If you’ve been a mom for any length of time and you’ve spent time in and about homeschooling circles, Bible studies, workshops, conventions, courtship talks, retreats, blogs in the last 3 years or so… etc., etc., you’ve no doubt heard, or been part of, conversations that left you with a case of comparatitus. All those Titus2 groups… you may lament and despair. Comparatitus happens — no matter your age, no matter your income, no matter your experience and, really, no matter your skills and abilities. Comparatitus happens. Some time back, a group of sisters were gathered and there was…
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I love receiving Christmas letters each year — I read them — some, many times. I read them to the family and take the enclosed photos and hang them on our kitchen cabinet doors. I love the letters for so many reasons — maybe for as many different reasons as the number of letters received each year. I often wonder how many drafts some writers attempted before the resulting letter was complete. I say this because I attempted to write our Christmas letter no less than a dozen times this year. Each draft wordier (no surprise there!) than the previous…
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Francis Chan: “… Everything I do is either going to bring reward or regret… You’ve got a few short years, here on this earth…” “We get one chance at this life on earth… and then comes eternity.” Francis Chan Rope Illustration
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I was wondering about the origin of the word, Acronym. And then got to thinking about different acronyms I regularly read. A few, I couldn’t remember the actual meaning — I see some of them every day, but for the life of me, I cannot remember what they stand for. In case you are also wondering: if you want to find acronyms and abbreviations you can look here. This, from Dictionary.Reference.com: Acronym: “1943 coinage from acro-, comb. form of Gk. akros “tip, end” (see acrid) + Eng. -onym “name” (abstracted from homonym; see name). The practice was non-existent before…
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What if you knew today was the last day you’d be alive. What would you do — or how would you spend this day? It seems that most of the time people think of what’s on their “bucket list” — you know, the list of stuff people want to do before they die. I don’t know why the thought of death triggers an urgency to get out the bucket list to see what could be done. But I was thinking that, in reality, the bucket list is a pretty self-serving deal and pretty much adds nothing to the lives left…
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Time was when people could hold to some basic principles or live by personal convictions — decisions that may or may not be or may not’ve been popular — and yet they could sort of remain unspoken or undeclared. Publicly, anyway. Time was when people could hold to convictions and only a small circle of community would’ve been aware of the person’s or couple’s personal convictions. Now… not so. With the advent of email, internet chat-rooms and bulletin boards in the 90’s… e-groups list mail and then the explosion of “social media” such “personal convictions” become public declarations. Write an…
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Have you ever had a dream plan or a dream idea you’ve imagined so long that you actually hope it never happens — for if it comes to pass, then you’ll no longer have the dream to dream? We’ve had such a dream… well, maybe better said, we long ago had such a dream. A dream that was actually a plan. I never noticed that because so much time had passed and that dream never materialized, I’d stopped dreaming about it and I’d even quit hoping it would happen. In fact, until recently, I hadn’t even realized that I’d sort…
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You’re never as right as you think you are — and — you’re never as wrong as you think you are. Deep down, I know this — and you probably know this, too. But we, too often, get stuck dwelling on our dilemmas or grieving over our losses. We get stuck, too, in maintaining our ‘rightness’ and fail to stop and consider our ‘wrong-ness’ about a matter. And then someone comes along and after hearing part of the story, illuminates the darkened or obscured side of the matter. And then we see, much to our regret, that maybe, just maybe,…
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My husband and I were invited to a dinner at a large church in Seattle… it was sort of charity dinner or some such thing. I don’t remember. So, anyway, we were directed to specific tables with assigned seating. Later, when I would tell my co-workers about that evening, I recall commenting that I didn’t know why in the world we were seated at that particular table. There was a couple, seated across the table from Wes and me, who seemed like they were straight out of some parenting/outdoorsman/selectric typewriter magazine or something. Everyone thing was going along fine, very…
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Well, I’m thinking that no April Fool’s Day would be complete without first agreeing with the Psalmist: The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.” And then, including an admonishment from the Proverbs: He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.” –13.20 April Fool’s Day has long been a day of silly tricks and pranks at our house — the one day a year that shenanigans can be played and everyone’s on the lookout…