More Than A Song

We had a Sunday school lesson last week that was particularly good I thought and I’ve been pondering on it ever since. The teacher (hubs) asked if we’d ever heard anyone say that they felt like their prayers weren’t going any higher than the ceiling…..in other words, we feel like God isn’t answering us or maybe we aren’t getting the answer we want. The passage we read was John 11; when Lazarus was sick and dying his two sisters sent for Jesus to come make him well. Jesus heard their request (prayer) and yet He stayed where He was 2 more days. He didn’t answer right away or come rushing back when they sent for Him. So what they heard was silence, which we usually take to mean that God hasn’t heard us. There was silence at Mary and Martha’s house for four days. God’s silences are His answers, sometimes one of the best answers to prayer. Just as it is important for us to be able to trust God, so it is important for God to be able to trust us. Has He trusted you with a silence, a silence that is huge with meaning? Can He trust us like that with a silence or will we keep on asking for a visible answer? If we keep on asking He might give it to us; insistence upon the blessing that we desire might be the denial of the blessing that HE desires for us. If He has given us a silence, then He has trusted us in a very intimate way and is bringing us into more of an understanding of His purposes, and into a closer relationship with Him. God does hear our prayers, we might hear silence…….can He trust me or you with that?

Because Judi so kindly asked to see the shoes I bought on Saturday, I’ve got a picture for you. She apparently LOVES shoes (she’s a cute pie too)! These are not sassy or cute I’m afraid, just maybe totally practical. And I’m hoping they’ll be comfy! It would be so much more fun if they were sassy, cute, fashionable, comfy and good for my feet all at the same time; is that too much to ask?! I eyed them last year when I saw people wearing them but didn’t get them. Went shopping with a coupon for 20% off and they were on sale when I went in the store, so they came home with me this time! I love the fact that they just slip on and I’m thinking it’ll be more likely I’ll wear them around the house. Going barefoot is a bad, bad habit of mine and I think my feet are paying for it now…..plus I don’t think it’s that good for you to go barefoot. These feel cushy, will hopefully give me some support and I think they look a bit better than regular tennis shoes because the back is out and they are a slide. New Balance for me! These are ones I got on Saturday……

This week might be a little hectic for me—got lots of cleaning to do before some of the kids come in for their break. They are likely to bring loads of laundry, stay up way past my bedtime, and want “good” food as one of them told me! She just wasn’t very specific in what she wanted but she wanted “good”.
I’m trying to plan what to cook without knowing yet what they want exactly, so this is a general idea of what I might do this week. Head over to Laura’s place to see the other participants for this week; they are probably much better prepared than me this time! Better yet, join in and let us know what you’re having this week.

Monday…..Salmon, broccoli, smashed potatoes
Tuesday……shrimp/veggie quesadillas, salad
Wednesday…church supper
Thur/Fri/Sat….several of the kids will be home for Easter break and I want to cook something they want, but they haven’t told me yet what they’d like to have! So I’m leaving it open for the moment until I email said child to find out some specifics from her.
Sunday……Easter dinner, right now it’s looking like chicken, potato casserole, crunchy slaw, green beans, rolls, deviled eggs (it could change a bit if someone has a special request)

We went to Jackson today so we could visit, and I’m suspecting the main reason was for the boys to play golf! I shopped by myself for a while and got 2 pair of shoes. Then we went to a matinee showing of the movie Amazing Grace with Stacy & Tim. It was a really good movie we all thought and I would encourage you to go see it. It was interesting to learn more about William Wilberforce, his faith and his fight to abolish slave trade in England. And I liked the John Newton character, who wrote the hymn; good to know some of what went into writing it. I’m glad we got to see it on the big screen. Don said he wanted to see it again to get some of the characters/names straight but I imagine we’ll wait until it comes out on DVD before doing that.
Go see it if you get the chance!

Dinner was at Chili’s afterwards and very good. I think the guys pick it though so they can order the Molten Chocolate cake for dessert! So, so good!

