August 30, 2016

Greetings My Friend, As a child of God I desire to "hear"His voice and to do His will. I am reading about Samuel and how he was trained to know God is talking to him. He was dedicated to the Lord by his mother when he was very young. Samuel lived with Eli the priest and Eli's 2 sons. One night as Samuel was sleeping he heard a voice " And the Lor call Samuel again the third time....Therefore Eli said to Samuel 'Go, lie down and if He calls you, you shall say, 'Speak, Lord, for Your servant hears...." More often than not there is not an audible voice but an idea that pops into my thougts. I strive to pray often asking God to teach me to hear His voice, not mine. I want to His will so I need to learn how to discern when I am being called to do something. I learn by reading the Bible to, "Be still," In the quiet it is easier to "hear" God's voice. Sometimes I find God speaking to me as I read the Bible. I will be reading the day's passages when one passage appeals to me and I find that the passage may stay with me throughout the day. That passage is God talking to me, teaching me, guiding me or correcting me. I find times where a situation will not go away and that situation is pointing me to reach out. This too is God speaking to me. God's creation speaks to me often. I think God had Junior and I move to a slowed down, quiet plaace with scenes that astound me. When I am anxious God has sent me to the porch and that is where I am able to regroup. Having a daily time with God helps me to tune into God much the same way having quiet time with Junior daily. I need to talk and find out where he is emotionally. I want to be aware of those things he needs help with so I can comfort him. I alos like to hear what work he has done, it helps me know many things like he is challenging his back or he is struggling to work out a problem area. I find when I get too caught up in being busy I miss much in life. I miss hearing God also. I notice as I read the NT where Jesus frequently goes off by himself to pray. He too needed quiet time so He could do the work He was sent to do. If Jesus needed to spend quiet time with God then I realize I need to make time to be quiet with God. Samuel was in bed when God called him. I associate bed time to be quiet time so it makes sense Samuel was more open to hearing God call him. Eli taught Samuel when he realized that Samuel kept coming to him asking him what Elie wanted. He taught Samuel to listen to that voice, to respond that he is God's servant. I learn too that sometimes I need to also be willing to do what God is calling me to. I see where Moses felt not able to do the work God called him to do. He kept pointing out why he was not the right man. God did not take "no" for an answer and Moses went on to lead the people here on earth while God directed Moses from heaven. I learn that I am able to anything that calls me to do even if I do not feel I am capable. Once I go through a challenging trial with God I find my confidence growing. I am not any more confident in myself but I am more confident that God will guide me. I am a whole lot braver when I have someone instructing me and comforting me when anxiousness stops me. With each situation I find I feel willing to keep trying. God's love is austounding to me. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 27, 2016

Greetings My Friend, I am on a journey to recognize spiritual blessings more so. I understand material blessings fairly well but spiritual ones are not so easy to grasp. Yesterday grief struck me rather quickly and hard. A young woman I know died and since I had not followed her all the time on social media I was not aware of her decline. I knew her from my old church when I was a youth advisor to the teens. I remember her with fondness and how she would be at my side one minute and gone the next. Many times when she drew near she was seeking to comfort me with silliness. The thing is I see it now back then I just thought she was sweet. We had a talk many years later and she told me how the "kids" knew what was going on in my life even if I did not talk about it. I also realized that I did not know how depressed I was until I sought counseling and started to understand how abuse works. We hooked up again a few years ago after Junior and I moved to VA. We were back in MI and she had moved back from TN. We had lunch and reconnected our friendship only this time we were both adults. I enjoyed seeing her and we kept in touch mainly on social media. Last year we were in TN for a Marine Corps reunion and we hooked up again since we were near where she lived. We had lunch, I was surprised at how much better she looked from our first visit a few years earlier. I knew she had a terminal illness but as with invisible illness' you do not always see how sick a person really is. When I had seen she had passed I was struck with deep grief instantly. I told Junior, called my friend Marilyn who also knew Laura. We talked and shared a few memories and then we hung up. I still felt the sting of grief heavy on my heart like I needed to be with some that are grieving her as well. I do not know which state she was in so going to the funeral proved difficult. I talked with God several times and then I had a need to write. I first wrote a blog and it helped some. Later I wrote on Facebook which started sending a few hugs my way. Finally I did my page "Letters From Janet" on Facebook and again I wrote of my grief. I had the chance to "tell" how I miss her, how her life impacted mine and with that I was able to function again. Later I went to prayer and then I knew that God had given me the idea to write those things about my precious friend. I understood the spiritual blessing God had given me so that I would be comforted. God saw that I was troubled deeply, down to my soul and He provided. The more I reflect on this the more I am amazed at all the area's God works in my life. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 25, 2016

