What a treat, a slice of pepperoni pizza, an ice cold root beer, and QUIET.  There was a nice big table by the sunny window so I took it and sat down with pizza, root beer, my spiral notebook and my phone/kindle app.

Forty five minutes of weekly goal checking, eating and reading an ebook was like  mini retreat.  For most of the time there were not even any other people in the shop.  My phone did not ring or beep.  No one asked me a question.  Quiet.  It still strikes me funny that although there was some fun cheery music playing it still seemed….quiet.

Quiet.

linking with the Extraordinary Ordinary

The Lordship of Christ by John MacArthur

“Becoming a Christian means being sick of your sin, longing for forgiveness and rescue from present evil and future hell, and affirming your commitment to the Lordship of Christ to the point where you are willing to forsake everything. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: it isn’t just holding up your hand or walking down an aisle and saying, ‘I love Jesus.‘” ―John MacArthur

A few plans for the rest of the week…we register for our co-op classes this week.  Piano lesson resume after a 3 week break and my Beloved comes home for the weekend.  I have left the folding table out in the living room with some sewing to be able to sit down for 15 minutes here and there, hopefully to mend, refashion and piece together a few different things.

 A little lingering of the Christmas holiday season as my youngest two spent a morning building the gingerbread house and tree, while I worked on school plans, new year’s goals and food preparations for the now and busy season ahead.

It was a brain fog kind of week, but this morning, a clear head has returned.  This new year is wonderfully exciting me as I anticipate the whole lot of LIFE ahead.

My goal setting is completed and I am pretty excited about the simple and specific goals for this year.  Writing is high on my list of goals so tonight I decided, to just write.

As is becoming a tradition, my Beloved was home for the week of Christmas, and we ladies headed to my Dad’s place to spend New Year’s week with my Dad, my Sister and her family.  Sweet times of refreshment and also growing insight & gratitude.

Learning how to use my new camera ~ lighting & buttons…

The way the calendar falls this time around, I had penciled in a school start day for TODAY but this morning, to sighs of relief all around, the decision was made to start back on Thursday.  That gives me a couple days of prep time and putting the house back in order from all the holiday hoopla, crashed computer, curriculum tweaking & travel messes.  Not really messes, but the suitcases go behind the tubs of Christmas decorations.  We pulled out the suitcases as we put away the Christmas tubs. Now the tubs will have to be pulled out to put the suitcases away.  No one was feeling that ambitious today! 

The magic box that will take my 11 month, 26 day old Dell Computer to the hospital is due any day and Miss Sunshine has taught me about External Hard Drives.  What an amazing little tool this black box of terabytes is!  Thankfully we haven’t lost any thing, although my goals were sketched out in a spiral notebook last week because I was very afraid of loosing everything.  BUT the Terabyte holder?  Wow.  I’ve figured out how to have iTunes on only 1 computer and have any computer available to the kids without thinking about which one has my files.

What a ramble post this is, but maybe letting these words splash the page will allow for some deeper thoughts to settle in and develop.

linking with extraordinary ordinary

As I finished reading “The Women of Christmas” I was very surprised by the direction my thoughts went.  There is a study guide at the end that I decided to simply read through instead of grabbing pen and paper as I often do.  There is this ~ “What things in your life seem to hard to handle?  Make a list.  Then write across the top your favorite translation of Luke 1:37.  If you truly believe that nothing is impossible with God, what must you do right now to embrace that reality.”

Sweet encouragement, the realization that even while I grieved and gave thanks and pressed on through this Christmas season without much Christmas spirit, that God had gone before me again.  He had lead me through this book to this place in the study guide to gently ask me to trust Him,  to Believe that He is at work and He has not forgotten us.

Also from the study guide of The Women of Christmas I got a start on my goal setting and planning for the new year.  I am excited to spend some time looking over my goals for 2013 without beating myself up for what isn’t accomplished and to look forward with hope and anticipation for what God is doing instead.

Another book, that was sent to me for review, “The War on Christmas, Battles in Faith, Tradition and Religious Expression” was started and set aside.  Maybe it was because of all that has been going on around us, I just could not press on with this book.  Maybe when life is pressing in it isn’t the right time to try and read this particular kind of book. I am putting it on my nightstand with the thought that I may read though it from time to time.