The Charity Chapter - Christmas Edition

 

Though I hum along to "O Holy Night" and wish the cashier "Merry Christmas" and have not patience with my kindergartener in Walmart, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.

‭‭ And though I shop small and find the perfect Mudpie gift at the local boutique, and source out the exact item that was linked on the family spreadsheet for an even better price, and help my child memorize all the program songs; and though I have all the presents wrapped early with coordinating paper and ribbon, so that I could feel smug, and have not time to read the Christmas story in My Bible Friends, I am nothing.

‭‭ And though I bestow fresh cinnamon rolls upon all my neighbors, and though I diffuse festive blends of essential oils all season long, and have matching family pajamas, and have not unity on what is important, it profiteth me nothing. 

The true Christmas Spirit suffereth quietly while standing in long lines, and thinketh kind thoughts about husbands who accept plans without first asking making an already crammed month even fuller, it envieth not others’ new dresses for each festive event, the true Spirit of Christmas vaunteth not a Pinterest-worthy decorated house, is not puffed up with every kind of Christmas candy, 

Doth not stay up sewing until unseemly hours out of obligation to “what people might think if I wear an old dress,” seeketh not to stress out, is not easily provoked about Christmas parties, thinketh no evil towards the scale; 

Rejoiceth not in seeing every local lights display, but rejoiceth in the Light of the World; 

Beareth all butchered Christmas carols, believeth that Jesus is the Reason for the Season, hopeth that family gatherings will be tranquil realizing that we are all messed up humans, endureth weather that wasn’t expected.  

The Christmas Spirit never faileth: but whether there be Amazon or FedEx, they shall fail; whether there be parades, they shall cease; whether there be peppernuts, they shall vanish away. 

For we know in part what Christmas is all about, and we profess to do our best. But when the time for us to experience Christmas in Heaven is come, then that which was important for Christmas on Earth shall be done away. 

When I was a child, I spake merrily as child who hadn’t gone through hard things, I understood as a child whose most difficult puzzle was figuring out who had my name in the classroom name draw, I thought as a child who wanted the holidays to never end: but when I became a woman, I put away some of these childish thinkings. 

For now we see life as it really is, with parts that are dark as midnight; broken hearts, empty arms, and vacant chairs at the family table. Now I know in part these heartaches on Earth, but when we all celebrate Christmas in Heaven, then shall we empathize fully as we are known. 

And now abideth the happiest of holidays, peace on earth, goodwill to all men; these three important things, but the greatest of these is Love, His love come down from Heav’n, the True Spirit of Christmas.

Grace in the Wilderness

 I was pouring over Jeremiah 31 this morning while pondering life and its perplexities. "The people which were left of the sword found grace in the wilderness;"  What? How? How can there be GRACE in the wilderness of all places?! Right now I have friends who are grieving, feeling like the sword has slashed through their lives taking a loved one way too soon. There are so many other situations too, that leave us feeling bewildered, asking why, and wandering bereft in the wilderness. And yet God would have us to find grace there?? Reading on I read, "Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee."  And further, "Again I will build thee, and thou shalt be built," So God knows we will have times of being broken if He is promising to "build us" again... Verse 9 proclaims, "They shall come with weeping and with supplications will I lead them: I will cause them to walk by the rivers of waters in a straight way, wherein they shall not stumble:" God does have a plan, even though it sometimes makes absolutely no sense to us. He knows we will weep, and will struggle to accept the wilderness we find ourselves in. Life on Earth will never be normal; our Garden of Eden is over.  "...and their soul shall be as a watered garden;" God CAN give us rivers of grace to fill up those parched places and heal our broken hearts if we choose to turn to Him. And when life is finally "back to normal" and we are at home in Heaven with our Father, "they shall not sorrow any more at all." 

(The thought of the Garden of Eden being life on earth's "normal" is credited to Allen Miller.)

Becoming Thirty-five

So, I’ve been THIRTY-FIVE for a whole week now! A solidly middle-aged 35! It doesn’t seem right. I feel like I should be 28. But, I digress. 