Greetings My Friend, Today I am grieving a special lady who passed. when I knew her she was a teenager in the youth group I volunteered with. As the kids grew up they got involved in their lives, I went on with my life but this young lady found me and we got reaquainted again. We were both at a spot in life where we were going through disability together. She talked many times with such knowldge that it seemed she was more my age than the 20 years younger that she truly was. It was hard for me to accept where she was in her life and at the same time I had found someone who understood. She understood a whole lot and we talked about the things of the past too. She seemed to "know" long before I did that I was struggling. At the time our lives interceted when she was a teenager she and her friends all knew and they loved me regardless of my situation. They do not know it but from the first group to the last group 15 years later I was learning right along with those young people. I saw the struggles the young men had figuring out life, girls, their faith. The young men opened my eyes a whole lot and I saw the sensitive side they truly had. It took me a long time to stop lumping all men in the same catergory but I learned. The girls taught me too. They talked to me about a lot of things and I let them unload. I knew a walk or having a teen help me in the kitchen would open them up and they did. When my young friend got together with me she was divorced and remarried, the same as I was. We shared our struggles there too. That is when I found out she "knew", her friends "knew" and I was amazed. I learned again that we may say things are good but kids know more so that they are not. I learned of her illness and I worked with a lady that had the same illness, one of those long names that is hard to spell. We talked a few times here and there on social media, we met up a couple more times and we again went on with our lives. Today social media is lit up with her passing and my heart is breaking. In my grief I find myself praying for her family and friends. As I ask God to comfort them I sense He is comforting me too. I find myself in my grief talking to God about the loss I feel and I realize that I will grieve her for some time but God will hold me until I have said the last of my good byes and remembered so many things from our time together in this life. I am sure that God will teach me a few things as I already have noticed. It is like Him saying to me I brought you 2 back together for a reason and I now understand how we for a short time shared life and then found each other to share another time. I am thankful for the memories too. I am thankful that I got to be an advisor to many groups of teenagers and I got to learn, to share and to grow with each teenager. Most of the teens are now parents of teens themselves and I continue to marvel at how quickly life passes by even when I am trying to live each moment. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 23, 2016

Greetings My Friend, After doing a few things aroud the house I decided it was time to rest and to write. When I am planning on writing I begin talking to God asking Him to lay upon my heart the message He wants me to write about. This morning I found myself thinking of comforting passages that have given me life when life was draining me out, such as depression, deep hurt and even anger. The only Bible Scripture I memorized as a child was the 23 Psalm, "The Lord is my Shephard." Today I only can quote maybe the first sentence or two and I find even this brings me comfort. "The Lord is my Shephard, I shall not want, He makes me lie down in....pastures?.... By the time I get to He makes me lie down in, I find peace and calmness filling the anxiety. Years later I learned that this is the Psalm that is read at funerals which I found strange because to me it gave me life and not permnanet rest in death. When I began my faith walk earnestly I found the love I was seeking in "He first loved us." There is more but the piece I remember spoke volumes to me. I felt accepted just the way I was. In Single Point I learned " I know the plans I have for you to prosper you" that verse told me that God has a plan for my life and work for His kingdom. Not only did God love me but He taught me my skills were unique and needed for the work of building His kingdom. The next passage I even know the address and quite a bit of it. "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, gladness....of such there is no law against it." When I discovered Galatians 5:20 I knew I had found the attitutdes I wanted to become part of my personality. I continue to work on this passage and my friend Debbie even painted me a picture of this passage which means I have a visiual reminder. I was a depressed angry woman when I started my journey and each time I read this passage I discovered that life of faith in God and Jesus as my Savior was to be a content and a joyful life. Getting out of being depressed was a lot of work throug counseling, Bible study and eventually I added medication to the mix. I discovered that the wiring system in my brain was broken so medication helped me maintain but when the medication left my system the wiring was broken again. I had one real bad anxiety attack when my gait started to dimish and I chose to focus on that I had to use the wheelchair. My PCP changed the medication and I am once more on target. I prayed asking God if I should go on the medication, I was leery finally I felt I should and today I am grateful for the assist. The political climate seems scary right now, my gait is weakening again and the anxiety is not in me today. I am able to pull out my comfort passages as each situation tries to overwhelm me. I have finally learned that learning passages is not about how many I know and can quote word for word but about the ones I remember in times of need. I learn that just a couple words can cam the storms in me and God is not impressed with all the quoting in the world. He does like the fact that I call on His Word with my heart and allow it to bring me comfort and peace. I learn my passages as I read the Bible and in prayer, sometimes God will remind me of a passage He knows I know and in that I find the strength to carry on. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 20, 2016

