So...

Have you ever tried to do what everyone else is doing (even when it's a really, really good thing) and you just cannot seem to do it?  Well, I am in my forties and I am still learning that just because it is really, really good - doesn't always mean I can do it how someone else says it needs to be done.  

There have been so many things over the past ten to fifteen years of living here where I have tried really, really hard to fit into someone else's idea of what life should look like.  Sometimes it has been to make friends, sometimes it has been trying to find a church home that works for us, sometimes it has been to have a clean house or lose weight or go on a sugar fast to grow in my relationship with the LORD.  Sometimes it has been trying to meet everyone's social expectations of us...& we learned through some brutal life lessons, that is just NOT going to happen.

But the thing is, if the plans someone else made doesn't fit in with our needs and/or into our season of life, it is going to be like banging your head on a brick wall.  

For example, when I tried my best to keep to the flylady cleaning routine, I ended up just basically feeling like a failure all of the time, overwhelmed with emails on what I should be doing, and a messy house at the end when I finally said, "Ummmm, I don't think this is right for me".

Or when we tried to attend a church and make friends with a group of people that we just did not fit in with.  

Or trying for what feels like the 554th time to do a sugar fast with a group of people (&by myself) for forty days following a book (which is a wonderful book!) and not being able to do it the way that everyone else seems to be able to do.  

Or trying to do a boxed curriculum with preset days and times and subjects...

DID NOT WORK.  

Every single time.  

And the discouragement that follows - BLEH!!!!

So, I decided something.  Just like it took a long time to find our church home, just like it took a long time for me to find a decluttering and cleaning routine that sticks, just like it took doing some out of the box (for me) things to tackle my weight and exercise needs...this sugar fast - it is going to take a different approach for me.  

I am going to do forty Fridays - fast from sugar - for forty Fridays.  That is what I can do in this season.  And that is ok. 

Alice in Wonderland, Tramp for the Lord, A Place to Hang the Moon...

Happy Birthday Lewis Carroll!!  As a way to celebrate I re-read Alice in Wonderland.  And since this is my youngest daughter's absolute favorite, favorite book,,,I read it aloud.  This is one of the best, most cherished read-alouds in my house.  There are so many great quotes, many of which hang on our walls here 😊...but my most favorite, favorite of all is in chapter four entitled "The Rabbit Sends in a Little Bill".  Alice has grown so tall that she is crammed into the White Rabbit's tiny home like sardines in a tin.  The White Rabbit becomes frantic to dislodge her, to the point that they elect the poor little lizard Bill.  Hilarity ensues.  I cannot even begin to tell you how many times we have read this particular passage, nor how many times we have quoted it aloud in our house.

A Place to Hang the Moon by Kate Albus.  Oh my good gravy.  This is one of the best historical fiction books I have ever read, hands down.  I LOVE LOVE LOVE this story.  SO much.  William, Edmund, and Anna are recently orphaned (kind of for the second time) and their Solicitor has a somewhat outlandish idea for them to discover their new, forever home.  I cannot tell you how badly I wanted to just curl up with a mug of something delicious and devour this book.  As it was, I had to read in snatches of time, but oh so worth it!!!  Perhaps my favorite part of this book is the books the characters themselves discover along the way.  I love books in which the characters delight in reading as much as you do.

I don't usually buy the hardback of any book as they are so expensive.  But I had heard so many good things about this, and Barnes & Noble had a sale on hardbacks one day when we popped in just to have a look-see after a doctor appointment...but what really sealed the deal was the opening few lines of the book:

"Funeral receptions can be tough spots to find enjoyment, but eleven-year old Edmund Pearce was doing his best.

He was intent on the iced buns.  Some of them had gone squashy on one side or the other, some had lost their icing when a neighboring bun had been removed, and a few had been sadly neglected in the icing department from the start.  Undaunted, Edmund picked through the pile..."

I heartily 5-star recommend this.  (I have heard it is even better on Audible, as the narrator has a British accent and apparently does an amazing job!)

