Thinking About Home

As the name of my blog indicates, I spend a lot of time thinking about home. Of course, my Heavenly Home is the one that is eternal, so that’s where I need to lay up my treasures, and that’s the one I’m striving for. But in the meantime, I have been given this tiny piece of the here-and-now—this home on the edge of town, this family, this neighborhood—in which to serve Him. And, though this is in the earthly realm, I want the things that happen here to be investments in the Heavenly realm.

Monday, May 8, 2017

The Purple Dress {And a Beautiful Song}

You may remember the story of The Purple Dress that Bekah needed to wear for her choir's spring concert. After a long and fruitless search, we decided to go online and order a dress that was scheduled to arrive sometime between mid-April and May 5th, the day of the concert. Too close for comfort! But Amazon had always come through for us, so I was fairly confident that the dress would arrive in time.

So we waited.

And waited.

And concert day arrived. If the dress did not arrive in the afternoon mail, we were up a creek!

As we were leaving our house to go to the final rehearsal, we saw the mail truck drive away. Hoping against hope, we checked the mailbox and the front step.

No dress.

I was probably even more disappointed than Bekah was. (I may have cried.)

I dropped Bekah off at rehearsal and I asked the Lord to help me find my girl a dress for this special night. I went in five stores (if you know my speed, you are amazed at that!) and I bought three items: two pretty tops and a dress, having NO idea whether Bekah would like any of it because she has a hard time even pleasing herself!

As we were leaving rehearsal, dear friends who knew of our plight offered dresses from their own closet, so we followed them home and borrowed all of their purple clothes!

Back at home, we had a (quick) fashion show. When Bek came out of her bedroom wearing the dress that I had bought, she was smiling and I knew that we had a winner. Amazing! (And it was on clearance too.)

Oh, it was such a wonderful evening! Bekah sang in the older choir and accompanied the younger choir for several songs. Eight of my ten grandchildren sang in one of the two choirs; some also performed in solos or ensembles. The music was glorious . . . songs with stirring melodies, rich in faith and praise.

As I listened, I was thankful that the Lord heard a mama's prayer for her daughter. I was thankful for sweet friends willing to help. I was thankful that He cares about the little things in my life (like a purple dress). I was thankful for our home school choirs and for the teachers who are pouring their gifts into teaching our children. I was thankful that my daughter and my grandchildren have the privilege of learning beautiful and God-honoring music.

I was even thankful, in spite of the stress of the afternoon, that the dress had not come. If it had arrived early, or even on time, we would have missed seeing these other gifts.

Maddie and Bekah , , , wearing their purple dresses 😊

I am sharing two songs from the concert. This gorgeous Chopin piece was performed by the older choir. (Bekah is in the back row on the far right. Granddaughter Maddie is at Bekah's immediate left, and grandson Gavin is on the far left also in the back row.)

"To God Be Joyful," performed by the younger set, is a song of exuberant praise. Bekah is playing the piano accompaniment for this piece. (Granddaughter Nora is in the front row far left. Alaine is also in the front row, wearing a color-blocked dress; her brother Ben is to her immediate right. Grandson Peter is on the far right of the front row. In the back row, grandson Owen is on the far left, peering just above Nora's shoulder, and granddaughter Eve is on the far right.)

Watching God provide . . . and an evening of beauty and praise!

Monday, May 1, 2017

Gathering the Moments | April

It has been a while since I have gathered the moments here on my blog. Life moves so quickly from month to month and after I missed a couple of months of "gathering," it became a little easier to let it slide. But I really do enjoy marking the moments and looking back before moving on, so when sickness kept me home from church yesterday, I decided to gather some photos and some memories and some thoughts from the month of April.

A group of us were able to visit the former home of my great-grandparents, an amazing house full of artistic details and rich with family history. What an opportunity!

We said good-bye to one of the sweetest kitties I have ever known. He had come to us nearly nine years ago. We just started seeing him around The Farmhouse . . . way out in the fields, away from the house. We would put food outside at the edge of the yard and he would wait until we were back in the house to gingerly walk up and eat it. He was so very timid, in fact, that we weren't even able to touch him for almost a year.

