Memorial Day-Two Families Remember

28 May

My Take

DiVoran Lites

 

Author, Poet and Artist

 

 

I knew my friend, Patricia had a wonderful family tradition. She grew up in a mountain valley where her great-grandfather had homesteaded. Some of the family has left the valley, some have stayed. Here is Patricia’s story:

 

 

 Memorial Day or Decoration Day as it was first called, was observed by most of the community who had loved ones buried in the cemeteries.  The tradition was started to commemorate those who had died in the wars.  People brought flowers and flags in the spring to place at their graves.  Spring, because the flowers were beginning to bloom, (there were no artificial flowers). Decoration Day officially began in 1868 and was on the last Monday of May.  Traditionally families and church members would celebrate it on that day.  Flowers only lasted a day or two, so we would go out on Sunday or Monday to decorate and visit with other family and friends, many of whom we saw only once a year, as they would come home to decorate the family graves.  It was a time to connect with old acquaintances who had moved away and came back to honor their loved ones and visit with old friends.

 My family still goes out to decorate and acquaint the youngsters with their ancestors.  Many good stories are shared and the children are very interested in learning about the people who are buried there and how they lived their lives back in their day.  They want to know how they are connected.  We have so many ancestors now that the children cannot remember them all.  Fortunately, we have family history documented by family members, to be passed down to the younger ones.  Hopefully, there will always be someone there to take care of the family and the old tradition. 

 We are excited about our visit beginning tomorrow with our children who will all be getting together for the once a year get together.  For three years it has coincided with our granddaughters’graduations.  So we are busily preparing, corresponding, coordinating, etc., which is very hectic, but also very fun and rewarding.  Nothing can be planned in advance, because everything changes, so I do not worry about the planning anymore.  It always works out.  Looking forward to seeing our kids tomorrow.

 

DiVoran

 

 

My grandparents settled in a town fifty-two miles away from where Patricia lived, but I got to live in her community from the time I was 7 until I was 12. It almost broke my heart to leave, but Dad and Mom had sold Min’s Café and Dad had a new job in Los Alamos.

All four of my grandparents and two of my great grandparents along with an aunt and two second cousins are buried in this larger town. Our Mother took us there when we were children to tell stories about her parents and grandparents. Her parents had graves next to each other near the beginning of the cemetery. They were also near their long-time friends and neighbors and each couple has a pine tree, now huge at the site of their grave. Mother’s dad died in 1939 when I was six months old. Dad and Mom came home from Nevada to take over the gas company his father-in-law had run before his death. Mom’s mother passed on when I was seven. I remember Mother crying and serving customers for days.

I was an adult with grown children when my Grandparents died. I didn’t get to attend Granddad’s funeral, but I did fly there for Grandmother’s.

 

Ten years ago I met with my brother, his wife, and her sister to bury our Mother and Dad’s ashes. The aunt who is gone now and two of her daughters came and brought their families. My brother lived in California and we lived in Florida. He kept their ashes until we could meet in the middle. Our son had a combined business trip and vacation so his wife and two children attended. Our daughter and her husband flew with us and our daughter got us a bed and breakfast to stay in that was the same two-storyfloor plan as Grandmother and Granddad’s house and just down the street.

Being together again went a long way in tempering our grief. We did the service ourselves and stayed in the park visiting on a sunny November day. My brother had just picked up a beautiful puppy at the Denver airport, and our grandchildren sat on the grass and took turns holding him while he rested after his strenuous journey. Afterward,our son drove the immediate family to the valley town where Patricia and I had lived as a children.

 

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I Remember…. Cousins, Mother’s Side~Part 1

27 May

SUNDAY MEMORIES

Judy Wills

 

 

I suppose most of us have a lot of cousins. I certainly do, as my Dad was one of 13 children!  Unfortunately, most of them I don’t know or don’t remember, not having contact with them for many years, not having lived near any of them.  But I’ll write about them another time.

In this post, I want to mention my cousins on my Mother’s side.  Mother was one of only two siblings in her family, and her sister, my Aunt Jessie, never married, so there are no first cousins there.

However, there are some second cousins that are very close to me.  You see, my Grandmother was the oldest of three girls in her family.

 

1953 – Albuquerque, New Mexico – Lillie, Granny, Loa

 

There was an older brother, Harry, who died six months after my Granny was born.

