Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree

Let Me Not Keep Christmas . . . . . . . .

"Let me not wrap, stack, box, bag, tie, tag, bundle, seal, keep Christmas.
Christmas kept is liable to mold.
Let me give Christmas away, unwrapped, by exuberant armfuls. Let me share, dance, live Christmas unpretentiously, merrily, responsibly with overflowing hands, tireless steps and sparkling eyes.
Christmas given away will stay fresh—even until it comes again."

Linda Felver

Emmy's song lyrics... ( The one she is playing in the picture ;0)

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Lord, I need you here with me,

In the morning, noon and night,

Even in the depths of my dreams.

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Lord I need you here with me,

Even when I feel I'm strong.

I am still a child in your arms.

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Take me, Take me,

Where your star shines in the night.

Wake me, Wake me,

Bring me to the morning light.

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William Cullen Bryant:
"O Father may that Holy Star

grow every year more bright,

And send its glorious beams afar

To fill the world with light."

Collecting Scraps

John Muir:

Let children walk with Nature, let them see the beautiful blendings and communions of death and life, their joyous inseparable unity, as taught in woods and meadows, plains and mountains and streams of our blessed star, and they will learn that death is stingless indeed, and as beautiful as life.

Blaise Pascal

The least movement is of importance to all nature. The entire ocean is affected by a pebble.

J. Lubbuck:

Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky is by no means a waste of time.
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We have been collecting Scraps....
Simple words of thanks, for simple joys. This is a child's way of communion. Pieced together into a Sunday afternoon scrapbook. Pages filled with the wonderment of details. Stiched together, little by little. From the details in nature, to the familiar ways of those dear and close, or the well worn pages of a well loved book sitting cheerily uptop a pile of even more upon the table. Scraps woven together by strong, stitches. Stitches, hand sown with love and care. By His hand.
For this is a gift He gives. A gift that transcends circumstance. A simple gift for all who Hope in Him. A binding of thankfulness. A prayer that weaves in and out of the din and the clatter and the noise just in the same way as it does the peace, of silence and the glinting of icy sunlight between the branches of winter trees.

Scraps of fabric woven together to make a life. Piece by piece. A life for Him, with Him and through Him.
Fragments of beauty, love, joy, memories, voices, dreams, green grass, laughter, songs, sunlight, quiet rain, falling leaves and budding blossoms.
With a thankful heart ready to embrace a love that can turn all things to grace.

And Why not visit lovely Ann's lovely peaceful place for gentle encouragment and inspiration. And many others who are walking in the way of thankfulness over at the GratitudeCommunity...

Tilling Over

“Jesus assumed our flesh; let us give him our own. In this way he can come into the world and transform it.” -Pope Benedict XVI

In a way I take Him everywhere with me.
He is my hands when I hold and comfort a crying child, stroking the hair, wiping the tear dampened cheeks. He is my feet when I walk along the peaceful mountain places and also when I tread the bustling city streets.
Sometimes He takes me to places of quiet, sometimes places of mess and noise and dischord. Other times I am lead to a place of joy, and at other times a place of suffering.

Maybe this is what, a life lived for Him, with Him and through Him becomes. A transformation that begins with me and ends with Him.

Just as a seed holds the blossoming tree so we, each one of us, hold the kingdom in our hearts. And it is from the heart that we are led.

It seems that Jesus often sought out the difficult ways and the narrow ways, the deep valleys and the back streets of the lost and broken before the high, transendant peaks of this world.

He went to the depths of life so He might illuminate them, redeem them, raise them up to the heights in his own resurrected body.

Still, must I, at times follow even here? Beyond my comfort zone. Beyond myself.

Must I step out into a bright light and open space I don't recognise? Become vulnerable?

Like the winter trees striped of their leaves. Simple, naked silhoettes embracing the stark, frozen sunlight of late November.

I like symmetry, order, comfort. I like to design a situation I can plan, regulate and control.
Sometimes it is hard for me to take His hand in mine.
When He comes in the form of a stranger who may upset my routine, or a sick and sleepless child, a messy chore I‘d prefer to leave for tomorrow, or a lonely neighbour, I would rather visit some other time. I begin to loosen my grasp. I busy my empty hands with my own tasks instead of His.

I try to make Him live through me, through my limited, awkward, unyielding body.

Instead of simply letting myself live through Him. Through His limitless, given and graceful form.