Greetings My Friend, While reading the Book of Mark I came across Jesus talking about hell. The picture I had in my mind was rough but I decided to look into the description some more and that picture was even more revealing. "It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell the unquenchable fire....to be thrown into hell, where ther worm does not die and the fire is not quenched." The description I read said it is likened to maggots eating away at a rotting corpse. I read that the Jewish people had a dump outside the city where things were thrown and fire burned in the dump almost all the time. It said that Jesus may have been referring to that dump. The word pictures that were described deepened the idea of what the existence of hell will be like for me. Once more I think about eternity, it is forever and ever and ever. When we die we have chosen in life where we will live for eternity. It is always an awesome comforting thought as to what eternity in heaven is like but as for hell that picture is one I avoid a whole lot. It is uncomfortable, not pretty and something I do not wish on anyone even my most despied nemisis. This word pictures compels me to do as Jesus commanded as He asscended into heaven "Go forth into all the world making disiples of all nations." I strive to do my part in bringing the Good News of Jesus as redeemer to all that I can in my little piece of the world. When I first began this journey I felt that my mouth needed to proclaim each day to anyone I came in contact with. I was not comfortable but I searched for ways to point conversations to why I believed. Later I discovered that actions speak louder than words so now I try to live what I believe and if asked I strive to give an answer for the hope I have. I also take time to revist my past and to see where I once was and where I am today. This look back in my thoughts reminds me how my life has changed for the better. I am no longer that scared woman fearful to say a word, fearful of others hurting me and fearful that I will make someone else unhappy with me. Today I do not have all that fear of living life. I find enjoyment and not in material things. I enjoy the work of my hands, I enjoy my husband and our fur family. I enjoy my church family and friends and the list goes on. I have a new zest to learn to do new things and not be afraid of offending someone. I allow myself to make mistakes and do not beat myself up for years. My change was not in all the counseling although it did help, it came about more fully in my faith journey. It was the first time in my life I felt accepted, loved and I had a purpose. I discovered that my life had value and those that did not value me were missing out on a special lady who is uniqe and one of a kind woman. God took me right where I was at and then He could not leave me there but began to make me a new creation. I like who I am today and I see my value on the smiles of those I meet. If this is the start of eternity, even those hard moments I am ready and willing. My prayer now is that I keep my eyes on Jesus. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 18, 2016

Greetings My Friend, When I was learning how to do accounting I learned how to do it with a computer. What my class did was teach me the concept of doing accounting manually and the way that the computer sorted out the various functions for me. I was glad to have the overview into the whole process. The computer has been great for reducing a lot of repetitive things. Lately I have enjoyed learning how to do things manually again like making bread, jam and applesauce. I have picked up sewing again after a long break and I love it the videos and internet help me with these endeavors. My Aunt Pat taught me years ago when she retired the joy of slowing down and doing things manually. At the time I was not so sure but today her ways seem spot on. I love my smartphone especially when we travel because I entertain myself more and talk less which gives Junior a break. I reach out on the internet to others as well so the computer is a very handy tool. I can see how the younger generation can enjoy the internet at their fingertips, the ability to call, take pictures or to text anyone at anytime. The more I watch life unfold I also think that the available connections to the world all at your fingertips is a time hog as well. We have to know right now about everything and then trying to organize your life becomes more of a burden. Letting go of instant gratitification is hard. While cruising through Pinterest today I found myself concentrating on homesteading articles, how to do things manually again. I found how to make vinegar out of apple scraps or even other fruit scraps. I was looking at ways to make a healthy breakfst on the go such as oatmeal in a jar. Recently I have taken up sewing again and started making simple quilts which I am enjoying. Remembering my mother in law Irene canning comes to mind often. Irene and Chuck came over to my house many times to make and can applesauce and she made the best spiced beets to can. The 2 of them loved working in the kitchen together putting up food for their family to enjoy. Sometimes Irene sent food home to her grown children to enjoy and I long to do this myself. I have decided to dehydrate food to put up for winter instead. To me it makes more sense to use what I need as I go through the winter months of the food I have put up. Instead of canning jam for the winter I dried blueberries and then froze them because it takes a long time to dry. Now when I make jam I pull out the amount I want and I make it as I go. By doing this Junior and I are not relying on processed food which we all know is filled with too much salt, chemicals and such. My thoughts today is whether this generation can manage without the computer, processed food and instant answers. I question why Home EC and Shop are not a part of their education anymore. These skills taught young people how to take care of their lives and ways to provide for themselves. Not everyone is college material so learning basic skills are helpful too. Sometimes it is wise to learn to live within your means and it would be helpful for people in general to know how to do these things. Instead I see our society becoming more dependent on the government for all their needs. That is scary to me. If we take God at His Word we should not need to depend on government to provide but for God. Learning that God provides also means He has given us an abundance of knowldge to harvest food for our use, animals to provide meat and it is up to us to go get these things. The more I have gone back to the simple life the more I find Gods ways make sense. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 16, 2016

