Love is…

Love is…

a cup of fresh hot coffee brought to me in bed every morning.

 

    

Especially on this particular day…

If you read my blog regularly you already know about the dreaded boiled egg incident.

(I accidently left the house with a pan of boiled eggs on the stove and came home FOUR hours later to a very stinky, smoke filled house.)

The whole house is now in the process of being repainted and refloored.

One night last week, things were so torn up at home, that hubby sent me to my mama’s to sleep, while he bunked on the floor…actually, the sub floor.

The next morning, as I was lying there in Mama’s spare room, I heard a knock at her back door.

There was my husband, the one who’d spent the night on the floor, with this.

As he does his part…

Ephesians 5:25-26 (Amplified Bible)
”Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her,
Even so husbands should love their wives as [being in a sense] their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself.”

I pray that with God’s help, I’m doing mine…

1 Peter 3 (Amp.)

“…you are to feel for him all that reverence includes:

to respect, defer to, revere him--to honor, esteem, appreciate, prize, and, in the human sense, to adore him,

that is, to admire, praise, be devoted to, deeply love, and enjoy your husband.”

 

Still following,

Elizabeth

This month on Walk with Him Wednesdays we are sharing the Spiritual Practice of Holy Matrimony.

Unwrapping an adventure with Little Buddy…

There’s nothing like my Little Buddy to turn a simple walk around my neighborhood into an adventure.

 

 

 

 

I gotta tell you, dirt and all, he just melts my heart.

 

I LOVE being a Nana,

Elizabeth

linking to Tuesday Unwrapped at Chatting at the Sky

My beautiful blog friend Ginger is giving away a Kari Jobe CD today!

God of the details, part two…

Years ago, when it became evident that my Daddy and his wife needed to move into assisted living, us kids had quite a shock when we had to go clean out their house.  Daddy had managed to keep us from the truth about how bad things had gotten by avoiding having us over to his home.  It was dirty, run down, and filled with junk.  As my siblings and I hauled load after load out to the dumpster, we joked with one another about the possibility of finding a valuable treasure in the midst of the mess.  I commented that there was only one thing out of all of Dad’s stuff that I would like.  When I was little Daddy had a little plastic toy that he would bring out and show us kids.  It was two little sailors that walked when you put them on something that sloped.  Dad was a World War II navy vet, and that little toy reminded me of him and of happier times.  But in the midst of piles and piles of trash, what was the chance of finding a toy no bigger than two inches tall?  Late that evening, with a huge dumpster piled high, the house was finally almost empty.  We had found no valuable treasures in the midst of the mess, but when we were down to the last few things, one of my siblings let out a whoop, ran up to me, and handed me the one thing, the only thing, I wanted.  To me it is a treasure.

The past few chaotic, messy days, God has been reminding me that He is in control, and that He is watchful over even the smallest details of our life. 

He’s working even the smallest things together for our good.

  I am so grateful. 

Gratitude list #440-450

-help packing up our things so the house can be painted and refloored

-help from my sister with taking care of Mama

-guidance and step by step provision for moving Mama

-a hot bubble bath at the end of a stressful day

-decluttering

-waking up and seeing three squirrels playing together in the tree outside our window

-my hubby going out of his way to bring me a hot coffee

-a whole crew of hardworking guys helping lay the wood flooring in our house

-hearing oldest granddaughter giggling with a little friend

-a much needed break from the mess and chaos of the torn up house, a good night’s rest at a hotel provided by the insurance

-the grandkids enjoying a swim at the hotel swimming pool

Gratefully yours,

Elizabeth

Join me and many others in counting our gratitude gifts...

God of the details…

 

 

Nothing is so small that it escapes His notice.

Nothing too insignificant for Him to make beautiful.

He pays attention to the details.

 

I simply remember my favorite things…Friday’s Favs…I’m lovin’ Ree’s boots.

