I was watching the Today Show this morning and Blake Shelton was one of the guests and he has out a new song entitled I Lived It. The words to his song basically says that our life events and what we live through make us who we are. I started thinking about all the times of my life.

Yesterday I made a chicken casserole at Matt’s just to be fixing something different for supper. I honestly didn’t think Pace would touch it so I intentionally left a cooked chicken breast out on a side plate to dice up for Pace in case he wouldn’t touch the casserole. To all of our amazement he was stuffing it into his mouth by the handfuls! Matt said to me that it was huge that he did that because he normally won’t touch anything with noodles.

I was beaming like any proud grandma would that my food was enjoyed but then I got to thinking and I told Matt that when I was little I would eat anything that my Grandmother Huddleston put in front of me because I thought she was the best cook in America.

This morning in hearing Blake Shelton sing I am thankful for all I have lived through and the people in my life. Each person molded me in some way by being either good to me or bad.

I am thankful for each life lesson learned either the hard way or the easy way.

I won’t try to name all the people or things as it is too numerous and I would leave someone or something out.

I was never sheltered from hard work or hurtful things. It is part of who I am. I was shown by example to be patriotic, I was led by example to pray and be respectful in the things concerning God. I was taught to tell the truth because the consequences of your lies are painful. I never received all I wished for but learned to be content with whatever I had. I can make items last by lovingly caring and mending them and can stretch a dollar to immeasurably places. I love giving more than receiving and even in my pits of despair I can always see a ray of hope. God is my anchor and stabilizing force and I was given His knowledge by many white haired saints in my life.

I challenge each of you today to think of who you are and where you came from and who or what molded you along the way. Maybe you love cooking because your Grandmother was the best cook in America in your eyes! Maybe you loved Billy Graham because your Grandmother insisted her TV stay on that channel. Maybe you learned to work because it was expected of you and no one in your world took no for an answer…. whatever the case, be the person you were called to be today and be thankful! I sure am and like the Blake Shelton song, I Lived It and I know all about it! Haha!

God Bless!

I am going on the second week of babysitting my youngest grandchild and I have a renewed respect for all of you young families out there!

I had long since forgotten how hectic life can be with little ones around.

I am laying awake now because little one went to bed at 7:30 and so did I as I feared she would wake in the wee hours and I would need the extra rest. Well, guess what? Little one is still sleeping sound and ole lady here had to get up and make a bathroom run and here I lay.

My thoughts are of Billy Graham passing, of my new Instant Pot purchase, my spring flower beds, and just anything and everything in between.

I hear the soft little breaths from the pack-n-play nearby and I contemplate how tomorrow I will master even more of this baby care schedule.

My son tells me all the time how he respects Dad and I more now than he ever has since he is in the child rearing years. I am here to tell you that I have a renewed respect for young families now since once again I am a participant.

I had forgotten so many things and so many emotions! Trying to keep all the laundry done and the tons of little bibs, trying to fit meals in somewhere and just when you think you can sit down for a quick bite, the baby screams and you are off and running! The monstrous car seats and all those fancy snaps and buckles! Whew!

My son and daughter-in-law both work and tangle with traffic about an hour of each day. The oldest baby and the youngest are about 13 months apart. I look at them and wonder how they do it but then I remember I did it too.

Luckily I lived in a small town where traffic wasn’t an issue but I had 4 each morning to ready and deliver. It was so hard but so rewarding too.

I remember when we purchased the mini van! I wasn’t worried at all about looking old….I just wanted the arguments over the window seats to stop. It didn’t! Those arguments just got replaced with who rides in the front seat!

I used to round the entrance to my employment back in those days on 2 wheels and grab the first parking spot I saw, gather my belongings and run to the keypad at the back door and race to the time clock! I went to work to rest or that is how it felt. I would come home in the afternoons and never even sit down until time for bed.

And…. that is just a few things that I lived through. I think today’s world is even faster paced and if not for the quickness of time and living past a lot of trying moments, I don’t think we humans could take it.

When I was young this verse gave me strength:

Proverbs 14:4 King James Version (KJV)

4 Where no oxen are, the crib is clean: but much increase is by the strength of the ox.

I looked at it like this:

Without my 4 children, my house would have been clean, the chaos would be gone, and I would be organized and rested but look at all I would be without!

