Carnival Wednesday
Topic: Carnival entries
Go and see this week's Carnival of Beauty at MzEllen & Co. The topic is Hope and the entries are so good!

I still am in a funk of scattered thoughts and buziness, so maybe next week I can join in.

Hannah's Big Move
Topic: People/Family stories
This is my daughter, Hannah, and her roomate, Bethany. We stopped by her place yesterday on the way to the movies. She made us lunch at her new apartment. Baked chicken legs, salad, and Rice a Roni. =)

Last Tuesday we were helping Hannah and Bethany (not to be confused with our other daughter Bethany) move into their new place. It's a studio apartment, but has a wooden divider to make the bedroom more private. Very cute place, very convenient for them and they've made it very homey and cozy. Here are some pics from moving day!

Putting up the IKEA loft bed was interesting...Brad and Kailey heave the loft bed up.

Dad looks confused, but they figured it out. ;)
Emma and Bristol moving one of a bajillion boxes.

For Hannah and Bethany, I looked up this verse, which I have loved ever since I can remember. It is not a burden or tiresome or hard to follow God....in fact, it is the way of life.

Deuteronomy 30 :11-20 Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, "Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?" 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, "Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?" 14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

15 See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. 16 For I command you today to love the LORD your God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the LORD your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess.

17 But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, 18 I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.

19 This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live 20 and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Whoops
Topic: Other
There was a mistake in a recent recipe post. I have reposted the recipe for Coconut Cranberry Chews...hope it didn't cause anyone grief! The ingredients should have included 1 large egg.....whoops.

c

A Short Walk through the Word...
Topic: God things
I got this in an email this morning. I love it! (Though the long version is much more detailed and inspired.)




The Bible in 50 Words

God made

Adam bit

Noah arked
Abraham split
Joseph ruled
Jacob fooled

Bush talked
Moses balked
Pharaoh plagued
People walked
Sea divided

Tablets guided
Promise landed
Saul freaked
David peeked

Prophets warned
Jesus born

God Walked
Love talked

Anger crucified
Hope died

Love rose
Spirit flamed
Word spread
God remained.

Coconut Cranberry Chews
Topic: Crickl's Recipes
These are what I'm baking today. I found this recipe last year and loved them! I found it doing a search on dried cranberries, to use them up.

It is a contest winner from Sunset magazine a couple of years ago. They come out crispy and have an addictive flavor. I use the orange flavored Craisins and add about a fourth a teaspoon of orange extract instead of orange rind.










Coconut Cranberry Chews


Ingredients:

? About 1 1/2 cups (3/4 lb.) Challenge Butter,
at room temperature
? 2 cups sugar
? 1 Tablespoon grated orange peel
? 2 teaspoons vanilla
? 1 large egg
? 3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
? 1 teaspoon baking powder
? 1/4 teaspoon salt
? 1 1/2 cups dried cranberries
? 1 1/2 cups sweetened flaked dried coconut
Instructions:
1. In a large bowl, with a mixer on medium speed, beat 1 1/2 cups butter, sugar, orange peel, and vanilla until
smooth. Beat in egg, until well blended.
2. In a medium bowl, mix flour, baking powder, and salt. Add to butter mixture, stir to mix, then beat on low
speed until dough comes together, about 5 minutes (see notes). Mix in cranberries and coconut.
3. Shape dough into 1-inch balls and place about 2 inches apart on buttered 12" x 15" baking sheets.
4. Bake in a 350?F regular or convection oven until cookie edges just begin to brown, 11 to 15 minutes (shorter
baking time will yield a chewier cookie; longer baking time will yield a crispier cookie). If baking two sheets at
once in one oven, switch their positions halfway through baking. Let cookies cool on sheets for 5 minutes, then
use a wide spatula to transfer to racks to cool completely.
Yield: About 6 dozen cookies

PREP AND COOK TIME: About 1 hour

NOTES: The mixture may look dry until it comes together as a dough. If its too crumbly to form into balls, the
dough need to be mixed longer; it should be a smooth homogeneous mass.

Per cookie: 92 cal., 45% (41 cal.) from fat; 0.7 g protein; 4.5 g fat (2.8 g sat); 12 g carbo (0.4 g fiber); 58 mg
sodium; 13 mg chol.

Source: Recipe developed by Sunset Magazine Test Kitchens for Baking with Challenge Butter.
www.sunsetmagazine.com
Remove from oven and let cookies cool on sheets for 5 minutes.

