Melli’s ABC Challenge: G and H

Posted on February 11, 2009 by Barbara Harper

Melli is hosting an ABC photo challenge wherein we’re supposed to look for letters in common everyday things or in nature without actually manipulating anything to make the letter and without photographing the letter itself in a word or sign. We’re doing two letters a week, and this week it is G and H.

G was a pretty hard one, but I found it in the bicycle lock my husband had looped on his bicycle. Can you see it?

It’s a lower case G (sorry about my less than steady-handed drawing…):

The H I thought I had last week didn’t work — it had two crossbars. But I found H’s in several of the different types of flooring in the house. Here is one:

You can see the what other people found for the challenge at Melli‘s.

I have been wanting to do a post along with this challenge on other things I “see” in unlikely places, but I forgot to take a picture of one of the main ones, so maybe I will save that for next week.

Stray thoughts…

Posted on February 10, 2009 by Barbara Harper

I have a dentist’s appointment this morning (ugh!). It’s just a cleaning, but there is still a sense of unease. I am a little concerned about the root canal I had last time. A few days after it I was eating a little mixed fruit cup, of all things, and inadvertently bit down on something hard in a piece of peach — right on that tooth — and it left an indention there. So I am hoping they are not going to say I have to have anything done with that. (Back from the dentist — everything is fine with the tooth. 🙂 )

Jesse’s last regular basketball game is today. To be in the playoffs they have to win, and by a good margin. This team beat them at their last meeting by twice their score — 34-17, I think. So this will be a challenge! They have a good strategy, though, so there is some hope. Win or lose today, they’ve done a great job and pretty steadily improved.

We had a wonderful ladies’ meeting last night. A lady gave her testimony who is a very quiet lady — you’d never know she was such a dynamic speaker! Her husband is a pastor, but they are in between ministries right now, looking for the Lord’s leading. They’ve been in our church now for a year — much longer than they had ever thought they’d be in a state of waiting — but they are still actively serving however they can. At last year’s ladies’ luncheon, her mom told me it was so nice her daughter could just come and enjoy since she usually speaks at them. I thought, “Aha! Someone I can ask to speak some time!” Then I heard she was a real dynamo at VBS last summer. She kind of wove her testimony in with something the Lord had laid on her heart, and He wonderfully used it.

Plus…I have been thinking and praying about the upcoming ladies’ luncheon in April…but just wasn’t set on anything yet, and I was starting to get a little panicky and really hoping to have at least a theme this week. This lady suggested a lady she knew who does dramatic readings and did one recently based on Evidence Not Seen by Darlene Deibler Rose, a tremendous book. My first thought was that it might work better for a regular ladies’ meeting, since the luncheon doesn’t usually have a missionary focus. But then I thought, since we usually have more people at the luncheon than at a regular meeting, it would have a wider audience there. Then this morning, more ideas of how to incorporate this into the luncheon came to mind — so this might be what we do! Maybe that’s why the Lord hadn’t given me any other ideas yet. I’ll try to make contact later today and see if this lady has the date free and then go from there.

Normally when planning for the luncheon, I like to have the verse for it first. Usually just in the course of regular devotions or while praying about the theme, a verse will stand out, and after further prayer and thought, then theme ideas, favor ideas, special music, etc., all just flow forth, and that, to me, is kind of confirmation that that’s the way we should go. I like to have the spiritual emphasis first rather than a cute or clever theme that we then try to dream up a spiritual basis for.

Well, I was going to share some interesting links I’ve seen lately, but since I have rattled on thinking out loud and ended up with rather a long post already, I think I’ll save them for another time.

Happy Tuesday!

Beneath the Cross of Jesus

Posted on February 8, 2009 by Barbara Harper

One of my all-time favorite hymns:

Beneath the cross of Jesus I fain would take my stand,
The shadow of a mighty rock within a weary land;
A home within the wilderness, a rest upon the way,
From the burning of the noontide heat, and the burden of the day.

Upon that cross of Jesus mine eye at times can see
The very dying form of One Who suffered there for me;
And from my stricken heart with tears two wonders I confess;
The wonders of redeeming love and my unworthiness.

I take, O cross, thy shadow for my abiding place;
I ask no other sunshine than the sunshine of His face;
Content to let the world go by to know no gain or loss,
My sinful self my only shame, my glory all the cross.