The children God gave to me were and are my blessing. My life has been much increased by having them. Sure, I could have pulled my hair out at times as you families with little ones know but I wouldn’t take anything for the times we shared.

I respect you young families, especially those who attend church and try their hardest to point their compass towards God.

I am experiencing this over again with little one in my care and this time around instead of just getting by and living through it, I am cherishing each day as tiresome as it is and respect it for I know how important these days really are!

If you are a young mother or dad and are reading this, I respect you so much! Keep up the precious work!

It all started years ago with me. One of my very favorite, vivid memories of my childhood was when I was in second grade and my Mom helped me to make my very first Valentine box for school. To this day I can remember each intricate detail of that box from it’s tin foil cover to it’s red pieces of ribbon stolen from the sewing box and better yet all the red cut out hearts. I was as proud as a peacock to be carrying that box under my arm into that school house. I was big stuff or that’s how it made me feel!

Next big impressive memory was a school trip I took at age 11.

When I was 11 years old I traveled to the Hermitage in Nashville on a school trip. I am a super big history person and that visit was one of the cornerstone markers that helped me to set the standard for my life. I made a vow as that 11 year old girl to be like Rachel Jackson and to work, doctor, and help all my neighbors, friends, and anyone that was in pain.

This morning I write this from my bed in Hermitage, Tennessee at my son’s house. Every time I travel here and get off the Hermitage exit, my mind instantly travels back to my 11 year old vow. I think it is so cool that at age 62 God has brought me full circle.

My children think the reason I make those treks to the Hermitage is because of Andrew Jackson but what they never realized was that it was Rachel Jackson that I modeled my life after all those years ago.

The first time I visited the Hermitage they used to have all of these correspondence letters on display between Andrew and Rachel. I stood there and read a lot of them. They had a deep rooted love for each other and it was very evident in the words that they wrote. Andrew was gone much of the time and Rachel tended to all the affairs of the home and the community. She had a servant’s heart and that is what I have always loved about her.

My Valentine’s Day this year will be spent taking care of my little Pace and Bri and sharing my old lady self with them and making this day as special as it was for me years ago. I love to see the little ones soak in the love of passing out those Valentine’s to their friends and sharing their little treats! Pace received this yesterday from Ellie:

Is this not the sweetest thing!

Like the Bible says, The greatest of these is Love!

Be kind this Valentine Day, cherish your family, make smiles where you can and instead of expecting, just concentrate on giving for it is much more rewarding!

In doing those things you will Be My Valentines❤️

I never knew that retirement could be so action packed.

I feel like my writings have suffered a bit the last few weeks because of my busyness. Yesterday and today I put Contact paper shelf liner in all the cabinets in my daughter’s new house. My backside feels as if I had picked strawberries all day and was bending from the waist over continually. I laid, I crawled, and I wrestled that Contact paper into position! Tonight I pulled out that bottle of bath salts that me and Sis got in Hot Springs and had a good soak. The people that know me really well know that I never take leisurely baths but think rapid quick fire showers are the way to go.

Sunday afternoon I will be leaving for our youngest son’s home and will start my new chapter of keeping my youngest grandchild while the parents work. I will stay there all week and come home on Friday nights. I ask for prayers from all of you that I don’t become the bossy, know-it-all mother-in-law and that my six months there becomes a time that we all will cherish.

I have worried about leaving Mark to himself with all my spring and summer chores pending but he usually does more chores when I am not around cracking my whip anyway.

Our one twin, Rachel, just built a new home as a divorcee with 3 boys and her back yard touches her twin sister’s back yard. I have lectured them both about staying within their boundaries and being courteous with one another and respecting each other’s privacy.

I have a tendency to be a Martha personality and need to learn to be more of a Mary and sit at Jesus’s feet. I want to not only teach my children and grandchildren things but to be a mother and grandma that they want to be around. In all my busyness I want Jesus to shine through me. Please Lord let me be your light!

Please pray for me as I pray for you as new chapters unfold in our lives.