June 18, 2021, was most definitely an "EAT CAKE FOR BREAKFAST" kind of day! I had taken blueberry cheesecake cupcakes to VBS for snacks the night before and luckily had ONE left! So my rainy birthday day started off right with that small delight, several slices of medium cheddar cheese, and black Griffin’s Wharf coffee. After donning my new cute Joules rain boots which were a birthday present from my bestie Jill, Danielle and I scooted up to the Atmore Library to take in a “rodeo” that was presented for the summer reading program. Once we said our heeyahs there, we headed to good ole WeCare where I had a $5 birthday reward to spend! I mean how cool is it to have $5 off at a thrift-store?! Erica Lyn and Summer joined us there, my mom soon also. We scavenged and dug and smiled and scored! I fell so in love with a comfy, Old Navy, thin, cotton blouse that looked cute over my dress, that I just wore it out of the store and for the rest of the day! It looked clean and smelled freshly laundered! What you don’t know, doesn’t hurt you! I also got 3 more books, and a small kitchen strainer I had been needing. Danielle got a large Ryan’s World pirate treasure chest. This daughter of mine… sometimes, I just don’t know why I let her choose “one thing.”

Katie and kiddos joined us at Cafe 251 for an amazing lunch! It was my first time dining there, and it did not let me down! For one, the kids’ play area is just beyond  brilliant! They quickly gobbled chicken fingers and then happily played away while we lingered over our lunches in peace, mostly. I had chosen the “Greek Goddess” wrap which was an excellent selection, along with loaded baked potato salad and sparkling water! My fave. Thanks, Mom, for treating us all! Next stop was Mutton Hollow Farm where Danielle and I gathered fresh eggs and picked Japanese cucumbers from Rhonda’s garden since they were gone. I was most delighted to open the gift she had left for me on the counter in a darling reusable bag! The electric teapot I had been longing for, a peachy tote bag, and 3 cans of peach Sunkist! YUM! (Would be ideal over ice cream for a peaches and cream float!) Once home, I caught up on birthday messages and peachy puns and got Danielle ready for her last night of VBS. Then Danl said he wanted to take me out for tacos! He couldn’t have done better than giving me a date night, authentic street tacos from Alcapuco, and cash to spend! (Perfect for the impending Prime Days!) The VBS Balloon Liftoff was the next item of the evening; followed by listening to the children enthusiastically sing their songs! Best music ever! Danielle was ecstatic to be onstage. Back home, it was time for more cake! This time it was 7-up pound cake with peach tea. I tried to stay up until midnight like I always purpose to do on my birthdays, so I don’t “miss” any of it, but alas. I remember seeing 11:46pm on the ceiling before drifting off into a sweets dream-filled slumber. 

 Becoming 35 got the best of me. 

The Haiku of the Water-hose

This week our assignment on the “Challenge Your Zone” chat that I’m a member of has been to describe in some way a daily touch of nature. Hence this haiku for yesterday. 

And here’s the correct 5-7-5 version in addition to the original 7-5-7 one! 🙈

A Monday Midday Stroll

(I do have a birthday post partially written, but since I quickly jotted this down yesterday as part of a group challenge, I decided to post it here for my posterity!) 

A Monday Midday Stroll…

•Sounds like birds tweeting away with raucous abandon! (No social media limits for them!)

•It smells like mud, and green things growing too fast, and the neighbor’s freshly-cut grass. 

•A Monday midday stroll looks like ominous, blue clouds building and brewing up another summer thunderstorm. 

•It tastes salty from the sweat beading on my stiff upper lip. (I can do this. 💪🏼)

•Even though it feels like a blanket that’s been wrapped too tightly around me, slowly smothering me in the 73% humidity, this Monday midday stroll made my heart feel full. 

smf 6-21-21

Fruit of the Summer 2021!

So I’ve done this “Fruit of the Summer” thing for several summers now! I can’t even remember what initially inspired this, but I just keep my eyes “peeled” for whimsical ways to incorporate items of the year’s fruit into my life. 2021 is my 5th year of going fruity! 2017 I went wonkers for watermelon! 2018 lent itself to lemons. 2019 was simply strawberrific! 2020 was the perfect year to go bananas! So far for this year, I’ve scored a set of 4 “just peachy” plastic cups from Target, a peach-printed market tote from Dollar Tree, and a peach-tinted glass water cup with a straw from DG! And I have been dousing myself with Peach body spray from Bath ‘n Body Works! Ordering these adorable peach charms from Etsy to make myself a bobby pin is also part of the plan. 

