THREE GOOD THINGS...

NOTE TO SELF...remember that as we make plans..God is smiling.

He must be smiling an awful lot lately...because it seems lately nothing goes as I plan. I go on a diet and plan on loosing some weight, this morning I stepped on the scales and decided to give my scales away to some needy family. I plan an amazing dinner and guests cancel....next time I'm planning SOUP. I spray my weeds and it rains and washes the weed killer away. I really dislike change..and I'm perfectly willing to compromise but it seems God wants to have everything His own way. I was really hoping that by this time in my life I could just breathe a deep sigh and say, "Oh, so this is how life works! Now I understand! Now I can settle back and just enjoy it."  But surprise...Seems I catch on to one thing and get really good at it and then it's over, and all the expertise I gained is no longer needed.

I didn't plan to celebrate Mother's day without a mother...or to celebrate my husbands birthday with out him.  Note to self....do research to determine if it's wierd to even want to celebrate his birthday without him.

So feeling kinda down this morning....OK I guess what I'm really feeling is poor...poor..pitiful me!!
So I decided to come up witih three GOOD things to focus on instead of myself.

1. On Saturday night my son was out of town so I invited my daughter in law and grandkids (4) over for a slumber party. What a grand time we had eating spaghetti and garlic bread...lots and lots of garlic bread. (Oh maybe that's why I'm mad at my scales this morning)

2. Went for a wonderful hike in the country. Saw beautiful wild flowers and stopped to play with some new born puppies. Then home to a good book and a nap on my porch swing while listening to the water cascade over the rocks in my beautiful water grden.

3. Rembering pastor Ron's sermon on Sunday and the fact that God never changes!! What a great thing to remember in this life of constant changes.

BREATHE IN...BREATHE OUT...MOVE ON!!

These are words to one of my favorite songs and this has also been my mantra these past years. When my husband of 47 years was diagnosed with cancer...I would tell myself just breathe...we can do this. During his numerous bouts with chemo...just breathe...during his stem cell transplants.....
breathe in...breathe out..move on!!!  Move on and do what has to be done. When we received the terminal diagnosis...I would breathe in but would forget to breath out. So numerous times a day you would hear this big whoosh of air being expelled as my body remembered to breathe out.

But that is in the past. Or is it? The past is never the past because it is really never gone. The past caught me off guard this morning as I was digging in my dresser drawer and came up with his safe accident free belt buckle. The past is there when I look into the eyes of our youngest son...the past is always there and after all where would it go and why would I want it to be gone anyway. The past I'm talking about and the past that I want to be gone is the hurting past of the past few months of his life. I'm trying to "move on" and move away from the bad years and focus on the good times. Trying so hard to not let the painful past haunt me and trying so hard to not let the past become my future. I want to look at the belt buckle and remember how much he loved driving his big 18 wheeler...I want to look at pictures of him on his ATV at the dunes and remember his dare-devil rides and jumps. What a hoot!!  I want to view pictures of us on vacation and remember the fun we had together...no tears of sadness. I don't want to remember cancer...chemo...treatments...and final days. I want to move on and move away from the pain...move on and away from cancer.

Breathe in...breathe out....move on!!

PARKINSON'S AND OTHER STUFF THAT ANNOY ME.

I received an invite last week to the 6th annual Shakers Ball that's being held at McMenamins in NE Portland. I had to belly laugh when I received the invitation to..."The Shaker's Ball" . Don't get me wrong, I'm all for fund raising events and Parkinson's is dear to my heart since I am a 3rd generation shaker. You've heard the saying she's a mover and a shaker...yep...that's me. But is this name appropriate for an amazing event that raises thousands of dollars each year for Parkinson's research? At first I was a tad bit offended but after a few moments of thinking about it I realized I wasn't really annoyed at the name of the ball...I was just annoyed....period.   I'm still trying to put a handle on it. Yes I have Parkinson's...yes I am a "shaker"...so what's the problem? After considerable thought I came to the conclusion I am just annoyed with the disease itself.
Parkinson's annoys me!!!

Cancer annoys me. I had lunch with four high school friends last week. We have kept in touch off and on over the past forty some odd years since our high school daze. Out of the five of us...Pauline is a breast cancer survivor and Sue just started aggressive treatment for her breast cancer. Five of us and two breast cancer survivor's (yes I am counting Sue as a survivor). Not good odds (2 out of 5)
Cancer annoys me!!