I find myself too busy and troubled to simply sit at His feet as Mary did. And seek His still voice in the whisper.
The whisper that can lead me so very gently to the places I really need to be and to the things I really need to do.
To hear a whisper takes a quiet and yielded heart.

Yet oftentimes I clatter around with my dust pan and brush, my dish cloth and scourer looking to clean up the corners, make things look tidy. Even if only in my mind.
Though maybe it’s the messy parts are what I have to get my hands dirty with at times. Embrace in fact.
The difficult places, the narrow roads.
To dig deep into the earth of life where the rot and decay can be over turned, to give life to new shoots. There is growth in the mess of it all, glory in fact, in the opportunity to turn goodness out of a little dirt.

Hard work, tiredness, the monotony of chores, sickness, the crying child, the untidy rooms, the needy and lonely ones I neglect to call on, the unkind comment someone made the other day that still lingers, are all opportunities to dig deep and plant a seed.

A seed that can be planted in my own heart first.

A place where the noonday sunlight of hope and the gentle watering of faith upon that seed may, in time, pollenate a whole garden of budding blossoms.
It is a strange yet beautiful fact of nature that it is only when the flowers have past their bloom and are about to fade and wither that they become most fruitful. For it is not in the beauty of the unfurled petals that they hold their life. It is from their very heart that they release their seed. Their hope of new life.

The soil of my own expectations is constantly being tilled over.
His order and beauty is grown from the earth up; from the depths of the soil to the heights of the heavenly kingdom.

"That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;" Ephesians 3:18

And during the times when the hard clay of all my pride and selfishness is softened to a fine rich soil, my own limitations are over come by His limitless.

You drench its furrows and level its ridges;you soften it with showersand bless its crops.
Psalm 65:

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Does the farmer plow continually to plant seed? Does he continually turn and harrow the ground? Does he not level its surface And sow dill and scatter cummin And plant wheat in rows, Barley in its place and rye within its area? For his God instructs and teaches him properly.
Isaiah 28

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... For, behold, I am for you, and I will turn unto you, and ye shall be tilled and sown ...
Eziekiel 36

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For the earth that drinketh in the rain which cometh often upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is tilled, receiveth blessing from God
Hebrews 6 >>

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the ploughman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that sowe the seed: and the mountains shall drop sweetness, and every hill shall be tilled ... Amos 9:13

pIECES Of oUR daY

As the brittle and stark days of winter leave trees bare against granite skies. Emmy captures the last blinking glimpses, lingering gazes and fading traces of Autumntime.
Here is our day through her eyes.
With the pictures she found.
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A sycamore leaf surfaces from the birdbath.

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Early morning shivers, blue and crisp as any day in early spring might.
Clouds rustle against the trembling edges of emerald green Bayleaves.
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Details, flutter, pause, wonder, glint. Unassumingly. Washing the days in their own colours. Defining the hours, with their own outlines.

As afternoon wanes, birds chirrup amongst the naked branches of a sycamore tree.

Emmy's candle made of the leftover's of candles, a glass ramakin, some essential rose oil and... Glitter...of course! Will it be lit today? Or saved for tommorrow :0)

Books undercovers! A few favourites ready for an evening read with little ones.

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Lot's of "helpers" making a mess, *ahem* I mean a set of birdfeeders of course!

And here is what you will need, so Emmy tells me:

• 2 and a half cups of wild bird seed.
• half a cup of raisins
• 1 packet of lard
• Lots of wiggly. wriggly messmakers!
• 4 sturdy twigs donated by a kindly nearby tree
• 8 pieces of garden string
• A dust pan and brush and a nice big bowl of soapy water for the floor afterward ;0)

One last picture to share as the pieces of our day scatter gently to the earth like the last of the Autumn leaves. ~

A day with Matilda

Tilly "washing" her little toy dog!

She loves to wear her "Bella- Mina" (Ballerina) dress all day ( everyday) :0)

This week we have started learning phonics! And the best place to start? The begining of course :0) So here is the letter A!!! Both upper and lower case! We have found lots of animals and other things to colour in that start with the letter "A" Online. Letter A Printable Activities Animals A to Z
"and then we found a couple of great sites online for signing. Here's a really good one....
babysigns Which I'm starting up with the girls this year.

Here Tilly signs the letter

"a"

For
apple ( lower two pictures!