Well not me, I usually don’t win anything and probably won’t this time either! But I decided to jump on the bandwagon….nothing to lose, right? There’s a fun contest going on over at 5 minutes for mom and you can get all the details here. I would REALLY love to have this Dyson vacuum and it would be put to good use for the whole upstairs of my house! You might want to read more about it at the Dyson site, way cool vacuum!
Somebody will be a very lucky person!

Hubby uses this saying ALL the time!
Saw this over at Susanne’s and I think I’ve seen Stacy and others do it as well. Seemed easy enough to do this morning while I’m thinking on other things to post later maybe!

1. Name six things in your refrigerator.
skim milk, flavored creamer (white chocolate macadamia nut at the moment), whole wheat tortillas, dijon mustard, 100% cranberry juice, Cabot’s light cheddar

2. Name six things in your freezer.
boneless skinless chicken breasts, salmon filets, cranberries, bread flour, shrimp, whole green beans (for this recipe that I make almost once a week!)

3. Name six things under your kitchen sink.
409 cleaner, Cascade dishwasher gel, SOS pads, sponge, Cerama Bryte cleaner for cooktop, Mr. Clean magic eraser

4. Name six things around your computer.
phone, sewing machine, piles of papers, cup with pencils, fax machine, framed photos

5. Name six things in your medicine cabinet.
Tylenol, band-aids, Neosporine, zinc lozenges, Q-tips, Glide dental floss

6. Name six things on or around your nightstand.
Bible, books, lamp, sudoku book, pencil, magazines

Ok, there’s mine………how about it? Will you play along? I won’t tag anyone specifically but I’d love for some of you to play and be sure to let me know so I can come read your answers!

Haven’t been able to get to my blog for a few days now. My blog is tied in with the family website that my sister and her husband take care of, and their internet went out on them! Yikes for them. I at least had internet and email access and they didn’t have anything, no phone service either. They have been working on it for many hours a day trying to get it all back in order. I’ve been at home going back and forth to the computer room checking to see if they were back on…….today I rode with hubby to his golf lesson and visited with young son at school for a bit. Low and behold, almost as soon as I leave home it all comes back on! I’m more happy for them that they have their access back. I’m gonna go read and climb in bed and maybe be back tomorrow with a real post!

So if you can’t think of anything to write about, I guess more photos from the ski trip will work. No action or skiing, just mostly the baby, we only like her a wee bit!
I’m missing the other 2 little ones also, hope to see them before too long.
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Oh my 3 girls would SO know what that’s from but they never read my blog. 🙁 No one else has probably seen this movie and it’s not quite the time of year to watch it!
We went to Colorado for spring break to ski and got home last week. Two of our four kids were able to join us and we missed the others terribly! We did get to see Kat & J’s baby though and what fun that was. She’s 14 months now and wasn’t walking last time we saw her, now she is constant motion! The sky was so blue, the weather very warm and it was typical spring skiing. I took way too many pictures and tried to pare it down but still got quite a few!
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I was gone some last week and didn’t plan a menu, and I felt slightly disorganized at meal time! Funny how I’ve come to depend on this for meals each week. I think it’s always good to have a plan even if some meals get pushed aside for other things that come up. So I’m planning a menu this week but hubby might have some business meetings at night and if he doesn’t eat here, I probably won’t cook just for me! I’m happy with fruit or yogurt or cereal or something. But I’ll have a plan for the nights that I do cook. So what are you having this week?

Monday……….Baked salmon, smashed potatoes, veggies
Tuesday………Quick vegetable & rice soup, bread…..found this recipe in the newspaper & it’s a new one for me, uses sausage & I’ll use turkey sausage
Wednesday…..church supper
Thursday……..Shrimp & wild rice casserole, corn on cob (another new one)
Friday………….Chicken pot pie, salad
weekend……….if any of these meals get put off I might do them this weekend or maybe mini meat loaves if all these get cooked during the week!

Thanks Laura for hosting this each week; hop on over to her site for more menu ideas or hopefully to play along with us.

I’m off to work on pictures to post from our recent ski trip, been putting it off long enough! I hope to have them up Monday morning sometime.

