Love of a Child....

What a moving song. Every once and a while my teens find a great one! Makes me cry for some reason.



Here are the lyrics if you want to read along....

There's a picture on my kitchen wall
Looks like Jesus and his friends involved
There's a party getting started in the yard
There's a couple getting steamy in the car parked in the drive
Was I too young to see this with my eyes?

By the pool last night, apparently
The chemicals weren't mixed properly
You hit your head and then forgot your name
And then you woke up at the bottom by the drain
And now your altitude and memory's a shame

What about taking this empty cup and filling it up
With a little bit more of innocence
I haven't had enough, it's probably because when you're young
It's okay to be easily ignored
I like to believe it was all about love for a child

And when the house was left in shambles
Who was there to handle all the broken bits of glass
Was it mom who put my dad out on his ass or the other way around
Well I'm far too old to care about that now

What about taking this empty cup and filling it up
With a little bit more of innocence
I haven't had enough, it's probably because when you're young
It's okay to be easily ignored
I'd like to believe it was all about love for a child

It's kinda nice to work the floor since the divorce
I've been enjoying both my Christmases and my birthday cakes
And taking drugs and making love at far too young an age
And they never check to see my grades
What a fool I'd be to start complaining now

What about taking this empty cup and filling it up
With a little bit more of innocence
I haven't had enough, it's probably because when you're young
It's okay to be easily ignored
I'd love to believe it's all about love for a child

It was all about love...

Pretty in Pink

My basket of petunias are beautiful this year! I don't know what I'm doing right, but it is just full of blossoms. I don't have a green thumb. I don't really have a black one either. Somewhere in between, I guess. :D

I buy whatever plants I like and stick them in the ground or a pot. I pay slight attention to sun/shade issues and will sometimes remember to look at the height of the mature plant. But for the most part my gardening is a hit and miss type of adventure. When something does well, I have no idea why. Worse...when something is NOT doing well, I don't know what I did. Too much sun/shade? Too much water? Not enough? Not enough fertilizer? Too much? And so on.

But it all come together for now in this basket of pink petunias.

Hanging just outside my deck door, they hide my pop bottle recycling can, and make me smile.

Cheers,

Carolee

Random Ramblings

Summer has officially started here. I am sleeping in on occasion and staying up late. I'm outside more, cooking less and BBQing more. And also, on the computer less. Less blogging. Less blog reading. Less emailing. It happens to me every year. So although I won't be quitting or taking a bloggy break...entries will be shorter, more random...and probably less thought provoking. I'll open an "idea" file and put my wonderfully deep, penetrating questions there so that I will have something to blog about come fall! ;-)

So...on to the random....

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What a cold rather rainy spring we have had here in eastern Canada this year.

The farmers are beginning to complain.

I love the coolness just fine!!!

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My "next tasks" list is enormous! I honestly don't know why I start them. I can never finish all I want to do. NEVER. AND I seem to be always waiting for one thing to happen so that I can accomplish other tasks that can't be done until that first task is finished. For example, Andrew (#2 son, age 20) has been "threatening" to move out on his own. :D He is currently sleeping in what is suppose to be my craft storage room. In order to REALLY organize my school room, I want to move all my craft stuff to the storage/craft room...can't do that until Andrew moves and frees it up!

See...

But until then, I have many more tasks on the list.

I also have a couple of GOALS. First I want to stay home more. It seems I am running a lot lately and nothing that is meaningful to me is getting done at home. That has got to stop. I'm really going to have a look at my schedule this summer and plan the school year with purpose! Also, I want to find some new recipes and get back to cooking more. I have fallen into the habit of quick meals or cheap fast food far too often. It seems easier, especially when Rick is away, to drive through Tim's and get 4 chicken wrap for $8 then to cook. But even though it is cheap, and not that bad for you, it is not what I want my kids remembering about "growing up" in our home.

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Today I put on fake nails (told you the post would be random). Years before "fake" nails became popular, I had them. My nails are thin, peal-y, and can bend in both directions. They are just gross. So I keep them chewed off short. They are great for working.

