The Next Stage

Summer is winding down; it's been a long, glorious one. Not as hot as past years, which has been a blessing. Lots of rain, but not too much. I've hardly watered the flowers at all.

Right now my son and his friend are swimming in the pool, diving for toy animals and playing with the shark ship toy. DS is holding his nose and swimming underwater now. He's thrilled with himself and so am I. I thought he'd never overcome his reluctance to get his face wet. I bought him some goggles and he's diving under the surface like a little fish. He told us today he's going to wear his goggles forever. "Even to bed?" asks his friend. "Yeah!" "Even to school?" I asked. "Yeah!"

I feel as if I am on the verge of the third stage of my life. Don't ask me what the first two stages were. School and my career, I guess, and then the first six years of motherhood. Now I will have time to write while DS is at school, and will be teaching one math class at the community college. Part of me feels incredibly guilty as I hear DH leaving for work at 6 a.m. every day, and part of me just feels blessed beyond belief. I don't know if I'll ever go back to full-time employment. If I could get published and continue to write steadily while teaching part-time, that would be ideal. But I'll never know until I finish the blasted thing!

Hopelessly addicted to Webkinz

Hi Everyone! Just a quick update. Things are ticking along with my novel... the writing is starting to flow again after a long hiatus. I haven't done any more on the Elfin Chronicles yet but I'm planning to. The whole thing is already planned out in my head, I just have to write it.

I am starting to interview for teaching jobs. I'm trusting the Lord to help me find the right position.

We are addicted to Webkinz, thanks to my sister! She bought DS and me each a pet and now we are online all the time to play the games, win free food and hunt for the Gem of the Day! The whole thing is just too cute for words and very entertaining. (A little too entertaining, sometimes.) I have been resisting the urge to get another real pet for years now, and this satisfies that, in a way. It's also like a virtual dollhouse! You get to purchase items for your pet's room using money you earn by playing games in the arcade or working in the employment office. So my two doggies have a nicely furnished bedroom, a kitchen and living room, as well as a yard with a virtual garden. I harvested my carrots yesterday! Yippee!!!

I know, I know, it's a little strange for an adult to get so caught up in this. But there's a little kid in all of us that just wants to play!

Have a great weekend, everyone!

A Prayer for Eti

I have a dear friend who is fighting a serious illness. She has been sick for a long time and now she may have cancer. Her son-in-law says that she is ready to go home to the Lord and will not take any treatment if it is cancer. She has been through so much, and is such a beautiful, loving soul, that I am praying that God will be faithful to her as she has been faithful to Him all these years and take her home quickly, with a minimum of suffering. She has suffered so much already and with such a beautiful spirit. Surely her life has been a sweet fragrance unto the Lord.

But if it is not her time to go yet, I am praying that she would recover quickly and that it would not be cancer. And also, of course, that He would hold her and her family in the palm of His hand.

"The LORD upholds all those who fall and lifts up all who are bowed down." Psalm 145:14

Dear Father in Heaven,

I thank you for the gift that Eti has been to me all of my life. I thank you for her patience, her optimism, her intelligence, and her understanding spirit. I know that She loves you and is eager to be with You forever, and that our parting, as sad is it might be, will only be for a little while.

I pray, Father, that you would spare her any more suffering. If it is her time to come home, please take her home quickly. If it is not her time, I pray that you would strengthen the cells of her body and of her bones to resist whatever infection or disease is there. You are the Great Healer; you have only to say the word and she will be healed. All of us who are praying for her are like the friends of the paralytic, carrying her tenderly between us with our prayers and bringing her before You with utmost faith. Please be faithful to her and honor your promises in Scripture to lift all those who are bowed down and to be gracious and compassionate to all that You have made. Please enfold her and Andy and Jess and Andrea and the rest of the family in Your loving arms. May they feel the peace that passes understanding the midst of this time.

I thank you, God, and praise You for what You have already done and for what You are going to do.

In Jesus Name,
Amen.

She is a big fan of the Elfin Chronicles that I started last summer. I learned that she was very upset with me when I stopped writing them. So I will have to finish them for her!

Cottage Wanted

I have decided that I need a cottage! After all, that is what the blog is called, but I don't have any nice photos of cottages to put on my blog header. So, can you help me? Post a comment to a link with a cottage photo. Let's see how many we can collect! I will pick my favorite to be on my blog header.

Thanks in Advance! I know we'll get some fantastic photos.

How Does Your Garden Grow?

I was in a gloomy mood this morning, and not even looking forward to our upcoming family trip. So I had devotions and then went outside to water my flowers. For some reason, gardening instantly soothes me. I feel very close to Jesus when I work with plants, remembering all the parables he told about them. I'm quite proud of how the border is shaping up after six years of work, although I have some things I still want to change. I thought you might like to see it, so here is a photo essay of my garden.

Here is a photo of the whole front border, as of this morning. You can see all the junk on the porch... the cooler, potting stuff, etc. How embarassing!



A close-up of the sedum, Autumn Joy, which will have reddish-orange flowers in fall. I love the shape of sedum leaves.



Some more pansies, peeking out from under the trailing mass of Coreopsis "Moonbeam."



Oriental lilies and zinnies around the bird feeder post.



I am hoping that if the other bunnies see this one, they will think my yard is taken!



My Stella D'Oro daylilies have finally bloomed... I wonder if they will continue all summer as promised? I love the lemon-yellow color against the Bird's Nest spruce.



Coneflowers against the brick wall.



