One of the Best Christmas Presents ever...

...is one I won't be able to see until next August. Yep, I'm going to be a grandmother again! Yeah me! Yeah, Ben and Tonya!

The best part of being a grandmother is that you get all the pleasure of the baby and none of the work.

I'm going to post some adorable pictures of my youngest granddaughter soon. And if you are lucky, I'll post some pictures of me in the next month or so. My daughter, Trista, has become quite the photographer and I am having her do a photoshoot of me for my birthday.

Merry Christmas

I didn't think I would ever hear myself saying those words ever again, nor writing them either. Some would claim this as evidence of how far I have fallen from the "attainments" but I choose to see it more as a form of liberation from yet more rules that I was living under.

The assumption in the circles I once inhabited was that if you said the words, "Merry Christmas" that you were giving assent to the Roman Catholic church and all its doctrines, as well as corrupting the worship of God. However, now that I have had some time to sit down and think about it all away from the noise one of the things I have noticed is that no Christian I know of actually claims to worship God through the use of gifts, trees, tinsel, jolly elves, candles and all the other typical accoutrements of the season. In fact, most of the Christians I know do focus on the birth of Christ as the beginning of the work that Christ came to accomplish. These other things are rituals that may or may not be used to remind one of Christ, or else something good merely to be enjoyed for the pleasure they give, like the beautiful display of lights that some people indulge in.

Last night I went to the candlelight service at the Baptist church I now attend. What we had there was a focus on Scripture. I have to tell you that I can't ever think of the story of Christ's birth without being gripped at the heart level by what it all entailed. It is such a profound story how all the hopes and desires that Israel had been promised were finally seeing fulfillment in the tiny Lamb of God, born in Bethlehem, the city of David where the sacrificial lambs for the Temple in Jerusalem, five miles distant, were raised.

So many things come together in this story for me. The birth of Christ is a story of redemption in itself. One year I made a point of looking up all the people listed in the geneology found in Matthew. You have people who committed incest, a prostitute, a murderer and adulterer, idolaters, and other notable sinners. Yet all these sins were redeemed in the One who came from that lineage.

Then I am struck by how disruptive letting the Holiest of Holies into your life can be. Mary was without fault in the conception of the Holy One of Israel, yet she bore the infamy of being an unwed mother for years afterwards as her Son was taunted by Pharisees who knew that Abraham was their father, but who is YOURS? All His life, He did unexpected, "outside the box" things that upset and offended the conventions of the society He was born into, yet there were infallibly the right thing to do. Let this remind me that I will sometimes do unconventional things that will upset people yet still be right in God's eyes. To my own Master I stand or fall.

May this season be one where the Holy Spirit speaks to you anew of the redemption, hope, and joy to be found in Christ.

This one is for Chrysalis,

Chrysalis, you have always intrigued me. Please email me privately because I wouldn't mind corresponding with you in a less public setting. knoxknoxwhosthere@yahoo.com

Everyone at some point in their lives, wakes up in the middle of the night with teh feeling that they are all alone in the world, and that nobody loves them, and that they will never have a decent night's sleep again and will spend their lives wandering blearily around a loveless landscape, hoping desperately that their circumstances will improve, but suspecting in their heart of hearts, that they will remain unloved forever. The best thing to do in these circumstances is to wake someone else up so that they can feel this way too.

Lemony Snicket Horseradish: Bittter Truths You Can't Avoid

And on a related thought -- When you think no one cares, try missing a payment.

More Wisdom from Lemony Snicket

Recess is part of the school day designed to give children a break from the more unpleasant aspects of the educational system, but so many school yards are full of villainous students that recess can often turn out to be the most unpleasant part of the day.

Labor Day is a holiday honoring those who work for a living. Laborious Day is a lesser known holiday honoring those who cannot stop talking about their work.



It is one of life's bitterest truths that bedtime so often arrives just when things are really getting interesting.

Just because something is traditional is no reason to do it, of course. Piracy, for example, is a tradition that has been carried on for hundreds of years, but that doesn't mean we should all attack ships and steal their gold.

Lemony Snickett ~ Horseradish: Bitter Truths You Can't Avoid

Deciding whether or not to trust a person is like deciding whether or not to climb a tree, because you might get a wonderful view from the highest branch, or you might simply get covered in sap, and for this reason many people choose to spend their time alone and indoors, where it is harder to get a splinter.

Lemony Snickett -- Horseradish: Bitter Truths You Can't Avoid

Mad TV Bob Newhart Skit - Mo Collins - Stop it

Good sound advice on how to deal with your problems and issues...

A Bitter Truth

Perhaps if we saw what was ahead of us, and glimpsed the crimes, follies, and misfortunes that would befall us later on, we would all stay in our mother's wombs, and then there would be nobody in the world but a great number of very fat, very irritated women.

Lemony Snickett Horseradish: Bitter Truths You Can't Avoid.

Great Big Sea - Feel it Turn

A poignant song

The Mom Song

Thanks to Raging Calvinist for this.

When I Go Down

I'll tell you flat out
It hurts so much to think of this
So from my thoughts I will exclude
The very thing that
I hate more than everything is
The way I'm powerless
To dictate my own moods

I've thrown away
So many things that could've been much more
And I just pray
My problems go away if they're ignored
But that's not the way it works
No that's not the way it works

When I go down
I go down hard
And I take everything I've learned
And teach myself some disregaurd
When I go down
It hurts to hit the bottom
And of the things that got me there
I think, if only I had fought them

If and when I can
Clear myself of this clouded mind
I'll watch myself settle down
Into a place where Peace can search me out and find
That I'm so ready to be found

I've thrown away
The hope I had in friendships
I've thrown away
So many things that could have been much more
I've thrown away
The secret to find the end to this
And I just pray
My problems go away if they're ignored
But that's not the way it works
No that's not that way it works

When I go down
I go down hard
And I take everything I've learned
And teach myself some disregaurd
When I go down
It hurts to hit the bottom
And of the things that got me there
I think, if only I had fought them

Any control I thought I had just slipped through my hands
While my ever-present conscience shakes its head and reprimands me
Reprimands me
Then and there I confess
I'll blame all this on my selfishness
Yet You love me
And that consumes me
And I'll stand up again
And do so willingly

You give me hope, and hope it gives me life
You touch my heavy heart, and when you do You make it light
As I exhale I hear Your voice
And I answer You, though I hardly make a noise
And from my lips the words I choose to say
Seem pathetic, but it's a fallen man's praise
Cause I love You
Oh God, I love You

And life is now worth living
If only because of You
And when they say that I am dead and gone
It won't be further from the truth

When I go down
I lift my eyes to You
I won't look very far
Cause You'll be there
With open arms
To lift me up again
To lift me up again

Church Sign Smack Down

Click on the link above for something pretty funny.

"Every faculty you have, your power of thinking or of moving your limbs from moment to moment, is given to you by God. If you devoted every moment of your whole life exclusively to his service you could not give Him anything that was not in a sense His own already. So that when we talk of a man doing anything for God or giving anything to God, I will tell you what it is really like. It is like a small child going to his father and saying, 'Daddy, give me sixpence to buy you a birthday present.' Of course, the father does, and he is pleased with the child's present. It is all very nice and proper, but only an idiot would think that the father is sixpence to the good on the transaction. When a man has made these two discoveries, God can really get to work. It is after this that real life begins. The man is awake now..."

C.S. Lewis

Sorry this is so small. This is my youngest grandchild, Elora Ann and myself.

Sixpence None The Richer - Breathe Your Name (Video)

One of my newest favorite bands...

Sixpence None the Richer

sixpence none the richer. Don't dream it's over

Summertime Friends...