Book Review: Snow Day

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I picked up Snow Day by Billy Coffey because a couple of blog friends highly recommended it, plus the title conjures up joy for this Southern girl — we only get snow days once or twice a year, and the phrase promises a fun day off. It’s basically the story of Peter Boyd, whose job at the factory is under a dark cloud of possible layoffs, his encounters during a snow day off from work, and lessons learned from various other characters.

Billy has a humorous yet warm, thoughtful, laid back style that I first encountered when someone shared a link to Billy Coffey versus the grocery store a few months back. The story was good, easily readable, the characters were genuine and likable, the lessons were valuable. All in all it was a good read.

The only slight shadow over it for me was that it was billed as a novel, and usually in a novel the story is the main factor and any lessons learned are handled with a little more subtlety, not quite so moral-of-the-story-ish. This is more like a series of several objects lessons set within the framework of a snow day. And that’s fine, there is nothing wrong with that at all — it was more a matter of adjusting my mentality when I was waiting at first for the story part to pick up and take off.

I poked around Billy’s blog a bit yesterday and saw a post which I can’t figure out how to get back to now in which he usually asked his children what they learned that day, and one day one of them asked him that question. Thus the title of his blog is What I Learned Today. It’s good to have that mentality with the encounters in life rather than just letting them float by without thought.

I’ve been debating with myself whether to mention my one area of disagreement with the book, having to do with Santa Clause. 🙂 I don’t want to start a Santa Clause debate. We haven’t incorporated Santa except as a storybook character, and my kids haven’t suffered any detriment to their enjoyment of Christmas or the development of their imaginations. We respect other Christian families’ rights to incorporate Santa if they want to and can in good conscience, and only want the same grace in return. I thought Billy’s logic was a little faulty when Peter encountered a Christian family who felt strongly against Santa and then he went on a few pages later to talk about people who want to explain away the supernatural and say that Christ was just a moral teacher. Obviously the family Peter encountered were not trying to explain away everything supernatural, and it doesn’t follow that if you believe in Jesus you’ll also believe in Santa. He goes on to say that Santa was like “God 101 for a small child.” That’s exactly why some people don’t like Santa. Children are capable of belief in God without also believing in Santa and the Easter Bunny and tooth fairy.

Again, I don’t want to get into a Santa debate, and everyone is free to handle him however they wish. I just wanted to mention the issue because I didn’t want to recommend a book that had an area I disagreed with without qualifying it.

And I do recommend this book. If you like Andy Griffith, Paul Harvey, and that kind of homey story and gentle wisdom, you’ll like Snow Day.

(This review will be linked to Semicolon‘s Saturday review of books.)

Wednesday Hodgepodge

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When Linda at 2nd Cup of Coffee had to put aside her Wednesday Random Dozen posts, Joyce From This Side of the Pond took up the mantle for all the random fans, shortened the number of questions (which I appreciated — the dozen was a bit too much some days), and renamed it Wednesday Hodgepodge. I hadn’t started in with it — I didn’t want the blog to be too meme-y and I already participated in a few others. But today’s questions “grabbed” me, so I thought I’d chime in.

1. What three words would you use to describe 2010?

There’s really only one word that comes to mind, and that’s change. We experienced a lot of it this year with every person in our family moving, my oldest moving away from home for the first time, new school, house, neighbors, church, etc. I suppose a second word would be faithfulness — God’s in sustaining us and remaining unchanging though everything else changed.

2. If fear were not an issue what is something you’d like to try?

Not sure how to answer this one. Some of the things I wish I could do are hindered primarily by things other than fear, though fear is a related factor.

3. What do you add to your coffee or tea?

Just powdered, plain Coffeemate — I don’t like liquid or flavored creamers. No sugar. Tea: nothing. I don’t like hot tea but love plain decaf unsweetened iced tea.

4. What historical sporting event would you like to witness?

One of Eric Liddell‘s races: either the one where he fell and got up to finish the race and win before collapsing, or the race he won in the 1924 Olympics in an event he was not trained for because he refused to run on Sunday, when his regular event was scheduled.

5. What is one piece of advice you would like to give your sixteen year old self?

I actually wrote a whole post about that as an exercise several bloggers did a few years ago. That was probably the lowest point of my life, and it was a blessing to review how God worked from that time to the present. One piece of advice from that post: “If I could encourage you in only one thing, it would be to always do that, always cling to God and His Word, to anchor your soul there when the waves of life come crashing over you.”

