Interesting Blogs

Please check out my new blog list. These are blogs that I've been reading and find interesting. I've put two up there but will add ones as I have time. The Constructive Curmudgeon is a very good blog that I've just started reading thanks to the Vere Loqui blog. The author seems to think a lot like me but puts things into words better than I do. Vere Loqui is also quite good, but Martin Cothran is very active in Kentucky politics. The result is that there are many entries about Kentucky politics. Some of these are about things that are national issues and issues that we are facing in Ohio as well-accountability in education and legalized gambling. He can also get very deep at times; and I don't know how other people are, but I have difficulty reading this kind of material on a computer screen. I do hope that you will check them out and enjoy them as much as I do.

Maple Syrup Time

The following is a reprint from my myspace blog from about this time last year.
A couple of updates are in order: First, the price of pancakes has gone up-we went last week and it's about $18 for all three of us-still a deal. Second, my comment about not having DSL-finally got it last summer, but with the weather it's been a little iffy this week.
I have to share a little funny from our meal last week. When I was served, they gave me a HUGE pancake telling me I was the 300th customer (not sure I bought that). I only took the one since it was as big as my plate. I barely finished it, but I told Geno, "Well I can tell people I only had one pancake and not be a liar."
Another little note about Pancake breakfast, we do this every year. It's one of those little traditions that we've started. I think that this is such a great thing to do for kids-it just builds those happy childhood memories. We go every year to the breakfast at Century Village and then go to the little general store there and get a little something. Jack loves this. I'm glad I can do this for him. You know, we don't know how long we'll have with our children and we need to just make time to do these kinds of things. I lost my parents when I was pretty young-an adult, but a very young adult. I miss my dad everyday, but one of the things that sustains me, aside from knowing I'll see him again one day, are the memories I have of him.

Maple syrup time. I live in Northeast Ohio, and a sure sign that Spring is coming is that there are pancake breakfasts everywhere. If you don't know, Northeast Ohio is big maple syrup country-Vermont gets all the acclaim, but we are just as syrupy here. Every school child learns the steps to making syrup. (I would tell you, but then I would have to kill you.) Seriously from mid February until sometime in April we are just Maple Crazy here.
And I love it. First, I love maple syrup. I love candy and to me Maple syrup is like having candy for breakfast. When I was a little girl, I could eat french toast or pancakes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner because I got to have syrup on them. (Per my last blog-I guess maybe I need to add gluttony to my sin list.) You can see from my childhood pictures, I was just a little thing, but boy could I put away the pancakes. That may be why I'm not a little thing now. When I was at church camp, I ate over 20 pancakes one morning in a pancake eating contest. BTW, I never could eat pancakes without getting syrup in my hair. I wore braids ala Laura from Little House from the time I was 8 or 9 until I was 12 and usually one would end up in syrup. I have very thick coarse hair and things tend to stick to it even today (kind of like velcro) so syrup was hard to get out.
I still love pancakes although I don't think I could eat 20 now. I actually don't eat them much now. I'm not very good at making them. When I do make them, I usually give my son the best ones and get the goofy burnt ones. (I just cover them with syrup ) I also don't have a lot of time to make them. I get them at restaurants when we're on vacation and every year we go to a local pancake breakfast in March. Today was the day to keep that tradition. After church, we went to Century Village and had our pancakes for lunch. It's a good deal. You get all the pancakes you can eat 3 sausage links, applesauce, milk, and oj for $6. Kids are only $3 so we got a really great lunch for $15. What a deal. They've gotten kind of fancy-offering blueberry and applesauce pancakes, but I'm a traditonalist and stick with the buttermilk.
You know sometimes small town life is kind of a pain. My current headache is a lack of DSL. Actually some people in my area have it-some don't. I don't. However, with all the faults, I love living here. I love that we have stuff like pancake breakfasts. I love the fact that I've lived in the area for almost 35 years and wherever I go, I see someone I know. Chances are I've known that person since I was a kid.
I also love Maple Syrup-it's candy..........for breakfast.

