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

Another week has gone by, and we’re another week closer to Christmas. Here are some favorites from this busy week:

1. A 35% off coupon code. I needed more long-sleeved clothes, and visited the site of an online store where I have gotten things I liked before. They had a banner across the top of their web page advertising a 35%-off coupon, applicable to your entire purchase. That was a big help: their prices are a bit more than I usually like to pay, but their quality is much better as well. I know, I know—you get what you pay for. But it was nice to have this opportunity to pay a little less.

2. A 5%-off coupon. I rotate between three grocery stores—each has some things the others don’t. I don’t go to all three in one day, but which one I go to depends on what I need. The store where I usually buy our Christmas ham, and where I planned to get our weekly groceries plus supplies for our Christmas meal, sent though the mail a 5%-off coupon for an entire order.

3. A mailing envelope. I had to mail some packages this week, and I needed a 9×12 manila envelope for one of them. But I didn’t have any: I used the last one last week. There is a store near the post office, but it’s not one of my regular stops and I wasn’t sure whether it had mailing supplies. All the other stores were a distance away. I thought about saving that mailing until after I had gone to the store, but I really didn’t want to make another trip to the Post Office, especially during this season. I checked an old cabinet where I used to keep mailing supplies, and voila, there was one lone bent but unused 9×12 envelope. A small blessing, but it really helped simplify my schedule on a busy day/week.

4. Moderate temperatures. We’ve had some icy-cold days this month, but this week the daytime temperatures have been in the 60s.

5. Christmas cards and letters, though we’ve only received three so far this year. I understand some families have foregone Christmas cards in an effort to simplify the extra tasks this time of year. And maybe they are not as needed since so many are connected more online through the year. But I still enjoy them.

We won’t have FFF next week, with it being Christmas Eve. So I’ll wish you a wonderful, meaningful Christmas. I hope you’ll be able to spend it with those you love.

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

Wow, this week has just flown by–maybe because it has been a busy one. Here are some of the best parts:

1. A Christmas concert. A local business sponsors a family-oriented Christmas concert at a nearby college every year. My husband has wanted us to attend for years, but somehow it never worked out before. This year we all got to go. I was afraid Timothy might be bored, but he said he enjoyed it. Then we all went out to a restaurant afterward for a bite to eat.

2. An uneventful cardiologist visit. I almost could have phoned it in, except that they do an EKG and listen to my heart at every visit. And we scaled back to appointments every six months instead of three.

3. Christmas music. I have an extensive collection on my phone, plus BBN Radio plays only Christmas music this month until after Christmas day.

4. Christmas lights are probably my favorite part of Christmas traditions, maybe second to or tied with music.I always miss them when we take them down afterward.

5. A surprise birthday party. Our pastor turned 50, and somehow the church was able to pull off a surprise birthday party for him after last Sunday morning’s service. Some were pretty creative with their commemorations and gag gifts.

Bonus: Crossing things off the ol’ to-do list. Christmas isn’t just about getting things done . . . yet there are more things to get done this month that most. I’m trying to get as much done as possible before my oldest son comes to visit. Besides some technical problems with the printer and the need to wait for new cartridges before printing off our Christmas newsletter, everything is coming along pretty well.

I hope you are having a lovely December!

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

Here we are in the first week of December with Christmas preparations in full swing. We’ve made a significant dent in the Christmas shopping and wrapping, have the first draft of our Christmas letter waiting for revision, purchased Christmas cards and stamps. Yay! I’m enjoying Christmas music both on my phone plus on BBN Radio.

This week I have ample candidates for a favorites list. I’ll try to narrow it down to five.

1. Post-Thanksgiving blessings. I forgot to mention last time being thankful for my husband and daughter-in-law’s help Thanksgiving Day. My husband tidied up the bathroom while I cooked. My daughter-in-law made several dishes. It helps so much to “divide and conquer” on a busy day. My husband traditionally picks as much meat off the turkey carcass as he can and then cleans the roasting pan for me. This year, he did that and went ahead and loaded the dishwasher. We had used paper plates and plastic utensils, do the main dishes were serving bowls and platters. And he made his traditional turkey salad that we spread on rolls or crackers. Then, the day after Thanksgiving I found an unexpected note from my husband thanking me for all my hard work and “homey touches” for the day.

2. Christmas decorating. This year we chose our tree alone, because of either sickness or scheduling among the kids. But the family came over to decorate. I’ve always been thankful that we do this together as a family and it’s not just my “job.” It helps to “divide and conquer” again—we get it all done in a few hours. But it’s fun to do together, to comment on the ornaments or decorations, bring up memories, etc. Mittu made chili and cornbread for dinner, and we ended the evening with a few games.