6. Are you a planner or do you prefer to fly by the seat of your pants?

It actually depends on what I’m doing. With a project, event, big meal, company, trip, etc., I like to plan. With everyday shopping and housework, I tend to float more than plan. I should plan them better — I just hate to spend the time on it though I know it would save me time in the long run. I do make a shopping list and have a few meals ideas in mind but don’t really plan it all out like I should.

7. What is one thing you are looking forward to in 2011?

Getting more settled at church. Though we like it, it takes a while for it to feel like “home” after being in our previous church for twelve years. It will come — people are very welcoming — but it just takes time to feel like you belong vs. feeling like a visitor or “the new guy.”

8. Insert your own random thought here.

This is one of the most beautiful piece of music ever written, and for some reason I’ve listened to it multiple times this morning.

Packing up Christmas

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Even though I am kind of glad to get the house back in order and get back to routine, it always makes me a little sad when Christmas is over and the decorations are put away, not just in my home, but in the community. The special lights are taken down, the cheery decorations are removed, the whole air of festivity is gone, and everything is just…ordinary again. And not just ordinary, but dreary, drab, colorless winter for a few more months.

I was thinking this morning of the shepherds to whom the thrilling, stunning announcement of the Savior’s birth was revealed. What excitement! Bright lights, wonderful news, angels, a quick trip to Bethlehem, awe and wonder at the sight of the Christ child, the long-awaited Messiah. And then…it was back to the sheep and ordinary life. Dark nights, lonely days, smelly work, in all kinds of weather. And yet…they didn’t return quite the same. “And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them” (Luke 2:17,20). I wonder how often they talked of that night, that promise. I wonder how many of them were still alive when word began to spread of a prophet and teacher doing miracles and saying the most incredible things. I wonder if any of them realized it was Him, the same baby they had seen thirty years before. I wonder if any of them saw Him die, or heard about it, and were mystified, and then astounded and joyful at the news of His resurrection. I like to think they continued “glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen” even in the midst of “ordinary” life.

And Mary. After the whirlwind of remarkable events — a visit from an angel, remarkable news, an unplanned pregnancy (unplanned originally by her, at least), almost losing her betrothed husband, an uncomfortable trip to Bethlehem and a birth in a stable, strange visitors —  shepherds, and later, magi, then another couple of visits of angels to her husband, a flight into Egypt to protect her newborn Son, and finally, after all of that…back to the ordinary life of a wife and mother, everyday housework and cares, at least six more children. What must it have been like to raise one child who never sinned? Did she have to deal with sibling rivalry against Him of the other six who did? How many things did Jesus say that she did not understand? We don’t hear from much from her in the rest of the New Testament: there was the incident when Jesus was twelve, the wedding at Cana where she asked Jesus to help the host who ran out of wine, and where, incidentally, her last recorded words in Scripture are “Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it” (John 2:5), a time when she tried to see Him but couldn’t get to Him, watching her Son die on the cross and arrange for her care as one of His last acts (Joseph must have passed away by then). And then in Acts we see her “continuing with one accord in prayer and supplication” with the disciples, women and Jesus’ brethren. Perhaps those quiet years from Jesus’ birth until He began His public ministry were the only ones anywhere near ordinary. We’re told just after the shepherds’ visit that “Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart” (Luke 2:19). You can tell from what words of hers which we do know of that she was a thoughtful, faithful woman who loved God. From the birth of her Son for the next thirty years, she did not quite know how the promises concerning Him would be worked out, but she faithfully served and cared for Him, pondering all the while the things she had been told.

As we pack up and put away Christmas, may we keep the wonder, the love, peace, and joy, the pondering, the telling, the waiting in hope. May His light fill our ordinary days.

The Week In Words

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Welcome to The Week In Words, where we share quotes from the last week’s reading. If something you read this past week  inspired you, caused you to laugh, cry, think, dream, or just resonated with you in some way, please share it with us, attributing it to its source, which can be a book, newspaper, blog, Facebook — anything that you read. More information is here.

Here are a few that caught my eye:

I saw this at Bobbi‘s in a longer fictitious poem about what Joseph’s (Mary’s husband) point of view might have been at one point in his life. From what I could tell it is by John Piper from the Desiring God site.

There’s something worse than death,
And loss of faith, not loss of breath,
Is what he fights.

Seen at Challies:

I have taken my good deeds and bad deeds and thrown them together in a heap, and fled from them both to Christ, and in him I have peace. —David Dickson

I have trouble with the right perspective of both, and I am glad that my peace is in Christ and not my deeds.