 

At the suggestion of a friend, I made Peaches ‘n Cream homemade ice cream for the Last Day of School Picnic; not sure why I didn’t think of this on my own since I have peaches on my mind! Danielle and I picked peaches at our local orchard, which proved to be mostly a fail. The plucking was fun, but most of our spoil spoiled before ripening properly! Oh well. It was still an adventure! Somehow I’ve never read James and the Giant Peach, so that’s on my summer reading bucket list. Also, I want to find the fabric to sew a knit peach gingham dress! No luck so far, so please let me know if you see such. And last but not least, a cup of peach tea with a spot of honey and a splash of cream is a satisfying way to end the day! All in all, it’s shaping up to be a pretty peachy “Summer of the Peach!”

Loving With Our Eyes Wide Shut

  Ever since our special revivals at Southern Harbor the end of March, thoughts about love, and family, and being there for each other have been drifting in and out of my mind. So when my cousin Sheldon messaged me last Tuesday asking if I would write something on the topic of "The Blessings & Benefits of Church Family," I thought, "Yes! Yes, I would love to do that." These thoughts had been simmering long enough and needed to be collected and written down! So here they are. I really felt like I didn't have much to do with it, that it just sort of wrote itself. It was as if God was telling me what I needed in my own life. 

Loving With Our Eyes Wide Shut

(He’s not heavy, he’s my brother.)

Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. Psalm 103:2

Benefits, just the sound of that word has pleasant connotations! God has given us so many benefits; blessed

us richly beyond what we deserve! One of those benefits is our closely-knit church family. We love being

together, singing and worshipping together, and feeling like we are in the battle of life together! But with all

this togetherness, we get to know each other pretty well, just like we do with our own personal families. And

then sometimes it’s easy to forget that being a family is a benefit and not a bother. We step on each other’s

toes and get on each other’s nerves. We can’t understand why people do and say and think the things they do!

Walking along by ourselves in peace and quietness even looks more appealing and stress-free. We just want to

do our own thing! Surely, that would be a benefit. But no, stumbling along on our own in our own littles bubbles

is not God’s plan for us! Satan wants us each to view each other as “heavy” and something that we want to

walk away from, but God has another way. He wants us to have the attitude of the boy back in 1918 at

Father Flanagan’s Home for Boys. When he was asked if carrying another boy who had had polio and was

wearing leg braces was hard, the boy replied, “He ain’t heavy, he’s m’brother!” We need to decide to love with

our eyes wide shut. Not excusing or making excuses for sin, but consciously overlooking each other’s petty

faults and humanness, just like we want others to do for us. Several years ago, Minister Shawn Becker told us

to think the best of each other! Especially of those of whom we say we love. Assume the good and doubt the

bad! When we want to feel overly reprimanded we can decide to think, “She’s not critical, she’s my mother in

Israel, and I’m so glad she’s looking out for me.” And we can go and ask her for more advice when we don’t

know what to do. When one of us is down and out again, we can say “He’s not needy, he’s my brother and I

want to sit with him in his darkness.” We can’t take away the burdens that our church family members carry,

but we can let them know that we know they have a heavy load and that we care. Sometimes just knowing

that we are seen and heard is enough. We can squelch righteous irritation by thinking, “She’s not flighty, she’s

my young youth sister with a heart full of dreams just like I used to have.” And we can tell her that we’ve

been there, and that it’s hard to trust your future to God, but it really is the best way. When we want to

sigh and plug our ears instead of hearing again about the horrible condition of the present world we can

remind ourselves, “He’s not a doomsday prophet, he’s my father, who’s handing down the faith of our

fathers.” And we can choose to empathize with our elders because deep down, they probably feel scared and

helpless because things are so different today than in the world they grew up in. When we can truly love with

our eyes wide shut like God loves us, we will fully reap the benefits of being a whole-hearted member of our

church family. People grow well when they are loved well. We can give grace and grow in grace! The benefits of

this attitude will be never-ending. Like Paul advises in Colossians 2:2-3, “That their hearts might be knit

together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgment of the

mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ; In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and

knowledge.”

