Which way?

You know those times when you’re trying to figure out what to do...

Do I choose this job or that one?  This school or that one?

Should I commit myself to join that group?

Which car should we buy?

When should I make that trip I need to take?

Should I speak up and say something to him or not?

And, for those who are Christ-followers, at the root of all of them is the question:

What does God want me to do and
how will He let me know?

At one far end of the spectrum are those who would say that God gave you a brain and He expects you to use it – it’s up to you.  At the other end are those who want to know God’s will for every decision, right down to what socks to wear.  The fancy words for those two extremes are ‘indeterminism’ and ‘fatalism’.  I know because I looked them up.  Religious thinkers have been debating this for centuries. 

I know that decision-making isn’t always so… theological.  But haven’t all of us wrestled with those thoughts at one time or another?  Especially when the decision we have to make is going to have some ripples into our future and into other people’s lives?

Jeff and I have been listening to many of Timothy Keller’s podcasts – sermons from his church in NYC – and we’ve loved them and been very 'stretched' by them.  For a recent car trip, I sort of randomly picked one that sounded interesting:  “Your Plans; God’s Plans”.

Well.

It was so incredibly helpful and enlightening and mind-blowing in many ways.  As is so often true about God, two seemingly opposite things can both be true – we have free wills to make our own choices and God is completely in control.  Knowing that is a huge relief.  As Rev. Keller says “The biblical understanding is utterly practical.  It doesn’t say that your choices determine your destiny or that your choices have no impact on your destiny.  God, in His sovereignty, relates your choices to your destiny but He is the One who fixes everything...  You have every incentive to do right and live wisely since there will be consequences for your choices but since everything is under the control of God, who is working things together for good, you can relax.”

I also loved his challenging words about how God gives us help in making decisions.  It starts with a radical, unconditional trust in His choices for us – in His way not mine. 

Rather than trying to recap it here for you, I’ll just give you the link to the message and you can download it yourself or listen online.  It’s also available on iTunes.

Your Plans: God’s Plans

Babies, weddings and Pee Chees

As these last days of summer wane and dusk comes earlier, tomatoes ripen quickly and crab-apples start to litter the driveway, thoughts begin turning to school supply sales and all things pumpkin.  Around here, we also have babies on the brain since our granddaughter is due at the start of September.  If I don't avoid the baby section of any store I’m in, I’m in trouble.  Yesterday it was jammies at Costco.  You'd think you would be safe at Costco but you'd be wrong.

Of course I am pinning lots of baby-related stuff, which helps me stumble onto all kinds of adorableness:

That Sinking Feeling
@bowerpowerblog
One of the quintessential mommy moments in my mind is bathing
your babe in the kitchen sink.

And the occasional funny:

Formula Fed Baby Enters Medical School (satire)
@babble.com
“I always wanted to be a doctor,” Barnes says, “but not having breastmilk felt like a black mark in my past.

My pregnant daughter now receives gobs of occasional emails from me with links to helpful articles, funny posts, Pinterest boards and lists of what baby items are absolutely essential and what are completely unnecessary.  Because she is so sweet, Lisa graciously thanks me for each one – bless her heart.  Here’s one I’m saving to send in a few months:

For the Desperate New Mom Who Thinks She’s Crazy Alone
@HuffingtonPost
I wanted to look exactly like I thought a new mom was supposed to look.  But in the first 18 months of Jackson's life I never met one other new mother who said that she was finding the transition hard, frustrating, exhausting or wretched.

I’ve also found a few marriage-related posts that I’ve loved…

Four Things I Wish I’d Known When I Got Married
@weareTHATfamily
Such good truth here.

A Wedding Under A Bridge
@gracefortheroad
This is an incredible and beautiful way to begin life together – serving.

If you want something completely time-wasting to do, stay up late finding photos on Pinterest that remind you of things in your past that you’d long forgotten about:  I Remember That!  I am embarrassed to tell you how much time I spent doing this but not how much fun it was!

And I wanted to share a song I’m loving – Sovereign Over Us by Aaron Keyes.  The lyrics are a powerful reminder of the TRUTH I need to tell myself over and over.

There is strength within the sorrow,
There is beauty in our tears
You meet us in our mourning,
With a love that casts out fear
You are working in our waiting,
Sanctifying us
When beyond our understanding,
You're teaching us to trust

CHORUS
Your plans are still to prosper,
You have not forgotten us
You're with us in the fire and the flood
Faithful forever,
Perfect in love
You are sovereign over us

You are wisdom unimagined,
Who could understand your ways
Reigning high above the heavens,
Reaching down in endless grace
You’re the Lifter of the lowly,
Compassionate and kind
You surround and You uphold me,
Your promises are my delight

Even what the enemy means for evil
You turn it for our good,
You turn it for our good and for your glory
Even in the valley You are faithful
You’re working for our good,
You’re working for our good and for your glory

Where the “buffalo” roam

We drove almost 2000 miles this last weekend (four days total) to visit our daughter who has been living in Montana this summer.  It was a crazy fun blitz and over in a flash.  We took some audio books and podcasts in the car which always make the time go faster. 

