Monthly Archives: December 2015

Odds and Ends

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Courtesy of imagerymajestic at freedigitalphotos.net

The low number of posts in my Feedly account must mean that a lot of people are in the same boat I am — too busy with Christmas or other activities to post much. 🙂  I thought I’d take a moment and share a hodgepodge of stray thoughts crossing my mind lately:

  • Have you seen or heard of the adult coloring craze? I have always found coloring to be highly relaxing. I haven’t done it in a while, but when we were first married, I had my own coloring book and crayons. 🙂 But the new books or pages for “adult coloring” now are very busy, intricate, and contain a multitude of small spaces, like the ones in here. I don’t know if I’d find that as relaxing – I used to like the big, open, simple spaces of kids’ coloring books.
  • I wish there was a rating system for books like there is for movies, along with parental guidance sites that will tell you exactly what the objectionable elements are. I hate being surprised by that kind of thing in an innocent-looking book.
  • It’s been fun Christmas shopping in the baby aisles again. 🙂 But I have been dismayed that so many toys make noise or have buttons to push for songs. I don’t mind some of that, but they don’t all have to have that. I’d rather have a toy that they can manipulate and do something with rather than something they push a button and watch (primarily – again, a few of the other kind can be a fun diversion). And I wonder about sensory overload. I like having music playing during some tasks, too, but there is value in enjoying silence sometimes. I get overwrought if there is not some quietness in the day.
  • Speaking of babies…:) I had been wondering how Timothy would do with the Christmas tree. We made sure to put all the soft and unbreakable ornaments down at his level. When he’s over, there might be one or two ornaments on the floor when he leaves, but he really hasn’t messed with them as much as I thought he would. His favorite seems to be one that has jingle bells dangling from it: he’ll take it down and shake it as he walks around. We joked that it comes in handy to keep track of where he is. 🙂
  • Arranging ornaments for a baby in the house wasn’t hard: figuring out what to do about other decorations took a bit more consideration, like placing the Nativity set up on the mantle rather than on a side table by the front entry like usual. Because of the rearranging, I had some blank spaces where I usually put decorations. I had bought years ago a decoration that looks like an antique car (having all boys, I thought they’d like it), but then never had  place to put it. I’ve thought for years about getting rid of it since I wasn’t using it. But this year, I had a space for it – and Timothy loves it! He gets it down every time he’s here and rolls it around. I’m so glad I kept it. Surprisingly, the stuffed snowmen I thought he’d like, he hasn’t taken much notice of.
  • We had been keeping presents in the sewing room so far just so they aren’t a temptation for him. His parents are teaching him there are things he can’t touch, but I just didn’t want Christmas to be a source of stress and tension for him by having to constantly deal with not touching the presents all month. But now I am getting the room ready for my oldest son when he comes, so we brought all the presents out and put them under the tree. Jesse, who was helping me, remarked that now it looks like Christmas. 🙂 Hopefully the short time between now and Christmas won’t be too much of a stress factor in keeping Timothy from wanting to unwrap the presents. We did put the gifts bags with tissue paper behind everything else – I figured they’d be the greatest temptation for him.  If all else fails, we can block the tree off with his Pack and Play. 🙂
  • Poor Jesse, being the last child at home, usually is Mom’s helper by default, usually without complaining. But the company he works for has been overwhelmingly busy the last few weeks with Christmas shoppers. He has been working tons of overtime, so I haven’t had the heart to ask him to do the usual or extra tasks if I can help it. But that does put extra work on me. I do count myself fortunate to still have a helper – I know I won’t always.
  • Speaking of work, both my younger sons work in Customer Service of an online company. As I listen to them talk, I’ve wished I could write an article like the ones Reader’s Digest has been running this year about things you might not know about certain professions. Though I know in the long run this likely won’t help them, here is my public service announcement on behalf of customer service employees everywhere:

The customer service person you are communicating with is not the cause of the problem. Please don’t yell at him or her.