Let’s all remember that, “We aren’t heavy, ‘cuz we’re family.” We are all just walking each other home with our eyes wide shut.

Written by Sharon Faircloth 4-22-21

WOTY WINNER!!!

 

drumroll, drumroll....

Congratulations, Nette!!! 

This printable is a digital file, so let me know what size you would like, and I will get our order placed! 

Remembering Your WOTY ~ Giveaway!

 Now that you have chosen your WOTY and it's forefront in your mind and your year is just proceeding along swimmingly accordingly, (cough, cough)... OR, maybe you are like me and the year is speeding by and you know you need to be reminded constantly of WHAT your WOTY is and WHY you chose it!?

There are so many good ways to remember your word of the year! I like to scour the web for quotes that speak to me pertaining to my word and then use them for my lockscreen and homescreen backgrounds on my phone. Currently I'm using these two respectively.

And this one sparks joy every time I glance at my Apple Watch.

I also am loving having my lightbox which sits above my pantry in the kitchen proclaim:

Q U I E T

💗

#WOTY

Last year I ordered myself a whimsical little copper plant tag from my creative friend, Priscilla Hibner. I loved it so much I ordered them for stocking stuffers for my mom and sisters this past Christmas! If you want to order one, contact Pris at (270) 590-4895. You won't regret it.

The possibilities are endless for ways to keep your WOTY front and center! Others ideas I've heard of are getting custom stickers cut, (you can sticker up your windows, mirrors, phone cover, insulated cup, etc.) getting a t-shirt or hoodie printed, or finding a worded mug.

This year, I've decided to frame quiet 2021 and hang it in my "new to me" home office that I've moved from my dressing room to a corner of our living room. I wanted something super classy, yet simple and minimalistic, so I chose the printable below from this Etsy shop! 

Because I'm so excited about this wall art for my WOTY, I will buy an extra one to give away when I order mine! If you want to enter this drawing, you have to tell me your WOTY in the comments below! If you haven't chosen one, it's not too late! Since I love long comments, I'd also be delighted if you tell me why you chose your word and what you hope it does for you. 

OK, comment away! 

I will do the drawing on Wednesday, so you have until 12:00 midnight on Tuesday before the coach turns back into a pumpkin. 

Welcome 2021 & WOTY 2021

 Happy New Year! 

Now that it's January 19, I finally feel ready to embrace 2021! I always feel like I need a couple weeks between December 31 and January 1 to get prepped and rallied and revived and to get my lists, aspirations, and resolutions resolved!  

But as the old quote goes, "Time and tide waits for no man."  That being said, I do have my WOTY chosen, and my 21 for 2021 list made. (I'll elaborate on this in a later post.)

Today I want to share my word of the year and the inspiration behind it. 

I chose the beautiful, calming, scary word ~ QUIET.

This year I want to learn how to be quiet. I am talkative by nature, which I embrace, but sometimes, it would do me and everyone me around so much good if I could just be more quiet. I want to live the quote, "If you can't be kind, be quiet."

Another benefit of being quiet is to hear what other people have to say.

I also want to have a quiet heart, a quiet spirit; to not let the voices of turmoil scream loudly in my mind. So many times, I can't change a situation anyway. I want to just trust God and let quietness reign inside.

And last, but not least, I made a WOTY goal to prioritize actual, factual quietness! Instead of feeling obligated or giving in to FOMO if I'm not constantly listening to some amazing book, podcast, lecture etc., I want to just listen to my own quiet thoughts as much as possible. It's not dull to just think! I want to leave my phone and its noisiness at home when I walk down Garrett Road.  

Did you choose a WOTY? If so, please let me know! This is my fourth year wotying and I love it! I try to get everyone around me to choose one too lol. Sorry, I'm so pushy! It just gives the year a bit of whimsy and somewhat of a goal/theme! The idea of a word or phrase of the year was sparked by my favorite author, Gretchen Rubin. I have all her books and listen to her podcast more than any other!

My past words were as follows: 

2018 - Home

2019 - Rest Up & Dress Up

2020 - Balance

I guess I never did blog about Balance, (I'll blame it on Covid!) but it ended up being very much of a blessing for the unprecedented year of 2020. 

So here's to choosing a WOTY and being QUIET in 2021!