And here is the painting she made with Bujana to go along with our bible story for this evening. "The lost Sheep"

Sharing a link

"There are two ways to live your life.

One as though nothing is a miracle.

The other is as though everything is a miracle."

Albert Einstien (1879 - 1955)

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this Incredible Story posted over at Hinds Feet on High Places of high profile abortionist Stojan Adasevic's conversion to the pro life movement. It brought tears to my eyes. Tears of sorrow for all those lost little lives and Tears of amazement at how God tries, tries and tries again to reach into the darkest of places that humans can go. Warning ( it is not an easy read at times )

And a new blog I created called Choosing Life and Joy Created to share a little of my own story to hopefully touch someone elses life in someway for the good. Well that is the hope :0)
God's grace is everything :0)

SACRIFICE ( A post revisited and updated :0)

(c) Tomo Yun www.yunphoto.net/hl/photobase

It is in a womans nature to want to nurture, protect and care for those around them. I've been thinking about this for a while now.

Sacrifice is the way of a Christian life. It is a beautiful aspect to our faith.. The beauty is that when we give we are really only giving a little of something up in order to recieve a part of something so much greater.

Yet, sometimes (at times) even the giving of ourselves can be done for the wrong reasons. We can overly focus on one thing or another and this in itself can weary us. We forget that this is a sign that we are not leaning upon HIM enough. Either by seeking HIS word, praying or doing the thing HE wants us to do even though that thing in itself may seem less important or rewarding or noticable or grand.

"Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls."

I remember when I only had two girls instead of four! I would get so tired all the time. I was wearied, much more than I am now. Looking back I was not taking HIS Yoke upon me but my own carefully crafted one. The one of " a perfectly clean and well presented home" The one of
"looking especially after my appearance" and the one of "Taking on responsibilities" outside the home which although seemed like they were the right things to do, were in fact simply feeding my sense of personal fullfillment. They were serving my identity, not my soul and not my God.

Jeremiah 6:16 Thus says the LORD, "Stand by the ways and see and ask for the ancient paths, Where the good way is, and walk in it; And you will find rest for your souls. But they said, 'We will not walk in it.'

Eventually, and somewhat conversly with nothing left inside to give I felt myself become even more burdened, even more incapable.

God does provide us with the strength to continue on our ordained path when we need it. He is our rock and fortress when we become weak. Through faith and obedience we are given the grace to endure struggles in life. But sometimes we try to take our own ways instead of his.

Our nurturing, protecting and caring starts to involve issues such as control, pride, idolisation. An attempt to recreate the ideal, picture perfect life that our minds and hearts desire and aspire to instead of allowing life itself to mould us gently.

"Abba Abba Father. you are the potter we are the clay."

We have to allow those gentle rivulets of turning clay change us slowly. If we try to speed up the wheel our whole pot will collapse!

If we are taking on more than we can handle it may be the case that we are not listening to that still, small voice of God within us.

It maybe that we are trying to plough our own field without the necessary tools instead of Gods field where every tool is provided when needed.

By stepping back a little we allow others the opportunity to flourish and grow. My husband and children all help with the chores around the house. I do the largest proportion, which is only fair as I don't work outside the home, however my husband is as hands on with the little ones as I am. As a wife and mother my duties don't stop at 5 pm and as a husband and father my husbands don't either.

If I as a wife and mother take over every responsibility from childcare to household chores am I not robbing other members of my family of the chance to learn how to serve in love and grace within their home. It warms my heart to see my little ones eagerly clamber up the stairs, polishing rags in hand in search of any piece of wood they can find to shine up good as new : )



Robert A. Heinlein: "Do not handicap your children by making their lives easy".


I take great pleasure in watching the older two care for their youngest siblings.


"There are only two lasting bequests we can hope to give our children. One is roots; the other, wings." Hodding Carter

The impression of Jesus related within all of the gospels is one of resounding peace. The time for every eventuality was pre-ordained, he knew this and did not contest it. And He wanted to give this same gift of Peace to us too.

"And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: But one thing is needful: and Mary has chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her."

I believe God means for all his people whether they be, young or old, male or female, both within the realms of family and community, to work together in praise and servitude for him as well as each other.

Even the best of intentions can come undone if they are not in keeping with Gods plan.

Sometimes all we are asked to do is take a breath.

Inhale his word;

receive his grace.

Here is a great link on the subject from The Flourishing Mother called Take my yoke I found the other day :0)