This is the time of year when people make goals or resolutions. The following two might help with that. The first I saw at Simple Mom from a link at A Holy Experience:

“A goal without a plan is just a dream.” ~ Dave Ramsey

And I saw this at Semicolon’s from (From Donna at Quiet Life — I don’t know whether Donna is the one who originally said it or of she quoted someone else.

“A discipline won’t bring you closer to God. Only God can bring you closer to Himself. What the discipline is meant to do is to help you get yourself, your ego, out of the way so you are open to His grace.”

So true. Sometimes we can get so caught up in setting up our disciplines as if so doing will make us right with God, when the disciple is a tool, not an end in itself.

I saw this at nikkipolani’s Friday’s Fave Five:

The bend in the road is not the end of the road unless you fail to make the turn.”

That just really resonated with me with all the changes we’ve faced this year.

Lisa Notes recently shared a link to “Amazing Blogging Lessons From Albert Einstein.” This jumped out at me — Einstein’s words in quotes, the writer’s words following:

“Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.” Don’t waste your time trying to create a successful blog, dedicate your time creating a valuable blog. If your blog is valuable to others, it will succeed.

And finally, a good hope for the new year, from a friend’s Facebook:

“What heavens are laid up in Jesus! What rivers of infinite bliss have their source, ay, and every drop of their fullness in Him! Since, O sweet Lord Jesus, Thou art the present portion of Thy people, favor us this year with such a sense of Thy preciousness, that from its first to its last day we may be glad and rejoice in Thee.” -Spurgeon (Morning and Evening)

If you’ve read anything that particularly spoke to you that you’d like to share, please either list it in the comments below or write a post on your blog and then put the link to that post (not your general blog link) in Mr. Linky below. I do ask that only family-friendly quotes be included. I hope you’ll visit some of the other participants as well and glean some great thoughts to ponder.

And please — feel free to comment even if you don’t have quotes to share!

Lucy Maud Montgomery Reading Challenge

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L. M. Montgomery Reading Challenge Carrie at Reading to Know is sponsoring a third annual Lucy Maud Montgomery Reading Challenge. The idea is to read anything of Montgomery’s and/or watch any program based on one of her works sometime between now and when the challenge ends Jan. 28. Carrie has a post up today where we can log our intentions and will have a post up Jan. 28 to wrap it up, and of course we can share on our own blogs our thoughts about our reading and watching along the way. And she’s also sprinkling a few prizes throughout the month!

I read through all six Anne books as well as Rainbow Valley and Rilla of Ingleside and a couple of collections of her short stories just after the Anne of Green Gables movie first came out. I had never heard of Anne or LMM before and was enthralled! I think I have reread them at least once since then and wanted to revisit them again, and doing so with other people increases the enjoyment. Last year I reread Anne of Green Gables for this challenge, and this year I am going to be very open-ended and just plan to read the next ones in the series until the month is over. I’d like to at least read Anne of Avonlea and Anne of the Island, but I don’t want to plan much beyond that in case I decide I want to read something else this month as well. Eventually, some year, after I work through these first eight books again I want to go on and explore some of LMM’s other books. I also rediscovered on my shelf Looking for Anne of Green Gables: The Story of L. M. Montgomery and Her Literary Classic, a biography of LMM. I haven’t read it yet and can’t deicde whether to try to this month or wait til I’ve read all six Anne books.

So, those are my plans. I look forward to a cozy visit with these old friends, perfect for cold winter days.

So High the Price

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One of my Christmas gifts that I’ve been nearly wearing out already is a CD by the Steve Pettit Evangelistic Team titled So High the Price. I know some of you aren’t familiar with the Pettits, but some of you are. They find songs that have such depth in the words paired with wonderful melodies that bring out the message of the song, and the singing and orchestration just all meld together into music that almost always touches my heart and draws me into worship of God. The title song was new to me but the words engaged me on the first hearing. I was all prepared to tell you that since it is fairly new, there wasn’t a full version of the song online, just a snippet, but I was delighted to find the a video of the Pettit Team singing this song on YouTube. May you be blessed by it as much as I was and continue to be.

So High the Price

Lord of Glory, reigning in His Majesty,
Ruling long before the worlds formed.
Yet when darkness claimed His own,
He stepped from Heaven’s throne
To bear a cross, and wear a crown of thorns.

So high the price He paid, the nails the cross, the grave.
Such pardon He bestowed, such grace He showed.
No greater sacrifice, He gave His very life.
So deep His love, so high the Price.