Greetings My Friend, I woke up feeling a tightness in my chest, tiredness from 2 weeks of going to appointments and a desire not to be coming down with bronchitis. I take my medications including my maintainance inhaler and I add the salt inhaler to my medications. My 2nd cup of tea is one made to help me breathe easier and slowly my lungs begin to clear. I thank God and realize it has been 9 months since I have had bronchitis, the longest I have gone in a few years. I am grateful for all the conversations God has allowed me to have with Him with Him pointing out my triggers, ways to cope and now the time that is legthening between bouts. While I am in this reflective mode I see that the anxiouness I felt about the weakening in my legs leading up to the wheelchair usage when I am out has settled. The past few days I notice my gait is weakening again and I am concerned but not anxious. I know that soon I will see my PCP and she will be referring me to an university hospital so that they might do more in depth looking into what is causing my weakening leg mucles to work right. I pray asking that God would enlighten the doctor's and put me on the right path to healing or managing of my symptoms. I know that today I will work slowly at building my energy level back to it's new normal. I was surprised that a few days of laying low has not perked me up fully yet. At the potluck yesterday I found myself tired and leaving early so we could go home and take a long afternoon nap. I was sluggish after the nap and did a few things but mostly I watched TV and did puzzels on my tablet. My reflections turn toward how many women my age are struggling. We are the generation of women who went back to work when our children were young. We tried to do it all, be married, raise our children, keep up with their activities, keep the house in order and go back to school and volunteer. As we eneter our older years it seems we are faicing dimished health earlier because we tried to burn the candle of our lives at both ends. I also see that by having so many irons in the fire that we did many things but I also see that what we did was not all done well, things went lacking in our lives and a lot was no down time, we had to cut corners sometimes our homes were not up to our standards or our children were put at the bottom of our priorities. For the most part our employers did not make it easy for us to be family focused and we wanted/needed to work. I remember thinking that if both the husband and wife worked that there would be more time to give to the children because the father may not have needed to work as many hours to support the children. What really happened is that both parents were expected to work the long hours. Many times we chose to work the hours so we could make more money to give to our children when we should have chose to give them more time. I myself did not choose to move way up the corporate ladder. I tried to stick to my 8 hours as much as I could so I would be able to take my children to their activities. I felt I could move up the corporate ladder when they were grown. I started thinking about that possibility when I found myself divorced but chose not to go much further. I had met Junior and I wanted to be with him, to grow with him. I worked for another 10 years after we were married and retired. I am grateful for the years we had early on for traveling and building our marriage. Since retirement I have dealt with my health. Junior has been beside me which helps. I also strive to help Junior with his health and even with our health issues I find that we are a team. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 13, 2016