~ Elizabeth C. Clephane

Full text here.

(Cross photo courtesy of the stock xchng.)

Saturday Photo Scavenger Hunt: Bridge(s)

Posted on February 7, 2009 by Barbara Harper

PhotoHunt

Theme: Bridge(s) | Become a Photo Hunter

When I saw this category months ago, I was excited because I had just the bridge in mind — one I had seen on the way to my son’s friend’s house, with a creek running over some rocks and a neat old shack. But when I passed that way last week — there was no bridge at all! Evidently my mind had just put one there! Too bad — it would have made a really nice picture!!

I didn’t have make the time to go bridge-hunting this week around town, so I went hunting through my photo archives.

It seems like I might have shown this before, but I couldn’t find it: this is a really pretty bridge at Magnolia Plantation and Gardens in Charleston, SC, from our visit there over 25 years ago.

A much nicer picture of it is here.

I know I have used this one before, I think for “lights,” but I like it 🙂 and it fits here as well. This is a footbridge from a hotel to a gazebo-like structure at the end of a pier on Folly Island in Charleston. This is from a second visit to Charleston maybe eight years ago.

These are from my oldest son’s wanderings downtown:

Here is a view from a bridge:

Though I like to look at “pretty” bridges, I am thankful for the many functional, utilitarian ones that greatly facilitate our travels.

Sometimes, though, bridges don’t just make life easier. There are some places we could not reach at all except for bridges. The most important place like that is heaven, and you can read more about the bridge that makes it possible to go there here.

Friday’s Fave Five

Posted on February 6, 2009 by Barbara Harper

(My Poetry Friday post is below this one)

Susanne at Living to Tell the Story hosts a “Friday Fave Five” in which we share our five favorite things from the past week. Click on the button to read more of the details.

It’s been a few weeks since I’ve participated, so a couple of these things are from the weeks in between today and last time.

1. Getting these hung:

I had gotten this little cabinet on sale half price a while back at Hobby Lobby, plus a little extra marked off because the shelves inside were missing. Evidently it was meant to sit on a shelf or tabletop, because it had felt on the bottom and nothing to hang it with on the back, but I didn’t have a surface to put it on and preferred to hang it on the wall. This last weekend my dear hubby went and got glass shelves cut for it and put hangers on the back and hung it up for me. I have in it just some odds and ends knicknacks mostly given to me by my family– my other shelves were getting too crowded (even for me) and I wanted another place to put them.

This little rose shelf I just love, but the hangers on the back were oddly placed, and it was hard to get level. But my husband figured it out. There is a matching one, only facing the opposite direction, on the other side of some other little wooden curio cabinets. Don’t tell him I said this, but I am not quite sure now I like them there. 🙂 They seem to kind of get lost in the wallpaper and I am wondering if they’d look better on a solid background. But I’ll leave them for now. I think they’re really cute.

2. A fixed washer and a husband who knows how to fix things. After doing a couple of loads of laundry, the washer just stopped agitating and spinning — with a load full of wet clothes — and my husband was out of town. When he came home a few days later he figured out the switch that makes the agitation and spinning shut off when the lid is open was not making the connection it needed to in order to start up again when the lid was closed. He disabled it, so now it doesn’t stop when the lid is opened, but I don’t usually open it during the cycle anyway. Thankfully I didn’t have to make a run to the laundromat in the mean time.

3. Winning basketball games! Jesse’s JV team had been steadily improving but hadn’t had any wins until the last couple of weeks. Now they have two! That’s always encouraging.

4. Root beer. Because of a heart rhythm problem I have to be decaffeinated. At home I drink Diet Decaf Pepsi, but you can’t find it in restaurants (the decaf, anyway — you can find diet drinks). I am not crazy about Sprite and 7-up but will drink them some times. But root beer is also decaffeinated! And there are just a few places in town that sell it. Every now and then when I am out running errands I like to pick up something to drink and regularly pick up root beer at drive-throughs. Oddly, I am not that crazy about it at home — the bottled kind seems almost too sweet there. But I like having that option when I’m out. (I know, I know, I could and should drink water….but I like the fizzy stuff.)

5. Lotion! Without it I would be a dry, cracked, itchy, flaky mess, especially this time of year.

Thanks, Susanne, for starting and hosting this!

