Happy Thanksgiving!

Football, food, family. Oh, and the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade.

Praise God from whom all blessings flow.

Bless the Lord O my soul and forget none of His benefits.

Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise. Be thankful unto Him and bless His name.

We had a quiet day together. Andrew is getting over a mild case of the flu, so stayed in bed late and lay on the couch. I went to his house last night and brought him home. His housemate was gone and he was there sick and alone. Poor boy. Will and Den helped me. Will helped get everything put away after we were finished. THAT'S the worse job! Den and I went for a walk in the clear cold breezy late afternoon.

Now we're watching MORE football and I'm catching up or just reading what's on the Internet. Washed Andrew's clothes. Everything is clean. Our house is peaceful. Don't we have SO much to be thankful for?

She's alive! She's alive!

Remember this 8 year old rosemary from last summer? Well, it got yellower and never did a thing all summer. Dried up even more (this is the beginning of June). I thought I'd just leave it outside all winter and if it died, well, it was almost dead anyway. But I thought I'd try something. I dumped it out of the pot. The bottom was solid roots. I cut them off, shook out, dug out all the old soil that I could. I cut the plant all off so that it only looked like some dead sticks. Then I put it in new soil and brought it into the house.

And this is what's happening now!!!! Yeah!!!!

Hallelujah!

Our holiday season has begun with the performance of Handel's Messiah. Yesterday Den and I went to the free performance at the Holland Performing Arts Center here in Omaha. Will went with Melissa. As always, it's an exhilarating worshipful experience. And it sure sets the mood for a proper view of the Christmas season. Hallelujah, the Lord God omnipotent reigns, and He shall reign forever and ever. Sometimes we think that God will reign only in the future, but God is reigning right now. That is such a comfort to me who is such a control person!!!

I'm not sure what my favorite part of the Messiah is. I've been listening to it for about 45 years, so most of it is very familiar. I love the Pastoral symphony in the middle. (They took up a collection during it! argh!) I love the build up of the message during the last half of part two beginning with "The Lord gave the word". It goes on to say, "and great was the company of the preachers" then "how beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace." continuing with "their sound is gone out into all the lands and their words to the ends of the world. (Yesterday they had intermission after "the Lord gave the word" kind of broke up the message!)
After God sends his Word out, of course there is reaction and that is heard in, "Why do the nations rage?" continuing with the nations' response is "Let us break their bonds...and cast away their yokes from us. (Who wants to follow the teaching of the Word? It seems like bondage.) God's response to their rebellion is laughter, "He that dwelleth in heaven shall laugh them to scorn" and "thou shalt break them with a rod of iron..." Finally, after that back and forth comes the Hallelujah Chorus. Amazing how Handel put them all together.

The soloists were fantastic, too. The bass was a tall thin man and the tenor was short and barrel -chested. We thought it would be the other way around!

The final section, part III, is Christ's and our victory over death and the exaltation of the Messiah in the final chorus,

Worthy is the Lamb who was slain and hath redemmed us to God by His blood, to receive
power and riches and wisdom and strength and honour, and glory and blessing.
Blessing and honour, glory and power be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne,
and unto the Lamb, forever and ever. AMEN!

Winter wandering

Andrew and I had a good time visiting the "home" place, even in November. Minnesota is always a good idea. The trip is only 7 hours all Interstate, so not very stressful. We arrived about 9:30 on Wednesday evening.

Andrew had some fun with the mounted deer that we took down to paint the wall.


















I haven't been up there in November since I was a child and we visited for Thanksgiving, so it was nice to see the place in a different season. Saturday, the day we drove home, was the only day it wasn't dark, cloudy and rainy. A little depressing. Lack of sun takes away my energy.
I had fun painting, hanging out and helping out where I could. There's a never-ending stream of people coming and going on a farm like this, so we had no end of activity.
One evening we had a good time laughing through the old slides and listening to Ron's jokes. *smile*



















Gramma's road doesn't look the same since they knocked down the old cement bridge, put a big culvert under the road, and left it all bare and flat. I took this photo about 4:30 in the afternoon. It was so dark, I was hoping it would turn out. Wouldn't know it was the same place, would ya?
I'm always very happy to go down this road this direction!!!

Burn, baby, burn

Yep, that's what I'm doing. I have 8 DVD's finished except for labels. I even bought colored DVD's, fun! I think I'll do the last two from this box of DVD's (came in lots of 10) and then I'll be done. Pretty cool that we can make our own, and mass produce them.

We've come a long way!

His praise shall continually be in my mouth

We sing A LOT at our church on Sunday mornings, ten songs usually. They are in groups of three with a closing song. Three as a gathering time. Three more after a prayer and call to worship. Three more after confession and pardon, then the offering, sermon, and closing song. Andrew had a friend in church with him a few weeks ago and she said, "We only sing four!" And those of us who grew up in church know exactly where they fit. Everyone does it the same.
The joy of singing so many is that I get TIME to get into the spirit of worship and get my heart ready to hear the preached word. I'm a little slow sometimes, especially after a long week. My joy has been to help lead worship. Those Sundays I have an hour plus practice before Sunday to prepare my heart to worship, to have those words ringing in my heart for the rest of the week. And THEN I get to get started extra early (like 8am) preparing for worship even before we start church. I LOVE it. And of course, the words of our songs are carefully chosen, full of good teaching. Praise God for feeding our hungry souls!

This is taken from the movie about William Wilberforce and is what we sang in church yesterday. I love it that the songs we sing go round in our heads for the rest of the week!

Another interesting blog post

Sorry about the boring title. While browsing the Internet on this dark, cold, rainy windy afternoon, I came across the old blog post from some random blogger. Note the date is October 10, 2007:
Here's the last paragraph, which is really the punch:

As a Republican, Barack Obama could have been the first Black
President of the United States, as opposed to what Democrats want, but will
never attain: Barack Obama being a United States President—that
happens to be Black.

We've come a long way, baby! Guess it was beyond any expectation.

Here's the message Will got the other night. He has worked hard ever since last June. Night and day, day after day. Actually, I think Linnea got the message, too. At least she had a text while she was talking to me. I'm proud of my kids!

I'm about to head to Grant Park to talk to everyone gathered
there, but I wanted to write to you first.
We just made history.
And I
don't want you to forget how we did it.
You made history every single day
during this campaign -- every day you knocked on doors, made a donation, or
talked to your family, friends, and neighbors about why you believe it's time
for change.
I want to thank all of you who gave your time, talent, and
passion to this campaign. We have a lot of work to do to get our country back on
track, and I'll be in touch soon about what comes next.
But I want to be
very clear about one thing...
All of this happened because of you.
Thank
you,

Will has been working so hard since mid-June and particularly since the beginning of August. It was a wonderful experience for him, contacting people door-to-door, on the telephone, organizing people, getting volunteers. So many details, so many contacts! It was amazing for me as his mom to see him work so hard and so passionately. He is happy today. CNN reported yesterday that the campaign is extending pay until the end of the month and health insurance until the end of the year. No other campaign has ever done that for its staff. Usually it's finished the minute the election is over. Will is over at the office cleaning everything out. He has had a great bunch of people to work with and has enjoyed the time he's been there. His "boss" had a birthday yesterday, what a great time! Bet that birthday will always be special.

Now what for Will? Guess he'll have to find a real job. God blessed him with this magnificent opportunity for training and experience, He'll use it in the future, I'm sure! As far as Will's concerned, he's going to the Husker game Saturday, and catching up with his girlfriend and lost sleep!!!