Greetings My Friend, Each year as I read through the Bible I find certain passages get underlined again. I have read various types of Bibles through the years so underlining the same passages seem to get underlined. Single Point used this passage which brings hope to our lives and rseminds me that God has a purpose for me. "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not evil, to give you a future and a hope." Understandably divorce throws people into a tail spin with the hurt of rejection and a loss of purpose. I certainly felt this way as I faced being single for the first time in my life really since I married the first boy I met in high school. I found a sense of life as I absorbed this passage and began facing being single and a mother of young adults. I struggled with how to relate to my children and to accept that they were growing in their own lives. A relationship class I took with Junior taught me that children who were raised in abuse are often angry at the abused parent as well as the abuser. They feel the abused parent should have gotten them out of the situation and generally do not understand the strggle it is to leave, to believe you can handle life. The more my children responded to me in anger and visted me infrequently the more I found myself coming back to this passage....I reminded myself that God wants me, all of me even my broken parts. It is hard to trust and trusting God was made harder since men have hurt me a lot, I feared God's anger with me would destroy me. After I met Junior and met a tough but gentle man I started to see God's tender loving side more and feared Him a whole lot less. I love God so much because of His gentleness with me and I was learning just as Junior had a toughness God also would correct us in firmness as well. I started to understand the need for firmness and correction, that love can be in correction. God also knew that if I am pushed too hard I will come out fighting and He corrected me the way I needed to be corrected. The more I settled into my relationship I found myself having a desire to write (Was it God's plan for me?). Ironicly Judy appeared in my life and mentored me, Sandy asked me to help put out with a newsletter for our re-married's group and my desire to write kept growing. While I was growing and started writing I continued to feel the sting of unhappy children and God reminded me over and over that He has plans for me. The process of fully immersing myself into God's desires for me has been a long journey of growing, looking back and mourning, God reminding me that I am His and He is enough. Junior appeared rather quickly in my life after the divorce, he is a gift from God, I see that almost every day. As my health declined I met God's gifts along the way, the people hugs I got from Celebrate Recovery, Clintwood Baptist friends and family later from friends like Teri, Ruth, Debbie and Boogie, my Sunday school class and along the way I met my on line friends. Recently I felt the release of sorrow my lost abilities, the loss of family and I am staring into the face of God seeing that He is enough, my all in all because He has plans for me a hope and a future. Life is good in Jesus. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 11, 2016

Greetings My Friend, Sammy died, Junior found him and it is hard to loose a little kitten so early on. He has been gone for a couple of weeks already and I am just now able to talk about him which means we only have one kitten left. Both Junior and I feel that Jack is the last cat we try to get, we have lost 2 kittens and frankly it is too hard. We love both cats and dogs so we felt our life would be complete with a couple of kittens, we also miss Alex and Blanko a ton too. We have a fur family and they are our family in every sense of the word. Val is the alpha dog, more like a Dad, he watches over his brood making sure there is no rough housing inside and staying on top of the other dog's playful outbursts outside too. He looks to us for approval and we lather it on him. We have done very little training of the young dogs other than enforcing that their bathroom is outside. Val even watched after the kittens when they were getting too rough with each other. He did not know how to deal with their rough housing so he usually just watched and let one of us know so we could deal with them. Harley needs a lot of special attention with his skin disorder and since he is clumsy not knowing his strength we tone him down. Brendy is in a war to show us she will not be contained. She is our boxer and has no problem jumping the fence only to come around to the front yard to greet us. Now that her partner's in crime can not join her she stays at home or visits Ronnie, our neighbor and her 2nd home. She even invites herself into his house. We are joining in the tradition down here and that means many days we leave our screen doors open along with the front and back door. This allows Brendy to opportunity to visit Ronnie inside and outside. Red is a stray who happened into our neighborhood a few years ago. He first adopted Ronnie, later he adopted us and he is now with Ronnie all the time. Brendy and Red are good friends. Red for some reason does not get along with most of our dogs so we have insisted that he is not aloud to be down here anymore which is another reason Brendy goes visiting. I think God brought us a family of dogs to love on. At first when we moved in a little shitz zu stray adopted us, she was pregnant and gave birth to 6 puppies, one died at birth and 2 were given away. No one wanted the other 3 so we kept them and this started our family of fur children. The house we are living in was empty for many years and some people used the house to crash in after a night of partying. I feel God directed Puppup to us so we were protected once the babies grew some with all their barking. It gave a clear message that people were living here, stay away. For a while strays kept finding us and we welcomed them in. Some moved on, some died along the way but we now have our kids fenced in, well except for Brendy so we should not get anymore strays. I also think people have called animal control before the stays reach us now. Either way our family is complete with 2 cats in the mix. Missy is a stray born here and has made herself at home, she is just now starting to let us pet on her and now we have Jack. The fur children are happy to see us, to love on us and in their own special ways they calm us when anxiety tries to over take us. I think God knew we needed the calming aspect that fur children bring, protection from outsiders fur and human. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 9, 2016

