What a fun surprise

Rebecca over at The Road Home passed on a Liebster award to me.  What fun - thanks Rebecca!  This award features up and coming bloggers (with less than 200 followers) and asks that it is passed on to 5 other deserving bloggers.  It's a great way to read someone new.  Here are 5 great blogs to go check out:

Made For Another World

Love Came Down

A Martha Trying to Be Mary

A Woman's Catholic Journey

My Dangerous Kitchen

Who would I have been?

This blog was inspired by all the women I see who are dealing with the pain of being infertile.  It seems just as being Catholic, or a wife, a daughter, a friend, an employee, etc. defines us, our inability to conceive somehow does as well.

But while most of you are at the beginning or somewhere in the middle of this journey, I'm at the other end.  Being in my late 40s I know I am not going to get pregnant.  I'm not going to be a mom. 

I've said it before and I'll say it again, I okay with that.  Now.  I've come to terms with it and know it's not what God had planned for me.

But that doesn't mean I don't think about it.  Himself and I were talking about it the other day.  Had we had children, who would we be today?

I doubt we'd have our youthful good looks. ;-)  I'd probably would have a few, okay, a lot more gray hairs and Himself would probably have less, hair that is. 

Would I be gentle and patient like Michelle Duggar?  Or would I be loud and snappish like Kate Gossling?  How strict would I be?  How afraid of the world and the big scary things out there would I be?  Or would I be more appreciative of God's gifts and graces?

Makes me wonder.

Sweet Dreams

The night my mom died my cousin, D, had a dream in which my mom appeared.  She was glowing, happy, beautiful.  At the time she had the dream, D didn't know mom was gone.  We both like to think that mom came to D to let her know that she was okay now.

A month or so ago I had a dream in which my mom appeared with a young boy, about 11 or 12, named Jonas, and a baby girl named Evelyn.  It was brief.  I saw them together looking happy and peaceful.  Jonas looked protective and proud of the baby.  It made me smile.  In my dream it was my mom with her two grandchildren - my son and my sister's daughter.

I never had a confirmed pregnancy, but at one time I thought I had what was implantation spotting and CD1 was late.  But like all good infertiles, CD1 did arrive.  For whatever reason I always thought had I been pregnant it was a boy. 

My sister, on the other hand, was pregnant last year.  We saw Sweet Pea's first and only ultrasound picture.  A beautiful sight - until at eight weeks she was gone.  Though it was too early to know, in my mind that baby was always a girl.

The ages of the children in my dream would have been right on the money.  Mom didn't have her grandchildren here on earth, but she had them in heaven.

Perhaps they appeared to me.  Maybe not.  Maybe it was wishful dreaming.

But it sure was sweet!

How I feel

I haven't had a cold in years.  Apparently I'm not as immune as I had liked to think.  And I'm a real big baby about it too!  Luckily I'm blessed with Himself who has been taking really good care of me, even while he's fighting something too.

Thankful Thursday - Thanksgiving Edition

The Lord's been good to me

And so I thank the Lord

For giving me the things I need:

The sun and the rain and the appleseed

The Lord's been good to me!

Check out more to be thankful for at The Road Home.

Meet Darryl

There's a couple things I never get tired of seeing and deer wandering the yard is one of them.  We've had a young buck visit us several times lately and I just find him so beautiful.  Of course I had to name him, you know I do that with all the critters that visit us frequently!  So, here's Darryl .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .

A couple of days after Himself captured these photos, Darryl was back with a buddy.  So, what did I name him? 

.
.
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Darryl, of course!  For all you Bob Newhart fans (are there some or am I the only one?) you'll remember the three recurring characters - "I'm Larry.  This is my brother Darryl and this is my other brother Darryl."

You can see it doesn't take much to amuse me!

Thankful Thursday (5)

Today I am thankful for. . .

My job.  I ended up in such a better situation than the last place I was at.  I work closer to home, in a nicer environment, and with people who actually value my experience and opinion. 

