Take Time

I'm so sorry I haven't been writing my gratitude's lately. Been taking a little break because I've been refashioning my wardrobe, watching many sewing tutorial videos and scrolling through Pinterest to find ideas for doing that. While I was at Youtube, I began to compile a new playlist on gratitude tools. It only has 4 videos in the playlist so far, but hopefully it will grow.

Here's some of the gratitude's that I've been writing down on my sermon note sheets in the last few weeks:

1. Warmth and light
2. RAKs from friends
3. his goodness
4. his provision
5. creative ideas for clothing to wear with leg brace for the summer
6. FISH money -- coins picked up off the ground and unexpected money given to us from friends and family -- may God continue to provide!
7. freedom
8. the vocalist special in our church service
9. godly values like patience, stamina, faith, a willing spirit, generosity
10. offspring
11. grace

I cut loose this last month and did some artwork in my faith-book. First I used the back of my divider for quotes and doodled some flowers around them. If you want to read the quotes I wrote down, click on the photo to enlarge.

 

I also water-colored my scripture sheet until the last week. I couldn't find my water brush then, so used markers instead. Didn't like the results, but was inspired by Stephanie to make the stripes.

 

Since I had been invited to a shoebox party and Stephanie had sent us an assignment to make a large tag with encouraging words for our faith-books, I used the idea for my contribution to our annual craft day.  I didn't have a large tag die, so instead I found a sack of manila envelopes at a thrift store and prepared the background in advance. All the girls had to do was to glue on the hearts, the little torn scrap of prescription paper, distress the edges with ink and stamp the words from my sample.  Cute little decorated pocket to store goodies in our  faith-books!

 



 

I've been getting nudges from my conscience lately that I need to get back to reading my Bible. I've gotten into a rut of being too busy for God. As I've been thinking about it, I remembered what Dr. Ketterman told us -- every parent needs to teach their child to spend 20 minutes every day in quiet time. It is meant to be used to decompress, to rest, to reflect on the positive attributes of the day, to read from God's word,  to meditate on God's goodness, to pray, and to praise.

 

And as a parent, I couldn't just expect my child to do as I say and not as I do. I had to model quiet time  too! Many of my friends are now becoming grandparents and some of them babysit or are raising grandchildren and getting a second chance to re-parent. They can begin anytime to instill quiet time on a daily basis. Dr. Ketterman said to set the timer for 20 minutes, sit down and read for that length of time or journal and pray. No TV, nor radio unless it is soothing music like classical or instrumental hymns. Make it a priority and teach the children not to disturb each other or mama during that time unless it is an emergency such as blood gushing from some body part. grin!

 

With our son's ADHD like symptoms, this was almost sheer torture for him, because his little body wanted to be active constantly and since my husband had a hard time getting him to go to bed at night (I had afternoon nap duty and husband had evening duty), we instilled the quiet time just before bedtime. My husband began reading books to our son such as an ABC Bible story book and later hubby let the son read to him. After the book reading, then hubby taught him to pray the Lord's prayer.

To have a spiritually healthy relationship with Jesus, I need to read, rest, and reflect. Take time to join me, won't you?