The following are the lyrics to the song by MercyMe entitled Even If:

They say sometimes you win some
Sometimes you lose some
And right now, right now I’m losing bad
I’ve stood on this stage night after night
Reminding the broken it’ll be alright
But right now, oh right now I just can’t
It’s easy to sing
When there’s nothing to bring me down
But what will I say
When I’m held to the flame
Like I am right now
I know You’re able and I know You can
Save through the fire with Your mighty hand
But even if You don’t
My hope is You alone
They say it only takes a little faith
To move a mountain
Well good thing
A little faith is all I have, right now
But God, when You choose
To leave mountains unmovable
Oh give me the strength to be able to sing
It is well with my soul
I know You’re able and I know You can
Save through the fire with Your mighty hand
But even if You don’t
My hope is You alone
I know the sorrow, and I know the hurt
Would all go away if You’d just say the word
But even if You don’t
My hope is You alone
You’ve been faithful, You’ve been good
All of my days
Jesus, I will cling to You
Come what may
‘Cause I know You’re able
I know You can
I know You’re able and I know You can
Save through the fire with Your mighty hand
But even if You don’t
My hope is You alone
I know the sorrow, I know the hurt
Would all go away if You’d just say the word
But even if You don’t
My hope is You alone
It is well with my soul
It is well, it is well with my soul.

Today I was doing a painting job for someone and I had my cellphone in my sweatpants pocket playing praise and worship music and Even If came on and I really listened to the words.

Earlier in the day I had started off by reading a Christian blog that my friend had shared. The blog had spoken of the word Calamity and how it is a Biblical word and how in the Hebrew it means aid…. and her words spoke of how calamity will aid in your spiritual growth. I thought on those words all morning.

I have had enough calamity in my life to last a lifetime but then I got to thinking of it in a different way. Would I be as close to God as I am if those calamities hadn’t happened to me? I think not! The deepest spiritual growth times of my life have come as a direct result of some calamity.

I talk a lot about JOY and wanting a continual JOY…. well I just realized that I can count it all JOY in my life because of all the upsets and unanswered prayers. Did I want to lose my first grandchild and my oldest son to death? No! Did I pray for that end result? No!

I could go on and on but you get my drift. What if you lose that loved one you prayed so hard for,what if you get outsourced at your job and have to begin again,what if your house burns down, or you wreck your vehicle,or the electric bill is more than you can pay?

Like the words to the song above,can you end each day and say it is well with my soul because God is able and I rejoice in Him alone. He is enough no matter what else comes our way!

The What If’s fade away and each day we live we can rejoice and that is why I was singing in that bathroom yesterday while painting it!

I sing because I’m happy, I sing because I’m free, His Eye is on the sparrow and I know He’s watching me!

Usually as I get ready for church on Sunday mornings my husband has already gotten his shower and sits in his recliner in our living room watching the CBS program called Sunday Morning. He loves this show and I do too but I rarely ever get to see it.

I must have been ready a little earlier this week because I got to see a few segments of the show.

One segment in particular got my attention as they were remembering those we lost in 2017. The list started out with Mary Tyler Moore and listed a lot of famous people. About midway through the list it was spoken to remember all the men and women of our armed services that have lost their lives this past year.

I have seen this same memorial tribute played out on several award shows and several newscasts but that was the first time I ever heard the military sacrifice mentioned. I salute the Sunday Morning program for doing this.

Those thoughts led me into several more thoughts of issues that concern me.

There are many losses in our spheres of living other than just through death. We have lots and lots of children that have lost the security of having a Daddy and a Mommy living together in a family unit. We have divorced parents that carry the constant guilt of the hurt that their children feel that they over compensate by letting the children rule the roost and manipulate them as checkers on a checker board. We see presents and money taking the place of quality time well spent. We walk in rooms where no one talks to each other anymore but rather holds some type of electronic device as if it was an extension of their own hands.

We have grandparents that are lonely because grandchildren don’t want to come to their house because there is no WiFi or specific gaming system.

We are raising up a ME society where it is rare to see people sacrificing and doing for others without the expectation of something in return.

I am not saying everyone is like this but the clouds of change are rolling in.

I pondered on these thoughts and did a lot of soul searching of my own self. What can I do in 2018 to make it better? Sure, I received and enjoyed many blessings in 2017 but there are areas lacking.

I saw these words posted on a friend’s page and that is what I seek for 2018. A closer and more intimate walk with the Lord.