Ohio Winter

We are in the middle of a snowstorm today. I hope it's our last big hurrah. Somebody noted to me a few weeks ago that our winters don't seem as bad as they did when we were children. I don't think this is true, but I also think we had a couple of really outstanding winters as children in the late 70's that sort of cloud our memories a bit. Most notably, we had the big blizzard of '78. I know that this dominates my memories of winter growing up. We had no electricity for close to a week, hurricane force winds, and when it was all over, snow drifts you could dig tunnels in. This week's ice storm with its big power outage brought back memories of that to me. I'm embarrassed to say that as prepared as I usually am for things, the power outage really took me by surprise. We hardly ever have them, but I still should have more that just flashlights ready. We got rid of our kerosene heaters a few years ago. I can't use them on a regular basis because of my allergies, and on one of my frequent purges of belongings, I sold them. I promised Geno I would buy a new one as soon as I could and keep it and some kerosene in the shed-just in case.
I thought back to the big blizzard of my childhood and realized that it wasn't as disruptive to us because of our lifestyle. We used a woodburner to heat the house anyway. We had a propane stove. Some things haven't changed since then, though. I spent a big part of my time that week reading. I think I read 4 or 5 books-I know Little Women was one. The woodburner in our dining room had a metal cover over it that had doors on either side. I would sit in a chair with one of the doors open and my feet up on the cover, reading as long as the light lasted in a day. On Wednesday, after we did school, Jack and I got under the fifty covers on my bed and each read our own book. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised that Jack didn't complain much about no TV or WII. He was unhappy about the cold, but he kept busy. He read and played.
He was not without his sarcastic comments. We had gone out briefly to a neighbor's; and when we pulled into the garage, he said, "Back to the house of the dead." I should note that by that time, our phone service was also out; and since I usually charge my cell phone at night, I really didn't have that either. The house must have seemed very quiet and dead to him without the almost constant ringing of one or both of the phones.
In spite of our current snowstorm, I am grateful that at least we still have power; and I have a nice warm house with lights and heat. Take care and keep warm.

Ice storm

I was all ready to complain about the ice storm and all of the problems it caused me, but somehow I can't. Last evening when we were on our way home from trying in vain to find a kerosene heater, even my Eeyore husband noted how beautiful everything was covered in ice. This morning I took these pictures, but they really don't do the scenes' justice. When I was outside this morning, the hymn For the Beauty of the Earth kept running through my head. Here are the first and last verses of it:

For the beauty of the earth, For the glory of the skies,

For the love which from our birth, Over and around us lies;

Lord of all, to Thee we raise This our hymn of grateful praise.

For Thyself, best gift divine, To our race so freely given,

For that great, great love of Thine, Peace on earth and joy in heaven

Lord of all, to Thee we raise This our hymn of grateful praise.

Amen.

My little girl Junior

Here's my sweet little girl Junior. Let me explain the name. Until November of '05, we had the greatest dog in the world, Bubba. He was a Great Dane/Lab mix-120lbs of pure love. I had him from '95 until we had to have him put down in '05. He was 13-old for either breed. He was deaf, was almost blind, and had arthritis. It was a difficult decision to make, but after seeing him come in from the cold one day, not able to use his back legs, I knew we had go ahead and put him to sleep. It was awful for all of us, but honestly I think it was hardest on me. He had been my companion when I would be home alone in those years before the boy came along. I worked at home, and I would talk to him when I was frustrated. He was a footstool for my short legs under the table when I was working. I absolutely loved him. Since his death, whenever we'd talk about gettting another dog, my son insisted that we call the next dog, Bubba, Jr. When I finally was able to bring myself to start looking for a dog, I decided to get a female Great Dane. I was able to talk the boy out of the Bubba part, but we compromised on Junior. So I have a female dog named Junior whom I call Junie. She is an awesome little girl, but I can't quite forget my Bubba so for now she's the second greatest dog ever.

Martin Cothran's take on Obama's Gay marriage remarks

Obama trying his hand at Biblical interpretation
I thought this was interesting. I wasn't aware that the book of Romans was obscure.

Winter Blahs

I have really suffered this year from the winter blahs. I live with two "eeyore's." I love them both but about this time of year, they can drive me a little nuts. I've also had some extra stress this year. I branched out in my business in October. I contract to the government for the services I provide, and long story short, I wasn't paid for anything I'd done until last week. I have two employees to pay for these services, rent, utilities, etc. so it's been a little stressful. I've also been sick and had a problem employee with whom I've been struggling. There are a few other things that have happened as well. All of this has added up to me feeling pretty blah. I wouldn't classify it as depression because I don't think it's risen to that level and I don't think it's been chemically related. I realized something last week though, and before I say it, I want to be clear about something. I believe that depression is a real disease that has physical causes. I don't think that the disease of depression is caused by not trusting God or having enough faith. I realized though last week that my "blahs"were worsened by something I wasn't doing-looking to Christ and all He's done for me. How I came to that conclusion will either make you laugh or think I do need medication: I listened to the VeggieTales Easter CD. When I listened to the CD which is full of Easter songs, I was reminded of what Christ did for me on the cross and of the miracle of his Resurrection and uplifted by that. I realized that I need to remind myself of His love for me and all that He's done for me when I get down like I've been recently. Somehow, when you know that your Redeemer Lives, it makes it difficult to stay down.