3. A new figurine. I saw someone mention receiving a gift of a miniature typewriter with the words, “Have courage and be kind” on the “paper” in the typewriter. I thought that was so neat, I googled to see if I could find a similar inexpensive one—and I did. I have it sitting just under my computer screen as a reminder.

4. Hanging up wall decorations in the guest room. They had been sitting around for weeks due to our sickness or busyness. But Saturday Jim hung up several items for me. Th

5. Power restored. I mentioned a few weeks ago that the power company was replacing some lines in our neighborhood. We had gotten a notice that the power would be off for several hours on a certain day while they finished up. Somehow, we noticed the alternate date and planned for that.

So we were surprised when someone knocked on our door yesterday to say the power would be off from 9 to 3. And that was a day I happened to go back to sleep for a bit instead of getting my shower. So I made a quick breakfast before they turned the power off and and jumped in the shower just after. I did have enough hot water to finish. Then my husband started up the generator in the RV so I could blow dry and fix my hair, and we used the microwave there to make lunch. We spent the rest of the day in the house. He was able to make a hotspot with his phone for internet access, so he was able to continue working. My laptop was fully charged, so I started on our Christmas letter. The weather was comfortable, so it wasn’t a problem that the heat was off. We could have spent the day in the RV if needed, but I am glad we didn’t have to. I’m sure we also could have gone to our son and daughter-in-law’s house, but we didn’t want to disrupt their routine or ours if we could help it. Despite the surprise and lack of preparedness, it was actually better day for the power to be out than the one we had originally thought. And there’s nothing like the power being off for a while to appreciate it even more.

I hope you’ve had a good week as well.

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 must be Thanksgiving after-effects: I fell asleep in my desk chair early this morning and napped much longer than intended! But here are some favorites from this week:

1. Supplies. It seems like every grocery store online order or visit results in several unavailable items, necessitating a visit to another store to fill in. But we’ve not lacked anything major, even if it takes more effort and time to find supplies.

2. Thanksgiving Day, of course, with feasting and time with family.

3. A successful pie crust. I may have made pie crusts from scratch in early married life, but then switched to either frozen or, more recently, the Pillsbury refrigerated ones. Since my daughter-in-law and grandson have developed gluten intolerance, we’ve used frozen GF crusts, but they’re not very good. Sometimes they’ve bought fresh-made ones from a GF bakery, but the prices have gone up and they’re a distance away. So this year I tried a pie crust mix made by King Arthur flour. I didn’t roll the dough out—I just pressed it into the pie pan with my fingers. It held up well, and most important, tasted good.

4. Thanksgiving place mats. These were cute and entertaining. I set them around the table before everyone got here along with some crayons. Different ones gathered to color, solve puzzles, place stickers, etc., while we talked and prepared the meal.

5. A Thanksgiving tree. I did this a couple of years ago. Then I didn’t last year, and a couple of people mentioned missing it. So it made a return visit this year. 🙂 I taped several sheets of brown card stock together and then cut out a tree trunk and taped it to the pantry door. Then I used the cut-off portions for branches. I set out a package of leaf cut-outs from Hobby Lobby along with masking tape and a marker, and added a few leaves to start everyone off. Throughout the day, people would write or draw things they were thankful for and tape them up. It was fun.

Happy Friday!

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

Tomorrow we’ll be 2/3 of the way through November. It’s going fast! Here are some highlights of the week:

1. Thanksgiving turkey. We had heard that some Thanksgiving dinner supplies might be hard to come by. So I was trying to decide whether to go ahead and get a turkey, paying more than usual, or wait for the sale prices that usually come up the week or so before Thanksgiving. I saw an ad for turkey for $.98 a pound, and figured that was as good a price as I’d probably get this year. But when I went to the store, they had a couple of different brands of turkey for $.49 a pound. I got most of the other supplies for the meal feast while I was at it, so I am thankful to be pretty much ready.

2. Ladies Bible study. We’d had to meet via Zoom last month as COVID was running through the church. And it seems like I missed a time or two before that for various reasons. It was good to meet together. We discussed Romans 12-13, a very rich and full passage.

3. Christmas cookies. Mittu asked if we could do our Christmas cookie baking and decorating early this year, since December is often so busy. She brought over zucchini boats for dinner and sugar cookie dough. I had the equipment, icing, and sprinkles. It was a fun time.

