Picket Fences

I was browsing around the store and noticed the NOOKS had been updated since last year. Then I noticed they were updated along with every other electronic device in the same department, where people were standing in line to purchase the latest “thing” that was on sale. I shook my head wondering how soon after we left the store, with our items, that a new updated one would be on the shelf, and what we had just bought would be outdated. We lost the charger to my daughters DS and had trouble finding one that would work in her device. A very young guy who waited on us had to look up our DS on the computer and we showed him a picture of it so he could help us. Okay, it’s really not that long ago since we bought it, but… That’s how it is now. As soon as you turn your new lap top on, your new phone filled with a bunch of cool apps, or the latest game player another one is being marketed that is so much better than what you have in your hands. A person just has to have the latest ...

I cried when I heard there was a shooter at Clackamas mall. The next day I was upset because there was a lock down at Evergreen High School due to a teacher finding a rifle in a student's backpack. And yesterday... How do you react to the horrific news of young children, and the adults caring for them, being shot to death while they are in an environment that is supposed to be safe? Where children are enjoying their peers, and learning from their teachers to be able to grow into intelligent adults. How do you react to the reports of the little kids who hid in terror and the heroic efforts of the teachers to protect them and their own lives? How do you react to the news of the principal losing her life trying to stop the gunman? Or the young teacher who hid the children of her class in a closet and then stood between them and the gunmen? So utterly senseless. I have seen and heard one way people are reacting...people want answers. They want ...

This last month has been incredibly busy, with proofing two books from the Sister Blue Thread series, getting ready to participate in a conference, and holidays. Now I’m busy finishing up the third book that is due the beginning of December. During all of this time I’ve had so many thoughts I wanted to put down and share on this blog, but I didn’t find the time.   One in particular keeps bouncing around in my head, so I’m taking a few minutes before getting ready for church to share it with you. I shared the following in the break out sessions I did at the conference and then amazingly when I went to church the following day, the Pastor did a talk on the very same subject. The Bible tells us of a story, of when Jesus appeared at dawn in the temple courts, and all the people gathered around him, then he sits down to teach them. The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman who was caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to J...

Ecclesiastes 3 (NIV) 1-4 A Time for Everything There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: 2 a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, 3 a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, 4 a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance… This last weekend the rains were coming down hard. Although a true Pacific Northwestern is known to not use an umbrella all of the time, the rains this weekend caused quite a few of us to pull them out from where they’d been stored. The water was high on the roads and windshield wipers were working on high in order to have clear visibility. In life guilt, hurt, anger, or un-forgiveness can cause the road we are walking daily to be unclear. Sometimes we can hold onto things we’ve done or someone else did to us in the past and we carry it with us daily. Or we are just plain angry over things in life. Maybe we’ve been...

Boots! I love to wear boots during the fall and winter as much as I love to wear my flip-flops during the summer. When I saw this pair of boots at a consignment store I picked them up to check the size. They were a size and a half to small. Still… I put my foot in them and surprisingly, other than being a little tight, they fit. I rushed over to the mirror and admired the way they looked with my jeans. I was really liking those boots. I was tempted to buy them even though buying boots is not in my budget right now. Times are tight and buying them would have made it tighter. Still, I battled back and forth, even after my right foot started to go numb from lack of circulation. I just kept stretching my feet hoping to make the tightness go away. Then a thought drifted through my head. You’re trying to wear someone else’s shoes. I felt a bit uncomfortable with that and took them off. There was a lady looking at shoes and I asked her what size she wore. It was the sam...

Although I really love Indian summers. I miss the gentle September breezes we normally get as summer turns into fall. A few days this week, instead of gentle breezes, we experienced some October wind. The sun may have been shining, but the air was chilly and the wind was strong. When I walked to my car it was raining pine needles. If they hit my face or head just right it kind of hurt. Pine needles covered my car. Broken branches and leaves blew across the streets. The wind seemed so strong for a while that I hoped none of the trees around my place would fall. This morning was a different story. I went out for a walk, the air was crisp and cool. The wind had settled down a bit and the pine needles were staying attached the trees. When the sun rose higher in the sky it even started feeling a bit warm. What a change from one day to the next… Isn’t that how seasons are though? Constant changes…even though every year we see the same cycle…each season is different. Someti...