We had so much fun being with Lindsey.  She did a 4K run on Saturday morning – ‘Scramble for Ethiopia’ which was a fundraiser for Charity:Water.  Then we had lunch at Burger B*b’s on Main in Bozeman.

I have to say that there sure are a lot of friendly people in Bozeman. Everybody seemed exceptionally helpful and just plain nice.

On Sunday we headed to Yellowstone, going in at the West entrance and leaving at about 7:30 that evening via the North entrance.  We didn’t actually see any buffalo – or even a single bear, which we were all hoping to see – but we were up really close to several elk and a couple of bison. 

This animal is H-U-G-E.  We took this photo from the car window.  We decided not to disturb him.

These weren’t taken with a zoom – we were that close! 

I don’t know if you can tell but that baby is having a little snack from his mama right in the middle of the road.  Do you think these elk are used to people? 

The forest ranger eventually came along and told all of us (loudly) to back away from the wildlife… you never know what a mama will do if she feels her baby is threatened.  This one seemed pretty nonchalant about the whole thing, don’t you think? 

Do you see all of those elk lying in the field with their heads poking out of the grass?   

Old Faithful was a bit anticlimactic compared to the animals and the other natural wonders in the park.  I remember thinking the same thing last time we were there:

This was summer of 1992 and you can tell even Amy and Lisa were hoping for something a little more exciting than hot water spewing out of a hole in the ground.  Lindsey had just turned one so she stayed back at the condo with her grandma. 

If you’ve been there, you know that Yellowstone is a bit like walking around on another planet.

Hot.

Weird colors.

Weird shapes.

Steamy.

But there’s also lots of green and cool beauty.

All in all, it was a really great trip – and over too quickly!

Completely trustworthy

I hope this brings you as much encouragement today as it brings to me.  His promises are sure.  His word is true when so much around us is not.  Thank You Lord for being completely trustworthy!

Score!

Just after I got done telling you about my husband’s incredible bargain-finding skilz, I snagged a bargain of my own!

One of my ‘likes’ on Facebook is Frugal Living NW.  She regularly posts deals and last week she posted “Check out what’s been dubbed the best melamine bowl set ever… Williams-Sonoma + 9.99 = not even joking.”

So I clicked over to the WS site and sure enough, a four bowl set was only $9.99 with free shipping.  I like to get Christmas and birthday gifts to stash away so I ordered.  Early this week, a box from WS arrived on my porch.

Cool, right?

Well, the box they came in looked kind of small to me.  I opened it and lifted the bowls out:

I think they are American Girl bowls! 

I went back and read the description on the WS site (which I may have failed to do initially in my excitement to get a DEAL):

Melamine Prep Bowl Set…
Set of four includes one of each size, from 1-cup to 5-cup
The mini prep bowls can be used to stage premeasured ingredients

My bad for being impulsive (something I like to think I’m not) and not reading the details.

This was not a mixing bowl set.  This set is for when you are doing a cooking show and you have pre-chopped the chives, scallions and tomatoes that you will use in your homemade bruschetta that you are showing your audience how to prepare! 

So if you happen to pre-measure your ingredients into mini prep bowls when you’re cooking, have I got a deal for you!

Who Wants To Go Back To The 60's? {a repost}

I'm guessing some of you reading this blog weren't ALIVE in the 60's and if you were, you certainly don't want to go back! Oh, but the music!

So humor me as we take a walk down my memory lane! If you think I'm not musically cool (my girls certainly don't - just because I don't know who The White T-Shirts are), allow me to prove you wrong. Some of these may roll over into the 70's because of their lasting musical impact.

Let's get this party started with my FAVORITE group when I was 12.

Herman's Hermits. What a great name for a group! Herman, unfortunately for him, was a contemporary of the next group I'll feature and as a result, was left in the shadows because he never had a goofy tv show. But I for one was a loyal, obsessed fan who made a scrapbook of Herman using all of my Tiger Beat, Teen Idol and 16 magazines. I pored over those articles to find out his favorite foods and pet peeves. (Why don't people refer to pet peeves anymore?) To this day, I can recite his real name, which is Peter Blair Dennis Bernard Noone. Fav song? Hard to pick one but I'll say
Mrs. Brown You've Got A Lovely Daughter.

The Monkees. Here's the group that overshadowed poor Herman so, at the time, I couldn't show any affection. Now I can admit that Davy played a mean tamborine and Daydream Believer (pre-Shrek) was a great song!

