Main category. Posts about what is going on in our day-to-day lives.
So I made a nativity for my mom this Christmas (she’s only been begging me to for about seven years), and one of the wise man’s hands just wont stay on. The problem with red clay is that it bleeds. So I am left with this…
until I can finish the whole project and stick wires in right before baking. Poor wise man. Just thought it too funny not to share.
(note, it’s not done yet. I’m that on top of it…)
One of the things Pretty much the ONLY thing I love about winter is when it’s foggy-frosty and the trees get all covered in white. We’ve had a perfect pick-me-up of frosty trees lately to make me feel better about all of the sickies going around in our house (It’s been a long week. Ranger’s putting up a good fight, but we’ll see how much longer he stays in the “okay health” range). I wish photos could capture it. Or at least I wish MY photos could capture it.
There has been gorgeous fog, too. It makes the mountains seem like they’re separated from the earth (once again, sorry the pic’s not any good. I was being incredibly naughty and snapped this while I was driving and in a hurry. To protect privacy, I had to mutilate the photo. And I wasn’t about to risk it more than once…).
Comedic aside for the day:
Can anyone else find the humor in this ad or is it just me?
How’s that for a mixed language title.
So I broke down and put up the other tree. And I’m happy I did. I stole some ornaments from the front tree and moved them to the back and both look much better. I also managed to use up every ornament and I’m happy about that, too! Why do I have so many ornaments!? Oh yeah, it’s because I hate decorating the tree the exact same way twice.
Here’s our old tree, now in the kitchen. It makes the house super festive even without too much decor.
Who knew red and purple made such a cute Christmas tree? I strung colored lights to help with the dead spot. You can still see the dead, but at least there’s a twinkle there now. And I’ve never had a tree with colored lights since I’ve had my own tree. It is whimsical. I think it only works because the ornaments are red and gold and purple.
I stole all the red ornaments off the front tree and loaded it with more blue instead, and I’m much happier with it now. The red was just too much. But with only one tree, the red had memories I didn’t want to leave off. With 2 trees I could just divide the memories. Problem solved.
(okay, there is still one red on the front tree, but I decided it needed to be there. Too special of memories).
Let me tell you about my night. My husband hit a deer. At midnight. I think my challenge is teaching me hard-core today. The interesting thing is, instead of getting frustrated, my thoughts sound like this:
Thank heavens that the “commuter” car needed repaired, or he would have taken it and this would have been much worse.
We just checked on our insurance. That’s interesting.
Ranger wanted new lights anyway.
I’m so glad he was in enough control to not swerve to avoid the deer. Swerving creates so many more problems. I’m grateful he had his wits about him.
We’re so lucky the airbags didn’t go off.
At least I didn’t buy the new headlights for Christmas, yet.
Any more to the front and it would have been serious damage. Any more to the side and it would have caused way more problems.
It’s nice to have good insurance.
Thank heavens deer collisions count as incidents and not accidents, so our rates wont increase.
Naturally, I’m grateful he’s up and walking around. Probably a little stiff today, and his nerves are probably on edge, and I understand that. But I’m so glad he’s not unconscious on a road somewhere. And let’s not even get into anything worse.
At first, Ranger was pretty frustrated and “why did this have to happen,” and I can see his point of view extremely well. I’m selfishly glad it was him and not me. It’s his “baby” as far as cars go. But so much has come up the past 48 hrs that could have come up any other time, so if he was really supposed to avoid the deer, he would have. Maybe it was to teach me about being grateful for the negatives. Who really knows. But I can say that if we were supposed to hit a deer, this was probably the best possible way to do it.
That is all finding the silver lining. That was a previous challenge. But being downright grateful for the negatives like today’s challenge is ironically in place for (Yes, I mean situationally ironic; or cosmically ironic, you choose… Grammar Nazi still resides in my head)? It is a bit tougher but still quite doable.
Interestingly enough, after working on gratitude and charity all month, it’s pretty easy to be grateful for the negatives. Here’s why: When you’re more focused on gratitude, you’re willing to look past yourself. You’re willing to trust that the higher power knows what he’s doing, that there is a force stronger than yourself that has watched over every step you’ve taken and won’t set you up for a fall that you can’t rise higher from. When you’ve spent all month working on gratitude, it’s even possible to see potential outcomes. This may take care of some problem in the vehicle that we were currently unaware of, or might have saved us from some bigger woe. Who knows. I’m not far enough away from the life event to see anything in focus, but I can see that this was not just some fluke in life. There are blessings I can’t see yet.
And then there’s the other vehicle. Finding out that it needed to stay home for repairs was a pretty big bummer. But look what a blessing it is now with a little more perspective. It had a lower profile and a curvier front end. It wasn’t as highly insured. It has less-responsive breaks. The list is pretty intense.
Needless to say, instead of teaching gratitude, today, life taught me.
So, it’s day 14. I’ve been sort of keeping up… Meaning I’ve fallen behind on writing, but I’m all caught up now. At any rate, I just wanted to weigh in. How is the challenge working for anyone else? Is anyone even doing it?
