So Much I Should Be Doing

When I get home from work today I am going to write on my whiteboard this note to myself - Have you done your 15 minutes today? This is to remind me to spend 15 minutes a day decluttering, cleaning, tossing or whatever I want or whatever needs to be done. If I'd been doing this for the past 2 years, my house would be free of junk and easy to keep clean - right now I can't clean because of all the stuff and I just look and ignore, so it never improves.

If I really want a house that I can freely invite people to enter, or stay (and I say that I do) then I must get serious about making it that way. There isn't anyone but me to do it, and while I semi-whine that it's John's stuff that is the main culprit, that's just an excuse - there are a lot of things that are my responsibility, not his.

The note will also serve to encourage me to take another 15 minutes and exercise, probably mostly on the treadmill initially, but adding some variety later.

I use it as an excuse but it is going to take some determination to not just get home after 11 hours at work and collapse on the chair like I've trained myself to do. I certainly have enough energy remaining to spend 1/2 an hour being good to the house and myself. The house will be better and so will I.

Right With the Lord

It was the fifth Sunday today and our new Bishop, Bishop Wells gave the joint Priesthood/Relief Society lesson. He talked about the last days and all the anxieties that could and can affect us. What we all need to remember is the Lord is in control, and if we give ourselves over to God in terms of living the gospel and being obedient and perhaps most difficult, trusting God to do what He says He will do, then there won't be anything we can't handle.

I'm in two choirs right now - my own Tropicana Ward and also Hacienda Ward. The Hacienda ward choir will be performing for both wards on the 14th. I had made sure it was the 2nd Sunday before I went to rehearse with them so it wouldn't conflict with the 3rd Sunday where I teach in Relief Society. Sister Enrico asked me today if I could teach my lesson on the 2nd Sunday instead as they have a special lesson prepared. She was going to check with her board and see if they could switch the special lesson to the 14th since I'd already made the choir commitment. It would probably be ok if I didn't sing for the Hacienda program, but I don't like backing out if I can help it.

Tithing settlement was this evening as well. I got a chance to visit with the Bishop and declare that I was a full tithe payer. He asked about what blessings I'd seen from paying tithing and I couldn't point to any specific blessing and say that was from paying tithing - but I do know that a whole lot of blessings come from it. It might be a blessing of protection - the destroyer passed by and didn't come in. I'd never know that happened, but it would be a blessing. Moderating challenges, having sufficient for my needs, health, and so much more.

I am going to pay more attention to the blessings I receive and the impressions I sometimes get regarding the reasons they enter my life. The Lord is so good to me.

More Rain and Quiet Thanksgiving

A wonderful day with more rain in the desert. I love how it smells during and after a rain storm, it's one of the best smells in the world.

I was coughing off and on today so opted out of the places I could go on this Thanksgiving Day. It may have been nothing, but I didn't want to give anyone a cold for the holiday season.

It was a day for finishing up a knitting project, making refrigerator bread dough, doing Family Search indexing and loving on the cats.

I need to cook up the turkey breast I bought earlier in the week sometime over this extended week.

Tonight will be a prayer just of thanksgiving. I have a home, and the gospel, a reliable car and financial security. I have friends and cats and scriptures and the blessings of the resurrection and atonement of Jesus Christ. I have skills for blessing others and my own enjoyment. I have health. I had a wonderful childhood with goodly parents and noble ancestors.

It's worthwhile to ponder sometimes and just focus on all that the Lord has given me. The more often I do it the more I recognize blessings and tender mercies every day of my life.

It's Raining

I love the rain. When the alarm went off, and Shadow took up his post on the headboard, ready to paw the clock if I didn't get up in the requisite 9 minutes I heard the sound of rain, and water running off the roof. Bee-uuu-tii-fulll sound.


Shadow on the Top of the Headboard

Living in a desert we don't see rain very often, and it's even less now than when I first moved here. Some years we get rain in the summer, sometimes it's in the winter. I'm hearing the rain fall as I type this and smelling that wonderful scrubbed clean air. I went to get my umbrella, and of course its not where I knew it was, so time for a bit of a hunt I guess, but right now I get to go scritch Sachi - she's wanting attention and doesn't come to me for it. I have to go to her.


Sachi Being Beautiful

It's a short day at work for me too, by 11:00am I'll have put in my 24 hours of work this week. I like those sorts of days.

Good Friends

My friends and neighbors, the Burdens came over yesterday and did some yardwork for me. Greg had asked me at church on Sunday if they could come by and I agreed. It was dark when I arrived home so I couldn't see all that they had done, but the front lawn was mowed and there were several bags of trash as well as a couple of trash cans out at the curb.


A before shot of the front yard

I could have done all this myself, but I'd had months to get to it and didn't so I'm grateful for the love and service they gave me. They are good and wonderful people.


An Aftershot

Dewey the Cat and Shadow the Cat

I was reading a book today about a library cat named Dewey Readmore Books, rescued from a book drop as a starved frostbitten kitten. He changed the lives of many in good ways by his life and affection. The author of the book and the 'owner' of Dewey realized that all through his life she had held him and he had held her. He died in his 19th year in her arms as the vet sent him to the next life.

Shadow is for me as Dewey was for her. He came into my life in 2005 just months after the end of my 30 year marriage. He has been a loving companion and unconditional support through all the dark days. He waits for me to come home, he prefers to eat only when I'm with him, he sleeps on my shoulder when I'm sitting and by my side when I sleep. If he's not next to me he's where he can see me.



God blessed me with Him. He is a tender mercy from a loving Heavenly Father, a little gray abandoned kitten that has become a strength and a joy in every day of my life. Even now he is stretched on my shoulder, purring.

The First Commandment first

... which is the great commandment in the law?
Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. (JKV Matthew 22:36-37)

We live in a world where good people are filled with confusion about what is right and what is not. We are appropriately encouraged to treat each other kindly, to be tolerant of differences, to be respectful of every human being.

Toleration does not mean we must agree. Toleration does not mean we must accept behavior or teachings that are contrary to our beliefs. Toleration means we allow others to be different from us, not that we roll over, give in, and surrender when beliefs and institutions are threatened.

And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. (JKV Matthew 22:39)

Noble as this second commandment is - it is the second commandment, not the first. If in an effort to love our neighbors we abandon the first commandment, then we've got things backwards. Our loyalty and obedience belongs first to God and His teachings. We cannot keep faith with God if we abandon the laws He has given us in an attempt to "love" our neighbor. That is why we must always love one another, but never accept sin against God's laws as ok.

The Great War

And Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels,and prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. (JKV Revelation 12:7-9)

The battles we fight today against the will of God are part of that same war begun before we ever came to earth. Wherever there is hatred, or contention, wherever there is evil calling itself good and good being called evil there is a battle in this war. Wherever good people do nothing while other good people are under siege, there is another front in the conflict. Wherever we try to sit on the fence and not be involved, there the dragon grins, for apathy is as good a tool in his arsenal as is activism.

The final outcome of this war is certain. What is right and good will prevail, the devil and his angels will be cast out where they no longer tempt and confuse and lead away the Children of God. The only question we really need to ask is this: What side am I fighting on?

Happiness and Stuff

How much is too much? How much is more than we need? How much does it take to be happy?

Its been a long time since I posted anything here, but lately my mind has been going around and around on various topics, Stock Market thrill ride, Bailouts, Buying and Spending, Charity, Service, Happiness. Today some of all this jelled for me. Americans are often villified by the rest of the world for our rampant consumerism and consumption and certainly we do a lot of that. The last time I located statistics we were also the most generous and giving people in the world as well, a fact rarely seen in the media here or elsewhere in the world. So we have more and we give more, perhaps there is a connection there. Do we give because we have or do we have because we give and are thereby blessed as a result? I favor the latter.

Father Jonathan, a Catholic Priest and contributor to Fox News made mention on how the Wall Street crisis has caused some who work there to rethink their priorities. They are realizing that it's not stuff that is important or makes one happy, its people, and service. It's a lesson we all can take to heart.

One way I see for this country to re-awaken to the blessings that are ours and find where real happiness lies is to realize that stuff means very little. How many clothes are sufficient, how many pairs of shoes are really necessary, do we really need that new car, will that bigger house make us happy? I submit - they will not.

Currently I can't think of a way to accomplish what has been going on in my head, but I feel it is a way to make the pie bigger so we all have a piece of it. Our economy, or much of it is driven by our consumerism. If we all stopped buying things we don't need and that won't make us happy, we'd have some additional economic challenges to face. However, those 5 pairs of shoes I didn't buy could be shoes that went to others who did need them.

