Somehow the toy giveaway contest at 5 Minutes For Mom hadn’t even registered with me — I guess because usually that kind of thing is geared toward younger kids and my youngest is 14 and doesn’t really play with toys much any more. But today’s giveaway of a Lego-City Police Headquarters caught my eye. My boys have loved Legos for years and played with them long after other toys were laid aside. I loved the creativity of the sets and those little faces on the Lego people.

For the next couple of weeks the 5 Minuted for Mom site is giving away several toys, some of the first ones really big ones! Go here or click on the button above to get more information and find out how to enter.

Praise to the Lord, the Almighty, the King of creation!
O my soul, praise Him, for He is thy health and salvation!
All ye who hear, now to His temple draw near;
Praise Him in glad adoration.

Praise to the Lord, who over all things so wondrously reigneth,
Shelters thee under His wings, yea, so gently sustaineth!
Hast thou not seen how thy desires ever have been
Granted in what He ordaineth?

Praise to the Lord, who hath fearfully, wondrously, made thee;
Health hath vouchsafed and, when heedlessly falling, hath stayed thee.
What need or grief ever hath failed of relief?
Wings of His mercy did shade thee.

Praise to the Lord, who doth prosper thy work and defend thee;
Surely His goodness and mercy here daily attend thee.
Ponder anew what the Almighty can do,
If with His love He befriend thee.

Praise to the Lord, who, when tempests their warfare are waging,
Who, when the elements madly around thee are raging,
Biddeth them cease, turneth their fury to peace,
Whirlwinds and waters assuaging.

Praise to the Lord, who, when darkness of sin is abounding,
Who, when the godless do triumph, all virtue confounding,
Sheddeth His light, chaseth the horrors of night,
Saints with His mercy surrounding.

Praise to the Lord, O let all that is in me adore Him!
All that hath life and breath, come now with praises before Him.
Let the Amen sound from His people again,
Gladly for aye we adore Him.

~ Jo­ach­im Ne­an­der

Thanks so much for your kind words and prayers concerning my earlier post. I saw the doctor today. She said I did still have cellulitis, but did not prescribe another round of antibiotics. I was both relieved and concerned by that She’s been concerned for a while about the fact that my blood flow from my feet back up to my legs isn’t good, and the excess fluid in my lower legs makes me more prone to infections like cellulitis. So we are working on that angle of things right now. I may have to go to a vein doctor — but I hope not. I’d appreciate your prayers.

Though rain was forecast for the whole week, the sun came out yesterday and again today. I know, especially as a Christian, my outlook shouldn’t depend on the weather, and normally it’s not that affected by it, but when feeling a little gloomy in spirit anyway, I think it helps those feelings along.

The Lord blessed with some ideas today for the monthly newsletter I am working on my our church ladies’ group. Plus, in thinking about my morning schedule with things that needed to be done around getting to the doctor’s office, I didn’t even know how to arrange it — but it just fell into place. Those “little” tokens of the Lord’s love and guidance mean a great deal.

Our ladies luncheon is coming up earlier than usual this year, and though I knew that, some of the ramifications just hit me this week — like needing to decide on a caterer and menu so I will know ticket prices so I can start getting announcements out.

I have thoughts for several posts, but because of these other duties I am short of time this week — plus I do still need to keep my feet up a good bit to try to counteract gravity. It will probably be pretty light posting here at least til the weekend (though I have said things like that before….)

Psalm 3:3: But thou, O LORD, art a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head.

• I love holidays, but part of me is glad when the fuss is all over and life gets back to normal. But I was thinking of that first Resurrection Sunday and how it changed “normal” completely. I hope the impact of the resurrection stays with us even though the time of particular focus on it is over.

• My leg is better, but the day after I saw the doctor a dark red splotch developed near where the original wound was and the area under the original wound, which was all clear, now looks a little bruised. Don’t know what that’s all about, but I figured since I am already on antibiotics I’d just keep an eye on it and wait unless it spreads. If it is not all clear by the end of this week I’ll go back and see my regular doctor. Meanwhile I am trying to keep it elevated as much as possible.

• Easter time is one of my favorite times to go dress shopping because you can actually find dresses in stores then. But I didn’t get out to look last week. At the end of the week I had to keep my leg up, and before that I just didn’t get to it. Let this be a lesson to me to shop early next time!! There were a couple of shops in particular about 20-25 minutes away I wanted to go to: maybe they’ll still have some items by the time I can get there.