But I LOVE the look for french nails. I will no longer pay the price of getting them done professionally, but occasionally I buy the Walmart kind and glue them on. I like how they look...but I always wonder...HOW DO YOU DO ANYTHING WITH THEM ON!!! Suddenly typing is far harder...so is cleaning the toilet, washing the dishes...just about everything is more difficult. And to those of you who wear them...how do you use with washroom with them on? Seriously....

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Cheers

Carolee

Busy, but Blessed???

What a busy couple of weeks.  We had our provincial homeschool conference this past weekend.  It was great!  Good encouragement and teaching.  Reminders of why we do what we do....

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I have been very busy around LeBlancville finishing up school and getting projects crossed of my "Next Tasks" list.  For the most part, I want all my next tasks done before we go on vacation June 28th.  AND the task list is LONG! 

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Today I got two more things crossed off the list.  I cleaned the fridge and stove.  And not just the spit and wipe kind of cleaning, but the hauling things out, taking out the shelves, spraying it all down kind of cleaning....

Here's the lovely, clean fridge.

And a nice, crude-free stove! ;-)

Feels good.

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I have also been very busy getting the outside of the house into shape.

I put together this flower box that hangs just below my livingroom, picture window.  The window frame was free.  I asked a local carpenter to keep for me any windows of this type he replaces, and he game me four!  Yeah!  The star hung in my diningroom, until I had the window installed.  I picked up the window box at a yardsale for a buck!  

This is my awesome child's wagon that I picked up for far too much money! LOL

And a rather poor picture of my fire-pit with  new lilac and forsythia bushes planted on the corners.  

Here is where I hung my barnboard shelf that used to hang in my bedroom.  I like it much better here.  The old, chippy shudder I picked up at the dump!  My what some people throw away! :-)

Best of all is my "All New Square Foot Garden"...the first of many, I hope.  It is not cheap to put it.  I figure that one box filled costs about $70...if you are following the exact directions from the book.  There are blooms on the tomato plants already!  I'm excited to pick my own veggies again after an eight year hiatus.

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My church community had a very hard loss to absorb this past week.  A young friend lost her nine month old baby daughter very suddenly to bacterial meningitis.  It was shockingly sad.  I mean you heard about things like this....but they don't happen to people you know....or aren't "suppose" to...

It got me thinking about "blessing".  I mean, we all do it..."I'm so thankful for all the blessing God has given my family."  

Because of my experiences "blessing" and the lack thereof...have taken on new meaning for me.  If we experience no trouble, have a good job, nice home, health, children doing well...we say we are "blessed".   "God bless America"...and all that clap-trap.

But what does that mean?  Does that mean that when the opposite happens we are cursed?  Unblessed?  

Thanksgiving and all the "talk" that surrounds it has really begun to bother me.  "Thank you God for blessing me." (North America)...while the rest of the world suffers.  Is God "blessing" North America?  Making Africa suffer? 

What is "blessing" from God's perspective?

I asked a Godly couple that I really respect that very question this past weekend.  They too have experience great lost.  While delivering her fifth baby, the baby died and she, in the process, lost her womb as well...no more babies.  I found their response to be quite insightful.

They said:  "Blessing from God is ANYTHING that grows our life in spiritually."

From that perspective an easy, stress-free life with no needs, pain or questions is not necessarily "blessings from God".  At times, these material blessings may be quite the opposite and lead to pride at best and at worse a lack of dependence ON God.

So...is North America blessed?

Am I?

Are you?

Carolee

"Faith is not belief without proof, but trust without reservation." 

D. Elton Trueblood

Finally Finished....sort of...

Well, my first entry about painting my livingroom/diningroom/hall was on April 24th...so I had to have started shortly before that.  So it has only taken me five weeks to finished the job! LOL  And by finished, I mean everything BUT this ridiculous entryway!  Who designed these things anyway!  I have purchased an extension pole and am have been playing with it as I have done my other, more reachable walls.  