Beauty of Winter Carnival
Topic: Carnival entries
This week’s carnival of Beauty is the beauty of winter. I was way too spread out this week, so I didn’t enter the carnival, but go and check out all the wonderful entries!




And enjoy this beautiful picture my husband took a few years ago outside my sister’s cabin. He loves wood….the woods as well as just wood…stacked neatly in the corner of the yard. To him I think it represents preparation for winter’s chill, hard work from summer paying off, and a tangible reward of hard work. Since he is a pastor, his hard work he is paid to do doesn’t always show in tangible ways. =)

Our wood pile is dwindling down this winter as we stay toasty inside. But there has been NO snow this year so far. This drought is hitting the ski areas hard now, but come summer, our water supplies will be hurting badly. We can do without skiing but we kinda need water. Carol of She Lives asks for prayer for rain, as she lives in the drought stricken grasslands of Texas. I echo her request for prayer….please pray for rain, snow and relief for the parched land and dwindling water supplies of these areas, including Arizona. Thanks!

Embrace the blessing
Topic: God things
Today I was squeezed more than I have been in a month! Well, that may be exaggerating, but I did notice the squeezing more today than other days. Maybe it was because we’d been gone for a week, maybe it was because life is back to ‘normal’….people aren’t as uptight from the stress of the holidays and more affectionate. Maybe it’s because there was a sweet spirit this morning in the services or maybe…..maybe it was just because I needed it. There’s no way they could have known it, but God knew it and sent some affection my way. We let God minister through us when we serve each other, when we encourage each other, love each other, so I associated it with God’s hugs…His sweet Spirit traveling through the congregation, touching each person in just the right way. It encircled us today and it took me until now, 3pm, to realize what it was….what made this morning so special.

Thank God for His people and how He uses us to touch each other. Not just in a physical hug, but often right to the heart and soul of our being. I think that happened for some people who were there today too. My husband just happened to be preaching partly from Deuteronomy 30:19-20, choose blessings or cursing.…choose to live for Him. And today the blessings were freely flowing all around.

Beauty of Limits Carnival Entry
Topic: Other
Today's carnival is the Beauty of Limits. This was a challenge to write, but I finally got inspired. My entry is the previous post, Reigned in by Love.

Reigned in by love
Topic: God things
What is it about a limit that makes me want to go past it? If there’s a boundary, I want to see what is beyond it. If a sign says take one per person, I want 3. If the speed limit is 75, I set my cruise control at 79. If a diet says to eat no more than 4 ounces, I slap on another spoonful. I crave more…even if it’s just one more ounce or 4 more miles an hour. If there’s a rule, I wonder what will happen if I break it.



By the way, just because I want to doesn’t mean I do….nor does it mean I don’t. *doing a little word dance* It depends on the circumstance….and the consequence. Situational ethics creep in like in the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip above. I am not sure if all personality types have that constant struggle, but mine is prone to be lacsadasical, at best, about rules. (I’ve even been know to call them suggestions.) It is ridiculous, but I’m prone to rebellious feelings and curiosity that would have killed the cat like a slam dunk. Maybe this is what Paul was talking about in Romans 7:19-21. It is a very real struggle between our sin nature and the Holy Spirit.

When I was in sixth grade, I had a group of friends who were not the best influence, but they were cool. During lunch break, we would walk the perimeter or the playground, talking. There is a word picture in there….walking the perimeters….just waiting for a chance to step beyond them. I was intimidated, yet somehow in my 11 year old mind impressed, by these girls and how ‘cool’ they were. Listening to them talk of the boys they knew and the parties they would get away with having on weekends while parents worked, made me curious.

I was with these girls one day at lunch break when we stepped out of the boundary and off the playground. I found myself running with them to a nearby drugstore, where we were going to get some candy. To my amazement and anger, when we picked out our choices (we got Pez candy because you could eat it more inconspicuously during class), the leader of our group said, “Now all you have to do is walk out, like nothing is going on. Act natural.” So one by one they walked out without paying, but I couldn’t. I stood in line at the counter and paid while they all stood outside the window, laughing at my lack of ‘confidence’ to do what they had all done. What stopped me was the thought of getting caught. The thought of my parents being informed that I had sneaked off campus and then shoplifted was more than I was willing to chance, thankfully.