And finally Tramp for the Lord by Corrie Ten Boom.  This book is so beautiful.  It is a follow up to her first book The Hiding Place, in which Corrie and members of her family are arrested and subsequently sent to concentration camps for protecting the Jews during the Holocaust.  Tramp for the Lord picks up with Corrie and what God does through her after she is released from Ravensbruck.  This book is a more intimate conversation of sorts with Corrie.  It bares her heart in a way that is both beautiful and challenging.  I want that type of relationship with God, the conversation, repentance, and obedience.  I read this, this week of all weeks, as it has dawned in my heart just how far I have really drifted from fostering intimacy with God.  

My favorite chapter was entitled "The Real Corrie Ten Boom" (chapter 15) and my favorite passage is from "Checkpoint Charlie" (chapter 16) - it is about chocolate and SO perfect for me right now - going through the sugar fast:

 

Corrie is held up in East Berlin and tells the story to a passport guard -

He asks her why she has chocolate bars and she says to gift them to the minister's children, they go back and forth for a minute and then she relates the story of how she used chocolate to preach a sermon one time.  She was tasked with meeting with a group of intellectuals who did not want to meet with her, as they found themselves superior to her in theological knowledge.  Undaunted, Corrie gifted them chocolate and after they had thoroughly enjoyed it, she began to speak.  She chided them on not saying anything about the chocolate, they immediately objected, defending themselves, saying that they did in fact thank her for it.  She continues - letting them know she did not mean thanking her for it, but instead wondering at their lack of questioning the chocolate - where it came from, what percentage of cocoa, sugar, vitamins, and minerals it contained.  Pointing out to them that instead of analyzing it, they simply ate and enjoyed.  She then picked up her Bible and said that the Word of God was meant for the same - to be eaten and enjoyed, not picked apart - bit by bit. 

Flight of the Dragon Kyn and Greenglass House

Flight of the Dragon Kyn has been in TBR pile for a loooong time.  I was supposed to pre-read it for one of my sensitive kiddos, then life happened, and then it became just a book I wanted to read.  I didn't realize it at the time, but this is the first book in a series entitled Dragon Chronicles by Susan Fletcher.

The writing style, print on the paper (I read the physical book), and weight of each sheet (paying closer attention this after reading The Great Passage) all added signifigantly to the reading of this story.  I have to read in spurts and snatches, often between lessons, or while trying to cook dinner, or fold laundry.  As you can imagine some of the piles are quite interesting when it is my turn to fold and I have a book I am immersed in.  This story - the writing - so immersed me in Kara's adventures - that it took me a minute to reorient myself to the task at hand when I was called away or the pot began to boil over or the tower of laundry spilled off the counter startling me 😏.

The cast of characters are unique - there is Kara - the main character.  A young girl of fifteen, she was all but shunned in her family, her village, because of something that happened when she was little more than a toddler.  When she was but four years old, she took sick with vermillion fever and grew worse and worse until her breathing stopped.  Her family, village formed a funeral procession taking her little body high into the mountains, covering her with herbs and flowers, and leaving her body in a cave.  What happened next, no one can say for sure.  But something happened, and a moon turn later Kara walked into the village.  Healthy and whole, with only the vermillion marks on her cheek reminding others that she really had been sick to the point of death.  That and apparently her eyes turned from blue to green.  Now, she possesses to ability to call to birds - to connect in thought with them.  And others are either terrified of this or hope to use it to their gain, heedless of Kara's heart.

Kara's parents basically trade Kara for a herd of sheep and off she sails with Rog, the King Orrik's own brother.  Apparently the King's new lady-love wants Kara to call down the dragons, much like she calls down doves, falcons, hawks...  On the ship, Kara meets Kazan and little Rath, but it is not until she lands at the wharf and Gudjen (the King's sister) steps forward to collect her, so that she may be presented to King Orrik, that the story really starts to pull you in.

Now, for Greenglass House.  This also has been in TBR for a long time, more than two years I think.  I have an audible copy of this book, but I did not like the narrator.  I tried to listen a few times, and just could not get past the first five minutes.  I really had not planned to read this book this week, but I signed up for it through Libby and have been on the waiting list for the ebook for so long I forgot I was waiting.  When it came available this week, I jumped right in.  

What a delightful treat this has been.  