Most companies will bend over backwards to help you if you have a problem with your order: there is no need to call names, bully, or abuse them to do so.

No, you cannot combine coupons. That’s the case in almost every online or brick and mortar store I have ever shopped in. Acting ugly towards the employees won’t increase your chances. Neither will asking multiple times or cries of unfairness. Stores like to give you good deals but do need to make money. (See Can frugality go too far?)

2-day shipping does not mean you’ll get your order 2 days from the time you order it. It takes time to find it, package and address it, etc., or, in my sons’ case, to make it for you. You’ll get it 2 days from the time they send it.

When you e-mail the company multiple times, you create more work and then clog the system. I am amazed at how many people e-mail things like, “When will my order be sent?”, some of them daily, or will e-mail multiple times over the same problem. Most online companies will send you shipping confirmation and tracking number once they do get it off to you. They want you to feel free to e-mail if you have a problem or question but sometimes it’s just a matter of waiting.

Order early for Christmas! 🙂 (Next year – it’s too late already for some companies to get items to you by Christmas).

Really, most of their customers are great: most orders get to people with no problems. There’s just a fraction who have problems, and of those a smaller fraction who are ugly about it. It’s easy to get frustrated, especially with the time factor involved this time of year. Of course, I know all of my regular readers are very nice and courteous people who would never be abusive to customer service people. 🙂

My to-do list is waiting for me, so I better get back to it. It’s been nice ticking things off it this week. I keep reminding myself that I don’t have get everything done for Christmas before my son comes, but I want to be as available to him as possible since he’s only here for a short time. And I keep reminding myself that he has seen the house at its worst, so it doesn’t have to be in mint condition. But I’d rather it not look its worst if possible. I haven’t done any Christmas baking yet – I am too tempted to nibble all day if I have home-baked things here. But I’ll plan to later this week when everyone is here.

Hope you’re able to get everything done on your lists and are enjoying the season!

I haven’t been able to do any deep-thinking posts in a while, but some of my previous Christmas posts are:

A Perfect Christmas.

Grieving at Christmas.

Packing Up Christmas.

Friday’s Fave Five

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It’s Friday, time to look back over the blessings of the week with Susanne at Living to Tell the Story and other friends.

It’s been a full week here getting ready for Christmas. I know I don’t have to get it all done before my oldest son comes next week, but I’d like to conquer as much as possible. One moment it seems to be going pretty well – the next, it still feels like there is a ton to do! Here are some favorite highlights of the past week:

1. The church ladies’ Christmas party. I hadn’t been sure that I’d make it, but thankfully I did. The fellowship and activities were fun, and we heard a wonderful testimony of God’s grace in very hard times.

2. Sunday lunch at my son and daughter-in-law’s. Normally they come here due to my mother-in-law’s situation, but my daughter-in-law’s mom was here for a visit, and they invited us to lunch there. Great-grandma’s caregiver was able to stay a bit later, so we were able to go. Enjoyed the visit, plus it was nice not to have to think about what to make when we got home from church! We enjoyed hosting them here a few days later. I forgot to mention last week that my wonderful daughter-in-law made hamburger pie the day we did our Christmas decorating. That was a big help, plus it was yummy!

3. The children’s Christmas program at church Sunday night. They always do the nativity story, though with different songs each year, and it’s neat to see different kids in the different roles each year. It just wouldn’t seem like the Christmas season without the kids’ program!

4. Making progress with Christmas preparations. Almost have the shopping done, am just about finished with our annual Christmas letter, I plan on addressing cards tonight, and have made a start on wrapping.

5. Beef! We don’t have it often, for health and financial reasons, but I crave it every now and then. A local store advertised roasts on sale, but by the time I got there, the last day of the sale, there were only two left which didn’t look very good. But stew meat was on sale right next to it. So I dumped that in the crockpot with potatoes and carrots and have been enjoying the leftovers for a couple of days now.