Poetry Friday: Winter poems

Posted on February 6, 2009 by Barbara Harper

I wanted to post a couple of favorite wintertime poems before winter gets too far gone. They are both a little lengthy and I would normally post them separately, but with Valentine’s Day coming up next week and then looking forward to spring after that, my focus will turn from winter.

The Snow Folks

I look out the window, 259301_snowman
And I see a place
That’s covered all over
With white, frosted lace.

This place once had colors,
But it changed overnight.
And now it’s a
Glistening, magical white!

I wonder who lives
In a place where I’d freeze,
If I didn’t wear sweaters
And boots to my knees.

These folk must be snow
From their heads to their toes!
For I’d never be happy
With frost on my nose.

The folks who live here
Just love to be out
In the cold, wintry drifts
As the snow swirls about.

They’re happy in blizzards.
They smile through a storm.
They laugh when it freezes,
But they cry when it’s warm!

~ Author Unknown

(Photo courtesy of the stock xchng)

The Winter Evening

by William Cowper

Oh winter, ruler of th’ inverted year,
Thy scatter’d hair with sleet like ashes fill’d,
Thy breath congeal’d upon thy lips, thy cheeks
Fring’d with a beard made white with other snows
Than those of age, thy forehead wrapp’d in clouds,
A leafless branch thy sceptre, and thy throne
A sliding car, indebted to no wheels,
But urg’d by storms along its slipp’ry way,
I love thee, all unlovely as thou seem’st,
And dreaded as thou art! Thou hold’st the sun
A pris’ner in the yet undawning east,
Short’ning his journey between morn and noon,
And hurrying him, impatient of his stay,
Down to the rosy west; but kindly still
Compensating his loss with added hours
Of social converse and instructive ease,
And gath’ring, at short notice, in one group
The family dispers’d, and fixing thought,
Not less dispers’d by day-light and its cares.
I crown thee king of intimate delights,
Fire-side enjoyments, home-born happiness,
And all the comforts that the lowly roof
Of undisturb’d retirement, and the hours
Of long uninterrupted ev’ning, know.

Those are lines 120-143 of a 193-line poem. You can find it in its entirety here. Winter is easily my least favorite season — I don’t like the bare trees, grey skies, and short days. But this poem reminds me that there are many things to love about every season God made. The following lines talk about someone doing needlework –

But here the needle plies its busy task,
The pattern grows, the well-depicted flow’r,
Wrought patiently into the snowy lawn,
Unfolds its bosom; buds, and leaves, and sprigs,
And curling tendrils, gracefully dispos’d,
Follow the nimble finger of the fair…

And of

The poet’s or historian’s page, by one
Made vocal for th’ amusement of the rest;
The sprightly lyre, whose treasure of sweet sounds
The touch from many a trembling chord shakes out;
And the clear voice symphonious, yet distinct.

It’s a cozy picture of a winter’s night at home without the usual visitors and responsibilities, spending time together doing needlework, making music, reading aloud to the others.

Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast,
Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round,
And, while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn
Throws up a steamy column, and the cups,
That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each,
So let us welcome peaceful ev’ning in.

Hope you have a cozy, peaceful winter’s evening.

(Graphic courtesy of Grandma’s Graphics)

Poetry Friday is hosted today by Wild Rose Reader.

Booking Through Thursday: Too Much Information?

Posted on February 5, 2009 by Barbara Harper

The weekly Booking Through Thursday question for today is:

Have you ever been put off an author’s books after reading a biography of them? Or the reverse – a biography has made you love an author more?

I don’t think I have been put off of an author’s books after reading about the author — somewhat dismayed, maybe, but not to the point of never reading them again. One case in point is that of Robert Burns. I dearly love several of his poems — especially To a Mouse, but also To a Louse, A Red, Red Rose, O Wert Thou in the Cauld Blast — but some of his other poems are rowdy drinking songs, which I don’t like, and some are rather crass, and he had “a penchant for debauchery and drink” which contributed to his early death at age 37. Yet in The Cotter’s Saturday Night he shows he has been at least exposed to a godly family (I did read in some forgotten source a brother’s quote that he did not know what family Robert had in mind in this poem, but it certainly wasn’t theirs) and contrasts their simple faith and integrity with that of hypocritical religion, as shown in this excerpt:

Then, kneeling down to Heaven’s Eternal King,
The saint, the father, and the husband prays:
Hope “springs exulting on triumphant wing,”
That thus they all shall meet in future days,
There, ever bask in uncreated rays,
No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear,
Together hymning their Creator’s praise,
In such society, yet still more dear;
While circling Time moves round in an eternal sphere

Compar’d with this, how poor Religion’s pride,
In all the pomp of method, and of art;
When men display to congregations wide
Devotion’s ev’ry grace, except the heart!
The Power, incens’d, the pageant will desert,
The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole;
But haply, in some cottage far apart,
May hear, well-pleas’d, the language of the soul;
And in His Book of Life the inmates poor enroll.

