Psalm 27:4 The Happy Palace Homestead

Musing with a sad heart

I spend alot of time (too much, maybe) on the Sonlight forums getting words of wisdom and some humor from other homeschool moms.  Today I was reading a post about the "health and wealth" gospel.  I shouldn' t have, I know.  I got my heart broke.  Maybe I need a new set of homeschool mom's, or maybe I need to stop reading things when I know where the conversation is going. 

At our first Bible study with our Care Pastors, one of the men shared how Ps. 1:1 affected him.  "Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful;"  

So often we think of the scornful as the unsaved, but how often are we the scornful?  How often do we scorn people, or situations, or events that we don't like?  How often are my words...'scornful'?  Maybe God used that post to remind me that when the homeschooling gets tough, I should turn to HIM and not the the seat of the known scornful.

Just reflecting on the pond.

I've Been Away - Did You Notice?

Hello blog-o-sphere.  I've been a way for a little while.  Why?  Because I discovered that my bloghost just sends an e-mail to my mailing list with my entry instead of sending a notice and a link to my mailing list so that my friends and family come visit my blog.  It made me angry and then really sad.  Why bother with a blog when no one is getting invited to visit?  So, I've been moping a little.

There hasn't been much going on here anyway.  We did have a winter thaw that took away all of the snow.  Karra's been sad because she can't sit with her birdies anymore.  The chickens have been ranging again and are very happy to be free from the coop.  They'd better enjoy it because we're supposed to get snow again late in the week.  We had a minor tragedy with our coop.  The big door wasn't latched properly last Wed. and the wind caught it and threw it open hard enough to rip off a hinge.  We propped it closed until yesterday when Joel took the door off, turned it around and screwed everything back together.  I'm so grateful he fixed it (however, I can no longer reach into the coop and get to the feeder!).  We're talking about how to improve the doors next summer - when the weather is warm.  We need to re-do the roost & the nest boxes if I can really, really sweet talk him.

Friday night we had Bible study with our care group from church.  The location was changed at the last minute to our Care Pastor's home (their kids are Kristen & Kurt's ages).  The meeting starts at 7 and the food is good.  The meeting broke up at 10 and we stayed until midnight!  Yes, we were the last to leave.  We just kept talking and yawning and talking and yawning.  I was a complete zombie yesterday and of course I had to go to the grocery store and I'd promised Karra that we'd hit the President's Day sale at JoAnn's.  I told her that if I had to talk to anyone, she would need to interpret for me.  I just could NOT think straight.  Moral of the story:  Mom & Dad are no longer party animals.  Especially when the drive home is close to an hour.

I guess that's the end of my musings  - or were those reflections?  Have a blessed week.

Fellowship

We had a wonderful time last night.  We'd been invited to a get together with our Care Pastors from church.  They're were about 8 adults and 7 children, and we ate and visited and just got to know each other a little.  It will be a bi-weekly Bible study until about April.

I think sometimes we get so busy and wrapped up in our own lives that we tend to forget the importance of fellowship with others who share our faith.  We go to a BIG church and it has taken us 15 years just to get to know a handful of other couples.  The friends we have though are good friends.  Joel's not the mot social of creatures and that's fine, but not everyone is like that.  I love to get toghether and visit with other adults.  For new couples and singles coming into our church, getting to know others and becoming part of the extended family can be the difference between staying and leaving.

Just a few reflections on the pond this morning.  God bless your weekend.

Reflecting Already

I had no business getting up at 3:45am today.  I just couldn't sleep.  I've spent the last 3 hours, grading schoolwork, making pancake batter, righting the checkbook and checking the weather.  I'm going to blame the sleep loss on some really good Papa John's pizza last night.  I ate too much of it and boy, does my stomach hurt!  But it did taste good going down.

While the girls birthday partied yesterday, Joel dropped me at JoAnn's & took Kurt to Gander Mountain.  "We looked at hunting stuff, Mommy!" 

I wandered around JoAnn's "looking" and spent $50!  I just had to buy some magazines, to inspire myself.  I love going through organizing magazines to get ideas.  There's something about the end of December and January that makes me long for clean and organized.  Which got me reflecting on the chaos of Christmas.   Isn't it nice in January to just put everything away?  We're so excited to get it out and yet it's a relief to pack the boxes and get back to normal.  But as January fades into February and March and so on, the chaos starts to snowball all over again.  By July & August we're left wondering where the summer went and then it's fall and school and before we know it the holidays are here again. 

As I look forward to organizing & cleaning my house for the new year ahead, I need to schedule some time to clean & organize my soul.  There's plenty of clutter in the corners and cobwebs I haven't dealt with.  I'm glad God's mercies are new every morning so that I don't have to wait until the New Year to start clearing away the chaos from my heart.  There's no time like the present to pick up my coffee, pick up The Word and start cleaning.  Blessings, friends, from the homestead pond.