My Favorite Blog

Lately I've been enjoying Tim Challies' blog so much! I don't remember how I ever came across it, but I'd highly recommend it. If your interested in anything reformed, check it out. Today he had an article titled "The Strange Phenomena of White Pastors Listening to Rap Music" or something along that line - very interesting. What other good blogs are out there? I better not become aquainted with too many or I'll be sitting behind my computer all day! Anyway, I've been much too busy to blog lately. Some other day, perhaps?

Monday Night Surprise

I don't know what it is about Mondays, but I always seem to have a ton of energy! It's great! I get up, start on the laundry, and accomplish all sorts of jobs around the house. As the week moves along, my energy for house-cleaning wanes, and I make up for my zealous over-the-top chore-packed Monday with more relaxed...activities. It never fails. It is such a good feeling to get a lot accomplished. Yesterday was like any other Monday. I rushed around during the day, cooked a meal for dinner (chicken wings, anyone? We eat em' for dinner and love em'!) and at around seven-thirty, it was off to the grocery store. Jules wanted to go with me, so I had company. After our trip, it was home again. I walked in the door, not aware of the major heart palpitations and the agonizing struggle that was in store for me. My livingroom had turned into a giant tent...of sorts. While we were gone, my dear ole' hubby made the entire living room into a fort for his little girl. (Can you tell he loves her?) I confess when I saw it, I had to bite my tongue. My beloved livingroom! The only neat room in the house! The one "sacred" room that I try to keep half-way clean. Well, Jules had her fun. While I busily put the groceries away, I kept thinking about when I was going to clean up the various blankets and sheets that seemed to be everywhere. But then I started to remember what it was like to be a kid - forts were the BEST! Endless hours of fun could come from a simple blanket thrown over a chair and made into a fort of sorts. On the other hand, we made them in the basement when I was a kid - slightly less visible, no? But we don't have a basement! And what better place to build a fort than in the room where the most chairs and various articles of furniture are situated? I consoled myself with the fact that once Jules was in bed, I'd clean it up as soon as possible. Then I heard Mike cheerfully announce to Jules that, "She could play with it in the morning and get more fun out of it then!" My heart sank. I'd have to go to bed knowing my livingroom was a disaster. Would I even be able to sleep? Somehow I kept my mouth shut. And you know what? Mike got me to go in the tent and pretend to be a lion and I don't know what all. In the end I kept my mouth shut and was a.) glad I had a husband who wanted to surprise his little girl b.) glad my husband cleaned it all up at night on second thought c.)and glad that my girl was happy! What do you say? Can you sympathize with my plight or am I a nut-job?

Backpedaling, Again.

I wrote not too long ago against books that try to find an answer for every gray area out there. I think I wrote a little too strongly because it is good to try to do things as biblically as possible, and reading different people's opinions based on God's Word is a healthy thing to do for a Christian. Better a person wanting to learn than a person with their head stuck in the sand, right? I suppose my frustration stems from people who get stuck on a particular subject and never deviate from it. That's all. So, take me with a grain of salt whenever you read me. Now, no more of these topics 'cause I always seem to have to backpedal! (There's this thing called, "Thinking Things Through Before You Post", and I lack it).

Two Dutch Girls

To begin with, I don't primarily view myself as a dutch girl. I tend to think of myself as an American (oh be quiet, all you Canadians). But every once in awhile, my old Dutch heritage reasserts itself with vigor. Mike and I stayed at my brother and sister-in-law's house this past Christmas along with my sister Ange and her husband, Josh. Well, seeing we had the place to ourselves (my brother and his wife were gone for the holidays), we proceeded to make ourselves at home. Disaster struck on Christmas Day. We drove home from church, made ourselves a cup of coffee and found to our dismay that we had NO BAKED GOODS to eat with our coffee! This was terrible indeed! Neither of us had bothered to bring cookies with us from home, or had shopped! All the stores were closed (it being Christmas), and we didn't have the time to bake! Ange and I looked at each other in dismay while our husbands looked on not quite understanding what was troubling their dear wives (they are too American to understand). However, after peering through the fridge fruitlessly, we discovered a frozen almond tart in the freezer. It looked delicious. Of course, there was a little gift tag on the top addressed to my brother from one of his students - a christmas gift. That started the predicament - to open, or keep closed? Ange, being the braver of the two, said frankly, "Well, if someone was staying at my house, I wouldn't mind them snooping in my freezer and having a piece or two of cake." That decided it. The tart was opened, two large pieces cut out, and two dutch girls were satisfied; after all, they had something to eat with their coffee....

If I Gained the World

If I gained the world but lost the Saviour,
Were my life worth living for a day?
Could my yearning heart find rest and comfort
In the things that soon must pass away?
If I gained the world, but lost the Saviour,
Would my gain be worth the life-long strife?
Are all earthly pleasures worth comparing
For a moment with a Christ-filled life?

Had I wealth and love in fullest measure,
And a name revered both far and near,
Yet no hope beyond, no harbour waiting
Where my storm-tossed vessel I could steer-
If I gained the world, but lost the Saviour,
Who endured the cross and died for me,
Could then all the world afford a refuge,
Whither in my anguish I might flee?

O what emptiness without the Saviour,
Mid the sins and sorrows here below!
And eternity, how dark without Him-
Only night and tears and endless woe!
What though I might live without the Saviour,
When I come to die, how would it be?
O to face the valley's gloom without Him!
And without Him all eternity!

O the joy of having all in Jesus!
What a balm the broken heart to heal!
Ne're a sin so great but He'll forgive it
Nor a sorrow that He does not feel!
If I have but Jesus, only Jesus,
Nothing else in all the world beside
O then everything is mine in Jesus-
For my needs and more He will provide.

-Anna Olander

When Company Comes A-Knockin'

What are you like before company comes a-knockin' at the door? I find that I begin a haphazard cleaning spree but as the day looms closer to the expected arrival of guests, I give up. The old adage, "Nothing cleans like company" rings very true for me. I have never in my life spring cleaned and hate the idea of it, but have a guest, and I start to look around my house with a critical eye. Take this past week. We were going to have guests stay in our room and seeing that I had just read a blog post from someone who stated that cleaning your curtains was a MUST, I enthusiastically tossed my brown swag trimmed with beads and baubles into the washer with a new blanket. Of course, me being me, I never bothered to read a tag and contentedly pictured my curtain hanging in my room sparkling clean. When I opened the lid of my washer, I was dismayed to see brown beads and threads EVERYWHERE. My beautiful curtain had disintegrated in the washing machine. And to top it all off, the threads were stuck onto my new blanket. It took me an hour to laboriously pick each and every thread off. Perhaps the next time I have someone over, I will learn my lesson and take it easy on the cleaning business. But then again, probably not.

Confessions of a Two Year Old

I was busy making up the bed this morning when Jules toddled into the room. "Mom," she declared, "I didn't push the button." Hmmm, my suspicions thus arroused, I asked her, "What button did you NOT push?" "The button on the computer, Mom!" Stinker! She knows she isn't allowed to touch the computer, but the temptation must have proved to be irrisistable. Thankfully, no harm was done, but I had to laugh at the way she gave it all away by her statement. I suppose I should be grateful that at this point it is easy to see through her "sneakyness".