The purple liatris is preparing to flower. I can't believe how well this plant has done in my border. Along with the coreopsis, sage and chrysanthemums, it could easily take over the whole bed. These are the plants that seem to do best in my southeast-facing border that gets lots of morning sun.



The basis of my color scheme is blue, pink and pale yellow. This photo didn't come out as well as I had hoped; the colors are kind of washed out. It's too bad the hybrid sage is past its first bloom. This one is called "May Night." It's one of the first plants I put in and has done very well, but the flowers are a little too dark against the brick wall. I recently found another variety called "Blue Hills" that I like better.



Along the driveway, I put in some barberry, which turns bright red in the fall, and some begonias to fill in the empty spots while the bushes grow. However, I discovered that barberry has some wicked thorns in it! Since this is right where we get in and out of the car, I will probably move these plants and put something friendlier along the drive.



Here is a photo of the Blue Hills sage, along with the peony that came with the house. This photo was taken last month when both were in bloom. You can also see my jockey windmill. I used to hate those tacky garden decorations, but I fell in love with this one on a trip to Connecticut and hubby gave it to me for my birthday. The yellow daisies were a Mother's Day gift from him and DS this year, along with the zinnias by the bird feeder.



Sometimes you have to water the dog as well as the plants.

Random Stuff

It's about 4:30 on Thursday morning. My second to last day of the school year, perhaps of my teaching career. I went to bed early last night but woke up about an hour ago and decided that since I couldn't go back to sleep I might as well get up.

My heart has been so heavy lately. I feel like a cartoon character with a little black cloud following me everywhere I go. I spent some time reading my Bible and praying, and I do feel better. I wish I could be like Lucy Pevensie and have Aslan appear and breathe strength and courage into me when I need Him.

It's funny, but the one thing I wanted most was to be home and not have to work, but now that I'm almost there - at least for the summer - I feel like the walls of my house are closing in around me. Well, not the walls as much as the Stuff. There is just so much Stuff! Stuff to do, Stuff to clean, Stuff to organize. It's like my home is this great big closet that I've shut my mind to for the past year, and now I'm trying to open the door again carefully so that all the Stuff inside doesn't fall on my head.

I guess that's really a metaphor for life. It's why people become workaholics. If you can focus on Work rather than Stuff, you can ignore your Stuff for a really long time. Whether it's emotional Stuff, spiritual Stuff, financial Stuff, or even just real, physical Stuff. I know I'm very lucky to have this break, and that many people have to put off their Stuff indefinitely because they just have no choice. They have to work two or three jobs to survive. I thank God I'm not in that situation.

However, part of my Stuff is the fact that once again my husband's job is threatened. It didn't used to be this way; when we first got married he had steady employment. In fact he was working so much overtime that I barely saw him for months at a time. Now he's struggling to keep each job and it's not because of the economy. It's because of the way people act. What has happened to society? Has it always been this way since the beginning of time, or does it just seem worse the more I grow older and learn about the world?

Anyway, I know that my little black cloud is being caused by a few specific things. I just need to keep praying and trusting that each of those things will get worked out in God's time. After all, He has been faithful to bring me this far. I'm not going to lose faith in Him now just because of some Stuff. But I really think it helps sometimes when I'm feeling overwhelmed to just stop and identify the Stuff that's bothering me. Somehow, classifying and labeling it helps me stop feeling that way.

I can hear the birds waking up. I'm going to try to write a little. And today should be a really good day; I'm going with the Kindergarten class on their field trip to the Cape May Zoo. Our heat wave has broken and the weather is gorgeous!

Have a blessed Thursday, everyone.

Rain and a writer's dilemma

It's raining today. One of those sudden summer thunderstorms that sweep dramatically through and leave the air feeling moist and warm and promising. The kind of storm that makes you want to put on your old raincoat and stand outside, catching raindrops on your tongue, and leaves the garden all fresh and dripping.

Anyway, here's my dilemma. I'm working hard on my novel, not writing as much as stewing over it. I'm hoping maybe you can help me. I'm trying to decide how authentic the setting should be. It's a fantasy, so I can make it whatever I want, but the question is... how much like real life should it be, and how much crediblity will I lose if I take liberties? Or am I just obsessing over details that no one will notice anyway?

Here's what I mean... I have set the story in the distant past, somewhat like Tolkein's Middle-Earth, so that it is pre-industrial with an idealized feudal system in place. The location is what I personally have dubbed the "Scotch-Coloradan Alps," a mountainous region combining elements of the Scottish Highlands, the Rocky Mountains and the German Alps. Here's the tough part. If my race of people, the Hanorja, live in this area and do not have trade with people from other parts of the world, then all of their clothing and foodstuffs would have to be indigenous. There would be no cotton, linen or silk; everything would have to be made of wool. It makes me itch just thinking about it! There would be no tea, no coffee, no ginger for gingerbread, no lemons or oranges, no sugar and no corn. They wouldn't have Mediterranean fruits like figs, dates or olives. They would not get enough hot weather to grow grapes for wine. There would be no tobacco, either.

They would be restricted to the dreaded British diet: meat, potatoes, vegetables, herbs, tree-fruits like apples and cherries, berries, cider, bread, nuts and honey. And since I have decided not to allow them to kill animals, their diet would be further limited to fish or fowl. They would also not be able to tan leather for saddles, boots, waterskins or anything else, nor use furs to keep themselves warm. I may have to rethink that decision!

My question is, if you were reading a story set in such a place and read that they had gingerbread with their tea, would you stop and say "Hey, wait a minute, where did the tea come from? And the ginger?" Or would you just accept it without thinking that deeply about it?