Bonus: Christmas music! I love the older carols and newer songs of the season. BBN Radio is playing all Christmas music this month, and that and listening to our own collection while cooking, wrapping, etc., has been a special blessing.

I hope your Christmas preparations are going well, both in activity and heart. 🙂 Happy Friday!

A Christmas Meme

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Christmas-Traditions

I love that there is almost always a meme going around about Christmas each year. The one I saw this year was at Melanie‘s. She found it at  Linda‘s, who found it at Cindy‘s. I don’t think any of them would mind of you wanted to join in on your blog or in the comments.

1. Do you prefer an Artificial or Real tree?

Real. Our main Christmas tree has always been a real one. I like to use lots where local people sell their own trees. Last year we couldn’t find one and ended up getting a tree at Home Depot – that turned out to be quite impersonal. Thankfully we found a local place again this year. I’ve always enjoyed going out with the family and picking out just the right tree. I don’t know if that will change when it’s just the two of us – we’ll see.

2. Do you prefer colored lights or clear lights on your tree?

I like them both, so it’s hard to decide, but our main tree has colored lights. A couple of artificial mini trees have clear lights. We have colored lights on the bushes out front and clear on a garland on the porch – I probably should have done one or they other so they would match, but oh well. 🙂

Mini tree on my desk

3. Would you say your Christmas dinner is traditional or not?

Yes, very: Ham, cheesy potatoes, green bean casserole, sweet potatoes if I remember them (only my daughter-in-law and I like them), pumpkin pie, apple pie, rolls.

4. When do you begin Christmas shopping?

Usually Thanksgiving weekend, but if we see a deal on something that someone in the family would like earlier, we get it. My husband is particularly good at that. We don’t start earlier because we like to get specific things that they want, and we don’t always know what those things are until about that time. Plus the end of our “birthday season” is September, so it’s nice to have a break between birthdays and Christmas shopping.

5. What is your favorite Christmas movie to watch?

White Christmas and the George C. Scott Christmas Carol.

6. Are you a Hallmark Christmas Movie fan?

We don’t get the Hallmark channel on our main TV, but it does come through in my mother-in-law’s room. So I have only seen snatches of of their Christmas movies and…no, I am not a fan. They seem similar to each other. But I may find out differently if I ever watch one all the way through.

7. Do you travel for Christmas or stay home?

Stay home. We pretty much have to now because we have my mother-in-law with us, but that is our preference anyway. We traveled a few Christmases the first few years we were married, but travel weather was always iffy, and we wanted to start our own traditions, especially since neither of our families incorporated the spiritual side of Christmas.

8. Who is the easiest person to buy for in your family?

Right now, my little grandson, Timothy. It’s so fun to shop in the baby aisles again. 🙂 When my mom was still alive, she was the easiest to shop for – I knew her tastes, and she was one person I could shop for any time of year and save it for Christmas.

9. Do you like to wrap your gifts or prefer gift bags, if possible?

It just depends on what it is. If it is something in a box, I like to wrap it. If it’s an odd shape or I can’t find a box it will fit in, gift bags are fine.

10. What is the one stress you feel you have at Christmas?

Getting everything done has always been a stress factor, but we have simplified over the years. No one in our extended families exchanges gifts any more except that we do still give to my step-father. But not having multiple boxes to send out has helped a lot. And now that our kids are grown, we don’t have the Christmas plays, recitals, class parties, etc. to go to or make things for. I do miss all of that in some ways, but it’s nice to have freer schedules now, and the children’s Christmas program at church helps fill that niche.

Bonus question: What is one of your favorite Christmas memories with your children.