 

This is a tin-type picture, possibly of Harry, Granny’s brother

 

Granny was born in 1892, her sister, Loa, was born in 1898, and the youngest sister, Lillie, was born in 1903.  Since my Aunt Jessie was born in 1910, and my Mother in 1913, that meant that Lillie was only seven years older than Jessie, and just 10 years older than Mother.  I remember Mother telling me once that she, Jessie, and Lillie grew up more like sisters, rather than Aunt and nieces.  There was a special bond among the three of them.

When Lillie married and had her sons (three of them), the boys became favorite cousins.  Jimmie Mac was just a year older than my brother, Bill.  Gary, the middle son, was very near my age, and Pat, the youngest, was the favorite of all of us.  In Jessie’s later years, she would go to Texas and spend Thanksgiving with the three boys and their families.  When my Mother died, Pat was one of the first ones I called with the news. He was devastated.

I’ve kept fairly close contact with Pat through the years.  Jimmie, being the oldest, just wasn’t in my sphere of familiarity.  However, when Pat and Jimmie came for a short visit back in 2001, it was a fun time.  You see, those two boys had gone to a cooking school in Tuscany, Italy,  a short time before.  I remember Pat saying that he just didn’t know Jimmie that well, and wanted to know him better.  I remember asking Pat why they went to Tuscany to cooking school, rather than France. He huffed out a breath and said, “huh! The French couldn’t boil water until the Italians taught them how!”  We both howled with laughter.

 

