From outside to inside......

It's that time of year again.  The red and purple autumn sky behind the ever changing treeline behind my barn.  The time of year when we put away our camping gear and our boat and get out our ATV, dust off the snowmobile, and pray for just a few more weeks of watching the leaves flit to the ground before the earth is put to sleep again for the year.   As poetic as it sounds, I sit here looking out across the yard and think to myself how nice it would be if the tamarack trees would just drop all their needles at once so I could get it cleaned up and over with.  And wonder if the snow advisory warning is going to hit my elevation before we get the cows corralled into warmth because I don't think their soft, woolly coats will be enough. 

Not ready to give up the camaraderie of the campfire, my husband asked recently if we could make s'mores in our fireplace in the living room.  After looking at him like he was bonkers, I came up with an almost-as-good-but-really-easy solution.  Voila Indoor S'mores.  While he said it took part of the fun out by not roasting the mallows, it was still fun to see the kids get it everywhere.  Or at least it was until it was time to clean it up.

Indoor S'mores

Make Chocolate pudding.  Garnish with mini mallows and graham crackers.  Easy-peasy.

Preparing a list of soups for the month, reveling in the fact that dinner is just so much EASIER when it can prepare itself in the slow cooker three or four nights a week, I reflect more on the changes outside.  And the changes inside.  Not only moving away from tents, swimming, camping, fishing, sand castles on the beach and target practice to family games, movies, holiday feasts, Nerf dart wars, and fellowship with friends and family, but also the constant change of life- inside me.

Over and over again I am seeing the need for gratitude in life.  Gratitude in itself would have prevented (and could fix) so many of the social (and economic) problems our society faces.

Gratitude in my life is an even bigger deal.  Being thankful is easy sometimes.  It takes no thought for me to be able to (honestly) say that I am thankful for my home, food, family, friends, church, etc.  To be able to say that I'm thankful for the military service men and women who volunteer to defend our nation and therefore my way of life.  But what about the hard things?

Wednesday we lost another dog.  Not even a dog, but a puppy.  Sweet, innocent, vibrant, potential yet unfilled puppy.  Can I be thankful for that?  I can say that I'm thankful it wasn't my kids.  But am I really thankful that my puppy was hit by a car and killed by someone who didn't even notice or care to stop?



I'll miss you, my Josephene, my Jojo P.



I've embarked on a challenge, a journey if you may, of gratitude.  Alongside many women I know, we're reading an amazing (and challenging) book and making our own lists.  A list of things for which I'm thankful.  One Thousand Gifts given to me from my great God above. (Hint, hint... One Thousand Gifts is the title of the book.)  I must say, the first 40 or so came almost as quickly as I could write them.  Wow!  To see on paper before me things that I have to be thankful for.  :)  How amazing is that.  But in a few months, to hold in my hands a whole book of them- I can only imagine. 

And at a time when the whole of our country is gripped by a sense of entitlement, self-pity and greed. 

To sit back and say, "Look at all I have, my goodness, how it's so much more than enough!"  It's my goal.  Not just to say it, or to feel it, but to really live it.  To live a life of gratitude, and to teach it to my children.

To bring them up in a way that they learn to fail in a safe environment, girded up with love, and to be thankful that they had the chance to try, to learn, to experience and to move forward.  Wow.  How great would that be?

All of this from a movement from outside, to inside.  From my circumstances, my too-quick judgements, my rash decisions, to fostering a heart of gratitude- to true joy.

~*~ Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.  1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 ~*~