Several people asked how I made my spring Easter egg wreath that I posted about and showed a picture of here. I made mine last year but didn’t do any step by step instructions! A friend had made one so I sort of copied hers…….Martha is in no trouble of losing her job, I’m not all that crafty and this is easy to do! I went to go see Stacy this week and we got stuff to make one for her door so I took some pictures of that. You might not have wanted this many pics but here’s what you’ll need to make your own Easter egg wreath:
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Katrina at Callapidder Days is hosting another reading challenge similar to the one she did last fall……a Spring Reading Thing this time! You can read about it here and be sure to check out this post for more specifics and all the links to the other participants. You can get some good ideas from what other people are reading and your list can be long or short. The challenge lasts from March 21st to June 21st and Katrina is giving away an Amazon gift certificate at the end of the challenge. Hop on over, check it out and hopefully you’ll participate too! You have until Saturday night to post your list and add your name to Mr. Linky.
I’m keeping my list shorter this time and it may change a bit later on!
Here’s the ones I’m hoping to finish:

Two that I own:
1. Colorado Weddings by Joyce Livingston
2. Kentucky Keepers by Lynne Coleman, Jennifer Johnson, Gail Sattler, Kathleen Y’barbo

Two that I borrowed:
3. A Year of Pleasures by Elizabeth Berg
4. In this Mountain by Jan Karon

and one I’ll check out from the library:
5. 204 Rosewood Lane by Debbie Macomber

And just because I like pictures to go with it, here’s the books I already have!

“Sing out loud, sing out strong…..”

I was tagged for this music meme by Kelli…….list 7 songs that you are into right now. It was hard for me to pick!

1. You Are Loved……..Josh Groban
2. And Your Praise Goes On…….Chris Rice
3. In My Daughter’s Eyes…..Martina McBride
4. Simply The Best……Tina Turner
5. Wasted…………Carrie Underwood
6. Piano Man………Billy Joel
7. Home……..Michael Buble

I’m supposed to tag others to do this too……….don’t feel any pressure to do it if I tagged you and please, anyone else feel free to do it too. It’s hard for me to know who likes to do these and who doesn’t!
Judi
Becky
Stacy (sis) but she’s already been tagged & done it!
Stacy (the other one!)
Jenna (another Mississippi girl!)

I took 4 books with me last week when we went on our ski trip to Colorado. Daughter K thought it was silly I think to have so many with me but like I told her, I get “twitchy” if I don’t have enough books with me or if I run out of something to read! I was about 3/4 of the way through with one book and another one I knew was short enough to easily finish; couldn’t decide between 2 more so I just brought them both. AND….. it was a good thing I did that because I did something this weekend that I’ve NEVER done before, I stopped reading a book! Just quit and decided not to go on with it because I couldn’t get into it. This is rather huge to me because I usually feel like I must finish what I start, always hoping it will be better but then disappointed when through with it. I just couldn’t get into the book or the characters and in the 50 pages I read it seemed like there kept being new characters introduced almost constantly. So after struggling Saturday and a bit on Sunday morning to read those pages, I finally put it in my backpack when I got on the plane and pulled out the last book I had with me. And quite easily read 100 pages or so while on the plane trip home!
I’m a little bit pleased with myself for finally doing this! After a bit of further investigation I discovered that the book is actually part of a series and is one of the latter ones, which would explain why I couldn’t figure out all the characters! Maybe I’ll be able to do this again sometime, put a book aside that I’m not interested in so I don’t waste time on something I’m not enjoying.

How about you, do you usually finish all books you read or can you easily quit reading it?

Several of you said I should go to the doctor so I finally did go this afternoon. Got x-rayed and looked at, there’s nothing broken. That’s good but it still hurts like the dickens! He said the joint was pretty swollen and bruised and that it would take some time for it to get better. So things like opening a door or bottle will still be hard for me for a few weeks but everything is fine. Hubby had told me all along it was just jammed or hyperextended and that’s what the doctor said too, now Don will think he IS a doctor! I might have gotten more sympathy at home if there was something “really” wrong with it. 😆
Thanks for asking about it!