1953 – Albuquerque, New Mexico – Lillie, Granny, Loa

We had a great time reminiscing about times past. I remembered one visit to San Antonio, and we were at their house.  One of the boys had an accordion.  I was rather young, but had been taking piano lessons for many years, so I picked up that instrument and began playing on it.  Of course, I had no clue what the “buttons” were for, but I did know the keyboard.  I just remember Pat’s mouth hanging open, watching me play it – without ever having played it before!  They had struggled to learn to play it.

~~~~~~~~~~To Be Continued~~~~~~~~~~

 

 

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What to do when facing impossibilities.

26 May

Walking by Faith, Not by Sight

Janet Perez Eckles

 

 

 

Reblogged May 27, 2018

 

What to do when facing impossibilities.

Memorial Day brings back memories of heroes as with gratitude, we recall their brave commitment to bring us victory.  But why do we forget the victory Christ has already won for us?

Do you remember this story?

One day the angels came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came with them. The LORD said to Satan, “Where have you come from?”

Satan answered the LORD, “From roaming through the earth and going back and forth in it.” (Job 1:6-7)

Did he say the earth? Gulp. Friend, you and I are on that same earth on which he roams. And we need to watch out because:

 

“the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8).

 

He’s probably licking his lips, staring at us.

And when we’re alone, seated on our bed of self-pity, surrounded by walls of gloom, lamenting our impossible situations, we become more appetizing. We’re more appealing because we’re weighed down by negativity. And we’re weakened by moments of hopelessness.

I’ve been there.

And unaware of what an inviting prey I was, I was soon to be his spiritual lunch.

The giant I faced towered over me, reminding me of my frailty, whispering I was defenseless.

That’s the place the enemy wants us, walking into defeat and deceived in thinking that victory will only come when the impossible problem would be removed.

But often that doesn’t happen. Not to us and not to David. Instead, like our struggles, the giant stood firm, relentless and threatening.

Poor David?

No! Although a boy, he was scrawny, a bit of a shy kid, the youngest of his brothers and probably voted the “least likely to succeed” in the senior class of the local shepherd high school, yet God was with him.

Success was at work. David stepped forward and the size of his opponent didn’t infuse fear, but injected boldness instead.

Unprepared to face giants, he probably smelled of sheep wool and with mud caked on his sandals, he stirred God’s power within him.

We’re like that, too; we’re walking with shoes caked with discouragement, and possibly smelling of hopelessness.

And like you and I, David probably had to shoo off the enemy’s lies: that problem is too big, destruction is inevitable, the pain will be fierce, or you are doomed to lose.

And as he does today, the enemy presented opposition from all sides. People doubted David’s abilities, King Saul scratched his head with bewilderment, and when Goliath saw David’s size, he laughed.

But God smiled …

…because he prompted David to shed the armor King Saul had given him. The metals and chains were way too cumbersome for his thin body. Instead, he tapped into the power of the Lord.

It was the same power he had used to bring down those ferocious bears and lions. He had the weapon—not a rifle, a shotgun, a knife or sword. And he didn’t trust in the smooth rocks in his sling either. He trusted in a greater and mightier weapon—the power of God.

Have you faced those giants that loom over you?

They mock your courage and laugh at your faith? The lies from the enemy that fuel your fear.

The lies that say your 2-inch faith is no match for the 9-foot giant of impossibilities. The deception that repeats you’ll never see relief, healing or triumph.

We’ve all faced that at one time or another. And in desperation we slip on that armor—our own abilities, wisdom, and solutions. But dragging ourselves toward the battlefield, we find that human armor hinders us. It’s too heavy with pride.

That’s when you and I do what David did.

We shed that wrong armor and pull out our best weapon instead. David was bold as we should be, he’s defiant like we have to be, and he’s truthful to declare to whom belongs the victory.

It’s not the giant that threatens, but it’s the gigantic love God has for us that must fuel our courage.

That’s why David said to the Philistine, “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty” (1 Samuel 17: 45).

Did you read that? The God David spoke about is not just any god, He’s the Lord almighty, creator of the universe, and immensely powerful.

Troubles can come from all sides bearing the sword of anguish, the spear of anxiety and the javelin of fear. But you and I come in the name of the Lord–with confidence, with resolve and trust that through Christ, the victory is already won.

And holding the smooth stones of faith, bearing the spiritual weapon of God’s faithfulness, we can face any giant of impossibility in the name of the Lord.

I had to make that choice.

In his devious craftiness, he lied to me when he said it would be impossible to find peace after my son was killed. But his lies are no match for God’s truth, to God’s power of restoring what was broken, to heal that which seared, and to defeat the giant who threatens our peace.

To the world, our problems seem gigantic, to God they are miniscule. They’re big when we see them with human eyes. They shrink when we see them through Christ’s eyes.

And as we gaze at our problem we have a choice: either to live hoping for blessings, or to bless the hope we already have in Christ.

 

Source: https://janetperezeckles.com/blog/victory/what-to-do-when-facing-impossibilities.html

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Road Trip~Celestial Seasonings

25 May

On the Porch

Onisha Ellis

 

Days 16 September 23, 2017

 

If you read the beginning of our road trip story on September 7, 2018, you will remember that we started out as Hurricane Irma was bearing down on Florida and I had mixed emotions about driving further away from our daughter living in Florida. It took us a week to arrive in Denver for our meet up with our friend, Pam and our daughter, Rebekah. The week we spent with them in Pagosa Springs, Colorado flew past and this morning we were up early to drive them to the airport.  Fortunately, they both had their electricity restored and now it was a matter of putting away their hurricane prep. We were sad for them to go, they were fun travel companions.

One place Rebekah had really wanted to visit was the Celestial Seasonings headquarters in Boulder, Colorado. Unfortunately, a visit there couldn’t be worked into our schedule. I guess a kinder mom would have chosen to not visit the tea headquarters without her, but I really wanted to visit it too. Rebekah enjoys flying, I hate flying, so she can fly in for a weekend. So after dropping the “girls” off, husband and I headed north to Boulder.

