You Are a Strawberry |
 You are friendly, outgoing, and well liked by many people.You are popular, but there’s nothing you ordinary or average about you.You a very interesting person, and you have many facets to your personality. Sometimes you feel very conflicted. Your different sides of your personality pull at you. You are a very sensual and passionate person. You are fiery… you can’t help it. In general, you keep your passionate side under wraps. You are only wild in private.
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Archive for March, 2008
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia!
The strife is o’er, the battle done;
Now is the victor’s triumph won;
Now be the song of praise begun. Alleluia!The pow’rs of death have done their worst,
But Christ their legions hath dispersed.
Let shouts of holy joy outburst. Alleluia!The three sad days have quickly sped,
He rises glorious from the dead.
All glory to our risen Head! Alleluia!He broke the age-bound chains of hell;
The bars from heav’n’s high portals fell.
Let hymns of praise His triumph tell. Alleluia!Lord, by the stripes which wounded Thee,
From death’s dread sting Thy servants free
That we may live and sing to Thee. Alleluia!Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia!
He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
It was now about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour, while the sun’s light failed. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Then Jesus, calling out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!” And having said this he breathed his last. Now when the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God, saying, “Certainly this man was innocent!” And all the crowds that had assembled for this spectacle, when they saw what had taken place, returned home beating their breasts. And all his acquaintances and the women who had followed him from Galilee stood at a distance watching these things. ~Luke 23:44-49
Once upon a time, I would try to get myself in the right ‘mood’ for Maundy Thursday service: solemn, reflective, and silent. And then I had kids. I tried to shush them, to teach them to match my ‘mood’. But it is impossible to shush five lively lads and one twirly girl into simultaneous silence: they sense mother’s frustration and burst into the opposite of silence. In short, my failed shushing efforts give me a headache not conducive to solemn reflection.
Thanks be to God, His word is present and working even when I’m not in the right ‘mood’! His Name is praised, even when I’m comforting a small boy upset because he can’t get his offering out of the attendance card holder. My sins are forgiven at His Table, even when the same small boy is trying to peer into the chalice and my daughter is whispering to her friend. And so it is still Maundy Thursday, even when every single one of my children manages to forget that on this one occasion we are to leave the sanctuary in silence. Thanks be to God that His grace is much greater than anything that is within me!
Not all the blood of beasts on Jewish altars slain
Could give the guilty conscience peace or wash away the stain.But Christ, the heav’nly Lamb, takes all our sins away;
A sacrifice of nobler name and richer blood than they.My faith would lay its hand on that dear head of Thine,
As penitently here I stand confessing guilt is mine.My soul looks back to see the burden Though didst bear
When hanging on that cursed tree; I know my guilt was there.Believing, we rejoice to see the curse remove;
We bless the Lamb with cheerful voice and sing His bleeding love.
My friend Melody already posted my favorite Palm Sunday hymn, All Glory, Laud, and Honor (LSB 442), so I thought instead I would share a verse from this morning’s closing hymn, No Tramp of Soliders’ Marching Feet (LSB 444):
And yet He comes, the children cheer;
With palms His path is strown,
With ev’ry step the cross draws near:
The King of glory’s throne.
Astride a colt He passes by
As loud hosannas ring,
Or else the very stones would cry
“Behold, behold your King!”
Every year it amazes me how in a few short days, the cries of the crowd will change from “Hosanna!” to “Crucify!” And yet, whether I can comprehend the matter or not, it is what it needed to be. . .it was always part of God’s plan for our salvation, just as He foretold through His prophets.
Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many,
and he shall divide the spoil with the strong,
because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors;
yet he bore the sin of many,
and makes intercession for the transgressors. (Isaiah 53:12)
Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem!
Behold, your king is coming to you;
righteous and having salvation is he,
humble and mounted on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey. (Zechariah 9:9)
And it isn’t even Palm Sunday yet. 
This afternoon I finally finished hemming the dress (8 gores!) and then assembled and attached the flowers. The dress is #16 from Ottobre Design 2/2002 and is a yellow linen blend. The bodice is lined in white muslin and the roses are from white linen scraps. I made this in size 122 using the length of size 128.
The little jacket is white rayon-lycra jersey (I think!!!) with yellow gingham ribbon for the ties. It’s also size 122 and is #34 from 3/2006.