I wanted to share an anecdote from my day. Testimonial from the source. It’s lunch time, and I’d had a bowl of soup already (I love soup. fyi. In case you really wanted to know), but I was still hungry. So I made myself a peanut butter sandwich. I reached in and got a butterknife, looked over at all of the dishes I’d managed to get dirty just by feeding my family breakfast and lunch, and instead of thinking ugh. Dishes. It stinks that so many get dirty. I thought,
I am so blessed to have clean dishes when I go to reach for some.
No joke! Score a point for the home team, it’s working!
also, here are some excerpts of what I am thankful for. I haven’t posted them on here, because I wanted the chance to actually get personal with them, but I’ve chosen some to share here. I thought it was appropriate.
[warning]This first one might be gruesome for some. [/warning]
I am blessed to have people I can rely on in an emergency. Tonight at the Relief Society activity, my daughter’s nose started bleeding rampantly. This is her 4th nosebleed in 36 hours. I rushed her to the bathroom to clean it up and get it to stop bleeding. I couldn’t get it to stop. And then, as we were pulling the tissue away, we pulled out a 2” clump (seriously, not an exaggeration), that wasn’t attached to anything, just clotting in her nose since there was so much blood and the stuff on the walls of the nose was still fresh and oozing. So I opened the door in the RS room, asked the first person I saw if they had a vehicle and if they could drive us to our house. Instead, we bypassed the house and went straight for the ER. She even stayed with us and gave us a ride back home. I was so grateful! We got the nose all cleared up… right before the doc walks in, naturally. I’m pretty sure that it was about an hour’s worth of bleeding. He checked for anemia, didn’t see any signs. Needless to say, we’re adapting to the Vaseline in the nose routine at our house. I think I’ve perfected it, because she doesn’t hate it nearly as much as I used to. It’s all about breathing out while you’re stuffing that cue tip up your nose.
I’m blessed for soup. My friend gave me the recipe last year, and it has been such a blessing to my life! I have been able to share it with others, and it has blessed their lives as well. Something about this soup made from ingredients I grew, that is hearty and healthy… It’s soul food. I’m so lucky to have such an amazing resource at my disposal. It’s also quick and easy to grab in nights that we’re in a hurry.
I am blessed to have a husband that encourages me to take time off. The world makes husbands out to be a “what did you do all day” sort of person, but Ranger has never even implied that I was lazy; quite the contrary. He often rejoices in a day taken just for myself. I am so grateful that he encourages me in resting. He makes me feel accomplished even when I didn’t do anything, because it meant I was taking care of myself. And I love him for that.
I am blessed by bears that say prayers. My daughter had her bear kneel down with us during prayers tonight. I didn’t see her do it, I just opened my eyes, and he was there. That is a childhood memory I want to keep. So sweet and innocent. She is such a breath of fresh air.
I’m blessed to have a past. Because of my past, I see things in others. Because of my past, I have warning signs to notify me of danger. But I can also show a level of compassion not available from a soul that has not also suffered. The human existence needs other humans to succeed. We need to be understood, and I’m grateful to have that level of understanding.
It’s Halloween, but most of the festivities here are already done.
The mummy hotdogs and pizza are eaten. The witch has a nose pinned back on, the fish are all “caught”, and the “potions” are strewn around. The costumes are set aside for tonight, and the punch bowl is empty. That being said, there’s still a brain mold full of jello sitting in my fridge because I forgot all about it.
Yeah, I wish I could say that was out of the norm for me… But oh well. We’ll just have a family game night tonight.
These mob bosses and one adorable Hello Kitty are looking forward to a night full of treats, tricks, and freezing temperatures.
We’re currently on our way back from my high school reunion (oh man, was that an eye opener), and jamming out to Hispanic music. Lest you think we actually enjoy it, let me explain:
This poem was shared at the CES Fireside yesterday. I absolutely LOVE it. I can relate with the tree in that I’m grateful to realize how strong I am now. And I feel like I’ve been in that wind storm before. And I hope that I can have the same attitude all the time. It reminded me of one of my favorite songs, Roots before Branches.
I’ve always felt that it is smart to know what you stand for. I feel like if I lose sight of who I am and what I stand for and who I want to be then I lose myself, so it’s always been something I cherish “down deep.” Throughout the years, I have learned and re-learned that I am a daughter of a Heavenly Father who loves me, and I love him. I am bold and sometimes I’m too pushy. I am a truth giver and truth seeker. I am a marriage advocate, and a divorcee. I am eclectic and a contradiction. And most of all, I am okay with who I am, even though I will still try to be better, and even though I’m far from perfect.
Today I was watching one of my friends’ kids. The boy told me I was mean and that he’d have the cops put me in jail. I asked him what he’d tell tell the cops to convince them I needed to go. He couldn’t think of anything. So he said he’d hit me. I told him that then I’d have something to tell the cops when he called, then. He’d say that he’d kill me (he’s only 4, so I doubt he really thought that one through). Said then neither one of us would have to tell the cops. They’d know.
Then he said he tells his mom that all the time. And his dad. I said if you killed them, who’d feed you?
“I would.”
“You can use the stove?”
“Yeah.”
“How would you get groceries? can you drive?”
“I’d walk”
“But what if it got cold? Do you have that many coats to stay warm?”
“I wont get cold.”
“Ok, but what about your sister? Who’d change her diaper?”
And that was it. He couldn’t stop laughing. So there you go. Never try to win an argument with a mom.