Except for getting some basic information, I didn’t know anything about the facility and what to expect, except that we would learn how tea is processed.  As we followed the map on my phone, I began to worry when it directed us to turn into a residential area. Surely the phone app had led us astray…again.  We decided to continue following the map app as we had no idea where we were and knew if we were in the wrong place, we could program it to bring us back to a main road.

To our surprise right there in the residential area, we saw the a street sign reading SleepyTime Drive. We were in the right place! Not far down the road, we came to the entrance.

 

 

By this time I couldn’t wait to get inside, and I was hoping we would not have long to wait for a tour.

 

As we approached the headquarters entrance, I had no idea what to expect. The front window was covered in their signature picture.

 

 

Once inside we discovered tea heaven! I can not believe I didn’t take pictures. The first thing we did was sign up for a tour that would be starting in about 20 minutes.  The room had a long counter set with a variety of teas.

 

Photo credit Yelp by Jeff Boyardee T

 

After signing up, we were invited to sample not only those prepared but any tea in their inventory!

 

I was in my element…..free samples!! Take that winerys! We sampled both cold and hot teas until it was time to go into the theatre and begin our tour.

 

 

There is a slight downside. We were touring on Saturday and the processing lines were not running. That didn’t stop us from enjoying the tour as our guide explained what activities we would be seeing if the machines were running.  They process their teas except peppermint from air drying to packaging.  I looked at each variety of tea from all over the globe, while my imagination roamed wild, imagining the places where the tea was grown as well as the people who spend their days hand picking the best leaves.

After we finished our tour, I asked if we could return to the tasting area. I wanted to try out more blends to decide which I wanted to buy. They laughed and said, “you can taste until we close!”  The people at Celestial Seasonings are friendly and seem to love their jobs.  We tasted several more blends, then headed to the Tea shop. As we entered the shop I was delighted with the huge assortment.

I told my husband to buckle up, I would be doing some serious damage to our charge card!

Celestial Seasonings teas are bulk packaged in signature designed boxes. My husband prefers individual pack and we were pleased to note they had a selection of boxed individual tea bags and scooped up several in flavors we can’t get locally. (Reminder to self….order some more of these online.) It was fun browsing the different blends and deciding which ones had to come home with us. It turns out quite a few hopped into our bag!

 

 

The facility also has a cafe and I was hoping to have lunch there, but it was closed. As I am writing this story, I am beginning to think I might need to join Rebekah and Pam when they fly out to visit Celestial Seasonings. Surely the two of them can keep me from embarrassing myself on the plane.

It has taken me way too long to tell the story of our road trip and this is the final episode. My interstate hating husband decided we should abandon back roads for the return trip and drive the interstates. I still don’t know why, but if I understand everything he did, what fun would that be?  Thank you for reading the posts. I have enjoyed remembering the journey. We are undecided about where we will visit on our Fall vacation this year. I do know that a short beach adventure and a tour of a historical city is in the works.

 

Oh the irony. As I am finishing this series, a sub-tropical storm is advancing on Florida.

 

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Sacred water……Precious gift

22 May

A Time to Live

Melody Hendrix

 

 

For thousands of years water has been among the main religious symbols.Water is a symbol of life as well as a means of cleansing or purification

 

Jesus answered and said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again; but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.”  John 4:13-14

Water, then, is a most beautiful element and rich in usefulness, and purifies from all filth, and not only from the filth of the body but from that of the soul. We can see from this the belief common in the Old Testament, that water is a mystically powerful element, which, being connected with God in some way, can cleanse sins, inner and outer defilement, and regenerate the human body.

The flow of a river from its source to the sea may also signify the flow of life from birth to death. A winding stream is a symbol of the tortuous course of human life. To descend a river can also be understood as symbolic of life’s journey down the “River of Life”.

 

One of the many special properties of water, listed among the Facts about Water, is that it is one of the best-known solvents. On a daily basis, many people, and animals, use water to help remove dirt and grime from their bodies.

Since ancient times, washing has signified literally and metaphorically a process of cleansing, of purification, of transformation, even metamorphosis.

Water is an essential part of all life on the globe. Plant and animal could not live without water. Water ensures food security, livestock security, maintains organic life, industrial production and to conserve the biodiversity and environment. Hence, there could no life without water.  So far we know, earth is the only planet that God gifted with water and this makes it fit for human living and other living organisms to exist on it.

Directly or indirectly, water affects all facets of life.

Without it, there would be no vegetation on land, no oxygen for animals to breathe and the planet would look entirely different. Water is necessary to keep people’s bodies and the environment healthy and should be valued and protected as the precious resource it is. The water you drink today has likely been around in one form or another since dinosaurs roamed the Earth. Some of Earth’s groundwater is fossil water, created when Earth’s climate was far different.

There is the same amount of freshwater on earth as there always has been, but the population has exploded, leaving the world’s water resources in crisis.Freshwater makes up a very small fraction of all water on the planet. While nearly 70 percent of the world is covered by water, only 2.5 percent of it is fresh. The rest is saline and ocean-based. Even then, just 1 percent of our freshwater is easily accessible, with much of it trapped in glaciers and snow fields. In essence, only 0.007 percent of the planet’s water is available to fuel and feed its 6.8 billion people.

 

 

Humanity’s growing thirst also poses a major problem for aquatic ecosystems. “When we take water from rivers, floodplains, and watersheds, those ecosystems bear the brunt of water scarcity and begin to be degraded or disappear.

 

 