Greetings My Friend Through the years of reading the Bible I notice periods of time where I feel certain passages are teaching me something I need to learn. For a few months I may be learning of God's patience and love and later I may learn of God's dissapointment still later I am stopped on the passages about God's judgement. Currently I keep reading about God's judgements. While God is pointing out judgements I hear His great love and desire that we listen because He would rather not pass judgement. He wants our hearts to turn to Him and to repent of our ways. He wants us to worship Him and no other gods. He seems to speak of judgements to come for a long period of time and then the judgements will come if we do not heed His warnings. For sometime I have sensed God pronouncing judgement on America and I also do not think we are listening. Natural disasters abound and it seems like to me they are getting worse. The draught, the fires, the storms are often the worst in decades, centuries and even longer. God shows us that the most powerful nation in the world can be brought low, 911 for example took our country by surprise. We take God out of everything and then when we are hit with a major disaster we stand with our hands on our hearts and sing a Christian hymn. That is not what God wants a public display only to deny Him in every aspect of our public lives. He wants our nation to turn back to Him. At one time schools used the Bible to teach children. Prayers were said in schools and the 10 commandments were put up in our halls of justice. Today we do not allow God anywhere. Either we are a Christian nation or we are not and frankly we are in name only anymore. from the colonies until around 50 years ago all we did was based on the God of the Bible. Our founding fathers stated many times our need to have Jesus as our Savior and God as our Father. Abraham Lincoln was concerned more about pleasing God than man. Our children are not even being taught this information anymore and history is being rewritten. God's judgement will come unless we turn and repent with a true heart as a nation. As I read my Bible study in Jeremiah I "heard" again of God's disapointment "I have spoken to you persistently, but you have not listened to me. I sent to you all my servants the phrophets, sending them persistenly saying, 'Turn now every one of you from his evil way, and amend your deeds, and do not go after other gods to serve them, and then you shall dwell in the land that I have you and your fathers." Many say that we are under the NT, I say we are and I also say we are under the OT since Jesus taught from the Torah or OT. If Jesus taught us from the OT then I believe we need to learn the lessons that are put forth in the OT. Israel is God's chosen people and we learn from them many lessons. They walked away from God throughout history and God corrected His chosen people. We learn that if God loves us He will correct us as a father will correct His son. God sent Israel into captivity and He can easily send us into captivity too. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 9, 2016

Greetings My Friend, The hard part of having adult children is I am no longer "Mom". My role as a nurturer and care taker is over and if things worked out we would be friends. I saw my role in their early adult years as guiding them in parenting, career decisions and such and in some ways I was able to do this with one of my children. By the time they are nearing 40 though I realize they are in their adult lives as they want to be and it is time to let go completely. I notice that I now have to focus on what is going on with my own body more, I have entered into to the "prune" years by that I mean I need to eat prunes in order to function regularly. I have to be on top of health changes and for me I need to allow myself down time so I can accomplish a decent days work. I have learned to manage my chronic fatigue, the ability to walk around the house and to not walk when I am out so I can have energy to do what I love to do. As I have found how to manage these things I am able to now move into things I love more frequently. For now my disability is not changing which is nice, the decline that I was going through is staying the same and that too allows me to focus on other things. As I write I will be going in for cataract surgery in 2 days which is another area that will allow me to see better and I will be able to thread a needle again without a lot of concentration. I allowed myself to get yelled at for the last time by my child and that weight is off of my shoulders. With that last encounter I have stopped feeling bad for all the wrongs both of my children went through growing up. Their children are now young adults and if they can't see I tried there is no way to make them see. I sense a freedom of letting go of what was, I can not go back and fix and I tried to be a source of comfort the only way I knew how. I did not realize that I would face that moment a 2nd time but today I see that parenting stopped at 18 but guiding quickly arose as the last child nears 40 I see that the guiding role is now over. I do not feel as sad as I did when I was becoming an empty nester but I do have a small sense of loss. I also see the great enjoyment I have been having doing all those little things I have longed for such as quilting, cooking more and so on. In a way I think that sense of retirement has taken hold and this phase of my life is no longer searching like it was when I first retired. We are established in this community now and have our friends we enjoy being with. Our home is comfortable with still more renovating but we have it established and comfortable for us overall. With my being in a wheelchair I now attend Sunday school with Junior and we are studying our weekly lesson together more. I love that time to learn and grow with Junior a whole lot. It seems as my youngest child nears 40 I am establishing myself apart from motherhood of care taking and guiding so even though I mourn leaving those years behind I embrace the new life waiting for me. God has guided me along the way and started teaching me to let go many years ago so as I approach this new phase in life it is not upsetting but a fact of life. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 6, 2016

