Graced with Grace

I am by no means a pro on knowing what kind of man to marry, but I believe I have an advantage to some extent, in that I am not dating or married and never have been, so I can’t be biased, but have instead gotten to observe much. Being single for almost 23 years now has given me lots of opportunities for watching the young men folk in my life and seeing pros and cons. Sometimes, I say “No way! I could never marry a man like that!” and sometimes I say “That is a beautiful characteristic and something to keep in mind for a future spouse.” Coming from a Christian perspective, there are some of the obvious things that a girl should look for in a spouse, but I want to mention some of the other things, assuming my readers already desire a godly spouse. 1.      In all my observations, one thing on the top of my list of approved men are the ones who help with the dishes or other mundane tasks, whether married, dating, or single. Yes, seriously! It seems...

    I love observing people and sometimes they just make me smile. Like right now as I sit in lovely local coffee shop writing this post I see a little girl sitting at another table nearby, eating a cup of ice cream. I don’t know really anything about her accept for what I observe, yet I already know she must be a girl after my own heart because she eats ice cream. She’s quite, just enjoying the ice cream, watching her surroundings, observing others like I do. Maybe she is not always so quite or so well behaved, but I can’t help, but love her. She seems to be a gentle sort of girl. Another girl that put a smile on my face or actually several smiles is girl I saw at church one Sunday. I stood at one of the doors into the sanctuary handing out bulletins to the congregation. She was in the back with her family. Young, but ladylike. That’s how she first struck me. I think she must have been the oldest daughter for she had that big sister/helper look to her. At one point...

Sometimes I let other people persuade me and tell me who I am. People look at my life and sometimes voice their opinion of me, telling me I am this or that. I am not so displeased with the people who say things as I am displeased with myself and how I receive it. I allow people to define my life for me with just one word. But can any one really be defined in just one word? How shallow a life that would be and yet I allow it for my own life sometimes. If someone says I am X, I begin to live X, whether X is a good thing or bad thing. Or maybe someone said I am Y and so I allow that to define me, as well. I sometimes live in a small box because I let others define who I am and often times that is a very small box, its only one very small part of who I am and yet I let it rule my life. Someone sees one very tiny aspect of my life and I allow that one very tiny aspect to control my life. It may even have been something that showed its face because of one particular circ...

Beginning a new journal, but I never know what to say for that first page. The beginning of a new journal, but the continuation of the same story, the same journey. One more volume of the tale has been completed, but another volume must begin. I like to leave the last page of my journal empty. It reminds me that the story is not over. Its "to be continued." The story is not over until the Author says so and I am not the author, I am just a scribe writing as I see and hear and feel and taste. But I don't know the Whole. I only know in part because I only see in part. So as a scribe, I only write in part. But he, the Great Author, knows the whole and has written the whole and the whole is a beautiful story. So the story I write is only a fraction. Where I begin and where I leave off is only a very small fraction of the Whole. Between the lines of the story I write, is a very different story of what my Creator writes.  

I haven't written too much lately, but that doesn't mean that nothing is happening, although life does seem to be kind of slow right now. I am trying to find a job for the summer, but already more than half the summer seems to be gone. Summer has had it adventures and highlights and also lows, so I thought I would share a few of them with you and because everyone loves pictures, I will share some pictures that go along with some of my favorite moments of this summer so far. ;) The first highlight of my summer was going home for a month to visit my sisters and parents. The low about going home was getting my Wisdom-teeth pulled (of which you shall have no pleasure in seeing the pictures of my chipmunk face because I am not going to share that with you. Muwahahahaha!) But there were several highs to my visit. One sister graduated high school and another sister I got to watch at her violin recital. I was able to visit with several friends, read several good and ...