Half of the world’s 500 most important rivers – water sources for hundreds of millions of people – are being seriously depleted or polluted.  A large percentage of the rivers in the U.S. are too polluted for fishing and swimming.Water shortages will likely be a fact of life for most people on the planet within the next ten years. We are facing dirtier, unsafe water and more risk of water shortages and scarcity. This crisis is real, it’s happening now and it’s getting worse fast.

 

 

Sacred water… precious gift.   Water is the cradle and source of life on earth. It is a sacred gift.

 

 

 

 

I am retired and enjoying life. My hobbies are my 5 grandchildren, son and daughter, and my loving husband. I am a photographer and extreme nature lover. I love spending time in my garden or in the wilderness connected to God my Creator.
Melody

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Dancing

21 May

My Take

DiVoran Lites

 



Our daughter comes to visit every week on her way to Line Dancing. It’s her favorite sport and exercise. She has always loved to dance from the time we danced around the kitchen banging on pot lids with wooden spoons when she and her brother were kids.


Bill and I liked to dance too. We were round-dancers, and square dancers and Bill’s sister even taught a dance exercise class in Germany when the Air Force stationed them there. Dancing must have been in all our genes


Here’s how I got my start.


In 1943, when I was five years old and Daddy was on the front lines, Mother, my brother, and I lived in an upstairs apartment in Grandmother and Granddad’s Victorian house.


 




 


Our small town had an apple-blossom festival and I loved the parade with the majorettes swinging their batons. Mother knew it and signed me up for lessons.


But I have one eensy-weensy fault when it comes to learning things. It’s just that I don’t believe in practicing. Or maybe I believe in it, but there are so many other exciting things to do, like read a book.


So after a few lessons when I still couldn’t begin to twirl, the teacher told Mother she was wasting her money. Grandmother stepped in to pay for ballet and tap dance lessons.


For that class, I walked the three blocks to Main Street and climbed the stairs to the dance studio above one of the stores. One day I walked past my friend Kay Lowry’s house, hoping she’d come out so we could play together in her backyard.


It was a wonderful backyard with a huge cherry tree that we could climb, and beautiful flower beds we just knew angels lived in.


 




 




 


So this one day, Kay did come out. We were in the backyard playing when we heard the doorbell ring and in a minute both mothers came out the back door. Mine had my ballet slippers in her hand and I thought, oh, oh. I forgot my slippers.


Mother said it was time to go home now. When we got out on the sidewalk she seemed calm, but she did have a few questions for me.


“Did you go to dancing class?”


“Yes, Mother.”


Whack! The slippers collided with my back-side.


“Who else came to class?”


“Uh,” I thought fast. “Betty, Jane, Anette…”


Whack again.


For each answer, the ballet slippers told me that skipping class and lying about it wasn’t a very good idea. Mother had walked to town and up the stairs thinking it would be pleasant to walk home with me.


Fortunately, I didn’t have to quit dancing. That meant that when it came time to perform for the soldiers at Camp Carson, I could go. Mother made my blue-checked, gingham pinafore, shined my black patent-leather tap shoes, and signed up to drive a car full of little dancers to the one-year-old military base outside Colorado Springs. She dabbed freckles across my nose with an eyebrow pencil. My hair was in two braids with bows on the ends. We sang and danced, just like Shirley Temple. I was the one on the end that watched the other girls but still couldn’t get the steps right.


We danced to “Whistle While You Work,” from Snow White with small brooms resting on our shoulders.


 




 


The soldiers gave us a standing ovation. I’m sure we all thought about our daddies who were, “Over There.”

				
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People Do The Funniest Things Part~2

	
		20
		May
	

	

	

		
SUNDAY MEMORIES


Judy Wills


 




 


 


I’ve been thinking about some of the funny/weird things that people do – including myself. Sometimes I wonder about myself when I find myself doing something really strange.


For instance – when I am walking along a street/sidewalk/road, if I see a grate over a drain – I make sure that I don’t step on that grate.


 


The type of drain grate within the circle


 


I’m absolutely convinced that, if I step on it – it will fall through and down I will go! It hasn’t happened yet, but I’m convinced…. And I see others walking over them all the time, but if I were to….


My Aunt Jessie was a special case in point:


 


Aunt Jessie


She had several superstitions that were unreasonable to me. For instance – she would never go to Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico, because she was convinced that, the day she visited the caverns, they would collapse in on her!


 


Credit Google Search and New Mexico Geological Attractions and Destinations


I know that I visited the caverns at least once, and here I am to tell that they did NOT collapse! Such are irrational fears – that are quite real, unfortunately. She had another superstition that I laughed about a lot. I’m sure that many have a fear of crossing the path of a black cat – or is that just an American superstition? Don’t know.


 


Credit Google Search and Wikipedia


 


However, I DO know that, as I was riding in her car with her one time, a black cat ran across the road in front of us. We were only a block or two from her house, but she stopped the car, turned around, and went another way home! Funny to think of that now, but she was quite serious about it.


And one more about my Aunt Jessie: She had quite a collection of jewelry, including a lovely ring, set with an opal.


 


Credit Google Search


 


 


Unfortunately, Jessie had a superstition about opals – they had a “curse” on them, so only someone born in October could wear an opal without the curse affecting them. Fortunately, we had a family member who was born in October, and she received the ring. That is our own DiVoran.


And then there’s Fred’s mother.


 




 


While she was a dedicated wife and mother of her four children, she also had some down time. She did love to read, and she read a lot. But one of her favorite things to do was to play Solitaire….with cards, not on the computer. I actually attempted once to show her how to play it on the computer, but she just didn’t get it. I went really, really slow with the moves…and her comment was, “can you go slow so I can see how it works?” That was the last time I attempted that effort. But what was funny about watching her play, is that….she cheated! She would lift a card or a stack of cards and “peek” at the cards to see what was where, to know how to play, so she could win! It was hilarious to watch!


 