Lately, it seems I keep writing about giving your cares to God and trusting Him. It just comes up over and over again in my life so I really don’t have a choice. I feel as though I am at a place in my life where my faith is being stretched further than it ever has before. It’s like my husband and I are on the edge of a cliff, hoping stones soon appear, so we clearly know where to put our next step down, so we can get to the other side. But right now, we aren’t seeing anything to help us get to the other side. In one of the scenes from the movie Indiana Jones, he was on a cliff and had to step out before the stones appeared and then the stones showed up one by one. That first step can be a terrifying leap of faith. This last week I’ve been looking back and remembering all of my spiritual markers. I have to say God has never failed us. Sometimes it seemed like He was about too…we could feel air beneath our feet and then…His hand appeared. Throughout the Bible you can find sto...

While having coffee with a friend one morning, she told me some things about her cute little grand-daughter. One thing… her grand-daughter likes to dance around and just enjoy herself. We started talking about how free kids are and how Jesus tells us to come to Him with the faith of a child. I mentioned how one afternoon I came downstairs to the sound of my daughter’s squeals of delight. She had stepped outside on the patio and was jumping on her trampoline. It had started to rain and she was delighting in the feel of the raindrops on her face. I hoped she never stops delighting in the feel of the rain against her face or dancing in a puddle. Childlike things... Childlike faith… It can be harder and harder to just enjoy simple moments with the pressures and responsibilities of life. It can be harder and harder to trust when things in life slip you a curve. How do you keep a childlike faith after watching a dream you’ve prayed about for years slip from your h...

Dandelion seeds…a child’s delight…I remember how fun it was to pick up one of these and after making a wish, blowing on it until it looks like… Then I’d pick up another one and spend many enjoyable moments delighting in blowing and watching the seeds fly through the air. Now as a gardener, I groan when I see a dandelion seed knowing full and well the weed can only ruin the look of a beautiful yard. Each time one of these seeds is sent flying in the air there is a chance when it lands it will ruin someone’s hard work or just cause a field of thistles. I was reading the story of Jacob and how he fell in love with Rachel. He made a deal with Rachel’s dad to work seven years to be able to marry her. The morning after their wedding night he woke up to discover the dad had deceived him and he had married her older sister, Leah. Jacob soon discovered it was the custom that the oldest had to be married before the youngest.   It’s like, uh thanks Laba...

“How on earth am I going to do this?” “What am I going to do now?” “Should I do this? Or should I do that?” “This is impossible.” “There’s nothing I can do.” Ever asked those questions or made those statements? I have. At those times life can be tiring, stressful, or frustrating. One afternoon Jesus, was trying to get some alone time for the disciples after they’d had some incredible experiences doing things in Jesus name. Instead, the crowds followed them and so Jesus taught the crowd. When it became later in the afternoon the disciples suggested to Jesus that He send the crowd on their way to go and get their dinner. Jesus told them to feed them. “Uh…what? That would cost us lots of money. We can’t afford that.” Jesus told them to bring whatever food they could find, to him. They found three fish and a loaf of bread. If I had been there, and I brought the food to Him, my words for people to read throughout history would’ve been something like, “Jesus, th...

Keys… Pretty much everyone has a set of keys. Attached to your key ring, you may have a key for your house, work, and car. So what do we do without them? Have you ever lost your keys? I used to be notorious for losing my keys. Now I’m notorious for misplacing them…difference is…I find them now. It can be so frustrating when it’s time to leave and for one reason or another, my keys aren’t where I normally put them. I can’t leave until I find them. How do I start my car? It’s even more frustrating when I discover I’ve already put them in my pocket or my purse and I’ve been searching for them. It was close to Christmas, last year, and I stepped outside to say goodbye to my friend and her daughters. My daughter thought we were leaving so she locked the door behind us and shut it. We were locked out. No problem. My husband had hid a spare key.   So I thought…he had hid it shortly after he had been in a car accident. His memory wasn’t doing so well and he could not reme...