Now that I "think" I have the technique down with the edger, I have made a start.  It is NOT easy and very hard on the shoulders as you are holding a 14 foot extension....

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I have all but finished school. 

Yeah!!

The littles are all done..Jake (grade 5) and Ethan (grade 3).  Cassie (grade 10) has some more to do, but that only requires a "do this, do that" type of instruction as she is a very independent learner...and after the last two oldest I schooled, I deserve an independent learner! ;-)

I can hardly wait to get to some cleaning and organizing.  With Brody (#3) moving out and Andrew (#2) to leave shortly, I will have my storage room back under my control!  Andrew, and his brother before him, Jordon, lived in a partially finished room with no ceiling, unpainted gyp- rock and a throw rug on the floor....we lovingly called it "The hovel".  It is my inside storage room, and I can't wait to get it back!  It will hold all the storage boxes, a craft table, tools, etc.  It will clean up the other areas in my home.  And...should the boys "move to independent" not be long term....they will have to live together in one bedroom if they return! 

With my extra time being spent on the painting, and now gardening, my house so needs my attention!  Little "piles" are beginning to appear all around the place, and I need to make them go away.  My "filing" basket, a cute little wicker thingy with handles, it overflowing...and well, everything is screaming for my attention.

So, til next time, I will be painting somemore and possibly cleaning!  

Pictures of the newly painted living in the next entry, I promise!

Blessings,

Carolee

Took Out the Leaf in my Table Today....

Well, after many years of adding to my table to make it bigger, today I took out a leaf. It makes me sad. Brody (#3) who is 18 came home on Saturday evening and said that he was moving out with his friends on Sunday. LOL It makes no practical sense to have a table big enough to sit eight when only five eat at it on a regular basis. I can always put it back when needed, but for now...my table is getting smaller...

Brody does most everything like this....all flurry and bluster! This is my first child to move out without getting married. I know this is more common today, but it is MY first, and it makes me sad. I think because I know the years between now and empty-nesting will fly.

When I think of Brody, there are two scriptures that come to mind for me. One gives me peace. One gives me hope.

"...but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck, and to be drowned in the depth of the sea." Matthew 18:6

First, I serve a just God. He will repay. Also, it reminds me that I can cause others to stumble...I need to be mindful of that.

"...Then I will make up to you for the years That the swarming locust has eaten." Joel 2:25

What was stolen from him, his mother, and his family will be restored. There are times that I struggle to believe that....but I struggle on...

We also found out this week that Brody was accepted into the photography program at New Brunswick Community College of Craft and Design. After doing the Foundation Year, you must apply with a portfolio of your work to get into the program. He scored a 3.2 GPA in the foundation year, and I am very proud. When you homeschool through the high school years, you really don't breathe until they have done well that first year out in university or college. I feel that I pass some kind of test...of my own making.

So...new stage. Now he will come home to eat and do laundry... This will be good!

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The painting of my livingroom/hall/diningroom continues! LOL I probably hold some kind of record. But with the ongoing task of homeschooling combined with the fact that my husband HATES messes (so I try to have everything in order for Thursdays when he gets home), it takes me FOREVER. But I can see the end....there is a light at the end of the tunnel...

...but it is probably just an oncoming train! LOL

I had a window put in my diningroom last week. I was very nervous. When I bought the window, it looked HUGE. But once it was in, I loved it! My windows are crank out style windows and removing them to put an A/C in is really difficult and it is difficult to find a size that fits. Thus the window that lifts up. Now I will be cool in the summer. I LOVE cool. ;-) I HATE humid heat.

Linda, of Behind My Red Door fame, purchased a coverlet valence for the window for me. I am jealous of those of you that can just go out and buy things like this that you want. Here in New Brunswick you have to buy online or wait for vacation/shopping trips in the New England states.

It has been a busy couple of weeks...painting, finishing school (8 more sleeps and counting ;-), moving kids out, getting windows installed, MORE painting, and all the little chores that go along with the above things.

Hopefully, I will be back to regular blogging soon!

Blessings,

Carolee