These are a few of my favorite things......

COFFEE- Of all of God's wonderful creation, Coffee is for sure at the top. It makes me smile just thinking about. At bedtime, I think about how wonderful my morning coffee will taste. When I open my eyes in the morning it gets me out of bed. Mmmmmm..........

PINK- What an awesome, cheerful, feminine color. No matter where I am I always notice pretty thinks in the color pink.

FICTION ROMANCE- Not all novels are equal. It has to be excellent. (non-smutty) hint: You know it's a good one when your husband and children have been trying to get your attention for 15 minutes to no avail!

LAUGHING- The best feeling is laughing your face off until tears are streaming down your face.

CHIPS- The only thing not to love about them is calories and fat they contain. Maybe some day they will invent tasty, calorie-less chips. I'd better not hold my breath for this one. sigh

SIMON"S HUGS- It's a great feeling when that little boy wraps those little arms around my neck and squeezes and vibrates for all he's worth.

EXERCISE- For some weird reason, I do not have to force myself to exercise. I love it. That is really weird isn't it?

NATURE WALKS- My family and I go for these walks in the spring, summer and fall. Very enjoyable. (especially in the fall) It's enjoyable for so many different reasons.

This blog actually took me less than an hour. Sadly, not by much.

A final thought: For those of you that do not drink coffee- you have no idea what you are missing. I quite frankly don't know how you wake up in the morning!

HAVE AN AWESOME WEEK HOPEFULLY ENJOYING YOUR FAVORITE THINGS. TTFN

That's when I'll know I'm home

Everyone's talking about it. The Virginia Tech shootings. The media is having a hay day with it. Students are feeling unsafe in their environment. Dads and moms are holding their children a little tighter and longer. Family and friends are grieving. People are angry and trying to figure out what happened.
When I heard what had happened the first thing I did was email my brother Junior and his wife Emily. They live in Virginia and Emily happens to be a crime scene investigator. I was wondering if she had been called to the scene. Junior emailed back and said that she hadn't. He did say that they knew some people who attend VT and that he had been glued to the TV all day. My brother is normally one of those very positive people, so his response kind of surprised me. He then said that he was having a moment that he was wishing that God would come back because there was so much pain and hate in the world. He said all of this before any of the circumstances surrounding the shooting was known. It was a reaction. I must admit that even though I love living, (please believe that I do, I have another wonderful sister in law who happens to be a psychologist and I don't want her to feel worried) that I have felt the same way at different times in this life. You do get overwhelmed with the amount of pain and suffering that is in this world. When Junior emailed me this it reminded me of a song that Matt sang in church once that I love. I want to share the lyrics with you.

THERE IS A PLACE MORE PRECIOUS THAN ANY OTHER
THIS SIDE OF HEAVEN'S DOOR
A PLACE WHERE WE LOVE ONE ANOTHER
A SHELTER IN TIME OF STORM
AND THO' IT'S A TREASURE THIS HOME'S NOT FOREVER
I LONG FOR THE LIFE THAT'S WAITING FOR ME
chorus
WHERE NO ONE WILL EVER BE HUNGRY OR COLD
AND NO ONE WILL HURT OR WILL EVER GROW OLD
NO ONE WILL DIE AND LEAVE SOMEONE ALONE
THAT'S WHEN I'LL KNOW I'M HOME
verse 2
THERE IS A PLACE WHERE TRUTH WILL ALWAYS BE SPOKEN
PROMISES WILL BE BELIEVED
A PLACE WHERE YOUR HEART CAN'T BE BROKEN
AND LOVED ONES WILL NEVER LEAVE
SO IF YOU ARE LONGING FOR A PLACE OF BELONGING
THE HOME YOU'VE DREAMED OF IS WAITING FOR YOU
repeat chorus
THAT'S WHEN I'LL KNOW I'M HOME FOREVER NO PAIN OR DISEASE
ALL WILL BE EQUAL
ALL WILL BE FREE
TRUE LOVE WILL COME AND WE'LL FALL AT HIS FEET
THAT'S WHEN I'LL KNOW I'M HOME
bridge
AND FINALLY I'LL SEE WITH THE DARKNESS ERASED
NOT THROUGH A GLASS, BUT THEN FACE TO FACE......................
THAT'S WHEN I'LL KNOW I'M HOME.

One of my favorites: "Now the dwelling place of God is with men, and He will live with them. They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. Revelation 21:3b-4

Mind Your Mouth

I really have something I want to blog about but I don't have a whole lot of time. (bad combination for a slow typer like myself) I wanted to share two incidents from the two past days in our family.

Incident #1: I overheard Matt (my husband) say something to my son Simon. You need to 1st understand that Simon LOVES Matt above all others. I'm sure many of you have seen this in action! When Simon sees Matt he runs up to him and squeezes him around the neck really, really hard and vibrates with excitement. It is really cute. Matt usually says something profound and heart warming like "Hey buddy". This time when it happened Matt said something completly different. He said, "It's nice that you love me so much even with all my faults.". Tears welled up in my eyes because I knew that he had been having a kind of rotten week because of things that others had said to him. It's not that easy to catch Matt in that kind of moment and now here I am blogging about it. It really hit me though. Matt knows his faults. I know most of mine. There are times to correct and teach people. So many times though we just tear and nit pick apart about unimportant matters. I'm really tired of it.

Incident#2: Matt and I were lucky enough to get over to Fredericton for a couple of days last week to visit dear friends of ours. The last night we were there was Friday and Matt, Danielle, Simon, and I ALL got sick. Barfing and such things kind of sick. The whole night will be one we will be talking about for a while. It was very difficult to clean Danielle's throw up at 2:00 in the morning. It was on Murray and Val's mattress, sheets, blankets, comforter, both pillows, both of us. It was twice as difficult because I was very ill. Everybody (but Murray) was still sleeping. Anyhow, that is probably too much detail for some of you. That's okay though. The night was worse than that. I've gone easy on you. Wait until you hear Matt's version!! On the way home Matt stopped at Sobey's for some stomach coating medicine. While he was inside, right out of the blue, Danielle said something to me that I'll treasure forever. "Mommy, you take such good care of us when we're sick-even when you're really sick." It sounded like she was going to cry. I did. My daughter said one nice thing and it literally did make my day. Hannah would want me to say that she feels the same as well:)

So lets start the change today. We can only do it one at a time. God wants us to do it. It feels great when someone does it to you. Let's focus in on picking one another up. That's what I'm gonna do.

Ephesians 4:29- Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.

PS- Matt I love you just as much as Simon!! (warts and all!)