

You are for me

be still

we are going on week number two of having sickness in some form residing at our home. first it was me with the sinus crud...finally in the end stages. next was my littlest with one of the nastiest coughs i think i have heard. it has a firm grip on him and we just cannot seem to shake it. my eldest is in an on-again-off-again state of illness...so we are just praying that it wraps itself up quickly and is over with.

i don't think any of us enjoys illness. the extra time at home is nice. the wearing of pajamas all day is a nice break. but the actual illness...not so much fun. colin (my littlest) thinks that being sick means that you get to hang at home in your jammies, watch extra tv and play video games. oh, how he has gotten to learn this week that that is not so. he has fought me intensely each day that he does not need rest. he does NOT need rest. and yet, each day as i make him purposefully be still for just five minutes...he falls asleep and naps for a few hours.

looking at him right now, peacefully sleeping on the couch...makes me appreciate these still moments. i love his energy, but i love how peaceful he can be too. i am truly hoping that these still moments help his body heal and that we are running around like crazy again soon...