If I stay in tune with God where I need to be and keep my focus on improving me then hopefully the reward of doing that will be that I can be effective in my sphere of living and lessen a portion of the problems that I am concerned about.

We all have areas that can use improving. My thoughts tonight are to challenge each of us to be more effective and make a difference!

As a small child Christmas was such a special time for me.

One year my siblings and I had been told by our cousins that there really was no Santa Claus but that it was just our Mom and Dad playing a role. Somehow Mom and Dad found out how disallusioned we were and that particular year they took the time to make the deer prints and the sleigh skids in our front yard of heavy fallen snow and Daddy walked in single tracks with his big work boots into our house and back out since we had no chimney for Santa to come down.

We woke up the next morning just overjoyed with the newly ignited belief that Santa was real. We went back to our cousins bragging about how real Santa was and how they were badly mistaken!

We also grew up with an intense knowledge of Jesus Christ and there was never any doubt as to why we really have Christmas and Santa was just filled to overflowing with God’s love and shared that love with children and by giving.

We were poor but not such that we forgot others at Christmas. I remember Mom giving each of us kids a twenty dollar bill and taking us in the Ben Franklin store on the square and telling us that we were expected to pick out something for each person in our immediate family, make our own purchase, carry our bag of treasures home and wrap our own gifts in private and put them under our tree at home. I learned all my wrapping skills by watching Mr. Carlock wrap all Mom’s purchases at the Jenkins and Darwins store that was also on the square.

I don’t think the real meaning of Christmas hit home to me until the year that Danny was 16 and Mark and I were really struggling financially and all we could afford that year under the tree for our kids was socks and underwear and that was all.

On Christmas Eve of that year that I speak of, my Aunt Leretha and Uncle James came by early in the evening and gave each of us our Christmas money envelopes with a ten dollar bill inside just like they always did each year.

After my aunt and uncle left that night our four kids went into the bedroom and shut the door. In just a few minutes the older three came out and said that they had to go to the store for a minute and would be right back. Danny was the driver as he had just recently got a driver’s license. In just a few minutes they returned as promised and nabbed our youngest son and went back in that bedroom and shut the door again and when they came out the three older kids said they had to go back to town as they forgot something. We did think their behavior was very odd but let them go as we suspected it all had something to do with Christmas and after all it was Christmas Eve.

We had a tradition in our family since our kids were older that we would stay up on Christmas Eve until one minute after midnight and then open our gifts as it was then Christmas morning and after that we would all go to bed and sleep late…. it worked out perfectly!

As we opened our gifts that night the kids were bursting with excitement as we found out what all the secrecy had been about. The  pow wow in the bedroom had been to pool their money envelope ten dollar bills together and buy Mom and Dad a gift as we had no gifts under the tree but our youngest at first wouldn’t fork over his money so the older three took off and found the Worley Brother’s drug store still open up by Jerry’s IGA and proceeded to buy me a new Bible there and picked out something for their Dad but didn’t have enough money for his gift so they hurried back and thus the second pow wow in the bedroom and this time they really put pressure on little brother to hand over his money and they took off towards town again. By the time they reached Worley’s drug store it had closed and the BP station was all that was still open so there they bought 2 cans of oil for Mark and a can of WD40 and hurried back.

As we opened gifts that night to all of this and to my shame of them just getting nothing but socks and underwear and seeing that they really didn’t care but wanted us to have a Christmas it melted my heart so much. After they all went to bed, I sat here in the living room  and bawled my eyes out and wrote out a Christmas Card of love to them and placed it in the branches of our tree for them to find the next morning.

Of all the magical Christmases that I have ever had, that year lives in my heart as my most cherished one. Our children gave all they had to us with no thought of anything in return.

God gave all He had to us when His only son came down to earth as a tiny baby in a manger  to offer each of us the gift of salvation and it is all free for whoever is willing to accept the gift!

As an adult now and a woman of quite a few years I realize that God’s Christmas gift is my greatest treasure of my life! I have a Savior, a comforter, a friend, a compassionate listener, a loving corrector, an unfailing love of mine that carries me at times when I can’t even walk. He has been with me through every trial and every blessing of my life and as I write this with tears streaming down my face I want that for you too!

Merry Christmas every one! May the love of Christ find it’s way into your heart this Christmas!