Son of God so willingly He took our place,
Clothed in robes of frail humanity.
Fragile flesh and blood, priceless crimson blood
Offered up for sin at Calvary.

Buried, like a beggar in a borrowed tomb,
Everything for nothing, so it seemed.
But death could never stand
Against the nail-scarred hands,
And power of Heaven’s resurrected King!

So high the price He paid, the nails, the cross, the grave,
Such pardon He bestowed, such grace He showed.
No greater sacrifice, He gave His very life.
So deep the love, so high the price.
So deep the love, so high the price.

Words and music by Deborah Cruise Bailey and Marty Funderburk

Happy New Year!

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(Graphic courtesy of the Graphics Fairy)

I launch my bark on the unknown waters of this year,
with Thee, O Father as my harbour,
Thee, O Son, at my helm,
Thee O Holy Spirit, filling my sails.

From The Valley of Vision

Hoping for you all a wonderful 2011 with a knowledge of God’s love for you and a resting on Him for whatever He has in store.

★˛˚˛*˛°.˛*.˛°˛.*★* .
˛°_██_*.。*./ ♥ \ .˛* .˛。.˛.*HAPPY NEW YEAR 2011*
˛. (´• ̮•)*.。*/♫.♫\*˛.* ˛_Π_____.♥Everyone♥ ˛* ˛*
.°( . • . ) ˛°./• ‘♫ ‘ •\.˛*./______/~＼*. ˛*.。˛* ˛. *。
*(…’•’.. ) *˛╬╬╬╬╬˛°.｜田田 ｜門｜╬╬╬╬╬*˚ God bless

Friday’s Fave Five

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Welcome to Friday’s Fave Five, hosted by Susanne at Living to Tell the Story, in which we can share our favorite things from the last week. This has been a wonderful exercise in looking for and appreciating the good things God blesses us with. Click on the button to learn more, then go to Susanne’s to read others’ faves and link up your own.

This is a hard week to narrow the favorites down to just five! But I’ll try.

1. Christmas. Everything about it — the food, the family time, the right blend of…everything. I could make a “Fave Five” just from Christmas! It was a wonderful day — our first white Christmas with a bit of snow. Being able to have all the family together was the best part. And getting to have Jeremy home for an extra couple of days due to problems with his flight was a special bonus.

I mentioned this briefly in my Christmas post, but Jim had received a certificate for Heavenly Ham for something he did at work three years ago — only them we didn’t have one of their stores where we lived. That’s one of the hazards of working at a place where you don’t live, I guess. I suppose we could have gotten one near his job and kept it in a cooler to bring home — but we just never did. But now we live in a city where there is a Heavenly Ham store, and the certificate didn’t have an expiration date and wasn’t confined to one location, so we were able to use it. I hadn’t realized how expensive those things were — we still did have to pay some, but it was delicious.

2. Games. I mentioned earlier a couple of rousing games of Apples to Apples. Another friend told me they found that game boring. It’s always a riot with us. We always read all the descriptions on the cards (though you have to watch out for a very few of them that are inappropriate), and the voices and inflections everyone uses are so funny, and the way we each defend or try to discredit the cards everyone else plays. Then at the end we each read the cards we won as if they described us. In one game I got “Woebegone” and “Friendly” and remarked that that was an odd combination, then Jeremy said, “You are the Eeyore.” Maybe it was one of those “You had to be there” moments, but that was a time I most wish I could have recorded all the funny things people said. Then Jesse got a Kinect as his “big” present and it’s been fun as a family to play games on it.

3. Found money. This was actually before Christmas. Earlier in the year Jesse had accumulated some money from allowances and gifts, and I told him he shouldn’t carry it back and forth to school but should take it out of his wallet and stash it somewhere. So he did — and forgot about it. Even through our move it remained hidden until he discovered it in December. He was thrilled to have a little more money to use for Christmas — he said he always felt bad always having to get the cheapest things on everyone’s lists, like socks, though I assured him that was always fine.

4. Fondu. Mittu got a fondu set for Christmas and she and Jason made a meal for us with it Sunday night. It was only the second time in my life I had ever had fondu. It was good and enjoyable.

5. Mulled cider. Jim got a mulled cider mix on a recent trip and I made it one night this week. I hadn’t had it in a long time and it was so good.

I keep thinking of several “bonus” faves I could mention, but I’ll be a good girl and obey the rules this time. 🙂

Happy New Year to you all!

