Giving Thanks

The turkey is wonderful. But that is not the most important thing. I really do like cornbread dressing and cranberry sauce, however that is not the most important thing either. One of my favorite side dishes is the congealed lime salad - I do not mind if others don't like it, it means more for me to snack on. Again, that is not the most important thing to me.


I think I finally have my priorities in order, without admitting I didn't always have them in order in the first place.

It is not often I have my little family together (all of us anyway) and I cherish those times above anything else. Naturally, we gather around the table for food and laughter, and it really does not matter if it is pizza or turkey - the fellowship warms my spirit. To be with my children and their families is so rewarding I am sure I do not know how to explain it.

I hate it when families are separated, but such is life. I've always thought I'd love to have my children around me on a 15+ acre spread where their children could grow up knowing each other and my children could stay in touch and enjoy each others company and accomplishments,


However, life does not happen as we plan and adjustments must be made. It is important to me that my children stay in touch and often it means that someone must travel the distance for that to happen. In addition, that brings me to Thanksgiving. I look forward to this time of year for one reason; we finally have an opportunity to be together even if it is for a brief time. My oldest daughter Sandy and her husband Ron travel with their two children from Sioux City, Iowa to Oklahoma where we meet at our youngest daughter’s house for a few days. The rest of us, which have to travel a distance, do so just to be with each other. In order to be together it has to be. Not going is not an option. Once we had air mattresses and a wall to wall slumber party. Not the best on aging men and women, but it was a memory. Since then some have had to get a room at a nearby hotel, but meals are taken care of.


Janean and her husband Deryl are great hosts, and their little boys have everything necessary to entertain their cousins from real animals to a room filled with everything imaginable.

Tom and his wife Stephanie bring their two boys and the fun begins for Uncle Tom brings fun times by the mere fact he walks into a room. The kids love him.

Greg and his wife Debbie stay busy with pastoring a church, as well as involved in the community - it is often a sacrifice of time to travel the distance to be there, but family is equally important to him and seeing his sister so seldom makes him travail in effort to make it happen.


Then three Granddaughters who stay busy with their own extended family and life do not always make it. Their situation is unique and getting to Oklahoma is not always feasible.

I pray distance will not always separate us - especially as Dad and I are getting older. I treasure the time I have when our little family can be together here. We will make it happen as often as we can and appreciate each moment of memories we make.

Happy Thanksgiving to all my blogging readers. I pray you will celebrate with family around the table, giving thanks you have made it another year and are safe and abundantly blessed.

Grammyof13

880 AM Radio Station

I like the radio controls on my Equinox. My hand never has to leave the steering wheel to change stations, raise, or lower the volume. I took advantage of it today while searching for the ball game. I did not find it on the usual stations so I kept dialing and came to an AM station that was broadcasting the game between the Razorbacks and Mississippi.

By the time I found the station I was at Wal-Mart. After I finished my shopping and returned to the car, the game was over. It was then I started station searching and came upon another AM station that once played Gospel music. At first I thought it was a Spanish station now, but it didn't take me long to learn better. I kept listening - I don't know why - my stomach burned - I got sick and apprehensive at the same time.

880am is now a Muslim Station. Yes - you heard me right. They read from the Koran in their language, and then the "message" started. It was pretty strait forward - saying that Muslims should obey those who have rule over them, unless they are asked to go against the Koran - it is then they should rebel and bring about a change. The speaker left a lot to be desired in his presentation - so I assume they aren't particular as to who does their "preaching" or "speaking" as it were.

What cut into my gut most was the RAP that came afterward. I wish I could remember all of it, but my brain isn't that sharp. "Teach me, I want to learn....teach me I'm ready to hear...if you want me to help you change the world, then teach me-teach me-teach me-I'm hungry to learn." It was blood curdling to me. I finally did turn it off and have not gone back to see if it is a full time station or what.

Somehow, I never thought I'd see the day when greed for money would take precedence over sanity; Or is there a law that governs the airways that says they have equal rights.

I’m going on record as saying I’m going to find out further what happened to the Gospel station that it would go Muslim. The first of its kind? Probably not. I’ve decided I may as well die and go on to Heaven now for what this world will be like in ten years I may not be able to handle for sure.

Grammyof13

Its a Wonderful Life!

It's that time of year again.  Reruns.  You know - the same ole Thanksgiving Hallmark movies we've seen before time and again.  Then starts the "Christmas Story, White Christmas, and It's a wonderful Life all in time for Christmas.  And except for the Thanksgiving Day Parade that ushers in the Holidays, there is nothing but reruns on TV.


I'm not complaining, as a rule we are too busy to watch much TV and Lord knows I have enough VCR movies to suffice for a month or more.  We could just read.  That would be a novel idea.  I love reading.  My husband hates to read.  I love reading to him when I find an article worth sharing, or a scripture I get excited about.  Otherwise his conversations with Cricket are intertaining enough.


We sound boreing don't we?  I've thought lately about how our lives have slowed down to a crawl.  We do so little outside the usual - go to church twice a week and the Senior center once a week.  Then other days are taken up with Doctor visits for blood work or shots.  Exciting, with emphasis mind you!!


I could label our life "Its a wonderful Life".  I love the movie and have to agree with the truth of it.  What would this world be had I not been born?  Mother would not have had my mischief and my sisters would have never known the sincere girl I grew up to be.  Or the missionary I became as a woman.  They would have missed me as a friend.  My husband would not be living in Arkansas by way of Tenn and my children would not be born which leaves 13 more people would not  be alive.


That gets too big for my pea brain to wrap around.  It is an imaginary trip I won't travel any farther than the above paragraph.  The fact is I was born.  Mother did have a third daughter she named Doris.  I was mischievious and enjoyed living.   I am a Mother of 4.  I am a Grammy to 13 and Mother-inlaw to 4. 