Greetings My Friend, In my older years I am discovering that the only way to learn is to plunge into a project. If I make mistakes that is okay, it is the only way I will learn something new. In my late teens or early 20's I decided I wanted to sew, I was off of work due to a broken wrist and bored so I thought I would try my hand at a quilt. I never read anything on quilts much less sew one but I thought a simple quilt would be to cut out a bunch of squares all the same size so I did that. I sewed the blocks together and then sewed the rows together finally I sewed an old sheet on the back of the quilt. It was a simple blanket made of squares. The quilt lasted for quite a few years and then it was gone, more than likely lost in a move. I have always been intrigued with quilts, simple ones. As I have started feeling better I have started making quilts. With each quilt I learn something new. I am enjoying learning and creating a whole lot. I am trying to cut my sugar intake and I have found a whole grain cookie with no sugar in the cookie and at this point I am having to figure out what works for me and what does not. When I think I want to continue with a project I have taken to reminding myself that my mistakes are the way I learn. Another love of mine is studying something. In my older years I love studying the Word. I journal my thoughts and answer questions that is helping me to grow in my faith. The same principal of learning goes for my faith journey. Sometimes I fall down and I find God comforting me then telling me to get up and try again. It is at this point that I have become comfortable with mistakes. Time and again I find myself headed in the wrong direction and time and again when I catch my mistake I ask God to forgive me. He does and then He begins showing me how to walk away from a struggle or a sin I am dealing with. The current quilt I am working on putting batting on the quilt, I want it to be a warm quilt so that is why I am learning how to work with batting. For the batting I am using an old sheet. I messed up the size of the back and I have been struggling with fixing the batting. I stood for 2 hours working with my mistake and when my back started to spasm I knew it was time to put the quilt up for the day. I will go back to this project in the next day or so and I will ask God to guide me. He will and I will figure out with God's hand on me how to deal with my mistake. I start asking God when I discover my mistake, when I pray throughout the day I will ask God to direct me and He does. I know that God will guide my thoughts and the quilt will come together well. In the mean time I will re do a few things and these days I do not mind. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 4, 2016

Greetings My Friend I am coming to the end of the denim memory quilt I have been working on. For the first time I am using batting in the quilt so I am learning something new. I also learned that "all" the seams need to ironed, not just the squares as I sew them together. After a few attempts to iron the row of seams I decided to listen to Junior and I used the table which helped me a lot. In the process of ironing the seams I discovered I sewed one block wrong leaving a hole in the quilt rows. If I had not ironed the quilt I would not have caught this mistake so I am now in favor of ironing seams. The hole was machined stitched and I will not have to be fussing with the hole to keep it closed. I am debating whether to sew the seams with the batting or if I understand right it would be quilting. In my minds eye I see that I might be able to sew lines one row at a time before adding the quilt backing. Once I get the back on I wonder if I could sew the opposite rows one row at a time and not bunch the quilt up inside of the sewing machine. This idea looks real good in my minds eye but is it plausible? I am not sure and as Junior reminds me often "How do you think you can find out?" This is my 4th quilt and I am finding with each one I am learning something new. I am grateful that I have finally learned to enjoy each step of the learning process, not expecting perfection on the first one. Each quilt is doing the job I made them for and that was the most important goal. I am not up to learning how to do intricate patterns, I do find the simple block style to be beautiful in its own right. The denim quilt is mixed with old summer shirts and tee shirts I wore which makes the quilt quite colorful. I like that a whole lot and the jeans are my sister's and Junior's old jeans. When our Mom died my sister took Mom's old sheets and made me a quilt. It is a lovely reminder of our mother. The first quilt I made was a tee shirt quilt using old tee shirts of Junior's. I admit enjoying having a part of him to be wrapped up in. I feel it is almost like how I used to be as a teenager enjoying Dad's old shirts to wear. I think it is a way to feel close to those you love. The bandanna quilt is not a memory quilt but it is doing the job rather nicely and it looking nice does not hurt. The quilt has been the perfect weight for this summer's heat. The jean quilt is heavier so it is also the perfect weight for winter. I like having a hand in our home's decorative finishes. Last spring I decopauged a wardrobe to hold craft supplies in and it looks nice in our TV room. This summer I have taken to making bread, jam and applesauce which the smells emit warm comfortable smells. In my own way I am taking this house we live in to a home that is comfortable for Junior and I to spend our later years in and I love it. I am thankful to God for more energy again even though I still crash from time to time. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 2, 2016

