merry christmas

The snow itself is lonely or, if you prefer, self-sufficient. There is no other time when the whole world seems composed of one thing and one thing only. Joseph Wood Krutch


Filled was the air with a dreamy and magical light; and the landscape
Lay as if new created in all the freshness of childhood.
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow


"Green thoughts emerge from some deep source of stillness
which the very fact of winter has released."
- Mirabel Osler.


Through winter-time we call on spring,
And through the spring on summer call,
And when the abounding hedges ring
Declare that winter's best of all:
And after that there's nothing good
Because the spring time has not come--
Not know that what disturbs our blood
Is but its longing for the tomb.
- W. B. Yeats


I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape - the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn't show. Andrew Wyeth


One must have a mind of winter
To regard the frost and boughs
Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;
And have been cold a long time
To behold the junipers shagged with ice,
The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think
Of any misery in the sound of the wind,
In the sound of a few leaves
- Wallace Stevens, The Snow Man, 1923


“Everyone who enjoys thinks that the principal thing to the tree is the fruit, but in point of fact the principal thing to it is the seed. -- Herein lies the difference between them that create and them that enjoy.” Friedrich Nietzsche



We leave for California tomorrow. We will be there until the fifth. See you in the New Year.

Love, M

the illusion of happiness

The happiness that we seek at the world's bidding is dangerous. If we seek personal happiness as the world suggests we hurt not only ourselves but those around us. The world suggests that personal happiness comes from meeting our own needs before fulfilling the responsibilities we've been given. By seeking personal happiness we hurt those we closest to us and (it may seem surprising) often incidental people in our lives as well.


We are fortunate for mercy. The undeserved grace we've been given even when we screw up.

The irony in this is that we often find the happiness known as joy when we surrender to our responsibilities (there is, by the way, a difference between responsibility and guilt - a difference that is easily and often confused).



I am simply sharing what I learned afresh today.

Peace to You,
M

dramaqueen

I went through some old photos working on an awesome gift for someone (will be shown later) and pulled a few old ones of C.

Christmas card when C was 1.


My youngest sister and C when C was just a week old.


One of my favorite pics of C and me. This is taken with color black and white which is why it is sepia tone (C40 is what it was called if I remember correctly). I have some others I adore where I am dressed formally and she is buck-naked that I love too but I doubt I will post them here.


I should have brightened the scan of this one - oh well. This is C in the fern room.


I don't know if any of you recall the photos of K in this outfit that I posted a month or so ago. This is the pic I mentioned of C. I used this for our Christmas card that year. It was taken at Como Conservatory before they remodeled - by the time we got there with K in this dress, the spot where this shot was taken was gone.


C would be about eighteen months here. This is taken with my first digital camera a ViviCam which had the resolution of 640X480. Before this all pics were taken with my film camera - it wasn't until C was two that I got my current cam a digital rebel.

There is something freeing about a basic point and shoot and so I try to use one occasionally just to loosen myself up.

This picture haunted me for a long time. I posted on a photo forum and this photo became my sig. It is funny because she looks so soulful here but actually - she is sitting in a grocery cart about ready to throw a temper-tantrum because I will not let her get in a truck cart - I wanted to use a regular cart because they hold more.


Fall 2005.


Valentine's pictures of C when she is about 18 months. Her eyes really were that blue and that big. I used to have people follow me through stores when she was little to comment on her eyes. They are still big and as many of you have commented she has stupendous eyelashes - however the blue has deepened to a dark blue or even gray.

K's eyes are still that color and I think will remain that color as they look more like my brother D's eyes and he has brilliant beautiful eyes.

jumble

We, of the great white north, woke up to absolute magic this morning. Jack Frost went all out last night.


My hands usually ache and are stiff in the morning until around eleven then they have warmed up and limbered up and I am left with an ache in the joints at the base of my fingers. Other joints join in as they see fit. Now that the big flare has passed I can get by with an NSAID as necessary and I take supplements that Heather suggested.

More blood has been drawn to run a battery of test to eliminate things such as Lyme disease before referring me to a rhuematologist but I get the distinct impression my doctor thinks it is some for of rheumatic disease.





K stuck a bead up her nose today. One of those plastic, three cornered beads that kids use for projects. She jammed it way up in there. I tried having her blow her nose. I tried to wiggle it out with a tweezers - nothing so we went to the clinic.

The doctor tried a tweezers but it kept slipping off. Then she took us to ENT and was going to use a vacuum. She had Stinkerbell blow her nose again and out it came. So I wasted a co-pay, I guess.


I guess it is a function of being an artist but one of the most pleasureful activities I can do is run around with my camera. For many years, poetry did for me what photography does for me but about five years ago, photography surpassed poetry for me. I love my other artistic and crafty endeavors as well but photography...


I've been busily sewing on dresses for the girls as their Christmas gifts. Last year I gave them Little House on the Prairie Costumes. The dresses I am making this year are a little older in style - early Victorian, might be a good era for them. DramaQueen's is mostly done and I am very pleased with how it turned out.


I find that getting enough rest is the single most important thing that I can do. Rest is more important than limiting my activity (although using scissors are bound to make my hands sore). I used to sleep about six a night. Life is better if I sleep eight hours and take a nap if necessary.


Having a six-year-old who understands that Adam and Eve brought sin into the world through their original sin and who knows that Christ died for her sins can be frustrating. For some reason (I can't imagine sin has anything to do with it (wink)) she has decided that those two bookends release her from personal responsibility for her actions. We've been having many 'theological' discussions around here.


Stinkerbelle calls icicles icepickles which reminded hubby and I of when DramaQueen was little she called snowmen nosemen.

Christmas Sarajevo

I am sure many of you are familiar with the popular Christmas tune 'Christmas Sarajevo.' I heard it on the radio earlier this past week and it did its job well. It caused me to think of the recent tragic history of Sarajevo as it traveled from Olympics through a brutal war and back into an attempt at a peaceful reality.

I pondered the reality of life in much of this world, a reality where the struggle never seems to end. Where life seems to be an endless battle interrupted by occasional moments of joy and peace. It is the tragedy of this world we live in.



In I Timothy: 1-2 Paul writes "I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone— for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness."

I am not going to write a treatise on civil responsibility here. I only want to comment on one notable thing. The implication is that God wants His people to be able to live peaceful and quiet lives.



The older I get, the more I want nothing more than to live quietly. Quietly, seems boring to the young, irresponsible to the socially conscious, unambitious to those with ambition. However, the older I get the more I think some of the greatest gifts we are given and can give to others is peace and quiet. And I don't think my desire for peacefulness and quietness is just the wish of a mother of two extremely active children. It runs deeper than that.



We are often so busy running to do all the things that we are compelled to do by our own insecurities, desires, or by the pressures of society that we fail to listen to what we are meant to do.

Some of us will find that our quietness comes on the side after we do the great things God asks us to do such as lead. Moses led by he also sought quietness and time with God.



But many are called to lives of quietness and peacefulness - lives of service to others. Perhaps even service to leaders. But how can we be of service if we do not know quiet?



It has struck me more than once that when one reads war time accounts of people living in countries where bombs burst daily, most people simply try to continue living normal lives. Most people try to their lives quietly while the bombs burst around them and the guns rip into their lives. Even Anne Frank, had a daily routine and dreams of a normal life. Her focus wasn't death. It was a desire to live a life of peacefulness and I think quiet.



We are not meant for war and yet it is the most common condition of this world.



I wish you a blessed Christmas and a Peaceful New Year.

the girls' church Christmas program on Sunday night

Don't you love how children just stand up their and do their own thing?