Fall.  In northeast Ohio we often say "Wait an hour and the weather will change."  Not this year.  We've had an extremely good autumn.  The weather has been pleasant, and on some days, downright warm for the season.  I've been able to get out on the weekends and get the gardens cleaned up.  I'm looking forward to this weekend and finishing up the last of it.

Our neighbors.  Our next door neighbors have a puppy, Lucy, who is turning out to be a real escape artist.  She's actually figured out how to open their back door.  When she's loose the first place she comes is to visit us, or, I should say, to visit Jack.  So, we play with them, practice her commands, and then walk her home.  We love it.  Jack loves it.  And so does Lucy.  On Sunday, Lucy's human, K, stopped over with a gift bag of goodies thanking us for helping out when she's out and about.  It was so sweet! 


Lucy

Part of the Thank You goodie bag. 

Check out more to be thankful for at The Road Home.

Yeah God!

My hundred plus pound "puppy" is a creature of habit.  He likes, no, he insists on a morning walk, every single day.  Trying to get that in before work is sometimes tough.  But, lately I've been rewarded.  Gloriously so. 

A few days before the time change we left a little earlier than usual, walking down the street carrying a flashlight.  I had a hard time not tripping over my own two feet because I was walking looking up at the sky.  The stars were nothing short of spectacular!  Orion's belt just glimmered and shined.  All the rest just sparkled.   Yeah God!

A few days later, after the time change, we were treated to a beautiful sunrise.  The colors reflecting off the clouds were a glorious mix of reds and oranges and pinks.  Yeah God!

Lately we've been seeing the hawks much more often.  We have a pair of red tail hawks that seem to come back this time of year and must makes their nest nearby.  They are so majestic and elegant.  Yeah God!

As I walked past my friend's house, a blue heron took flight from her pond.  It was large and gangly and flew with an odd, awkward smoothness that was interesting to watch.  Yeah God!

What makes you go Yeah God?

Another year older - Giveaway details

You gals who responded all just made my day!  And week, and month and year! 

So you all get presents. I created a tab - Pretty Things - since that was what I called my crafting business - with all your choices.  E-mail me (donna1164 at gmail dot com) with your 1st and 2nd choices and address and I'll get your "birthday presents" right off to you.

Essays of our lives

It comes as no surprise to anyone who reads this regularly that Himself and I are big fans of GK Chesterton.  Last night we had the opportunity to attend a fundraiser for a local, private Catholic school  at which Dale Ahlquist spoke.  Dale is probably the foremost authority on GKC as he is the host of The Apostle of Common Sense on EWTN, author of a number of books, and the president of the American Chesterton Society. 

As usual, he gave a brilliant and most funny talk about GKC ranging on a number of topics.  Since it was a fundraiser for the school there were probably people there who were not all that familiar with this author so Dale gave some background on the man.  Chesterton has written well over a hundred books and hundreds, if not thousands, of essays.  Dale chuckled as he imagined that the students from the school that attended last night's event would themselves be writing essays shortly about what they heard.

That got me thinking.  That's what we do here.  We write essays.  About our lives, our faith, families, dreams, hopes and even our fears and disappointments.  We might not be as prolific as GKC but for whatever reason we feel a need, even a calling, to pour out our words for others to read.

When I was in junior high school we had an tremendous English teacher.  He made sure we knew the structure of our language, how to write well crafted sentences.  We diagramed hundreds of sentences, understanding every noun, pronoun, adjective and adverb.  He would probably be horrified at some the writing and phrasing I do here. 

One of the things Mr. Z had us do was keep a notebook in which we wrote every day.  He would give us a phrase or a sentence and that would be the beginning of our essay.  Sometimes that start would be pretty innocuous, leading to some wildly different writing from each of us.  Sometimes it was more directed.  But, regardless, it sparked our imagination and got us writing.  What a great gift he gave us! 

And, oh, what I'd give to have that notebook back!