Greetings My Friend, Dawn my cousin is working through the fact that the church she is attending now does not have monthly communion. She called me a while back to discuss this and how much communion means to her. I gave her the way I dealt with this issue when I switched churches in which I came from a monthly communion service to a church that has this service once in a while. For me I prayed through our Lord Jesus' last hours almost daily for a long time. Today I do not but those years of praying that prayer opened my heart to the gift I have been given more so. We talked again this past weekend and she told me how she is handling her need for communion. She bakes a loaf of bread, prepares the wine and while the bread is rising and baking she reads the Scriptures on the last hours of Jesus. When the bread is done baking she then takes the bread and drinks the wine. The physical act of communion and the Bible reading/studying helps her feel close to God and she sees how much she is loved. This morning while reading my Bible I read about the last supper how Jesus broke the bread telling them to "Take and eat." In Sunday school we were studying our lesson and I recalled a time when God intervened in my and Junior's life. The teach responded how God was there and knew years before the situation happened. I found myself in awe and then the teacher reminded me again about how God was providing for me before I even knew I was going to go through that trial. That comment prompted other times that I saw God's hand on me and my mouth was going. Later I realized I needed to keep this last thought to myself, it could have appeared I was bragging and that was not my intent. I asked God to forgive me as soon as I realized what I had done but for some reason I stewed on it. This morning's study showed me that the cross was where my overthinking needed to go. In my mind I began nailing it up on the cross as I read. "now as they were eating, Jesus took bread and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said , "Take, eat this is my body.' And He took a cup and when He had given thanks He gave it to them saying "Drink of it , for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins." At this moment I realized it was time to quit chewing on my mistake and to move on. I understand that I need to work on not saying each thought as it pops into my head, something I am not so good at. I can not do this on my own either, I have a history of not doing so, I do know though that the Holy Spirit will help me. I can look back on my thought life and I recall when thoughts try to crowd my thinking I have learned to rely on the Holy Spirit to help me by taking those thoughts away. I may need to ask "Is this something I need to say out loud?" I will have to ask the Holy Spirit to guide my mouth and with this thought process I have a freedom in my heart. It will take a lot of concentrated effort on my part so I need to be patient as I learn to train my thoughts and my mouth which means when I fail I need to start all over again. The cross is where I can see I have been forgiven and the cross shows me that the cleansing is a process and I am grateful for the process of growing into my faith. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet

August 13, 2016

Greetings My Friend, I have worked hard to not be so ready to fight and the only way I was able to let it go was Jesus. I take to heart the passage that says "Vengence is mine says the Lord." To me this means if I have been wronged that God will fight the battle and I need to walk away. My anger issues started as a reaction to being beaten by my Dad, after a beating I generally found a sibling to go take my anger out on which meant using my fists. I retained this method into my first marriage as well, if I was struck I struck back, it made sense to me. I thought that this showed that I was not tolerant of being battered. Since my divorce I have not used my fists for any reason. Learning to tame my words on the other hand took God's guidance. Imagine my surprise when I had cataract surgery recently when I was informed that I was thrashing. This is the 2nd time I have reacted this way during a procedure. I know the first time I punched a nurse when she tried to put the nasal oxygen back into my nose and I did not like it because it irritated my nose. I also think that maybe if someone gets too close to my face I might get defensive which makes me wonder if this is what made me thrash about during cataract surgery. I will never know although I think I may need to warm surgeons in the future that I have this tendency. This morning my Bible study seemed to point me in two different directions although underneath maybe the lessons are the same. In Song of Solomon the verse that stuck with me was, "I am my beloveds and his desire is for me." This passage made me think about commitments we make. I find myself frequently making a commitment to stay in love with Junior. Many times I ask God to open my eyes and heart to Junior especially when I am annoyed with him. God reveals Junior's heart to me over and over. That is what I love about Junior is his heart. By doing this I do not stay angry. Then in Hebrews I ran across the quote "Vengence is mine, I will repay' And again, The Lord will judge His people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God." The first part felt real good. If I have been wronged God will defend me, who wouldn't like that? The 2nd part was a bit more sobering. I just felt it and honestly I did not "feel" any words just that it was sobering. I was wondering how these 2 passages could relate when the Holy Spirit reminded me "Do not forsake your vows." This is the point I saw how the 2 passages related. Junior and I asked God to be the center of our lives. I pray often asking God to teach me to be the wife Junior needs which in turns helps me to stay committed to Junior. Another prayer I have is asking God to keep opening my heart to Him, having walked a long time in sadness and despair I do not want to ever to go back to those days. I felt older when I made my commitment and that time was short so I did not want to do the seesaw of back and forth in my faith. I want to be committed and growing. God is faithful and has kept opening my heart to Him much the same way He has kept my heart for Junior on him. I see that sometimes commitment needs to be revisited lots of times. It is not a one time thing and then I go along my merry way. I vaguely see how God allows me to go through trials so that I stay in need of Him. It is worth it to me to keep learning how to trust and obey. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet