weekending - Christmas weekend and favorite moments

 

Happy Monday, friends! I hope you had a wonderful weekend and Christmas day! We did...it was made even more special by what I'm about to share. I said I probably wasn't going to write a blog post for today, but apparently I like to eat my words. Here's why, though—I stayed home all weekend and got so much done that I had the time to write. 

We got a very light dusting of snow Thursday night, which then turned icy when the temps stayed below freezing. It's beautiful! It was the closest to a white Christmas we'll ever get, most likely. Anyway, as you know, I finished all my shopping on Wednesday of last week, I wrapped everything on Thursday, I stuffed the stockings at five thirty on Friday morning, and then...

I was done. This gave me lots of free time, so I made some goodies for the boys to eat, I cleaned a little, I read a book, and I watched movies. Which is why I'm sharing today...I have some favorites from the weekend I wanted to share with you. I'll start with the beautiful and light snow that we got Thursday night. I put them in chronological order, because I am me, and of course I would do that. This is Thursday night, then Friday morning...etc.

Have you ever heard the song Winter Snow by Audrey Assad with Chris Tomlin? It's one of my favorites! I'll share it here in case you want to listen. The snow falling on Thursday night reminded me of this song.

It was so pretty! It was cold and crystal clear on Friday, which is my favorite kind of weather. I love how the white adds a touch of sparkle to everything. Our sons that live with us stayed out with friends all day, so I never saw them. Drew got to leave work early because of the cold and Noah's work never even opened for the same reason. I was so glad to hear this! Todd ended up going into work for the sheriff's department that night, so I made myself a yummy dinner that my friend Debbie at Millie's Cozy Cottage inspired. 

It's not the best picture, but it was delicious. I made a grilled cheese sandwich on our electric griddle using wheat bread with a lower fat butter spread for the outsides, a tiny bit of mayo and Dijon mustard, and provolone and Colby Jack cheese (one slice of each). 

While I ate my dinner of the sandwich, homemade Chex mix and some orange slices, I watched the cutest movie ever! It's one that my friend Amy at Coffee and Cocktails at the Casa recommended. 

Have you seen About Fate? It was so good! I watched it on Prime TV. I appreciated Amy recommending it to me. It will definitely be a favorite for years to come! And this sweet picture of Callie is another favorite. 

Have I mentioned lately that Drew is Callie's person? I am always taking pictures like this and sending them to him. When he comes home, she's the first one he goes to and she acts so differently with him. I know she misses him! She still sleeps in Drew's old room that belongs to Noah now. Noah likes our dogs, but not like the rest of us, so he's a little indifferent about Callie sleeping in his room each night. 

Other favorites include the obvious... our candlelight Christmas eve service, Christmas day and being with family. I don't take any of these moments for granted! What was the favorite part of your weekend? I would love to hear your answers! I am always interested in how people spend a holiday and the things they love about the day. 

Here are a few of my favorite moments from Christmas day.

They keep me laughing and alternately shaking my head. It was the BEST day. 

Thanks for reading my blog, friends! I'll see you back here tomorrow. Love to all! 

Share 4 Somethings (December 2022)

 

Happy day to you, friends! I don't know which day I'll post this, but regardless of the day, it's a bonus post. Tis the season for them, apparently! I'm linking up with Heather one last time for her Share 4 Somethings link party. I have LOVED being a part of these over the last couple of years and was saddened to hear that she wasn't going to continue on with them in 2023. Many bloggers I know and love also enjoy this link party, so I had a thought...since I took over Anne's monthly Currently posts and had such a great response, I decided to offer the same thing to Heather. (About all those links...I just want you to know that I was not the creator of those link parties. They were and I want to make sure they get the credit for such creative ideas!) Like Anne, Heather took me up on the offer, and I am excited to start! Below is all the information you need to know to schedule your posts for this beginning in January. I hope you join us in the fun! 

I will host this party on the LAST SATURDAY of every month, beginning with Saturday, January 28th, 2023. Each and every month, the topics will remain the same. We will talk about the THINGS we are loving, reading, learning and eating. If you joined in with Heather for these parties, you'll notice she used the past tense of her choice words each year. I decided to make my version the present tense of the words I chose, because that's how I see things like that I'm loving—as a current and ongoing thing. I hope you'll make plans to join us! I am excited to read about recipes that you'll share in the months to come...I am always in need of some dinner inspiration, my friends, particularly if it's something both healthy and delicious. 

And with that last, I'll segue into the rest of this fun post. I already told you what I loved this month in the top paragraph, so I'll continue on with something I gleaned this month. I gleaned that I thrive under pressure sometimes. Notice I said sometimes, not all the times. I'll give you an example. The last two weeks have been insanely busy. I've had so much going on that I have barely had time to stop and savor the moments and catch my breath. I say that but I am not complaining about it, I promise. I love this time of year and all that it brings! I've had my Christmas worship night and the rehearsals leading up to it, I've had work three days a week, I've had get-togethers with friends who wanted to meet up, I went out of town for one full day (eleven hours and one full tank of gas), I have had to finish shopping, and then I've had all the normal things the rest of you also have—shopping, cooking, meal planning, wrapping, Christmas gift shopping, cleaning the house, etc. Throw in my birthday and being sick last week for good measure and you get the gist of what I'm saying. 

Because of all that, I've been SUPER organized about all the things I need to remember and I've been getting things done. I've never felt so productive in all of my life. So, I gleaned that when it counts, I thrive under pressure. As a side note that I talked about in yesterday's post, and because I didn't have enough going on, I started a huge writing project Tuesday afternoon. This isn't the writing project that I'm committed to with my writing team friends from church...(the four of us write Bible studies together, for anyone who didn't know)...this is something new and exciting that the Lord gave to me as an idea during my quiet time on Tuesday morning. I was praying and catching up with my Bible reading, and He put this thought in my heart. I don't want to share too much in case I don't follow through with it, but it involves me and writing a book. (Don't be surprised, I've actually written several but never had them published.) I was greatly inspired and had to start writing before I forgot about all the ideas I had. The only other person I've shared this with besides you is my oldest son Graham. I'm excited at what could be to come in 2023! 

(Pictured above are my beautiful writing friends. Left to right is Barbee, myself, Amy and Lynn.)

Something I braved in December were the Christmas crowds. I have to daily remind myself to be patient, kind, loving and all the other things God's word says in Galatians 5:22-23. I'll share that passage below:

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (Galatians 5:22-23)

Something I achieved this month are all the things I have already listed above! It's been a great month and while I have loved almost every minute, I will be glad when the hustle and bustle is over and done with. Maybe that's the reason January always feels slow. Maybe it's because we needed that after a full and merry month. 

Talk about weary. I also always look forward to the week between Christmas and the new year.

What's something you loved, gleaned, braved or achieved this month that you're proud of? I'd love to hear from you! Thank for reading my blog, friends. Love to all! 

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Share Four Somethings is a monthly link-up that Heather started back in 2018. The concept was to share the same four topics every month as a way to look back and recap your month. While some topics have changed over the years, some have remained. (We're looking at you, Something Loved!) We have enjoyed this monthly reflection as well as getting to know the others who have joined on this adventure.

The link-up opens on the last Saturday of every month and will stay open for three weeks. The topics for 2022 were Something Loved, Something Gleaned, Something Braved (and NEW option Something Saved), and Something Achieved. In 2023, we will share the THINGS we are loving, reading, learning and eating. I hope you will join us each month! Just write your post, maybe add a picture or a few and then link back here to me at Overflowing with Thankfulness. I can't wait to read all that you have to say in the coming year. Thanks in advance for joining in with us! 

a couple of my favorite Christmas songs and the story of how my blog came to be

 

Happy Tuesday, friends! I have a funny story about this picture above. I saw my sister post it last year on Instagram and when I enlarged it, I realized that those were my words that I'd written in an online devotional for Tirzah Magazine. The image is one they created, but the words were mine. She had no idea! Isn't that hilarious? And so crazy that the huge internet can sometimes feel small. 

I thought I'd share a few favorite Christmas songs I love today and the story of how my blog came to be a thing. I hope you enjoy reading this post!

First up is Come Thou Long Expected Jesus by Meredith Andrews. 

Next up is an old favorite: Heaven Everywhere by Francesca Battestelli.

I believe that music is an excellent thing to use in your home. It fills the quiet spaces, it brightens the mood and the right kind is relaxing to dogs, at least according to Dad and me. I've taken to leaving some on for them when I leave the house. One day last week, I even left a YouTube screensaver going for them, one for dogs. It was Christmas-y and there were birds chirping and flitting about. I'm not sure how much they enjoyed it, but it never hurts to have something to distract them with. 

I can't remember if I've ever shared the story of how my blog title came to be. I started it in 2007 with my first post, as I mentioned last week, but I didn't come back to write much that year. I really started posting faithfully in 2008, at a time in life when I was in the throes of raising young boys. Life was busy and complicated, but the exact day that I started this blog was on a day when I had a panic attack over all that my husband had going on right then. It was in the winter or the spring of that year and he was in the hospital recovering from a major abdominal surgery and a hernia repair. He had a tumor in his stomach that everyone thought was cancerous, but it was caused by the acid in his stomach. They were never fully sure it wasn't cancer until they were able to get in and do a biopsy. It wasn't, but I remember being overwhelmed at all that an abdominal surgery is—very difficult on the patient and with lots of iv's going in and out of everywhere, including an NG tube. 

As a young 30 year old mom with four boys aged 4-8 years old, all of this was hugely overwhelming. I wasn't able to leave his side hardly at all, but at the insistence of both him and one of his nurses, I left one day and came home to take a shower and to see the boys. I don't remember them being here, though...I guess they were staying with grandparents at the time, but while I was at home and in what was then an office upstairs, the phone rang. I answered it and it was the mom of one of his friends that volunteered on the fire department with him. I'll never forget her not asking about him, but asking about me and how I was coping. (She had recently lost her own husband to cancer.) I probably wasn't truthful at first and probably replied with the standard, "I'm fine, how are you?", but she wouldn't accept it. She told me that it was okay to let my guard down with her and that I could NOT be strong for a few minutes. I immediately burst into tears! We ended up being on the phone for close to an hour, and after I hung up, I wrote and published my first blog post. I wish I could find it for you, but I have tried several times and can't go back that far. 

Anyway, Todd turned out just fine, he eventually got to come home from the hospital after a seven day stay, he recovered well and life went on. I was overwhelmingly grateful for all of this and feeling all the things when I came across a couple of Bible verses in my quiet time one day. These are Colossians 2:6-7 in the NLT translation. I'll write them out for you.

And now, just as you accepted Christ Jesus as your Lord, you must continue to follow him. Let your roots grown down into him, and let your lives be built on him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness. 

I changed the title once or twice, but I always came back to those verses. Even if things had turned out vastly different, I can honestly say that God has been incredibly good and faithful to our family. He has carried us through countless things and several health scares, like the one I shared about Todd in the early days of our family. I can promise you that I mean every single word I say when I say that I am thankful for the goodness of God and all that He is to me. I literally cannot even imagine what my life without Him would look like, and it's something I don't want to even think about. One of my sayings is that even for a believer, life is hard, but without Jesus it would feel impossible. What those verses say above is true—He has made my faith strong through His word and He has caused me to overflow with thankfulness. I hope that my blog always reflects Jesus and the love He offers. 

Many of you have blogs. How did your blog and title come about? I would genuinely love to hear this story. I probably know a few of the stories already, but I love to share and read this kind of thing. Thanks for reading my blog today, friends! Love to all. 

Wednesday in the Word

 

Happy Wednesday, friends. 

I hope that by the time you read this you've spent time with Jesus. I don't always have that time with Him early in the morning, but by seven thirty or eight each morning, I am sitting down to pray and to read the Word of God. I don't tell you this to shame you, I say that to encourage you to do that and never to neglect time with Him every day. We have time to shop or watch tv or talk on the phone or play on social media, but have you spent time with Jesus? Do you spend as much time talking to Him about something as you do talking to others about something? These are good questions to ponder in your heart—and on that note, I am going to share a verse with you that Pastor Chuck read to us in the sermon Sunday, one that won't quite leave me alone.

But Mary was treasuring up all these things in her heart and meditating on them. Luke 2:19

There are so many things going on in so many of our lives right now, and if not in our own lives, then in this world we live in. Do you ever just observe all that goes on around you in any given moment? Do you sit and wonder how people ever get by without the hope of Jesus and the knowledge that His Word is true? I was out doing Christmas things with Dad yesterday and I had that thought. People were hurrying in and out of stores quickly and so few were taking the time to see the others near them. There was a sense of being frantic and as much fun as Dad and I had together, it made me sad to see that reaction in people. 