4. Getting my hair cut. My hair gets to a certain length and then just does not cooperate any more. For once, I made a point to get it cut before I got frustrated with it. I wanted to go a bit shorter than usual—and ended up with it quite a bit shorter than I had in mind. But it will grow out.

5. Warmth. It seems like we’ve had a short autumn and have jumped right into winter. We’re supposed to get down in the 20s most of the next several nights. I’m thankful for home heat at the touch of a button, decaf coffee, sweaters, throw blankets, and fingerless gloves so I can still type with them on.

I hope you’ve had a good week as well!

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

Can you believe we’re more than 1/3 of the way through November already?

This has been kind of a strange week. By Thursday afternoon, I didn’t have anything in mind for today’s FFF. But that’s one reason I love this exercise: when I stop to consider, there are always blessings. Some might be overlooked if we don’t pause and think.

1. Veteran’s Day. I’m abundantly grateful for those who served our country and defended our freedoms and those who still do so today.

2. Finding a recorded program. I caught part of Elisabeth Elliot’s Gateway to Joy radio program while driving on Wednesday. BBN Radio plays her old radio programs at 11:15 a.m. weekday mornings. One thing she said really struck me, and I don’t remember hearing her say it before. The foundation that set up her web site has included many of her talks and writings, so I searched there, but couldn’t find the one I was looking for. Finally I looked up the program on BBN, and discovered they have the audio of her programs for the current week on their site. I was so glad I got to hear what she said again, and in context this time. (The episode was titled Reflections of a Granny #3: The Secret of Tranquility.)

3. Recording apps.Since the above-mentioned program was only going to be online this week, I wanted to record it in case I wanted to listen to it again later. I found a recording app in the app store and figured out how to use it.

4. Lunch with a friend. It had been a long time since we’d met for lunch, and I thoroughly enjoyed catching up.

5. Timothy seeking me out. I try not to spend time off in the kitchen when the family’s here, and everyone is good to pitch in and help when we eat together. But sometimes when I’m in the kitchen tending to something, Timothy will come in and see how I am doing or tell me something about his day. That touches my heart so much.

Bonus: I used to go fancy for holiday celebrations. The last few years, we’ve decided to simplify and decrease the work load. Many places have pretty and inexpensive holiday paper plates. I had found dessert paper plates and napkins for Thanksgiving at one store, but there were no dinner-sized plates. Then, when Jason and Mittu came over, they brought some dinner-sized Thanksgiving paper plates, but said their store didn’t have the smaller dessert plates. It was neat how it worked out.

Hope you’ve had a good week!

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 feels like we had a short autumn and dived right into winter, with nights in the 30s and days in the 40s. But I’m hoping fall isn’t done yet.

Here are some favorites from this week:

1. Family costume party. My son and daughter-in-law used to take my grandson trick-or-treating in public places like the zoo or mall. But then Covid came, and this year and last we got together as a family and dressed up in costumes. Here’s this year’s array:

We have Captain America, a cute fox, a mini Darth Vader, a pirate, a . . . he was going for a Mandalorian storm trooper, and Cyclops.

Pirates had grandmas, too, right? 🙂 I gave Timothy my pirate accoutrements after we got done.

2. Tilapia. I’ve only had it twice, and my daughter-in-law made it both times. Good stuff.

3. Fall color has finally come in the neighborhood trees. So pretty.

4. Light kitchen duty. Jim had a company dinner to go to one night and was out of town for two evenings. I made frozen pizza the first night he was away, got take-out Mexican food the second night, and Jason and Mittu brought hamburger pie over the third. Now that I think about it, I didn’t make dinners over the weekend, either: we had the tilapia with the family one night and got fast food Friday night and Sunday lunch. So I probably better come up with something good for dinner tonight, huh? On a side note, it’s amazing how many dishes get dirty even without making dinner and with using paper plates.

5. A party at Grandma’s house. Mittu texted me a conversation with Timothy. She mentioned that Granddad was on a work trip. Timothy said, “So we’re having a party at their house tonight?” Mittu commented, “Glad we have a child that thinks visiting Grandma by herself is a party.” Me, too.

Happy Friday? What’s something good from your week?

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

October is almost over. It seems like it has been a long month in some ways but has flown by in others. On Fridays I stop for a moment to remember the good things of the week lest I forget them in the blur of passing time.

1. A family outing. With various ones of us being sick and our traveling before that, it had been about three weeks since we had all been together as a family (those of us who are local). That’s a rarity for us. So it felt good in a number of ways to have an outing Saturday. It was good to be together and do something fun and get out. We visited the Pinta, a life-sized replica of Christopher Columbus’s ship (I wrote more about it here.)