~~~~~More later – when I think of more zany things my family has done~~~~~

				
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How to pray so God will answer.

	
		19
		May
	

	

	

		
Walking by Faith, Not by Sight


Janet Perea Eckles


 


 


His Way


 


 


 


 








How to pray so God will answer.








Reblogged May 19, 2018


 


What’s that smell?


Not long ago, an unidentified odor filled the front of our house. We tried and tried to find the source but failed. We cleaned, washed and sprayed air freshener. Nothing worked.


To make it worse, since I’m blind, my sense of smell is heightened. Ugh! There was only one thing to do—cover my mouth and nose.


So, I went to work, frantically searching for a cloth mask to cover my mouth and nose. I was sure I had put one away in a drawer somewhere.


I pulled out items; I ran my fingers all around. No mask. “Lord,” I prayed, “I know this is silly, but will you help me find that mask. You know where it is, will you help me?”


He didn’t.


Facing my defeat, I sat at my computer and worked for a few hours. Then I got up, walked around the house and, to my relief, the smell was gone, totally gone.


What came instead was a big lesson.


How often we ask for something specific, yet God is up to something bigger. We beg for a solution, but God has a mightier answer. And when we plead and plead for a specific outcome, He comes up with a different one, and one that solves a bigger problem.


That is what His promise is—to solve them His way. That’s why we can be reassured that although He listens to our prayers, He sees our heart. He often doesn’t give us what we want but grants us what we need.


And He gives the reason why in Isaiah 55:8-9: “’For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways’” declares the LORD. ‘As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.’”


Trusting in that promise…


    

  • I pray not just to see a better tomorrow, but to delight in the best of today.
    • 

  • I pray not just for a leap to triumph, but to take each step on firm ground.
    • 

  • I pray not just for triumph, but to know how to defeat fear.
    • 

  • I pray not to do great things without first knowing the greatness of God.
    • 

  • I pray not for a life of roses, but to remove the thorns of doubt.
    • 

  • I pray not for knowledge in a lifetime, but for enough wisdom in each defining moment.
    • 

  • I pray not for the abundance of my bank account, but to take into account my riches in the abundance of God.
    • 

  • I pray not for my own answer to every prayer, but for His every answer to fuel my faith.
    • 

  • I pray not for God to take away every trouble, but for me to take the trouble to see His way out.
    • 

  • I pray not just for a cure to my illness, but for the healing of my soul.
    • 

  • I pray not to trust in my success, but to succeed in trusting God.
    • 

  • I pray not to heal my loneliness, but to heed the truth that God alone is enough.
    • 



Let’s Pray


Father, thank you for your answers, your solutions and your victories. Grant me wisdom to wait and to trust that your thoughts and ways are above my own. In Jesus’ name, amen.