Milo is a young boy who lives with his two parents Mr. and Mrs. Pine at Greenglass House Inn.  They run an inn, a smuggler's inn to be more precise.  The story opens with Milo finishing up his homework so that he can really relax and enjoy Christmas break.  All is set to go according to plan, until the bell rings late one snowy night, a few days before Christmas.  

No one is supposed to come, no one ever comes this time of year.  

Milo is not happy.  Imagine how not happy he is when the bell rings two more times and someone also decides to sprint up the winding snow covered stairs to bring a total of five quests who aren't quite sure how long they are staying and prove to be a shifty bunch.  The real adventure begins when one of the Inn's employees agrees to return to help out, bringing her daughters in tow: Lizzy (an amazing baker) and Meddy (a girl just about Milo's age).  Meddy gets Milo to agree to go on a "campaign", to play a role playing game.  Their initial goal was to get to the bottom of who in the world are the five guests, why are they there (especially this time of year), and who is the thief who keeps taking things that do NOT belong to them???

I love books where the house itself is also considered as part of the cast of characters.  This book is fabulous.  It is so well written, the stories within stories are superb and serve as a way to draw you even deeper into the mystery and intrigue.  I love that Milo is adopted (I too am adopted).  Milo really struggles - strives to know who he really is.  I think that struggle in inate in all of us, no matter how loved we are, there is always that niggling feeling, deep inside, of 'who am I' and 'where did I come from' and 'who were my people, before these people became my people'.  

I am sorry to bade this week's selections farewell, they were so utterly delightful.

The Great Passage and A Christmas Carol with a repeated reading of the book of James...

This week was one of those weeks in which I got behind before I even realized that I was behind.  *sigh*

I spent the first of the week still hacking and coughing so much that by Wednesday everything I ate or drank had a faint underlying taste of cherry hall's cough drops.  Bleh!😬  We had multiple appointments, more medication changes, school to tackle, and the never ending laundry and dishes to stay on top of.  Coupled with the fact that everyone wants to eat more or less three times a day...the moments were gone before I realized it.

So...I will begin with the Book of James and work backwards.  I read the Book of James to fulfill the Brighter Winter Challenge.  I not only have read it, but I am transcribing it and putting into practice what I learned from How to Study your Bible by Dwight L Moody.  I am always challenged by James - he doesn't shy away from the importance of putting into practice what you profess your faith to be.  I plan to read it two or three more times this coming week.

I finally, FINALLY, read A Christmas Carol.  This was a book to fulfill two challenges - the brevity challenge for 52 books in 52 weeks, and two squares for Brighter Winter (a book sat in winter and a classic).  Brief though it is (coming in at just 100 pages), this is the very first time I have ever read it in its entirety.  I saw the movie as a kid (and was terrified out of my mind) and so never had a desire to actually read the book.  But last year we watched the "Man Who Invented Christmas".  I was all gungho to read it aloud after the movie.  Doesn't that movie make you want to read the book?!?!  But, we only made it to Stave Two and had to abandon it.  This year, I  again watched "The Man Who Invented Christmas" (more than once, I really do love that movie!).  I started the book over on this past Sunday and loved every.single.moment I squirreled away reading it.  I would recommend, if you are hesitant, have had a bad experience with the movie as a kid, or just aren't interested in reading this classic...watch "The Man Who Invented Christmas", pour yourself a cuppa and immerse yourself in the pages. 

Now for The Great Passage.  I have never, ever read anything by this author before.  I knew in joining the 52 books in 52 week challenge it would get me to step out of my comfort zone and read books that stretch me, I just didn't expect to enjoy it so much.

I love The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society and 84 Charring Cross Road and I don't know why, but this book reminded me of both of those.  It wasn't about writing letters, but it did pull you in and immerse you into the characters lives and obsession with words.  I found myself craving soba noodles (even went and got some today to make) and steaming mugs of tea (or in my case coffee).  

I adored the main cast of characters - Araki and Professor Matsumoto.  Mrs. Sakai and Nishioka.  Majime and Kishibe.  All of them, in one aspect or another, are determined to get "The Great Passage" ready to be printed.  All of them are such cherished friends that I feel like I know them and loathe to part with them at the end of the book.