-OR-

Maybe what we need to do is continue to buy and spend because we have, but instead of buying for us we buy for others. I could send those five pairs of shoes to someplace that could use them. I could buy extra clothes, extra coats, extra school materials and see that they go where they are needed.

To a degree we do this when we donate our used, but useable goods to charity and that is still wise. Giving of our abundance with new goods could be an even greater blessing.

We give from the abundance we have because of our charity to our fellowmen. Our economy can thrive, and the world is enriched as well - the pie has become bigger. Eventually those places that our goods go to in charity will become strong economically as well, when we strive to enable self-reliance, both in us and in all the world. Crushing poverty can lead to despair, but simple lives with sufficient for our needs is a much more joyful way to live.

We do not need forced redistribution of wealth, we do not need new social programs or agencies, or more taxes; we just need the love of man in our hearts and a means of distributing that which is freely given.

Rite of Spring - memories

I woke from a sound sleep this morning to the strains of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. It brought back wonderful memories of growing up and sharing a room with my younger sister. Believe it or not we would insist that after we had a bedtime story that we wanted to go to sleep listening to the 'Dinosaur music', the original Disney Fantasia version of Rite of Spring. So from the living room they would crank up the old lp player (which wasn't old then) and put on that portion of Fantasia and we'd usually fall fast asleep.

If you've ever heard the piece you are right to wonder how on earth children would want to go to sleep with that violent-sounding powerful music linked to dinosaur battles, and dinosaur marches and great volcanic explosions, but we did - we just loved it.

It was a fond remembrance - one of those tender mercies of the Lord and something worth remembering.

What's in Your Backpack?

I watched a talk John Bytheway gave to an assembly of High School Students today. Among many things he spoke about were five things we can do to get through life better. We can't change the trail but we can lighten our backpacks so the journey isn't as hard.

1. Best way to get the weight our of your backpack is to help others get the weight out of theirs.


2. Spend time with your family and loved ones - nothing else gives us more regret than lost time with family


3. Popularity only lasts till yearbook day - respect lasts a lifetime


4. Focus on what you can give - instead of what you can get.


5. Don't do things that will kill you.

Good advice for us all.

Gifts of the Atonement

It was our Stake Conference today. Much was said that touched me and I expect to make several posts regarding what I learned. Our Stake theme for this year is: Sharing the Power of the Atonement

Here are seven gifts that the Atonement has made available to mankind:

1. The Resurrection - all of us will rise from the dead, never to die again.


2. The means to repent - a way that can free us from our sins.


3. The power to forgive others - a way to free us from bitterness and hatred.


4. The redemption of little children - children are free from original sin.


5. Those who have lived without the law can be redeemed - all of God's children will have access to salvation, regardless of where or when they lived.


6. Jesus knows all our trials - He can therefore know our pain and suffering and how to rescue and aid us.


7. Physical and emotional healing - Because he knows and has experienced all we may suffer he can heal us from our distresses.


8. Being filled with the love of God - the Atonement, when accepted and understood, will fill our hearts with overflowing love for our Savior and also all His children.

Knowing and understanding the Atonement can help us to feel for all of God's children the same way we might feel about our own children - that we don't want to ever lose any of them.

A New Year and New Possibilities

For the most part I don't make New Year's resolutions anymore - having found that I rarely manage to keep them for long. What I do try and do is re-commit to doing the things I should be doing and generally am doing - just better. Some people can charge forward quickly and be successful quickly, then go on to more things. Some of us run at a slower speed, but this is ok too, it's less about the speed than the destination, and enjoying the journey.

I signed up to Ravelry.com, a web site for knitters and crocheters. It's still in beta, but you can sign up to be added as they are adding several hundred people a day to the site. It's a place to organize, keep track of, share and get ideas from other knitters and crocheters. So far I like it a lot.

I've been thinking of my Dad a lot lately as his estate gets closed out and his things get given away or sold. I miss him and Mom, but my fondest memories are from years ago and I'll have those always.

This year I will give thanks every day.
I will smile more often - and every day.
I'll remember that I'm a daughter of God,
And He loves me no matter what.