Love reigned me in…. my parents loved me and I did not want to disappoint them. The boundaries were there and I had pushed them back, broken through and could have really set a rebellious precedent that day. Everyone in the sixth grade would have known how rebellious and cool I was, I’m sure…if I had gone through with it. I think that if I had the kind of home those friends of mine did, I may have done it. But I had a home where I was loved and taken care of, where I was taught to honor God and to have good morals. I was taught to respect my parents and the serious consequences of disobedience.

Gradually I stopped hanging around with those girls, but as seventh and eighth grades went by, I kept my eye on them. I watched their lives and took notice, even at that young age, of how pitiful it was to see them thinking they were cool, but knowing how awful their lives were. I had been to their homes, I knew. Wisdom and discernment started to develop in me. I had compassion on those girls, I felt pity for them, but I didn’t know at that age how to help them.

Later on in my middle teen years I learned to curb my rebellious nature by taking my own relationship with Christ more seriously, reading my Bible every morning and listening to Christian music. My pastor’s wife at the time challenged us to start a quiet time. And during the same period, a youth leader was challenging us to listen to Christian music. Choosing to fill my mind with good things, with the knowledge of the Word and encouragement from this new music helped me to be reigned in by a far greater love than even my family. I was learning how much Christ loved me and how much He sacrificed for my rebellious ways, my sin.

What the law couldn’t do, Christ does for us. His love is the motivating source of our obedience, not the consequences of disobedience. Instead of seeing how far I could push a limit, I learned to gladly accept **most** of them in my life because I knew they were there out of love for me from a gracious God.

The rebellious nature never left me completely, I am sad to say. I still struggle with it every day. I know what I want to become, I see the ideal and desire it, but everyday rebellious little choices and attitudes are keeping me from my big picture. Thankfully I remember God’s grace toward me and pick myself up to start again…. new every morning. I know He looks upon me as a daughter and is seeing the potential in me to become what He wants me to be. So I am ashamed, yet confident in His love as I go to Him and ask His forgiveness. He helps me start again, helps me to learn to go farther with Him in His infinite world of freedom…instead of remaining weighed down and stumbling over earthly things…


There is a measure in everything. There are fixed limits beyond which and short of which right cannot find a resting place.
Horace (65 BC - 8 BC)

The evil implanted in man by nature spreads so imperceptibly, when the habit of wrong-doing is unchecked, that he himself can set no limit to his shamelessness.
Cicero (106 BC - 43 BC)

Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped.
Elbert Hubbard (1856 - 1915)

Lamentations 3:21-23 (NAS) ? This I recall to my mind, Therefore I have hope. The LORD’S lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, For His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness.

Romans 7:19-21 (NAS) For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good.

Hebrews 4:15-16 (NAS) For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

John 8:36 (NAS) "So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.”

Dreaming of a white Tuesday....
Topic: Other
Well we are home now from Oklahoma. It was quite a drive, fighting high winds the entire way across interstate 40 from Oklahoma to Arizona. At times when I was driving, I had the sensation of driving through water, like on top of a wavy lake or ocean because of the wind. We only saw one accident, an overturned semi truck, but I was surprised (and thankful) there weren't more. Hopefully all this wind is bringing that cold/wet front down to us in the parched southwest!!

I'm very glad to be home! The men in our church put in a newly tiled shower stall and toilet in our master bathroom while we were gone. It looks very nice! I got a wild hair tonight and took down all the Christmas decorations. Why I did that tonight after driving all day, I don't know. I'm glad it's done though!

I am going to try something a little intimidating tomorrow. I entered a post in the Carnival on Two Talent Living last week. The carnival theme was the best of 2005, so I just picked one of my best work. But this week, there is a topic that we have to write about to enter the carnival, and it has to be a new piece. So I worked on one to enter all week while in Oklahoma and will post it tomorrow. It is a stretching exercise for me, but I wanted to do at least a couple of these carnival entries to broaden what I write about. I won't do it every time, but will let you know when a post is for the carnival.

Happy getting home and waiting for snow day!