Then we went out to eat, another thing we hadn’t done in a long time.

2. Grilled burgers. My husband had stopped at the store for me Saturday morning and noticed ground chuck was on sale. So he bought some and grilled hamburgers for us for Sunday lunch, then invited the kids for burgers Sunday evening. So we had a second family get-together last weekend.

3. My husband not only grilled twice on Sunday, but he loaded and ran the dishwasher, unloaded it, and reloaded it all in one day. He regularly cleans up the kitchen after Sunday morning breakfast while I get ready for church, and I appreciate that so much. But it was also a joy to come into the kitchen after dinner and find everything done.

4. A radio interview. I mentioned this unexpected opportunity last week. Thanks so much to those who prayed. It went well, and I felt God gave me the words to say. Some of you mentioned you’d like to hear it. My oldest son recorded it and made a link to it it here, if you’d like to listen.

5. Dinner and company. Jim had to go out of town overnight Wednesday, and Jason and Mittu offered to bring over some Mexican food for dinner. Then last night, Jesse brought over some peanut butter cake, the first cake he ever made from scratch.

Thus ends another week, and almost another month. I hope your October is wrapping up well.

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 hard to believe we only have a week left in October. I enjoy these pauses every week to stop and reflect. They help time not to pass by in such a blur that we miss seeing God’s hand. Here are a few favorites from my week:

1. Feeling better. After being sick all week, I had a great Saturday. Then I had a horrible Sunday with head and body aches. I’m much better now. Jim still has a lingering cough from last week that’s plaguing him, but otherwise feels better.

2. Fall decorations. We finally had a day when we both felt like dealing with them–Jim getting the boxes up and down from the attic for me, and me placing them.

3. Sunday dinner with Jesse. I mentioned last week that we felt a little isolated, because we were trying not to share whatever illness we had. It felt almost like the beginning of the pandemic. Jesse asked to come over for dinner and a haircut, and since had been, was still a little sick, we felt it was okay to be together. It felt good to see him in person.

4. A cute new purse. I had not been able to find anything at my usual stores for months, so I looked on Amazon. This is a smidgen smaller than I usually have, but I think it will work okay.

5. Multi-tasking. A writer’s group I considered but decided not to join will still send me free videos sometimes. This week they had a series each weekday, but they were only accessible that week day–unless I wanted to pay $67 for lifetime access! No, thank you. When I wasn’t feeling well at the beginning of the week, I gave myself permission to just sit and listen. But I was too antsy to do that later in the week, so transferred stuff from my old purse to my new one and cleaned out files and old catalogs while I listened.

Bonus: an opportunity. Since some of you are only here for FFF, I wanted to mention something I shared earlier: I was invited to a radio interview next week, October 26, at 8:10 a.m. EDT. More information is here. It’s both exciting and nerve-wracking! I’d appreciate your prayers.

Hope you’ve had a great week!

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

Is it Friday again already? This week has been a blur. Jim has been sick for around two weeks now, and I’ve been sick this week. We think it’s just a cold or maybe flu–we haven’t had the hallmark COVID symptoms of lack of smell or taste or trouble breathing. Still, it’s packed quite a wallop.

But there are always good things in a week, even when we have to look a little harder for them.

1. Soup and cookies. My son and daughter-in-law dropped off some chicken vegetable soup and peanut butter M&M cookies. Though she frequently makes meals for the family, it especially meant a lot this week when I had less energy.

2. Seeing our kids in person. We hadn’t seen them in a while, due to traveling for a memorial service and then being sick. We’ve Face-timed a couple of times, and though I enjoy that, I missed seeing them in person. When they dropped off the soup, we visited out in the front yard for a bit—like early pandemic days.

3. Naps. I can’t take decongestants due to heart rhythm issues, so I muddle through with cough drops, acetaminophen, and sleep. I’ve been letting myself doze off whenever the urge strikes.

4. Zoom services. Our church has kept the Zoom option open even when they resumed services. It’s been a help for those who are home sick or those who need to keep isolating due to heath issues. We’ve had four people in our small church test positive for COVID recently, so we’ve gone back to only using Zoom for a while. I’m glad that option is available. It’s more interactive for a small group than just using Facebook Live or YouTube, though I am thankful for those as well.

5. Jeopardy and AFV. America’s Funniest Home Videos just started their new season, and I am grateful for the laughs. And you may have heard of Matt Amodio’s 38-game winning streak that just came to an end. He seemed like a genuinely nice guy, and I really enjoyed watching him play.

How was your week?