For the people whose life I've touched  there are too many to count.  I've known many who have walked through my life, and whose life I have encountered.  It is just too wonderful this life of mine. 

Personally I believe we each one want to leave our mark on the world.  I do.  I'd like to think people will have a good laugh when they think of me; or I'd settle for a word of praise in how I made their life a little better.  I hope you feel that way too.  Christmas can be a gloomy time for some - it seems to be a reminder of Christmases past that weren't so happy.  Maybe even a lost loved one around the season, but whatever the cause for depression, I hope you look around and realize you too have a Wonderful Life.

It is a Wonderful Life after all.

Grammyof13

Behind the Scenes.

For a writing exercise in one of my classes this week I gave everyone the same picture.  My instructions were - "tell me what you see in this picture."  It was a lesson in observation, as well as an exercise to expand the eye to see more than the obvious.

Not everyone caught on.  Naturally even in a small group there is at least one that gets it, and never stops until he's finished.  Otherwise the others saw the two main characters, (a picture I have had displayed here before) of a little blond boy kneeling by his bed with hands folded in prayerful attitude, and beside him is his trusted dog also eyes closed as if praying.

I've thought of this at other times, when visiting an Island anyway.  After we got settled into our room in Barbados, several of us took a walk outside to explore the grounds.  The old Hotel was built on the edge of the water, with little beach to speak of.  Mostly rocky clifts and sand more like crushed gravel only smaller.  I guess it could be considered coarse sand.  The roar of the ocean was deafening so much so that the first night I could not sleep for the noise of the mighty Atlantic Ocean that lapped at the shoreline below my window.

The women that had gone to the shoreline were as varied in personality as there were numbers of us.  We made up a group that had come from all over the US and a couple Islands around.  Even though we had seen the Ocean before, when we visited the Bahamas and Jamaica, the terrain was different here thus having our attention from the beginning.

My friend Elva and I were walking and silent almost to the point of speachless as we took in the vastness of what lay before us.  There was no stopping the miles across the water looking south.  The sky was a beautiful blue that matched the water, only a few white clouds dotted the sky and made for the most perfect day one could imagine.  Here we were down in the middle of the Atlantic surrounded by miles and miles of water before reaching another island, and the idea of it all was so awe inspiring we could do little more than say, "Wow, isn't God good?"  Wow, the ocean reflected its power to me so mightly I tried to measure the power of God to the raging ocean, but fell short.

Meanwhile, there were others who had not looked up at the sky, nor payed much attention to the powerful Ocean or its roar as it fiercely pushed the waves to shore making a splash that would reach the varenda of the hotel. 

Instead they had their head down, collecting sea shells, and beautifully shaped rocks.  I had not thought of looking down.  They had not thought of looking up.

It would be interesting to hear their take of our trip to Barbados.  Having been to the same place on the same day, there would be several different descriptions of our stay.

I guess I have a facination with character study.  The nature and character of humankind, and how different we are.  The children in my 5th & 6th grade class did not disappoint me.  Only one saw everything I saw in the picture. 

The others saw the most obvious and overlooked the little things.  Yes everything they named was on the picture, but they stopped looking after they described the little boy and his dog.  They were amazed that I could find so many things that never crossed their mind to look at. 

It is a lesson in life really.  Often we see what looms before us so much so that we fail to see what is in the back ground that is significant to the picture.  Should we take time to scrutinize the picture a little closer, we just may see God's hand at work in our lives.  In the picture I had my students describe, there was a computer screen in the back ground.  I saw that.  However I failed to see there was a snowman on the computer screen. 

As seasoned as I think I am in looking behind the scene for detail, I too can miss the working of His hand in my life situations.  I'm sure I'll have other times to get it right.  Keep seeing the bigger picture, but don't over look the little things.  Then, don't have your eyes so focused on the little things, that we fail to see the bigger picture.

Grammyof13

Pets.

I've attempted to post several times this week, only to lay it aside and move on to something else.  Do you have those days, when what you start to write just isn't what you want to say?  Maybe it is just me but I'd like to keep those who read coming back and strive to have something worth reading waiting for them.

From several posts prior to this, you know we have a pet named Cricket.  He got sick last Friday and we've been in a tizzy trying to take care of him, and know what to do.  Saturday last week I took him to the Vet who lifted our spirits by saying "he has bronchitis".  So with antibiotics given twice a day he should be good to play again.

He really did get better for a couple days, when he tried jumping on the bed and missed.  The bed is too tall for him to jump from the floor, so he jumps first into a small rocker close by, then makes the final jump to the bed.  But somehow he missed and fell pretty hard on the carpeted floor.

Yesterday he started screaming!  I know - dogs tend to bark and whimper - however you just had to be here to understand what I'm telling you.  He screamed - blood curdling screams.  We weren't touching him, he was just on the floor walking when he stopped and just stood there and screamed.  My husband picked him up from the floor, but momentarily he started the pitiful cry again.

What to do?  Naturally I count my money, not knowing what a visit to the vet entails.  I guess in his case I visualize the worst - thinking they'll have to X-ray.

I'm so glad we took him, Dr. Ward was so gentle and found he had hurt his back when he fell.  Poor thing.  He got a steriod shot and some prednisone for seven days, and reminds us to keep him quiet when he does feel like playing.

I'm telling you it is just like having a child.  He came to us at a time in our lives when we needed him more than we realized.  We've become so attached it is difficult to leave him for long periods at a time.  I'm sure he is fine, but we aren't!!!  Aren't we a sight?  Only someone who has a pet could understand what I'm saying.  The rest of you will just have to laugh at me and move on.  Just be sure to come again when I have something else to talk about.

Until then, Cricket and I are going to rest.

Grammyof13