My favorite Christmas memories are when we decorate the tree. I love the exclamations when they see their favorites and all the “remember when” stories about them. I wish I had written down something about individual Christmases through the years. The only Christmas I did specifically do that, I recorded that one son said that if he could open one present early, he wouldn’t hit his brother. 🙂 It’s been fun to watch the changes as they have grown. The most memorable Christmas since we’ve had children was actually the day after when Jesse was just a baby. I was feeding him on the couch when I heard something moving with a galumph sound behind me. I called my husband, who was actually taking a bath at the time, but he threw some clothes on and indulged me and came to investigate – and discovered a huge rat, the size of a cat, in the living room. Jim had just gotten some thick gloves for Christmas, put them, and tried to corner the rat, but every time he did, the rat would stand on its hind legs and hiss at him. (Eeeeek!) The rat did take a few nips at him, so I was especially glad he had the gloves. He spent all kinds of time trying to catch him – I was afraid he was going to say, “I’m sorry, honey, but I have to get to work,” and leave me alone with it. But he didn’t. Our kids had gotten that year a big container of Legos that basically was a big box with a door that slid open. Jim dumped out the Legos, trapped the rat behind some books, set up the container, and the rat ran into while Jim shut the door. Now what to do with it. I didn’t want Jim to release it outside just to have it come back in again. So he submerged the container into the bath water he had left until the rat drowned, then he disposed of it and cleaned out the container. I was on the couch with my feet up the whole time, and I think the other boys were on the furniture as well, just watching, wide-eyed. Later Jim wrote a poem about it in the style of “‘Twas the night before Christmas…” (or the day after in this case), and he’s pulled it out and read it a few times over the years.

Thank you, Cindy, for creating this! I enjoyed reminiscing.

 

 

Book Review: Forever Christmas

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forever ChristmasIn Forever Christmas by Robert Tate Miller, Andrew Farmer is quickly moving up the ladder as a literary agent. But his frequent travels and need to move away from their home town have been hard on his wife, Beth. She could endure it all, however, if they still had the closeness they used to, but Andrew has been busy, distracted, and distant. Andrew has to travel again just before Christmas, and when he gets back on Christmas Eve, they argue over a misunderstanding. When Beth goes for a walk to cool off and clear her head, Andrew goes after her. He sees a taxi speeding toward her, but is unable to reach or warn her in time.

In his grief, he is met by a mysterious stranger named Lionel, who offers him a gift: the opportunity to do the last three days over. Beth will still meet her fate, but Andrew has the opportunity to give her a different kind of send-off, to let her know that he truly does love her. Andrew accepts, but his attempts just seem to show up how out of touch with his wife he really is.

Along the way we learn some of their back story and Andrew discovers that old issues, like his hatred and unforgiveness of his father, who left his family when Andrew was young, are affecting his ability to love now. Will he be able to work out his issues, get past his ambitions and self-centeredness, and truly learn how to love before it is too late?

I wouldn’t say this is exactly a Christian story. In fact, there were a couple of statements I strongly disagreed with, like Andrew’s remembering his grandmother saying, “When all earthly endeavors have been exhausted, there’s always God” – as if we should only consult Him if we’ve tried everything first and can’t make it instead of asking for His guidance and help from the beginning. And “The universe is harmonic, Andrew. If your life isn’t harmonious, it’s because you’ve chosen disharmony.” I would disagree with that on more levels than I can go into at the moment.  But there is a subtle underpinning of faith, the need to pray, the need to forgive. It’s not a story I would send someone to for doctrine, but as a basic story of the need for self-sacrifice in love, it shines. Miller writes the gut-wrenching emotional scenes quite well, and keeps the story moving without dragging.  It’s not a long book – only 169 pages. I started and finished it in one evening, which is rare, but I was staying up late waiting for my son to come home, so that helped. 🙂

I thought this sounded a lot like a movie I had seen ads for, and after a bit of research I found that Miller had also written the script for one with the same characters and plot called Three Days. In this case it looks like the movie came before the book. I have not seen it but I might see if I can find it online some time. If you’ve seen it, let me know what you thought of it.

This is the kind of book I like to read during December – touching and heart-warming without being sappy.

(This review will also be linked to Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books.)