Now we enter the strange zone - Paul Revere and the Raiders were one of the first groups I remember that wore costumes. I didn't think it was the least bit strange but looking at them now? Really guys - the tights? This looks like a 60's version of The Nutcracker.
Most memorable song: Action (Oh baby come on, let me take you where the action is). I believe they also debuted Louie Louie. They appeared occasionally on American Bandstand and The Lloyd Thaxton Show. Teenagers everywhere would dance in front of their black and white tvs along with all the cool kids that somehow made it on the show. Think "Hairspray."

Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs also had a costume but only one. Not sure why Sam is dressed up and the Pharaohs aren't. Sing along with me one of their biggest hits:  Wooly Bully.

Bread. This was a chick group for sure. And one of their signature songs, Baby I'm-A Want You, spoke deeply to my heart. But they were a source of a lot of material for my youth group messages in high school because I shared how you could take the lyrics to their songs and change words like "Baby" to "Jesus" and derive deep spiritual meaning. They deserve a mention because of their incredible influence in my musical and spiritual heritage.

The Dave Clark Five also came from 'across the pond' and you'll remember their hit Glad All Over. I feel sorry for all the groups that were in direct competition with The Beatles - that's why I'm not even going to mention them. The Beatles, I mean.

Ah, The Turtles.
Don't they look So Happy Together lying there in the road?

The Lovin' Spoonful - Do You Believe In Magic? This group had several big hits that play on the oldies stations. Even my girls know them (they were raised on the oldies). Think Summer In The City.

This group, on the other hand...

Come on. You remember them, don't you? The Cowsills? I'm pretty sure that was their real last name. A family group, much like the Partridge Family only, again, without the tv show. Their real mother sang with them - that's her in the white dress. For some reason you don't see a lot of mothers fronting bands any more. Hmmm.

They were more of a one-hit-wonder kind of group. Think Hair. (Give me a head with hair. Long beautiful hair...) I wished my family could form a singing group, except they weren't cool enough.

Gary Lewis and the Playboys. This Diamond Ring! Remember? This is really Jerry Lewis' son - that's him on drums - and he could sing. How about Everybody Loves a Clown? Killer lyrics.

I wore a hole in my Grass Roots album playing Midnight Confessions on my portable stereo with the swing-out speakers. I was 12 years old. What did I have to "cry a million tears" about?

Crosby, Stills & Nash (no Young yet) had that great folk sound that I loved - Teach Your Children and Our House - yet they were edgy enough (which is not a 60's term) to sound a little Woodstock-y: Suite: Judy Blue Eyes or Ohio. The term 'groovy' would fit here.




Before their disco days, the Bee Gees had some great music. My favorite? Lonely Days. Another angst-ridden song that I sang at the top of my pre-adolescent lungs.




And Blood Sweat & Tears - what can I say?
You Made Me So Very Happy!




Creedence Clearwater Revival. I still love those harmonies and easy-to-sing lyrics. Who'll Stop The Rain? or Down On The Corner. I believe they introduced Proud Mary and I Heard It Through The Grapevine.

Dear Sonny and Cher,
I watched your tv show.
I sang The Beat Goes On while swinging my hair.
I loved your go-go boots and your vests with the fur.
I wished I had bell-bottoms like yours.
Love,
Becky

Phone photos

A glimpse into my world via my phone...

Or, in the case of this first photo, into my neighbor’s world.  I had to do a double-take when Jeff pointed out our neighbor working in his yard.  Fertilizing?  Nope.  Spraying his grass green.

I’ve heard of this but never actually seen it.  It does look much nicer now! But he has to re-do it every time the lawn is mowed. 

Next is a dresser we helped get for our kids for the baby’s room.  Because it was from Ikea, it came flat in a couple of very heavy boxes.

But the guys spent the afternoon pouring over many pages of directions and many plastic bags filled with screws and glides and little wooden shims and knobs and... voila!

Now there is somewhere to put all of those cute baby girl items!


This is something I’ve had on a Pinterest board...

It’s called a ‘flexible blossom crown’ or an ‘easy arranger’ and I love it!  It fits over most vases and helps prevent flower flop!  (I wish you could smell those lilies - they are heavenly!)


Everyone who knows my husband knows he loves to find a good deal.  The search is more fun than the purchase.  Recently he found this really nice pair of no-iron slacks.  When he showed them to me I knew they had to be marked down a LOT or he wouldn’t be carrying them around the store.  (I have to beg him to buy an article of clothing for himself if it’s not priced ridiculously low.)

But even I – who know this man’s ability to shop for a bargain – couldn’t believe my eyes.

That’s right – $3.  Slash-reduced from $65.

Now he’ll never get a pair of pants for anything more.  And I’ll look like a spend-thrift if I do.  Darn it.