Lost boy update: #2’s throat was fine by the time he woke up this morning, but #4 now has a mysterious sore bottom. We have no idea what, exactly, hurts, so we’re stuck listening to periodic cries of “my bottom is huuuurting mooooommy” that we can’t do anything about. Never a dull moment. . .
It was time for dinner and lost boy #2 was missing. I finally found him sitting in the bathroom, crying because his throat hurt. Ummm. . .scratchy? while swallowing? what? He couldn’t provide any further details so I told him dinner was ready and went back upstairs to eat with the rest of the kids. When I checked on him after I ate, he had put on his pajamas and crawled into bed. So much for that 4-H meeting tonight!!! Well, there’s always next month, right?
Moral of this story: Don’t blog about anything that isn’t in past tense yet.
Updates & other random thoughts
Published March 13, 2008 education , family , friends , sewing , shopping 1 CommentThankfully Larry seems to be back to normal now, although he’s had to work hard to stay awake. It seems that the doctor told him NO caffeine, as that weakens the muscle (?) between esophagus and stomach, allowing the acid to escape. We’ll see how long this lasts! He’s also taking a handful of medications; please don’t ask me what they are.
All of the kids are more-or-less healthy, and busy tracking mud into the house. I should have given up mopping for Lent; every time I mop the kitchen it gets mucked up again in less time than it took to clean it. <sigh> And if red mud on gray tile weren’t bad enough, there’s also the occasional muddy bootprints going down the newly carpeted stairs to boyland the basement.
Thank you for the sewing compliments! It’s my main attempt to help keep my sanity; I only wish there were more hours in a day so that I could be more sane.
Tonight the two older boys go to their first 4-H meeting; we missed last month because no one told us when or where to show up. Unfortunately the meeting is at 7pm and Larry has adult instruction tonight, so it will be a second late night in a row for the short people. Some of them will really be feeling it too; after getting to bed late last night (after church) I found some of them up before the sun this morning, watching PBS Kids. I was not amused. . .
Today was a good mail day. . .no bills, just the local paper and a large box of chocolate from my dear friend Lauri! Thank you Lauri! 
American Girl has free shipping through Sunday (March 16). . .the girl ordered some paper dolls with the last of her birthday money, and I also picked up a few clearance items to stuff her stocking come December. Now to intercept the UPS man and get those items out of the box before she notices!
We’ve been reading a lot about Ancient Greece in history lately, using The Story of the World. We haven’t done many projects lately (not that we usually do many, but in the interest of catching up after moving we’ve done even less), but at the library this week I found books on Greek food and on crafts of ancient Greece. I let the kids do some of the background reading and then pick their own project; lost boy #1 is currently making Greek Christmas cookies (which makes me wonder how I’m going to get in the kitchen to fix dinner tonight, but that’s beside the point). Lost boy #2 and the girl both chose craft projects; of course we need to buy some supplies before they can start! I think he is making a paper mache pot (vase?) and she is making clay beads. . .stay tuned for pictures.
These vests have actually been sewn awhile, but it wasn’t until the other day that I finally sat down and sewed buttons on the last one. The boys all picked their own vest fabrics from the ‘quilting blenders’ at www.fabric.com (all but the orange have stars); the buttons and lining (plain ol’ muslin) are from stash. I’ve used this Simplicity pattern for many vests (and bowties) over the past 5-6 years. They’ll wear these with their white dress shirts and khaki trousers.
I went to church this morning after all, but only because Larry was feeling too poorly to conduct worship this morning. Instead, he ended up holding down the couch with yesterday’s sick boy (who seems well now, just tired).
I’m still not clear ‘where he hurts’ other than lying down, talking, and walking all seem to make it worse. He got up early this morning to find a sermon to print up for an elder to read (he preaches from an outline, not exactly something you can hand to someone else!). While he was gone I figured there was no point in all of us missing church so I got myself and the rest of the kids ready to go. Leaving doesn’t sound like a very good wifey thing to do, but I am as poor a nurse as he is a patient.
After church, we dropped him off at the local ER to be poked and prodded. I don’t know that they figured out exactly what was wrong but when we picked him up again he had a list of prescriptions to fill and his papers talked about tension headaches, non-specific chest pain, and esophagitis. Now he is back to holding down the couch. . .