    

  • What have you been asking God lately?
    • 

  • Does your prayer align with His Word?
    • 



Janet


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Did you know I wrote a book filled with words of encouragement, uplifting thoughts and illustrations of real-life triumph to empower you? Its title, Trials of Today, Treasures for Tomorrow: Overcoming Adversities in Life. You can get it HERE.


CLICK HERE for a one-minute inspirational video.


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Beauty and Pleasure

	
		15
		May
	

	

	

		
A Time to Live


Melody Hendrix


 


 


God created the flowers to bring beauty to the earth and pleasure to us.


 




 


Each flower is unique and some are very beautiful as a single bloom but many times it is more beautiful to see them put together as a bouquet or arrangement. That can be a lovely parallel to how we each come together and complement the strengths, weaknesses, gifting and needs of each other.


 


 
 
 
  
 
 
 
  
 
 
 


Together we are more powerful, more complete, although individually we are also beautiful in our own way.


 




 


Do you ever feel insignificant, like God wouldn’t pick you from His garden? He doesn’t see one gifting or personality or appearance as better than another. None of us is less important to Him. We are all supposed to be different. And we are pleasing to Him if we fulfill the specific call and purpose He created us to be. We are only to be ourselves, not like someone else.


 




 


Whatever type God created you to be, it is not just for us to keep to ourselves but our beauty, our aroma, our gifting are to be used for the benefit of those around us. Just as in the bouquet, each of us is important to the whole. Even those who feel small or insignificant have a role to play.


 






 




I saw these little flowers, I had never seen before,

They were so small and delicate, a hundred-maybe more,

I had to smile when seeing them, and wipe away my tears,

You always give me flowers, Lord. At least, you have for years.

Anne Peterson


 




 


 


Consider the wonderful works of God.  Job 37:14


 




 


 


 


 


I am retired and enjoying life. My hobbies are my 5 grandchildren, son and daughter, and my loving husband. I am a photographer and extreme nature lover. I love spending time in my garden or in the wilderness connected to God my Creator.




Melody

				
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Marie Bowers

	
		14
		May
	

	

	

		
My Take


DiVoran Lites


 


Photo by Melody Hendrix


 


 


In her last photo, standing by a big fountain


Grandmother was tiny.


She never seemed tiny before.


She was the matriarch of the family


And we all tried to please her.


 




 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


She was right to think she knew a few things.


Born in Illinois in 1897, she was the first of 13


Marie helped with everything.


Kid care was just a part of life and…


She especially enjoyed looking after chickens.


 


She was one of the fortunate who got all the


The way through eighth grade.


For a while, she was the teacher


Since teachers were hard to find in rural spots.


I’ll bet she kept the big boys in line,


Maybe with some help from her brothers.


When her mother died of female problems


Marie was already married and had two boys


Marie took in the two smallest sisters.


One trick she had was to get the four


Ready for church then rest the legs of the bed


On each dress-tail so the children wouldn’t get dirty.


Yes, very little boys wore dresses in those days.


 


Marie, Ivan (my dad eventually), Ira, Lowell in front.


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


So much I could tell you about Grandmother Marie.


She loved us all and went back to visit her dad and siblings.


While Granddad was a guard at the Colorado State Penitentiary


Grandmother ran her beauty shop,


They also had an apartment house


Victorian with a beautiful yard and


Chickens in a pen out by the garage.


She went to the hospital and to the morgue to “do hair”


For those who couldn’t help themselves.


 


In extreme old age, she got a job in a nursing home


Where Granddad had to live by then


She was loved in that town


And they gave her a little room


With a phone


It was her paid job to answer if it rang during the night.


Some people say, “All I Know I Owe to my Darling Mother,”


But I say all I know I owe to my darling mother and my


Stalwart Grandmother.


I’m looking forward to seeing both in Heaven.


 




 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


Marie and her sweet, adorable little granddaughter: me


I think I’m trying to get away. I don’t think she wanted this picture taken.


 


 


 

				
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