Gradually, he got closer and closer, and eventually he would come into the back porch. (Ron had fashioned a little cat door on both sides so Puss wouldn't feel trapped.) He remained an outdoor kitty all of those years at the Farmhouse. He did not want to come in! Only late at night would he lay just inside the open (it must remain open!) door and allow one of us to rub his belly.

When we planned to move, I knew that we couldn't leave our boy behind, but I was also worried that he would not make the adjustment to living indoors. Every night I'd tell him, "You're going to be a house cat." And he would say (in my imagination), "I don't want to talk about it."

It was an adjustment, but Puss actually learned to love being a house cat! He'd greet me every morning, winding around my legs as I attempted to get his breakfast. He'd stare at us when we ate dinner, hoping for a morsel (or two or three). He learned to be held and cuddle and he even lay in laps!

We miss him and wish that he could have been a house cat for longer, but he was an old boy (not sure how old he was when he came to us, but he only had two teeth left) and we are happy that he lived out his days with us, wanted and loved.

(I didn't plan on telling the whole story here today, but that's how it happened.)

We celebrated Bekah's 16th birthday three times! A celebration with extended family, just the four of us on her actual birthday, and a game party with friends.

We "sang of our Redeemer" with a Resurrection Day celebration.

We gathered with family to celebrate the 50th birthday of Michael and Michelle, Ron's youngest siblings.

We had a Shakespeare Reading Day. We had ordinary days. A friend brought tulips. We babysat our granddog Lucy while her family was traveling.

We celebrated one full year at Pineapple House! We watched the azaleas bud and bloom for the first time. (They were already in bloom when we moved in last year.)

We worked on the library. We are on the home stretch! (Sneak peek below.)

If you're a longtime reader, then you may remember the 31-day series that I wrote on celebrations. Do you remember the definition of the word celebrate that I used?

cel·e·brate /ˈseləˌbrāt/

(v.) to mark a notable occasion with gratitude and rejoicing

(synonyms: commemorate, observe, mark, keep, honor, memorialize)

And I also wrote this:

If our focus is marking the occasion, commemorating its significance, if our hearts are full of gratitude, knowing that everything comes from His hand...then our celebrations will be those of true rejoicing, and not just meaningless exercises in "having fun"!

This April . . . it has been full of celebrations.

Full of the marking of occasions.

Many of them fun and exciting and glorious. Some of them sad and discouraging and even life-changing. (Some are not my story to tell.)

We must continually "tune our hearts to sing Thy praise," knowing that everything comes from His loving hand, and that He gives only good gifts to His children!

We have so many reasons to be grateful!

Saturday, April 29, 2017

What Do You Go By?

Sometimes a little social anxiety gets in the way of your brain.

A few years ago, I was chatting with one of Ron's cousins at a family reunion. Attempting to bring Bekah into the conversation, Karla turned to her and said, "Hi, Rebekah." And then, "What do you go by?"

I looked at Bekah, waiting for what seemed like a very long time for her to answer such a simple question. She looked a little panicky and finally stumbled out, "I don't know."

(What?!)

I supplied the answer for Karla. "She goes by Bekah."

Later, I asked Bekah why in the world she had said she didn't know what her name was! She explained to me that what she had heard was, "What do you go buy?" and she didn't know how to answer that! We both laughed, imagining what Karla would have thought if she had answered, "Dresses." Or "Books."

I think that one of the reasons I like to write is that I can ponder what I am going to say. I can get my thoughts together, consider, weigh my words, change wording, clarify...even start all over if it's not right.

Not so with speaking.

On more than one occasion, my ~~mouth~~ brain has failed me and I have blurted out the wrong thing. (I shared one such story in this post. Can you even believe it?)

Then there was the time that I was in 10th grade and was going on a field trip. I was sitting on the bus as more students piled on and found seats. I looked up and getting on the bus was the cutest guy in my school! And the seat beside me was empty. It was my lucky day!

So there I sat, knowing that Mr. Cutest-Guy-in-My-School could very well choose that seat because it was the first free seat he would come to on the nearly full bus. I saw him glance over at the empty seat. (Yay!) As he got closer, I imagined him saying, "Is anyone sitting here?" and I was so very prepared to say "No!" in my perkiest voice.

Just as he had in my imagination, he stopped there at the empty seat. (Woo hoo!) He looked at me (swoon) and said, "Can I sit here?"

And I (in the perky voice that I had rehearsed in my head) said, "No!"