• This week is Jesse’s spring break. My thoughts leading up to this week were joyous over not having to set the alarm clock and being able to sleep a little later. I do enjoy not having to set the day’s schedule around the school schedule. But Jesse’s my one who, when left to himself, tends to spend more hours than he should on computer or video games or TV. I could put specific time limits on those activities and might, but I am thinking I should have some other projects for him instead. I don’t want his break to be all work and no fun, but a little work never hurt anyone. 🙂 And since I have to be sitting with my foot up anyway, maybe we can play some games or something. I determined a long time ago that I was not going to be my children’s one-woman entertainment committee — I wanted them to learn to amuse themselves (I know adults who don’t know how to do that) — but Jesse is more of a people person and still young enough that he could use a little direction.

• Terry at Ornaments of Grace has an excellent post this morning about the fact that those women who stay home with their children are not always those whose husbands make a lot of money, as the prevailing sentiment seems to be now among feminists. Most that I know have to work at it and sacrifice in some areas and are staying home for greater reasons than economic ease.

• When I was lying awake at 3 o’clock this morning, it seems there were other things I was going to post today…but that’s all that’s coming to mind just now! And since my posts seem to always come out longer than I had planned, that’s probably a good thing. I did want to share a couple of amusing videos. Well, the first one is somewhere between amusing and disturbing….if you have too many chocolate Easter bunnies in the house or are trying to diet and need a way to get rid of them, here are a few ideas. The second one shows a a way to keep a dog amused for hours. Love the expressions on the dog’s face!

This morning after I woke up I noticed a red band across my ankle. I thought maybe I had brushed against something, but the red area spread a few inches down my foot. I debated with myself all morning about whether to call the doctor or not and finally decided to after lunch. But this was her day off, so they told me I could go to urgent care or call my doctor in the morning. I wanted to go ahead and have it looked at, so I went on to urgent care, and was diagnosed with cellulitis. I had a bout of it last January when I banged my shin on a shelf and had a small wound there. This is the same leg but a lower area and there’s no wound to speak of. I don’t know what triggered this. Perhaps the last bout wasn’t fully cleared up.

But I am on two antibiotics this time, so hopefully this will take care of it once and for all.

I was dismayed about it all day — that it popped up again and that I’m going to be on antibiotics again — they tend to do a number on my system.  But at one point in the car today I had the Christian radio station on during their prayer request time, and so many people had such awful things they were going through. I really don’t have any right to complain.

I am supposed to have my leg elevated 20 minutes out of every hour. So it looks I’ll be digging right in on my Spring Reading Thing list!

Most of my odds and ends posts seem to come on Mondays, I think!

• Busy day today, so this is just a drive-through posting. Our ladies’ meeting is tonight and we’re assembling care packages for our college students. That takes a little more preparatory work than some meetings, so that’s what I am busy with today. I’m stopping for a lunch break at the moment.
• I have a few posts percolating on the back burner that I hope to get to. Sometimes when that happens and I try to actually write them, I wonder what I was thinking — it just doesn’t come together. We’ll see!
• I don’t like Daylight Savings Time. I haven’t heard of anyone who does. I was so concerned about remembering to set my clock ahead Sat. night that I did that but forgot to set my alarm. I woke up at what would have been my regular time, but was now an hour late. Somehow the Lord helped me get my shower and then breakfast on at not too much later than usual. The rest of the family got to church on time but I didn’t get there til after the preaching started. Then it was hard to go to bed last night because it just didn’t feel as late as it was, so I was dragging this morning and finally took a little nap.
• This is the “odd” part of my odds and ends: I was skimming through the weekly 5 Minutes Around the Blogosphere posting at 5 Minutes For Mom when I thought I saw a line that said “5 ‘green’ combustible diaper starter kits.” A closer look revealed it was “5 ‘green’ compostable diaper starter kits.” Somehow green in the same sentence with the word diapers conjures up unpleasant memories…
• If you haven’t seen this, Amy’s Humble Musings has an excellent post with Thoughts on contraception and the quiverfull movement. I appreciate her balanced, reasonable, and gracious line of thinking on this issue.
• One of my favorite craft bloggers is published!
• I finally watched Miss Potter. Loved it! I couldn’t get any of the rest of the family interested in it at the time, so I watched it over several mornings in my room while getting dressed/fixing hair/making beds, etc. I do think they’d like it if they gave it a chance. When I first saw the commercials I didn’t really like the idea of animating her characters — that just made it seem too Disneyish. But it’s not done much and is mainly used to show her imagination and playfulness and what she is thinking in some places. I even watched most of the special features.
• When I went to rent it, I came across another DVD that looked interesting enough to try: a Hallmark Hall of Fame production of In Love and War. (evidently there are other films by that title, but I don’t think this is related to them.) I normally am wary of picking up a film I am unfamiliar with off the rental place’s shelves, but I think the Hallmark ones are usually pretty safe. This is about an English soldier in WWII, captured in Italy, released, then pursued by the Germans as they invade Italy, then injured, so his buddies have to leave him behind, and he is helped by many Italian people along the way, including the girl he falls in love with. I didn’t realize it was a true story until the end where it says they recently celebrated their 55th wedding anniversary. I looked in the production notes and saw it was based on the book Love and War in the Apennines by Eric Newby, the main character in the film. I want to read that book now. My oldest son, not a fan of love stories, pronounced this “not as bad as I thought it would be.” 🙂 I enjoyed it!

