bits of sunshine

sunday coffee series

july 17:

. enjoying 78 degrees this morning and watering my flowers before we creep up to 105 or so this afternoon . it should be a perfect day to enjoy an afternoon movie .
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. oh summertime, there is so much i love about you . ☀️🌊🌻☕️🌾🍧✨
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#sundaycoffeeseries with connie  // mug from ben for an anniversary eight or so years ago 🥰

 

july 24:

coming to you from Miles City Interagency Dispatch Center
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from the Aircraft desk
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mug was a gift from ben, purchased at the Pima Air and Space Museum in Tucson, AZ
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#sundaycoffeeseries with connie  // #wildlandfirewife #wildlandfiredispatch 
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weather - sunny - 71 degrees F - 53% humidity - it’s going to head towards 90 degrees and 20% humidity as the day wears on

 

july 31:

. enjoying 76 degrees this morning and planning to water my flowers before it gets hotter . last day of july - and i’m not sure what i think about this .
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. i started a book by madeleine l’engle yesterday - and read until way too late last night (early this morning?) .
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. oh summertime, there is so much i love about you . ☀️📖🌳🌳☕️🌻🍧✨
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#sundaycoffeeseries with connie // mug created by arne ceramics in flagstaff, az / gifted to me by stef and simon // at home in front of number six-twelve

lessons from the bionicles

sometimes, what we have already is enough. 

a few days ago, isaac was telling ben and i that he wanted to buy some new lego bionicles. 

"don't the new bionicles look quite a bit like the hero factory guys you have?" we asked him.
"well, yeah, they do." 
"and don't you have quite a few of the original bionicle guys?" 
"well, yes," to that too. 
"so why would you need new ones?"

turns out the neighbor boy has two of the newer ones. and they are big. bigger than isaac's hero factory figures. so as soon as isaac had enough money saved up from some jobs, he asked us if he could spend it on new bionicles.

ok. parenting moment. just because i have enough money to buy something i want, doesn't mean that i should buy the thing right this second. i need to think about why i want it. one-upping my friend is not a good reason to buy something. ever. i also need to think about what i or the others in my life need or might need. i need to think about the fact that christmas is not so very far away. i need to think about having a bit saved away for a rainy day. i need to think about if something i have already would work. then i need to think about if this thing i want to buy is really the thing i want to buy. if, after all this thinking, i still want to buy it, then i should buy it!

after visiting for a while about all of this, isaac headed upstairs and we could hear the sounds of the lego bins. 

before too long, he came downstairs with this:

i didn't realize how big and involved these are! (the new ones don't hold a candle to the originals!) back when isaac first got a bunch of these (from a dear friend who's son was growing out of them), he had never built them from start to finish. he basically built their skeletons.  

that was cool. and isaac was maybe five-years-old. but i had no idea how really cool they could be!

i don't think isaac did either. after building more of them, he realized that he certainly didn't need to buy any bionicles. not only that, he didn't even want to!

he got down to business and built five of them! (the one on the far left is one his friend put together from more pieces isaac has, and the second from the left is one of his friend's new ones.) isaac is having a great time putting these together and playing with them and inviting his friend to play, too. 

and a couple days later, he told me a little list of people and the christmas presents he is planning for them. some things he needs to buy, some things he'll make, all very thoughtful. he even bought a birthday present for our tiny neighbor girl - her second birthday is tomorrow. 

these are the kinds of things that ben and i love talking over with our kids. partly because it helps us solidify who we ourselves want to be while we help our kiddos grow into people who live with kindness, joy and peace. 

be encouraged and be wonderful, my friends.
love, ~e

inspiration

i just thought you might like to see what's inspiring what i'm dreaming about . . . some of it will happen sooner, some of it will happen later, some of it much, much later.  but that's the fun of dreaming, isn't it?

advent :: bringing the outside in

on one of the snowy, blowy days (read 0 degrees, 20 mph wind, icy snow) we've had this week, the kids and i spent a couple hours sorting through our christmas cd's and loading our favorite songs onto itunes so we can listen to them . . . we've been loving being wrapped in music.

on one of the not snowy, blowy days, we went traipsing through our woods and prairie and down by the river and brought in all sorts of interesting, weedy, seedy things and strung them up with twine and sparkly ribbon.

on sunday, ben went out and came back with a huge cedar tree.  it smells SO good.  we wrapped our lights around it - but it's the biggest tree we've ever had.  our lights didn't reach . . . my dad brought us some more yesterday, so we'll finish lighting it, and start decorating - maybe tonight.

we are lighting our advent candles each morning and talking about prophecies of Christ.  it's so interesting.  God prophecied about Himself so many times . . . this morning we talked about Genesis 22.  if you are interested, read through the story and think in terms of Christ - the wood carried, the journey lasted 3 days, on the 3rd day deliverance was provided, "God will provide the lamb for the sacrifice," lifted up on a mountain, a son - an only son, the promise of blessing to all, . . . .  God telling His story through all of history.  always pointing to Christ.  always pointing to deliverance.  always pointing to the Gospel - the Good News. 

and thank you, my friends, for your encouragements.  i am weak.  i am tired.  i am worn.  but i am blessed.  and i am cared for.  and i am wrapped in arms of love.  i am leaning on the Everlasting Arms.  i am pressing in to Him.  and my family is pressing together.  and God is good.  so very good.

and the verse of the day today is "Lord, you have established peace for us.  All that we have accomplished, you have done for us."  Isaiah 26:12  amen.  and amen.

God bless each one of you today.  i love you.   ~e

box elder bugs

I haven't turned on the computer since my last post . . . so here I am, catching up a bit . . . looking forward to catching up with some of my favorite reads, too . . . I'll have an update on our building project tomorrow morning . . . LOTS of pictures to share!