On the flip side of that, are you ever just completely overwhelmed with something that you know was a move from the hand of God in a certain situation? I witnessed such a thing just Monday night. I have a friend whose sister has cancer and had to go to Mayo Clinic for surgery and the outcome was far more than we had ever dared hope for or could even imagine. God provided a miracle to my friend's sister and to her family and I, along with many others, had the privilege of being a tiny part of it as someone who prayed for her the day of her surgery. We had the faith to believe that God could give her a miracle, but we didn't know if He would. When we don't understand why or why not God does something, I refer to that as His sovereignty. We don't have to understand, but we can know and trust that He is sovereign and we know from Isaiah 55:8-9 that His ways are far better than our own.

Do you ever wonder what Mary must have felt, the night she gave birth to Jesus, the Son of God that we read about in Luke 2? You can read the whole story in Luke 2:1-20. I love the verse above: she treasured up all those things in her heart and meditated on them. That word used for treasuring is from a Greek word that means to preserve or to keep close or safe. Why do we preserve things? We do that to keep them safe or to be forever preserved in time. Maybe Mary wanted to keep these things safe in her heart where she knew it would be forever preserved in time.

This makes me think of where we are right now in the time we live in. There are so many things going on around us in the dark world we live in and I have so many thoughts about all of it, but I keep the thoughts hidden in my heart and only those I am closest to know them. I talk to Jesus about them, because He knows what is in my heart and because sometimes I imagine Him sitting with me at my kitchen table while I have coffee and pray. I imagine my prayer as our conversation, much like I would have with my best friend. 

When I have this time with Him and pray these prayers and thoughts, I am keeping them safe in my heart for that moment, because I am waiting on Him to act and to make a move. I know and trust that He will at any given moment and I don't know what His move will be, but I have the faith to know and believe that He will help us through whatever happens in the future.

When my friend whose sister got that unexpected good report from the doctors there at Mayo Clinic, I know her heart was overwhelmed. Don't you know that Mary was overwhelmed with what was happening that holy night in Bethlehem? Don't you think she had many questions about what was to come? Maybe she had questions, maybe she didn't—but she believed and trusted in the Lord.

Don't so many of us have questions right now, in this present day?

I don't talk about my thoughts much, because they're reserved for Jesus. I can do that and leave my concerns and burdens at His feet and I trust Him with the outcome. When I pour out my heart to Him, He brings me peace that surpasses all understand (Philippians 4:7). When I talk to others about them, I find myself flustered and anxious.

Mary knew what had happened to her and she trusted the Lord because He sent to her an angel to tell her what would take place. She believed in her heart. She didn't have to talk to others, because she knew that what she had heard was true.

Today we have the Bible, which is the Word of God. John 1:1 tells us, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Faith is defined in Hebrews 11:1 as the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen.

If you have faith that God is who His Word says He is, you have to trust in Him. If you have faith and when you trust Him, don't you long for Heaven? Our world is stained dark with sin and sin is what separates a sinner from God. The only way back to Him is through His Son, Jesus. Jesus is the Light of the world and He is our hope and our salvation. When I look around me, I long for a place I've never seen and I long for Jesus to return for us, our long expected King. 

I am going to leave you with some lyrics to a song I've had on repeat all week and the link to a video on YouTube. Watch the video and pay attention to the lyrics and turn it into your prayer, your praise and confession to God the Father and His Son, Jesus. 

Here is a link to the song and below are part of the lyrics to the song. 

Come, thou long expected Jesus

Born to set thy people free

From our fears and sins release us

Let us find our rest in thee

Israel's strength and consolation

Hope of all the earth thou art

Dear desire of every nation

Joy of every longing heart

Born thy people to deliver

Born a child and yet a king

Born to reign in us forever

Now thy gracious kingdom bring

By thine own eternal spirit

Rule in all our hearts alone

By thine own sufficient merit

Raise us to thy glorious throne

By thine own sufficient merit

Raise us to thy glorious throne

I pray these words, the song and the lyrics to that song are a blessing to you. Don't just listen, turn them into your praise to the Lord. He alone is worthy of all our praise, if you're a believer and follower of Him. Speaking of that, do you know Him? If not, don't wait! Reach out to someone today, none of us are promised tomorrow. 

Thanks for reading my blog, friends. Love to all. 

Jen.