The contrast between the different types of poetry he wrote, the combination of the thoughtful and tender with the less than admirable qualities work together to make an intriguing whole.

After all, we all have our less than admirable qualities. I didn’t stop reading David’s Psalms after learning of his various sins, though they broke my heart. Then again, he was repentant. If I read biographical notes of an author that showed he led a profligate lifestyle, I might be put off from further reading, but I don’t think I read the types of books that someone like that would write in the first place. I would also be put off from reading books by someone with a New Age type philosophy.

The reverse is quite true: reading biographies of Laura Ingalls Wilder, Lucy Maud Montgomery, Louisa May Alcott, Dickens, C. S. Lewis, Janette Oke, and others made me love their writing all the more and enhanced my understanding and enjoyment of it.

Melli’s ABC Challenge

Posted on February 4, 2009 by Barbara Harper

Melli is hosting an ABC photo challenge wherein we’re supposed to look for letters in common everyday things or in nature without actually manipulating anything to make the letter and without photographing the letter itself in a word. We’re doing two letters a week, and this week it is E and F.

This is the fireplace in the family room, and I noticed yesterday an E lying on its side.

I didn’t know how to do the little drawing thing to trace the letter on the picture, and my in-house computer consultant is asleep, but I played around a little and think I figured it out.

And here is an F on the floor of the bathroom:

Sorry for the glare — taking the photo without the flash made it look dark and dirty. I didn’t trace this one — didn’t want to obliterate it. But I think you can make it out — the shorter line of the F ends at the point of the blue diamond shape.

I already found and H for next week, but the G is going to be a challenge!

You can visit Melli‘s to see where others found Es and Fs this week.

Quizzes

Posted on February 3, 2009 by Barbara Harper

Saw both of these at Joyful Days:

You Are Mac and Cheese

When you are stressed out, you seek safety above everything else.

And nothing is more nourishing than a big warm plate of carbs.Taking risks takes a toll on you, and you prefer your comfort food to be old fashioned.

You’re the type of person who could eat the same meal every night, especially when life is hard.

What Comfort Food Are You?

The last line definitely isn’t me — eating the same food every night would get old, but I do eat some of the same things often. Everything else pretty much nails it.

You Are Easter

You are an optimistic, hopeful, and genuinely sweet person.

Sensitive and affectionate, you are easily touched.

You love nature, animals, and anything cute or cuddly.

For you, every day is a new chance – no matter what happened yesterday.

What makes you celebrate: Almost anything. You love most holidays and celebrations.

At holiday get togethers, you do best as: The peacemaker. You can prevent any squabbles that might break out.

On a holiday, you’re the one most likely to: Remember to include everyone

What Holiday Are You?

The Bookshelf Meme

Posted on February 2, 2009 by Barbara Harper

I’ve been in kind of a malaise this morning. Even though I had a nap yesterday and fell asleep on the couch last night before my usual bedtime and then overslept by an hour this morning, I still kept falling asleep while trying to read my Bible and felt foggy-headed all morning. I am just now feeling a little clearer. But several things I had in mind to post have all flown the coup for the time being!

I usually participate in Sally‘s Blue Monday, but since the day is more than half over and I don’t have too many more blue things, I think I’ll skip that for today.

I’ve been wanting to do a book meme (I’m almost always up for a good book meme!) that Janet at Across the Page tagged me for a while back. I didn’t want it to get lost in the shuffle of other posts — I wanted to wait to do it on a day I wasn’t also posting something else — plus I had to really think about these questions! So today seems like the perfect day for it.

Tell me about the book that’s been on your shelves the longest. . .