The story begins with Araki's introduction to his love (obsessive love) of dictionaries.  He, over a lunch of soba noodles and after cup of cold barley tea, tells his beloved Professor Matsumoto the cold, hard truth.  He is going to retire before he can help edit the lastest project from Gembu books.  This will prove to be no small parting because the two of these men have been ensconsed side by side for more than three decades.    So Araki sets off on a monumental journey to discover (actually uncover) someone who has the passion and perseverance and that something undefinable, yet distingushing to carry this to the finish line.  

He finds Majime.  

I LOVE Majime's character.  I love his awkwardness, the fact that his hair is always going in all directions but the right one, how he dresses, his passion for words (his very soul is on fire).  

Before reading this book, I never stopped to think of how important choosing just the right word is, the weight and tint of paper for the book, the process of editing and choosing what to include and the truly difficult challenge of what to leave out.  I highly recommend this book and I will leave you a few of my favorite quotes:

" “Editing a dictionary isn’t like editing any other book or magazine,” the professor pointed out. “It’s a peculiar world. You need extreme patience, a capacity for endless minutiae, a love of words bordering on obsession, and a broad enough outlook to stay sane. What makes you think there are any young people like that nowadays?” " pg 3 or 4 

"However much food you ate, as long as you were alive, you would experience hunger again, and words, however you managed to capture them, would disperse again like phantoms into the void." pg 54

*I read physical copies of the Bible and A Christmas Carol, and kindle version of The Great Passage.

The Circular Staircase by Mary Roberts Rinehart

The challenge this week was to choose a "Grandparent of Crime" for 52 books in 52 weeks, and I am a bit nervous to write my first book review for this challenge.  So, I am going to try several different formats until I find what works for me.  

First of all, I read two books this week.  The Circular Staircase and How to Study the Bible by D.L. Moody.  

I will review Mary Roberts Rinehart's book first:

I am not a big mystery reader, I have read (& adored) Sherlock Holmes...but that is about it.  I love Hallmark Movies & Mysteries, and have often times thought 'I should really read the series this is based on', but such is life, one thing or another has always seemed to pop up to prevent me from following through.  I'm sad that I've never taken the time to read mysteries, I realize now that was a mistake.  

This book was utterly delightful (except for some time-period language *will explain in a bit).

I will begin with my favorites :

Favorite characters: Liddy and Doctor Stewart

Favorite lines: 

1)"In certain walks of life the tea-pot is the refuge in times of stress, trouble, or sickness.."

2) "Sunnyside was furnishing the people, in one way and another, the greatest excitement they had had for years."

3) "I am not at all superstitious, except, perhaps in the middle of the night, with everything dark..."

Rachel Innes is a middle-aged spinster who inherited custody of her neice and nephew when her brother passed away.  She takes a furnished country home for the summer, entitled Sunnyside, and so the plot unfolds.  The book is narrated from Miss Innes' perspective and is utterly delightful.  I found myself giggling out loud at some of the scrapes Rachel and Liddy found themselves in, pausing to read them to whomever was near enough to listen.  Each chapter end found me eager to read 'just one more', and I am already planning to read the next book she published - The Man in Lower Ten.

*I do NOT like reading books that use offensive language to describe (& thus look down upon) people based on their class or race or education - how is/was that ever ok to say about someone?  This book has two passages that almost ruined the entire book for me.  I wish she had not included those.  

I would recommend this book given my above caveat, I also loved her writing style so much that I am willing to give her another chance in her second book.  I do not know enough about this genre to give it a star rating, but hopefully I will read more this year and be able to revisit this.  

Now, for Dwight L. Moody - I have heard much about him, but never read anything by him.  This book was in short AMAZING.  I am immediately rereading this as a read aloud to my girls.  

Favorite quotes :

"We take good care of this earthly body that we only have for a short time. We feed it three times a day, and we clothe it, and we dress it, and soon it is going into the grave to rot; but the inner man that is to live on and on forever is weak and starved."

"there are four things necessary in studying the Bible: admit, submit, commit, and transmit. First, admit its truth. Second, submit to its teachings. Third, commit it to memory. Fourth, transmit it."