Getting old annoys me. Actually it's not the getting older that I'm annoyed with it's everything associated with the aging process. Why can't we just get wrinkles and die? Actually I'd like to do away with the wrinkles also and high blood pressure...high cholesterol....low thyroid...high blood sugar....high thyroid...bad heart...and all the other diseases that seem to be plentiful in the retirement communities.
Getting old annoys me!!

Rain annoys me. It rained all night long..every time I woke up it was pouring.  As I sit here in my office writing this I glance out the window and there's a beautiful rainbow. The rainbow is telling me this morning that God is still there for me...whether you are going through physical problems..financial problems or problems of any nature....God is always there!!

AIN'T NO MOUNTAIN HIGH ENOUGH!!

For some reason I awoke this morning with that song running through my head. The music is great...but it's the lyrics that are stuck in my head and keep popping out of my mouth at inapproprate times, it seems.

"I'll be there in a hurry...you don't have to worry...No matter where you are. No matter how far. There ain't no mountain high enough to keep me away from you".
(Taken in Josuha Tree National park)

Isn't that what we all desire in life? Isn't that what we all are looking for? Isn't that what we are all in search of? Those connections with people that remind us that we matter!! We all have that list in our heads. You know the list...the one that when the %$#@ hits the fan... you know who you can call on.

I have, and I am blessed with those people for whom "there ain't no mountain high enough...there ain't no river deep enough...ain't no valley low enough...to keep them away when I need them". My list is hugh...humungous...immense....colossal...massive...you get the picture...and I am thanking God this beautiful Sunday morning for everyone in my life that climbs montains...swims river...and crosses valley's for me. 
Thank you God...and thanks to my peeps!!

View from my front porch

I love the time just before dawn...the birds are just waking up...my neighbors are still asleep...stillness.

So with a steaming cup of coffee in my hand I head to my porch. I love to sit on my front porch and just listen for God...and as I just sit and listen...slowly, slowly my senses awaken to His presence.

Dawn...early morning and the sun barely peeking

through the trees.

Flowers...spring flowers, bushes and shrubs beginning to bloom.

I have decided to just sit here and listen for God's voice. He has been whispering in my ear for the past week but I haven't been "quite" long enough to listen.

"It's all good"  That is a favorite saying of a good friend...it's good for me to remember that when God finished creating the world, He declared it good.

Thank you God for all the beauty around me....it is all good!!

SEASONAL LUST!!

This morning I woke up and as usual the first thing I do each and every morning is look out the window. If it's not dark...which it usually is...I look up at the sky. What I'm looking for is that bright orange...or yellow....or golden...globe that sits in the sky.It's hard to remember the exact color of it.  But this morning as usual when I peeked through the blinds...and I saw gray...again, I learned something new about myself....I hate gray!! 

Not only do I hate gray but I also realized something else about myself on this bleak...gray...cloudy...sunless day...I have a disease. Maybe it's not really a disease. I think it's more an addiction or maybe a flaw in my genetic makeup. I have seasonal lust!! The bible tells me that lust is a sin so "welcome to this sinners blog". But it is really a sin to lust after something beautiful that God made especially for me to enjoy?? OOPS...I guess God made everything.

Here I am last fall enjoying one last ride before the sun is gone again. 

                                                         Island memories...oh how they linger!!

The sun is somewhere....I remember it clearly!!

If you are lucky enough to have a garden.........you are lucky enough!!

I recently have been coresponding with a second cousin that I didn't know existed. She lives in New Zealand and her grandpa and my grandpa were brothers. So this morning I was on a quest...looking for an old photograph I had promised a friend and at the same time looking for a copy of the family record book I had put together back in 1983. Wow...good thing the date was printed on the back cover because I had told my cousin that I thought I had done it about 15 years ago. OOPS...more like 27 years ago. But in my search for these items I got lost in a sea of old photographs and old memories. Pictures of my Grandma and Grandpa...pictures of my Mom...pictures of my husband (all in heaven now) and lots and lots of pictures of flowers.

The love of flowers and plants and digging in the dirt is the hertitage passed from my Grandpa....to Mom....to me...and then to my daughter. Take a look at my nails this time of the year and you can eaasily tell that yes I have the digging in the dirt gene.  I'll have to remember to ask my new cousin if she also inherited this gene.

Mom was a lover of cut flowers..if she saw a flower growing she just had to pick it and make an arrangement. She owned and operated a florist shop most of her "retirement" years. She was self taught and in her element when fussing with her flowers.

Now I love cut flowers also but my favorite place to view flowers is in the dirt.....right where God planted them. With my help of course!!

My secret garden!!