Have a great day!

I saw at Dawn’s and Bet’s that March is National Craft Month. I should let that inspire me to actually DO some crafting instead of just dreaming and wishing! One of the things I need to do today is just to sit down and have a planing session for the next few weeks, especially for our Ladies’ Luncheon at the end of next month. Maybe I’ll look over my craft things then, too. According to Dawn it is also National Frozen Food month (now that I can celebrate in style!), National Nutrition Month, and National Umbrella Month.

• I see humorous posts sometimes about weird search engine terms that have led to one’s blog. Most of the ones that I see on mine make sense, but this one the other day threw me for a loop: “how to put classic clothing together.” I don’t think I have ever written about that….because I don’t know anything about that!! I’d be curious as to what post came up with that search!

• WordPress employs Akismet as a spam filter, and it does an excellent job. Just every now and then, though, a legitimate comment gets caught in the spam folder, so from time to time I take a quick look in there to rescue any of those. I say a quick look, a very quick look, because most of what is in there is vile (don’t people have better things to do with their time?) A great number of them want to advertise products to enlarge body parts I don’t have to abnormal proportions. I don’t appreciate those or the ones who want to advertise any products through my comment section. But some amuse me by trying to grab my attention by either effusive praise or by baiting. One frequent spammer whose address seems to have to do with various home and garden products (does he not know I can see his ISP address for all his variations?) started out with nice comments but now is trying to raise my ire with comments like, “What if i say that you where wrong and you need to do your research better, would you belief me?” No, I wouldn’t “belief” you, but a better grasp of English would help. 🙂

• One of the cutest posts ever: Medical case study: Big Blue Ted at disdressed.

• Terry at Ornaments of Grace has an excellent post titled “Freed to Love…Me?“

• I don’t write much about politics here, but I have been greatly dismayed with the election process so far. One reason Obama scares me is his stance on abortion.
• 
• (HT to Jungle Mom)

But Hillary scares me, too. Yet I am not thrilled with McCain, either. I was so surprised when he took SC. Everyone I knew personally or heard on the local news was for Thompson, Huckabee, or Romney. Maybe that was the problem — the conservative vote was too fragmented.

But I found an interesting post at a new blog to me, Findings. I found this blog via Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books, and I love the writer’s style in her reviews. I was delighted to discover that she is also a conservative Christian, and I thought her post about the quest for political power quite insightful in Gandalf for President, though I am not as disappointed in Bush’s administration as she is.

• One last note: many of you know that Susanne at Living to tell the Story broke her hand last week and is having pins put in it today. She runs a daycare from her home, so not only dealing with pain and recovery, she’ll be dealing with a loss of income and all her parents will have to make other arrangements, hopefully not permanently. I know she would appreciate prayer as would Barb for her daughter having a C-section today.

Have a great day!

I’ve seen the “Pay It Forward” contest going around, so when I saw my friend Alice hosting one, I joined in and won. Here is how it works:

1. Anyone with a blog can join.
2. The first three people to leave a comment on this post will receive a handmade gift from me.
3. I will send the gift in the next 365 days.
4. In return you have to pay it forward by making the same promise on your blog.

In addition to the above, I’d like to ask you to share your favorite colors in your comment so I can hopefully tailor the gift to your tastes.

I welcome international participation.

Update: Comments are now closed since I have my three. I’ll be contacting you shortly for your mailing addresses. Thanks for entering!