Confessions

Preface:
I haven't blogged here for quite some time, but I'd thought I'd start again. I have blogged a bit on myspace over the last year and thought I'd post one I did about a year ago on there since it is in the spirit of Lent.

Confession
Confession has been on my mind lately. Of course, it is Lent so I guess it is appropriate for it to be on my mind, but I seem to be reminded of it in all kinds of little ways. We had a meeting at church last Sunday of all the people who are involved in the worship service to try to reorganize the service. We were given a basic frame for the service for each week and part of that frame was a time for corporate confession. This is not something we have done as part of the weekly service so we spent a lot of time focusing on this part to determine how we should do this. My church is a non-denominational church, but we have mostly a Mennonite/Amish heritage. Almost everyone in the church is either ex-Amish, descended from ex-Amish or a spouse to one of the above. What's interesting is the diversity of backgrounds of the spouses. I grew up going to an Independent Fundamental Baptist church (I consider myself a "recovering fundie," but that's for another blog.), but I have Seventh Day Adventist and Episcopalian in my background as well. My pastor's wife grew up Lutheran. She shared a confession used in the Lutheran church. We also looked up some confessional prayers in prayer books that my pastor had.
On Monday, with this fresh in my mind, I opened Jack's Latin book to the new lesson and what was the practical Latin phrase for the week? Mea culpa-my fault. The origin for this saying is the Confiteor or confession portion of the Latin mass. The whole phrase is "Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa"-through my own fault, through my own fault, through my own most grievous fault. The worshippers were to strike their chest with each mea culpa.
On a less classical note, I saw a sign in front of a church today-"If you mess up, 'fess up."
So there it is, confession is on my mind and in front of my eyes wherever I look these days. I saw the movie Amazing Grace, and it was very good. One line stood out for me. John Newton, the former slave trader and author of the hymn Amazing Grace is talking to his protege, William Wilberforce. He says, "I am sure of two things, I am a great sinner..."
People don't like to admit that they are great sinners. True, I haven't trafficked 20,000 men and women like Newton did, but I am a great sinner nonetheless. It is human nature to justify sin-Adam and Eve started passing the buck in the garden, but we seem to have taken it even farther in our times. We have the non-apology apology-"mistakes were made." We have the cult of self-esteem. It will hurt our psyche if we are horrified by our own sin as Newton was by his. One of the things that struck me in reading some on the history of Newton's hymn recently is how many people called the phrase, " a wretch like me" a hyperbole. It is not a hyperbole-compared to God we are all wretches. We need to see ourselves as God sees us and compare ourselves to a Holy God instead of to our neighbor.
For most of my life, I have been a "good girl." To some, my only fault would be that I am boring. I was not a perfect teenager, but most parents would have called me a good kid. I didn't smoke, drink, or do drugs. I got decent grades in school. During my late teens and early twenties, while a lot of my contemporaries were bar hopping and bed hopping, I was not. As a matter of fact, I only have one serious regret from that time period. As an adult, I've done it right. I've been married and faithful to one man for almost 18 years, am active in my church etc. I don't say this to brag, but to make a point. Most people who would look at my life would say I'm a pretty good person, better than most even. They would be wrong.
I have a dark heart. I am as horrified by my own sin as John Newton was by his. One of my sins is my own self righteousness. I sit here with my upright orderly life and look down on those who don't have my orderly upright life with such disdain. "Why do they make such messes of their lives?" I wonder when I should be saying,"There, but for the grace of God, go I." I am way too proud. A few weeks ago I almost ruined an outing with my family because I was too proud to stop and ask directions. I know that is usually a male stereotype, but I have difficulty asking for any type of help due to my pride. Our church elects people for their offices/jobs on an annual basis. My pride is so awful that inevitably when I am not elected to an office, my first thought is that the other person can not possibly do the job as well as I can. This is horrible. I am not the only capable person, but my pride is so great that I delude myself into thinking that I am.
I am also impatient with people. I am a Martha by name and by nature. I sometimes think my parents had the gift of prophecy when they named me. I am a doer and expect others to be doers, too. I am right there with Martha, complaining to God and anyone who will listen-why can't those people keep up? Why don't they just do as I tell them? I also have a sharp tongue, and I've been known to use it particularly when I am impatient. I have hurt people with my sharp tongue.
These are NOT the worst of my sins. The rest are too awful to put into print for the general public. So here I am horrified by my sins. What now? Just sit here and be horrified and know that I can never ever be as holy as God?
Back to the Newton quote: "I know two things. I am a great sinner, and Christ is a great Savior." We do have a great Savior, One who died a horrible death for all our sins. If we believe this and trust in Him as our Savior, we can have forgiveness. This is that Amazing Grace and to this sinner, its sound is very sweet.