Awww... Isn't that Sweet!

First, today is our anniversary. I had remembered this first thing in the morning when I got up, but by the time I had come in from the garden, I had forgotten. I sat down at the kitchen table with the DH and he pointed across the table to a shelf. There, hanging from a wire hoop was this...

Then my husband says, "It's your 30 year pin." One of the sweetest gifts he's ever given me. He said it had a back side too...

He had a difficult time finding a clothes pin. For some reason this one was sitting on the counter just waiting for him to use it. I think that one of nicest things one person can do for another is to just acknowledge them and confirm their place in your life.

Thank You, Love! Happy 3oth Anniversary to You Too!

I ♥ You!

Happy Valentines Day!

Had a couple granddaughters spend the night last night. I asked the youngest, PK, what she'd like for breakfast this morning (knowing full well what she'd say). Pancakes! So the pancakes pictured above is what they got for Valentine's breakfast.

Hope you're all having a loving Valentine's Day!

LOVE: A PARAPHRASE of 1 CORINTHIANS 13

The Love chapter has always been one of my favorites and I find this paraphrase of it exceptionally nice.

If I talk a lot about God and the Bible and the Church, but I fail to ask about your needs and then help you, I'm simply making a lot of empty religious noise.

If I graduate from theological seminary and know all the answers to questions you'll never even think of asking, and if I have all the degrees to prove it and if I say I believe in God with all my heart, and soul and strength, and claim to have incredible answers to my prayers to show it, but I fail to take the time to find out where you're at and what makes you laugh and why you cry, I'm nothing.

If I sell an extra car and some of my books to raise money for some poor starving kids somewhere, and if I give my life for God's service and burn out after pouring everything I have into the work, but do it all without ever once thinking about the people, the real hurting people-the moms and dads and sons and daughters and orphans and widows and the lonely and hurting-if I pour my life into the Kingdom but forget to make it relevant to those here on earth, my energy is wasted, and so is my life.

Here is what love is like--genuine love. God's kind of love. It's patient. It can wait. It helps others, even if they never find out who did it. Love doesn't look for greener pastures or dream of how things could be better if I just got rid of all my current commitments. Love doesn't boast. It doesn't try to build itself up to be something it isn't. Love doesn't act in a loose, immoral way. It doesn't seek to take, but it willingly gives. Love doesn't lose its cool. It doesn't turn on and off. Love doesn't think about how bad the other person is, and certainly doesn't think of how it could get back at someone. Love is grieved deeply (as God is) over the evil in this world, but it rejoices over truth.

Love comes and sits with you when you're feeling down and finds out what is wrong. It empathizes with you and believes in you. Love knows you'll come through just as God planned, and love sticks right beside you all the way.

Love doesn't give up, or quit, or diminish or go home. Love keeps on keeping on, even when everything goes wrong and the feelings leave and the other person doesn't seem as special anymore. Love succeeds 100 percent of the time. That, my friend, is what real love is!

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Edit: Information below updated 2/24/08 from email from David Sanford.

Copyright 2003 David Sanford ( *dsanford@sanfordci.com* ). Permission is granted to send this to others, with attribution, but not for commercial purposes.

David serves as president of Sanford Communications, Inc. (www.sanfordci.com).
David and his wife, Renée, are co-authors of the 400 pages of devotional application notes in the "Living Faith Bible" -- http://tinyurl.com/296gax

We Were Poor

I've been participating in a conversation about consumerism over at Prairie Dreams, which made me think about something my father told me.

Before I was old enough to remember my parents lived in an apartment that used to be part of an elevator, a place for grain storage for those unfamiliar. What dad said was, "We were poor, we just didn't know it. We were too busy having fun."

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The whole thing behind this story is that it wasn't what they did or did not have that made their lives happy. It was who they were with and how they spent their time together. Mom and Dad have always been hard workers, never expecting to get anything for nothing, but always willing to give the shirt off their backs to someone else who was in need. My parents have always been my heroes, my role models. I'm a very fortunate child.

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I Love You, Mom & Dad!