"The best law for Bible study is the law of perseverance. The psalmist says, I have stuck unto thy testimonies (Psalm 119:31). Diligence and discipline in studying the Word will allow it to grow within and show without."

and finally

"That is the way with the Bible – study it and study it, one subject at a time, until you become filled with it."

If you have made it a resolution to study your Bible in the New Year, I HIGHLY recommend you read this book.  It is full of encouragement to get you from resolve to action.  And LOTS of great ideas on how to approach it different ways, if one doesn't work for you - try the next.  Both this book and Mary's above are free on kindle.  The D.L.Moody book was on my Tim Challies list and both counted towards the Brighter Winter challenge.  What did you read this week?  

Sooo....

 The first week of January did not unfold how I had envisioned.  I ended up in bed with a cold.  I started the week off feeling ok, just a mild cold, but by Wednesday I felt horrible.  I think I literally slept all of Wednesday and Thursday.  Except for my cough, I am feeling much better now...so really, this will feel like the first week of the New Year to me.  I am just hoping my girls don't come down with it now.  

I did get two books finished this week and will be doing a book review post in a bit.  Hope you guys had a great week - 

Happiest of New Years!!

I sit here, at my computer, this morning, sleepily sipping coffee.  I have had a mild cold the past few days and am just hoping my girls don't come down with it.  

I'm ready to put up all of my Christmas decorations today except for some strands of light.  There is something so beautiful, so magical about dark mornings with twinkling Christmas lights and cinnamon candles flickering.  I'm also not quite ready to stop playing my Christmas station on Pandora.  I LOVE old choral Christmas hymns, the Cambridge singers are one of my most favorite choirs.  (Although the Christmas at Downton Abbey is my favorite cd - we have just about worn this cd out playing it to and from doctor appointments)

I don't know how to succintly tieup 2021, it ended much how it began - VERY bumpy.  We, overall, had a great year (taken in context for what that means for our family), but then some medicine adjustments that began in November(ish) have caused quite a bit of havoc.  I have a love-hate relationship with pharmaceuticals.  I know some people are staunchly against them and some people are staunchly pro-western medicine - I land right, smack, dab in the middle.  I am thankful for advances in western medicine that help manage chronic health conditions, yet, I hate medicine because our bodies weren't made for them and it is often times SO hard to find the right balance.  

I am trying something new this year in regards to my goals.  I label my goals in the following categories:

Disciplines - Spiritual Disciplines and becoming an ever increasingly faithful and holy disciple of Christ

Fit - food and weight loss 

Tidy - decluttering and maintaining a cleaning schedule that somewhat keeps a lid on the mess (SO SO SO far from perfect here that I won't even bother to post the before and after pics - but I do take them - as I think that is such an important part of the process)

Smaug - money matters and taming the greed

Reading and Teaching - I love to read and I love to learn 

So I have found or made a mix of 365 challenges and 52 tasks to keep me motivated throughout the year.  

365 challenges

Decluttering Challenge - Starting today 💝

Promises of God - 365 of them - will do a mix of things - verse map, scripture journal, pray them, sticky note them around our house so we can meditate on them and memorize them...most important part?  Making sure I start and end each day with His Promise 💝

52 week challenges

52 books in 52 weeks

Brighter Winter Challenge

and YES YES YES Tim Challies released his reading challenge for 2022 - I will of course be reading books that fill in the blanks for all three challenges...I am so excited.  My end goal - to read at least 52 books - it would be awesome if I could go over that...but I will be happy with 52 - a book a week.

 

Paula B Fitness videos and follow her five things for 2022 - I am not 50 yet, but I am not that far from it either...I am going to give her videos a good shot this year and try her five thing plan and see what happens 

The Bible in 52 weeks for women 

And then I decided to take a Spiritual Discipline a month from The Study Guide of Celebration of Discipline and study it.  Next year I think I will try a fruit of the Spirit each month.

And finally I am once again going to try the 40 day sugar fast challenge *sigh*, (In case you are interested in joining it begins on January 10th).  I have yet to make it past four or five days - so we will see how this goes.   And then Lent is right around the corner after that and I will choose something to fast from during that season.