Newsboys for the New Year
Topic: Holidays/Vacations
This song kind of represents what I feel the New Year should be about. Fresh starts, new attitudes, laying down the grudges and guilt and get on with it! =)

The video to this song shows the Newsboys group riding in baskets, similar to the ones on hot air balloons, but then you see the hot air balloon is an elephant shape….a beast of burden. They are being held to the ground by people walking on the street like the Thanksgiving Day parade, holding those ropes so the balloons don’t fly away….only these balloons were meant to fly away….to carry your burden away. At the end, the people with the ropes let go and the Newsboys go flying up into the atmosphere in the elephant balloons. Watch a clip here: http://www.artistdirect.com/nad/music/artist/listenwatch/0,,473158,00.html

Million Pieces (Kissin' Your Cares Goodbye)
By the Newsboys


Chorus
They all fall
Like a million raindrops
Falling from a blue sky
Kissin' your cares goodbye
They all fall
Like a million pieces
A tickertape parade high
And now you're free to fly

Carryin' a millstone malaise
It's been pulling down your gaze
You pound the pavement
It don't give or care
This weight ain't yours to bear

Why you holdin' grudges in old jars?
Why you wanna show off all your scars?
What's it gonna take to lay a few burdens down?
It's a beautiful sound
(Chorus)
When that muffled sigh
Says you're barely getting by
Cut your burdens loose and just simplify
Simplify

This is not your floor
You're going higher than before
Drop the weight now
Wait for the lookout guide
Look outside
(chorus)
You've gotta lay that burden down
You've gotta lay that burden down
It's time to leave your burdens in a pyre
Set a bonfire

'Cause when you lay your burdens down
When you lay your burdens down
When you drop them burdens
What a free-fall
What a thrill
Bury them all
In a landfill
(chorus)

After Christmas peace and quiet...and brand new Oklahoma babies!
Topic: People/Family stories
We are in Oklahoma this week, visiting my husband's family. We have 2 little additions to the family. Charles' sister and her husband are brand new parents. They have adopted 2 newborn babies this fall. One is 3 months old, the other is 6 weeks younger! They have their hands full...as well as their hearts. =)

Hope you have a great week, enjoying the after Christmas peace and quiet!

Christie

Carnival Wednesday!
Topic: Other







Sallie over at Two Tallent Living is hosting the Carnival of Beauty. It is not a contest, but sharing a writing on that week's topic.

Here is the Carnival's purpose statement:

The two main purposes of the Carnival of Beauty are:
1. Encourage women by reflecting the beauty of Christ in our writing.
2. Meet women online who cherish the beauty of Christ that we might not have met otherwise.

So go and check out the Carnival! This week's topic is sharing our most excellent entry for the year 2005. Oh, that makes me want to say, "Most excellent post, dude!" I put in my entry about being in the sandwich generation.....the story of taking care of my dad while my mom was recuperating from hip surgery.

Merry Christmas!
Topic: Holidays/Vacations


....from my nest to yours. =)

Pleased as man with men to dwell....
Topic: Holidays/Vacations
Hark, the Herald Angels Sing

The words by Charles Wesley, music by Felix Mendelssohn, this is also a new favorite of mine in the past two years. The phrase that caught my attention anew, “Pleased as man with men to dwell.” We have no idea what wonders await us in Heaven, in His presence. But Jesus knew…and He left it to dwell with us….and was just as pleased as we are to live here (since it is all we know), laying His glory aside.

Go ahead and read through these lyrics and feel the inexpressible greatness of the Incarnation.


1. Hark! The Herald Angels sing,
"Glory to the new-born King;
Peace on earth, and mercy mild,
God and sinners reconciled!"
Joyful, all ye nations, rise.
Join the triumph of the skies.
With th' Angelic Hosts proclaim,
"Christ is born in Bethlehem!"
Hark! the herald angels sing,
"Glory to the new-born King."

2. Christ, by highest heaven adored,
Christ, the everlasting lord
Late in time behold him come,
Off-spring of a Virgin's womb
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see,
Hail, the incarnate deity
Pleased as Man with men to dwell,
Jesus, our Emmanuel.
Hark! the herald angels sing,
"Glory to the New-born king!"

3. Hail the heav'n-born Prince of Peace,
Hail, the Sun of Righteousness
Light and life to all He brings,
Risen with healing in His Wings.
Now He lays His Glory by,
Born that man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of earth,
Born to give them second birth.
Hark! the herald angels sing,
"Glory to the New-born king!"

4. Come, Desire of nations come,
Fix in us Thy humble home;
Oh, to all Thyself impart,
Formed in each believing heart!
Hark! the herald angels sing,
"Glory to the new-born king;
Peace on earth and mercy mild,
God and sinners reconciled!"
Hark! the herald angels sing,
"Glory to the New-born king!"

5. Adam's likeness, Lord, efface,
Stamp Thine image in its place:
Second Adam from above,
Reinstate us in Thy love.
Let us Thee, though lost, regain,
Thee, the Life, the inner man:
O, to all Thyself impart,
Formed in each believing heart.
Hark! the herald angels sing,
"Glory to the New-born king!"