Flashback Friday: New Year’s

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Mocha With Linda hosts a weekly meme called Flashback Friday. She’ll post a question every Thursday, and then Friday we can link our answers up on her site. You can visit her site for more Flashbacks.

How did your family celebrate New Year’s when you were growing up? Was staying up on New Year’s Eve a big deal? Was it a date night for your parents or was it a family occasion? Did your family have any particular traditions for New Year’s? Were resolutions emphasized? Did you do fireworks? Watch parades or bowl games? Were there church activities you attended? Did Christmas activities extend into the new year? Was the Epiphany a focus?

We never had a set tradition or routine for New Year’s Eve. Sometimes my parents went out, I think sometimes we got together with other people, most times we stayed home. We did get to stay up late, and I think we watched the ball drop in Times Square on TV. We did fireworks sometimes.

My dad probably watched football on most New Year’s Days, and I think maybe the kids watched parts of the parades in the morning. We did have black-eyes peas for dinner, supposedly for luck, though I don’t know what they were supposed to have to do with luck. 🙂 Resolutions were not a big deal, though I tried to make some for several years — it was more just a day to relax before school and work started back up.

When I started going to church as a teen-ager, my church often showed a film on New Year’s Eve and I think had some kind of refreshments afterward. I liked that then, but when another church did that when I was older, a middle-aged mom, I dozed through most of the film and was very cranky afterward. 😳 In subsequent years they played group games, and that made it much easier to stay awake and alert.

The church we attended for the last twelve years had a New Year’s Eve service, but not all the way until midnight: our pastor wanted us to be able to be home before the roads got unsafe with drink-impaired drivers. We usually lived in an area that did not allow fireworks, but last year Jason and Mittu lived outside the city limits, so we took a bunch of fireworks out there and made munchies and had a nice time. We haven’t talked about any plans this year yet. If we’re home we do usually watch the ball drop in Times Square on TV — there is just something about that moment that’s really neat. I remember the year of Y2K as they showed New Year’s celebrations in different countries, being relieved that so far none of the other countries had any problems as the clock turned to 12:00 a.m. and hoped that bode well for us, too.

We do usually take down the Christmas decorations around that time. Sometimes we shop. We don’t watch football and we don’t have black-eyed peas (I like them but my family doesn’t). 🙂 We have never attended a church that celebrated Epiphany, though some pastors mentioned it and they did note that the wise men came some time after Jesus was born (maybe as much as two years) and not while they family was still in the stable in Bethlehem.

So, though New Year’s Eve and Day are probably some of our most nontraditional holidays, I enjoy them as a last bit of vacation before the routine starts back up again.

Retrospective Stray Thoughts

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At the end of December the first couple of years I blogged, I did a look back at the first post from each month. In the course of looking through old posts, I found several favorites that I wanted to note as well, so I began making a list of first posts of the month plus favorites. I think this year I’ll just list a couple or three favorites rather than the first post of each month. I don’t know if anyone gets anything out of this except me, but I enjoy it. 🙂

I hope you’ll forgive two retrospective posts in one day, with this and the look back at the top 10 books of 2010, but I wanted to get them both posted before the end of the year — which is tomorrow — and I already have the Friday’s Fave Five scheduled for tomorrow.

January:

Thankful in everything.

Finding God’s Will For Your Life.

February:

Spontaneity vs. scheduling.

Light Thoughts For a Dreary Day.

March:

God’s Help For God’s Assignment.

The Face of Jesus.

April:

Am I the only one who…?

May:

Wanting things to be “perfect.”

The blessing of hymns.

An original poem...

June:

Findings.

Big changes coming…

“Fret not thyself because of evildoers.”

July:

Spirit-lifters.

“What Keeps Us From Real Rest?”

A fond farewell from the ladies’ group.

August:

Do You Have the Son?

“David encouraged himself in the LORD his God”

September:

Exposing kids to evil.

In case he needs my prayers…

October:

Colorlessness.

Inner peace. (Not what you might think from the title. 🙂 )

98 books and book series that have enriched my life.

The Gospel and Christian Fiction.

November:

I guess it is time…

The ministry of showers.

December:

Christmas grief.

A Perfect Christmas.

“That’s just the way I am.“

I see I am woefully inconsistent in my capitalization…

I didn’t delve into Friday’s Fave Five posts — that has become kind of my round-up of what’s happened over the last week — or any other meme. I am sure I might have pulled a few favorites from there.

Sometimes it helps to go back and remind myself of things the Lord has taught me, and this look back through posts has been an exercise in that respect.