I don’t have any of the books from my childhood, which is too bad — I’d love to look back at what I read then! But I was the oldest of six, so I am sure they were all passed down, plus I think my parents got rid of things like that in a few moves. The earliest books I remember reading, besides Dr. Seuss, are A Child’s Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson and Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. The earliest books I have that I owned personally are from college days, and the one I think I’ve had the longest (besides my trusty Roget’s Thesaurus and Harbrace College Handbook from Freshman English) is Through Gates of Splendor by Elisabeth Elliot. about the five young men killed by the Indians they were trying to reach for the Christ and the way the Lord opened the door for the wife and daughter of one of the men and sister of another to go and live with the Indians and lead them to the Lord. I think I have mentioned it several times before — it was the first missionary book I remember reading and it impacted my heart and life in many ways.

Tell me about a book that reminds you of something specific in your life (i.e. a person, a place, a time, etc.). . .

This was a hard one, but I finally thought of a book that reminded me of my dad. He loved westerns and even rode in rodeos himself before he was married. He wore cowboy boots most of his life. Though I am not a fan of westerns and think the cowboy lifestyle has been greatly romanticized, there is still a soft spot in my heart for some cowboy items I see, like a card I saw one time with a print of a painting of a cowboy riding on horseback while holding a little boy who was asleep on his shoulder, or the book A Cowboy at Heart compiled by David Knopp. It must be out of print, because a quick search only turned up a romance novel by the same name, which this is not. This is a collection of poems, anecdotes, sayings, songs, facts, etc. about cowboys. I don’t have many mementos from my dad, but I bought this specifically because it reminded me of him, and every now and then I take it down and thumb through it.

Tell me about a book you acquired in some interesting way (gift, serendipity, in a used bookstore, prize, etc.):

I had seen the devotional book Daily Light on the Daily Path mentioned in several missionary biographies, and I was delighted to find a copy of it on a used book table at a home school conference several years ago (we do not home school, now but we did for four years). It was from 1906, I think, and was $2. Then the next year I found the exact same book for the same price, with the same binding, so I bought it, too. Both are falling apart now after several years of use — I’d love to take them to a book binder and put the parts of the two back into one whole with something like what the original cover looked like.

Tell me about the most recent addition to your shelves. . .

Though I don’t need to add any more books to my TBR list, I came across An Unexpected Love by Tracie Peterson in the bookstore recently and picked it up. It is the second in the Broadmoor Legacy series. I had read the first some time back and of course want to finish out the series. 🙂

Tell me about a book that has been with you the most places. . .

I always carry something with me to read when I am traveling, but the only book that commonly always goes with me is my Bible. I like what Janet said, that it has “traveled around to different states and churches with me physically…and is ‘with me’ mentally more than any other book.”

Tell me about a bonus book that doesn’t fit any of the above questions. . .

Well, that is a hard one, too, because I have so many books, and many that have impacted my life in various ways. I always have a hard time narrowing answers down to one item. The genre would be missionary biographies, and the top few there would be Amy Carmichael of Dohnavur by Frank Houghton, By Searching and In the Arena by Isobel Kuhn, and Climbing by Rosalind Goforth. I have given the last three several times over to various people, but probably I have give Climbing more than any of the others. Rosalind had written a biography of her husband titled Goforth of China and another book called How I Know God Answers Prayer about their experiences as missionaries in China. Then she was asked to write about her own experiences and perspectives. She is very frank about problems they faced both in China and at home, and about her own faults and failures as well. She tells about the great lessons learned and answers to everyday needs.

I am also supposed to post:

The Rules
1. Tag 3-5 people, so the fun keeps going!
2. Leave a comment at the original post at A Striped Armchair, so that Eva can collect everyone’s answers.
3. If you leave a comment and link back to Eva as the meme’s creator, she will enter you in a book giveaway contest! She has a whole shelf devoted to giveaway books that you’ll be able to choose from, or a bookmooch point if you prefer.
4. Remember that this is all about enjoying books as physical objects, so feel free to describe the exact book you’re talking about, down to that warping from being dropped in the bath water…
5. Make the meme more fun with visuals! Covers of the specific edition you’re talking about, photos of your bookshelves, etc.

I am going to tag a few people I know are avid book readers, but please, anyone feel free to do this as well, and let me know so I can come read your answers.

Alice, Sally, Julie, and Susanne — you’re tagged! As always, only if you are interested and have time.