Today

my new spring/summer arrangement on my living room wall.  i love to look at it!

enjoy today
enjoy your family today
make a choice that you know is right today
enjoy a bit of the outdoors today
enjoy beauty (a book, a dish, a linen) inside today
live today so that at the end of it, there is at least one thing that you are very satisfied with
"do not fret about tomorrow. tomorrow has enough worries of its own."

these thoughts were inspired by this post and i don't mean these thoughts in a cliched sort of way. i really am finding them to be true and real for me.

these are a few of my favorite things

this is one wall in our school room.
i'll take you on a full tour of the room one day,
but this wall needed a post all it's own.
this collection spans over 15 years of my life!
if you click on the picture to go to flickr,
you can read a bit about each piece in the collage.
i only bought one of the pieces -
the framed picture in the lower left -
maddie and i found that one at goodwill
and decided we needed it.
oh! and the two cards with Duluth Harbor scenes -
i bought those when ben and i lived in Duluth.
all the rest have been gifts.
so this is sort of a memory wall.
each little bit reminds me of somebody special -
and my kiddos really love each colorful bit as well!

beach glass and rocks, take 2

So, at the beginning of February, I had this idea to show some of my collections over the month. I thought that I would post at least 20 times . . . ahem . . . that didn't quite happen.

This picture is the same collection as the one I started the month with. My kids and I had fun arranging by color and type of rock.

So, February didn't go as I had planned. In many ways.
Here is a little February wrap-up ::

One whole week was spent in counseling and arranging for a couple from our church to move out of town to a place very far away from alcohol, a place where they will receive 24-hour support and encouragement and counsel and life. A place where the people love God above all else and help others to dig in to the Word and see what living for God's glory really looks like.

Another big part of February was arranging for our Pastor to take a one month sabatical, or leave-of-absence. He has been having some serious health issues and needs to try a different climate to see if he can find some relief. Ben meets with our Pastor on a regular basis and has been helping plan the logistics of the coming month. Ben will also be preaching the last three Sundays in March!

The last half of February brought us many sunny days! And I am just praising and thanking God for that. I do not do well with grey for days on end with no end in sight.

February was also warmer than January had been. So we did a lot of sledding and skating!

Maddie and Isaac love story-hour at our local library. We decided to share our story-hour trip with my brother's kiddos last month. He and his wife have 4 kiddos, so I decided to take them, one at a time. It was really fun to have time with just one of them. And they each felt so special to have their day to go with Auntie and their cousins. We turned it into a longer day, too. After story-hour we stayed and looked at books for quite a while. Then we returned to our house for lunch and time to play and a little movie. I think we'll do this again - starting today!

I finished some projects upstairs in our house. I'll show some before and after photos throughout this month. Lots of painting and furniture moving!

Ben built a handy-dandy little exercise box, and I have been doing some extra (extra, as in, above and beyond the regular laundry and house work and playing with my kiddos) exercising a few days a week - right in my living room!

Then there are the things that I actually did blog about in February!

And since I'm doing a wrap-up kind of post here, I'm going to look at my list from January, and see how I'm doing. Care to join me? Here goes ::

:: slow down (hmmm . . . still wanting this) :: write at least two short stories :: attempt a collaboration with a friend on a children's book (THIS is in progress! the story is written! the illustrations are begun!!!!!!) :: listen to more music (this is happening. we have music on more often throughout the day, and i like it! so do my kiddos) :: take more pictures of my children - at least one a week (i'm doing this, too. i'll have to share some pictures of my almost toothless girl!) :: read through my Bible (i'm still in Leviticus, but i've read all of Ruth and 1&2 Timothy) :: share something from my reading here each week :: finish Maddie's quilt :: finish Ben's quilt (it's still almost done) :: do learning/school work with my children at least 4 days a week (we are getting 3 days for sure of really focused time . . . then there is real life - which is always a learning experience) :: share some tips and tidbits about our learning here :: stay home all day most days (still working at this, too. though i think we have been around home more) :: really utilize my etsy shop :: use less natural gas (keep my fire stoked! - i go in streaks with this . . . ) :: go on more dates with my husband (we went on one little one and one bigger one in February) :: finish going through all those boxes of papers that have followed us for 9 moves in the past 8 years . . . :: stay in this house! :: go on at least 3 camping/backpacking sorts of trips :: help Ben loose 40 pounds :: organize my blog - so you and I can find things in my old posts :: write at least one handwritten letter per week :: be an encouragement :: find the bits of sunshine in every day ::

So there. That felt good! I'm two months into the year, and even with extra happenings in February, I think I'm off to a pretty good start!

Did you make goals for this year? If so, have you revisited them to see how you're doing? You should! You might be encouraged. And if you haven't done so well . . . you still have 10 more months! Now that's a bit of sunshine.

.. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..

For those of you who saw the Ben post the other day . . . it's a work in progress and accidentally got published.  You will see it again.  When I have it finished.

:: February, A Month of Collections :: 14 ::

:: February, A Month of Collections :: 14 :: Depression Glass ::

my green depression glass
(part of my larger collection of green glassware)

my mom has found most of these pieces for me
she keeps her eye out for pieces, then gives them to me for my birthday or Christmas
- the candle holders were my Christmas gift this year

the candy dish in front belonged to my gram
she gave it to me just a few months before she passed away
she was going to stay overnight with me before my brother's wedding, and she had it all wrapped up with a little thank-you note, ready to give to me, but she ended up in a nursing home a week or so before our planned overnight and trip . . . she had my mom bring me the package anyway, and i am so thankful to have both the dish and the note . . .

:: February, A Month of Collections : 12 ::

:: February, A Month of Collections :: 12 :: Charms ::

Some are Maddie's.
Some are mine.