Laudable Linkage

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Here is my periodic round-up of notable reads discovered the last week or so:

Ignore the Pundits and Keep Praying.

Divine Appointments. Neat account!

An Introduction to the Family Advent Art and Reading Guide. “I wanted us to think about Jesus and the nativity, but I had not provided a sense of his pending arrival. Meanwhile, everywhere we went, my kids were told Santa was on his way. Fortunately, I had a couple thousand years of church tradition to back me up, if only I knew how to draw on it. It was time to learn about Advent.”

9 Things You Should Be Doing to Support Your Pastor’s Wife.

12 Steps to Avoid Disappointment This Holiday Season.

28 Reasons Not To Hate Winter, HT to Lisa Notes. I come pretty close to hating it, especially in January, so this is a help.

Have a great weekend! I am behind visiting with blog friends – hope to catch up some time this weekend.

Friday’s Fave Five

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It’s Friday, time to look back over the blessings of the week with Susanne at Living to Tell the Story and other friends.

It’s so hard to believe we’re into December already! Here are some highlights of the week:

1. Decorating for Christmas. It was a really enjoyable day all together. We found a new spot to get a tree (our previous place closed down, and getting a tree at Home Depot last year just wasn’t the same). Having a little helper this year was great fun, too. 🙂

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2. Turkey Bone Soup. One of my favorite leftover turkey dishes.

3. Not having rain and cold on the same days. 🙂 The beginning of the week was rainy and overcast, but temperatures were in the 50s. By the time we got down into the 30s later in the week, the rain had gone. If the situation had been reversed – we would have had a mess of icy and/or slushy roads. I’m sure we will at some point this winter, but I am glad we escaped it this week.

4. Online shopping. It was good to knock out the greater part of Christmas shopping at home all in one morning.

5. A turn for the better. My younger two sons both work in customer service in the same online company. Of course, Black Friday and Cyber Monday generated a lot of business, which they were expecting, but some problems in their system caused trouble for both them and their customers. Jesse came home Wednesday night quite discouraged – no matter how much he worked, the number of tickets they needed to answer kept rising by the hundreds. But a server upgrade Thursday plus the end of their extended Cyber Monday sales has made catching up look possible again, and he was in a much better frame of mind yesterday.

Happy Friday! Hope you have a great week ahead.

 

Book Review: Caregivers’ Devotions To Go

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caregivers devotionsI got Caregiver Devotions To Go by Gigi Devine Murfitt from a Kindle sale a few years ago, and it has been sadly languishing on my Kindle app since then. I just recently rediscovered it and thought it was the perfect time to read it.

Gigi writes from the perspective of a daughter who helped her “widowed and disabled mother as she cared for her ten children” and then later cared for her mom when she was older, and then as a mother of a son with special needs. In some cases her definition of a caregiver broadens to include teachers, firefighters, etc. She shares here 30+ short (a little over 2 pages each on my device) devotional thoughts on various aspects of caregiving. Each one includes a Scripture verse, several paragraphs, a prayer, and activity ideas.

The devotionals cover a variety of topics, from acceptance to finding strength to showing love to our need and the provision for forgiveness when we fail. One of my favorites was when a friend wrote a letter to Gigi’s son after he was born with arms only 3 inches long, saying that he was as fearfully and wonderfully made as anyone else and that she was looking forward to see how God worked in and through him. Another was when her sister, after finding her mother in “a five pound, urine soaked diaper” at her nursing home more than once, even after speaking to the nurses about it, asked if she could visit with the staff. She thought she was just going to have a meeting with the nurses and aides who cared for her mom specifically, but she found when she arrived that she was the guest speaker for a staff meeting of about 60 people. She talked about what residents gave up to live in the nursing home – homes, pets, most possessions, autonomy, etc., and emphasized their need for compassion, pointing out that “for many of them, the caregivers were the only contact they had on a daily basis. A touch, a smile, a gentle response, an ‘I care about you’ attitude could make a bleak day brighter.” She asked them to treat the residents as they would want their own family members taken care of. When my mother-in-law was in various facilities, I often wished I could address her caregivers, but I never thought to ask. My husband did speak to the person in charge more than once, but I would have loved to gently urge everyone to remember that these are people they are dealing with, not just tasks, and to treat them as they themselves would want to be treated in the same situation. Now I find myself needing to be reminded of the same truths.