I am purposely not mentioning that we are in the middle of a chaotic, messy total house repainting and reflooring project.  Oops, I guess I just mentioned it.  Anyway, by next week I’m hoping to be lovin’ my new wood floors, my new carpet upstairs, my new soft gray walls with beachy white beadboard wainscoting… but for now, can I tell you that I LOVE boots!  And when Ree Drummond, the Pioneer Woman, came to town, I just fell in love with her boots!

For some reason, tonight I got to thinkin’ about Ree’s boots, (maybe because we are having boot weather right now when it should be flip flop weather!), and tracked down the brand on her website.

 
Frye’s Jane boots.  Cost $298.  Sigh… When I become a world famous blogger and cookbook author like Ree, I’m gonna get me some of them boots!

Happy Friday Everyone!

Elizabeth

A triple play…

God is so good.  Sometimes the kindest thing He can do for us to to correct us and get us back on the right track.  Sometimes, He repeats Himself, once, twice, three times…just in case we’re hard of hearing.

It was Tuesday night and time to go to bed on our temporary mattress on the living room floor.  I finally found my clean pajamas and decided to take a bubble bath before bed.  As I laid back in the hot water, God spoke to me about how spoiled I was acting.  He took what was bad, (accidently leaving the house with a pan of boiled eggs on the stove for four hours until the whole house was smoke filled), and turned it for our good.  Thanks to our homeowners policy, we are repainting and reflooring the whole interior, which we have wanted/needed to do anyway.  But, I was grumpy about living in messy chaos in the meanwhile.  In that hot bubble bath, I realized, with God’s help, my foolishness.  I realized that the fact that I still have a bathtub that I can fill with hot water is a huge blessing that most of the people on this planet don’t have.

Yesterday,  my sister and I spent the day in meetings regarding moving my mom into assisted living.  It was an exhausting emotional day.  Heading home that evening, I turned on the car, and the radio news was on.  The announcer talked about how many people are still living under tarps in Haiti.  Under tarps…  A temporary, inconvenient mess gets me off kilter, while they live under tarps.  God forgive me.

I drove home, and the cloud formations were stunning.  Suddenly the words of a song we sing at our church bubbled up in my spirit…

“…and all of a sudden

I am unaware of these afflictions

eclipsed by glory

and I realize just how beautiful You are

and how great Your affections are for me.

Oh how You love us so

Oh how You love us

How You love us so…”

In the midst of all this chaos, God in His great love and kind intentions toward us, has been working for our good.  He’s working for my Mama’s good, too.  Once, twice, three times He reminded me of how really blessed I am.

Still following,

Elizabeth

Sometimes it doesn’t matter how you feel…

 

Today is not a mountaintop of marital ecstasy type day.

We are living in chaos as we are in the middle of repainting and reflooring the whole house.

I don’t do chaos well…at all.

This is my dining room! 

The wood flooring is filling the dining room, because it needs to acclimate with the temperature of the house for a few days…or something like that.

This is/was our bedroom.  Our comfy king size bed is in a  Pod container in the driveway.

I really honestly have no idea where my pajamas even are at this moment…I’m not kidding.

Yep, if you were to ask me what I FEEL, if I were honest I would have to admit that I FEEL like having a good, old-fashioned hissy fit…

complete with tears, wailing, and stomping my feet.

This is our temporary “boudoir”. 

The full size mattress from the spare room is now in the living room. 

This is where we will be sleeping until the upstairs is done.

Then the downstairs will get all torn up and redone.

My son in law teased me about it being romantic with the fireplace right there and all,

but with stuff piled here and there and everywhere, I gotta be honest,

I’m just not FEELIN’ it.

But then I heard hubby say to the work crew, “you don’t touch her desk until the last possible moment when the carpet layers come.” 

They literally worked all around this little island. 

I gotta tell you, the man gets me. 

In 34 years of marriage FEELINGS have come and gone, sometimes several times in one day!

Love is a decision, moment by moment, day by day, year by year to ACT LOVING -

to think about the other person instead of being absorbed with what you think, feel, or want.

So, instead of having a temper tantrum, please excuse me while I go and give my hubby a great big hug for thinking of me, when all I was thinking of was myself.

Still following,

Elizabeth