No. I didn't just say that! He hadn't read the script! He was supposed to say, "Is anyone sitting here?"

Wait a minute, Mr. Cute! I meant, "No one is sitting here!" Please come back!

But he had already moved on toward the back of the bus.

Yep. Bekah gets it honest.

Sometimes a little social anxiety gets in the way of your brain.

Tuesday, April 25, 2017

Home Happenings and a House-iversary

I could totally repeat the words I said a couple of weeks ago at the beginning of my post on Catching Up.

I won't, but I could.

Today was the first day in over a week that I did not have an outside appointment (or two or three!), nor was I hosting anything. Rest was the first order of business! I rose at my regular time, but it was a slow, meandering, sipping-coffee-in-my-nightgown kind of morning. Just before lunchtime, I decided that I needed to vacuum after yesterday's gathering and then I mopped the kitchen floor. I told Bekah to go ahead and eat lunch while I took a leisurely bath. This afternoon, I did some school work with Bekah, and made spaghetti sauce because comfort food was also a part of this day of rest. And I was back in my nightgown before I ate my plate of spaghetti. Luxury!

Between lessons and classes and grocery shopping and laundry, here are some of the happenings in our world this past week . . .

Bekah celebrated her sixteenth birthday one last time. We had a family party earlier in the month, and we went out to dinner on the actual day. But on Friday evening, friends gathered to play games and celebrate with her.

Family gathered at a local restaurant to celebrate another birthday . . . that of Ron's youngest siblings, twins who turned 50 on Sunday.

Fourteen homeschooled students and moms gathered at our home to read aloud The Taming of the Shrew. We have hosted several of these Shakespeare Reading Days over the years, inspired by the ideas of Karen Andreola as shared in A Charlotte Mason Companion: Personal Reflections on the Gentle Art of Learning.

We begin by reading a "retelling" of the tale from Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare for Children. to familiarize ourselves with the story and the characters. After we assigned roles, we read the induction and all five acts of the play, stopping only to eat our brown bag lunches or to answer questions. Our students met the challenge! They did a fine job of reading and they were engaged in the story. We all laughed at Katherine's wit and her sharp tongue and we cheered on Petruchio as he "tamed" her.

We have lived at Pineapple House for one year . . . our "house-iversary" as my friend Joanne called it. Although we loved The Farmhouse, our home for thirty-five years and the place for so many memories, and we could hardly imagine living anywhere else, I can honestly say that this house feels like home.

We have made so many new memories over the past year! We have now celebrated every holiday and every birthday here. We have completed a school year and begun another. We have enjoyed the happy sounds of children playing. We have given out Grandy at the back door as they were leaving for home. We have had parties and guests and homemade ice cream. We have all had the flu. We've decorated for every season. We have made countless pots of coffee. We have done house projects. We have lived.

And it is home.

Thursday, April 20, 2017

Sweet Sixteen!

Moving back in time a bit . . . to the weekend before last when we gathered to celebrate our Bekah's sixteenth birthday . . .

Again, this party was hers. She chose the colors, the decorations, the menu, and even made her own cake. She loves to plan parties and helps me all year long, but she knows that she is the Executive Planner on her own birthday and she revels in it!

I think she did a good job! It was such a pretty party, perfect for sweet sixteen!

We took some photos of the birthday girl with each branch of the family . . .

with her oldest sister Kristin's family

with her brother Ryan's family

with her Gammy (my mom)

with her MomMom (Ron's mom)

I had to snap this shot of Peter with his spectacles. Isn't he darling?! He has been pretending to be "John" of the Peter Pan story. He was disappointed that he had to remove his "glasses" for the family photo. :)

I loved Kristin and Macie's coordinating mother/daughter dresses!

Macie, playing with the Fisher Price cash register her mama once played with

Bekah wore her lovely hope necklace, made for her by our dear friend Terri. Hope is her middle name, and it is also her story.

What a gift this girl is . . . sweet sixteen, lovely, musical, artsy, bright, sensitive, tenderhearted, funny, unhurried, a lover of beauty, and wise beyond her years. On her birthday, I always reflect on the amazing journey that brought her here and my heart is filled with gratitude.

Birthday blessings to our youngest, our Rebekah Hope! We love you with all our hearts and we pray that you continue to walk in His goodness and grace.