Though not every entry applied to my situation, and though I would differ with the author on a couple of issues, overall I benefited much from this book, and I think any caregiver would as well.

(This review will also be linked to Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books.)

Book Review: The Butterfly and the Violin

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Butterfy and the ViolinIn The Butterfly and the Violin by Kristy Cambron, Sera James owns and manages an art gallery in Manhattan. For years she has been looking for a painting she saw as a child which held special meaning for her. She has finally found at least a copy of it, but hopes it will lead to finding the original. The owner, William Hanover, refuses to sell but wants to hire Sera because he also wants to find the original, but for very different reasons. They develop a relationship, but Sera is reluctant to open her heart again after having been left at the altar by her fiance two years ago. Unraveling the mystery of the painting at first brings them closer together but then suddenly brings a sharp division between them.

The painting portrays a young woman with piercing eyes, a shaved head, and a number tattooed on her wrist holding a violin. Cambron switches back and forth between the present day and Sera’s situation to the 1940s and the story of the woman in the painting, Adele von Braun, revealing more of Adele’s story in both narratives.

Adele’s father was a high-ranking official in the Third Reich, and she was a well-known violinist nicknamed “Austria’s sweetheart.” She loved a cellist named Vladimir, but her father would not sanction their relationship since Vladimir was only the son of a merchant. Adele kept seeing Vladimir in secret and eventually learned that he was part of a network that smuggled Jews out of the country to safety. Adele had hidden Jewish friends of her own that she secretly brought supplies to, but when she tried to help them escape, she was discovered, arrested, and sent to Auschwitz. There she became part of the prison orchestra, made to play every day as the prisoners were sent out to work, during executions, and occasionally at a Nazi social event. While she felt her spirit dying, her friend tried to help her see that there could be beauty and service to God even in such a place.

God is here. He sees. He knows what is happening in this place.

This, child, is our worship. To live and survive and play to God from the depths of our souls. This is the call that binds us. When we worship in the good times, it brings God joy. But worship in the midst of agony?…That is authentic adoration of our Creator.

One day we will be free. And we become free by living despite what they do to us. We live by working, and we work for God.

I had known that their were musicians among those in WWII prison camps who were made to play for the Nazis. And I knew that the Nazis had confiscated a lot of art during those years. But I hadn’t known that there were many paintings and other art by the prisoners themselves discovered after the camps were liberated – over 1,600 pieces in “partially destroyed warehouses and old barracks of Auschwitz,” according to the author’s note at the end. Those pieces still survive even now, though many of the artists are unknown. As one character muses in the story,

She told herself that to have something of worth in a world full of chaos was the very definition of beauty.  It felt like a spiritual liberation that couldn’t be silenced.  These prisoners, the ones who painted or wrote poetry or played in the orchestra – they refused to let that spirit die.  And this, she decided, is why the heart creates.

God plants the talent and it grows, sustained by a spirit-given strength to endure, even in the midst of darkness. It thrives in the valleys of life and ignores the peaks. It blooms like a flower when cradled by the warmth of the sun. It remains in a hidden stairwell in a concentration camp. It grows, fed in secret, in the heart of every artist.

I enjoyed both Sera’s and Adele’s stories and the themes of God’s presence in suffering and the need to create. This is Cambron’s first novel, and it has deservedly won many awards. My overactive internal editor stumbled over just a few minor places where I felt the writing was a little awkward, but I’m not even going to go into them because overall this was a gripping, fascinating, heart-breaking, yet beautiful story.

(This review will also be linked to Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books.)