A.M. / P.M.

The table holds the memories of the morning; breakfast dishes, open poetry book, Bible stacked on our history book, legos.  

                                                             Morning time is done! 

 

Outside holds the memories of our afternoon; flowers budding, hummingbirds, sprinkler on, trampoline, bare feet running, laughter. 

                                                                                                Afternoons of fun! 

Stop and stare

In a world that screams for our attention this way and that, all day, every day, I say, "No."

Life is made of a million little choices mixed with a few big ones. One of my big life choices was to move to a small town up in the mountains. We live here with next to no neighbors but for a few months of the year. It is quiet. It is brimming over with wildlife. It is beautiful every season of the year. But still, we can fill our time with activities, ignoring our surroundings and feeling the stress of the world. We can fill every hour, leaving no time for the wonderfulness of just being; resting and seeing and listening.

We must be intentional if we want to be rested, truly rested. We must take time to feed our souls with truth, beauty, and goodness.

Leisure for me, those things that really make me feel at peace and content, are Sunday morning worship with fellow believers, reading a good book, and being outside with my family.

We turn up the music at home and sing together but there is something so magical that happens at church when a group of us sing to the Lord and sit, receiving the Word of God in harmony. The Spirit of God meets with us and there is nothing like it.

This poem had me contemplating life's gift of leisure:

Leisure

What is this life if, full of care, 

We have no time to stand and stare. 

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And stare as long as sheep or cows. 

No time to see, when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass. 

No time to see, in broad daylight,

Streams full of stars, like skies at night. 

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,

And watch her feet, how they can dance. 

No time to wait till her mouth can

Enrich that smile her eyes began. 

A poor life this is if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare. 

William Henry Davies  

We chose adventure

A few nights ago, Micheal and I were talking about our next order of business on our little cabin in the woods and he reminded me that "we chose adventure!" Yes, we did! And this weekend's adventure was putting me to rest by taking a tree down. A huge tree. A huge, dead tree. Right behind our house.

Our house was built with one side basically right up to the side of the hill. While we love the idea of a hobbit sauna, we wanted our home to have a walkway around the whole thing, so naturally we dug it out last Summer. And quickly thereafter, saw that one of the trees was dying. We had chopped apart one of it's main roots. Every time a gust of wind blew, I would lie in bed and fret over that huge tree killing my whole family.

A friend of ours is in the "Hey, I climb trees, and fall them" business, so he and another friend and their two awesome wives came over this weekend and helped us out. 

With boots on and snatch blocks set to go, up the tree he went!

This was super fun and nerve wracking to watch. He cut the limbs off as he went up and the crew would gather them up in a pile. Then he chopped the top 1/3 off and then the rest.

There she goes! He expertly fell the tree in between all the others, missing anything and everything. Truly spectacular to watch!

I am relieved to have this behemoth down and happy to have one cord of wood for next winter already.

This was the beginning of this years home projects. We have SO MUCH to do but are enjoying the process. Next up is a new kitchen!