All posts in Better Check Out Links

Love Your Enemy

by admin on November 29, 2011 in Better Check Out Links, Feeling It (Thankful), People In My Heart with No comments

43-47“You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.

~Matthew 5:43 (The Message)

Even Christians squirm at this teaching of Christs. It is easy to forget how powerful a love Jesus has called us to live in. We are called to live in HIS love and not ours. It is easy to do what is only natural and not go above and beyond loving those you find it easy to embrace, but this doesn’t make it right for us to turn from his clear teachings. Often that which is easy isn’t what is right and we know that deep down.

All the walls preventing us from practising this teaching come from a root of selfishness. If we are walking in our own strength we will slip into the mindset of the world, but then why call oneself a Christian if we don’t seek to live as Christ?

Living his way is only accomplished by sacrificing your whole self to living in and through him. Jesus is more then willing to take all you and your STUFF on. Are you willing to take on a completely counter cultural saviour?

P.S. May your heart be stirred to remember, when faced with a seeming foe, that Christ saw EVERYONE as worth loving. They might not be worthy of it, we aren’t usually worthy of it either, but Jesus declared they and we worth him dying on the cross.

For an inspiring message CLICK HERE to listen to the audio recording.

TTFN

START

by admin on November 22, 2011 in Better Check Out Links, Feeling It (Thankful) with No comments

Gleaned from a speaker from this weekends past ‘Spoken Word’ conference:

We are all called, in the great commission, to go out and make disciples for the Lord. You have the freedom to make any mistake and be forgiven! Give your choices to the Lord and He will lead you, then go out with out fear of making mistakes (that shows a lack of trust in Christ).

We aren’t talking freedom to sin and screw up outside of a motive to glorify God. Going about this selfishly is in its self a sin, licentiousness, defined as the abuse of grace and hospitality. Exercise that behaviour and you yourself will endanger your heart.

TRUST, ACT and do all for the Glory of God and in Christ alone.

TTFN

Victoria Awake

by admin on October 10, 2011 in Better Check Out Links, Music Flavor with No comments
Hi readers:)
My brothers band is releasing their first full CD soon and could use some publicity.
They love CBC (a Canadian Radio Station) and if you
click THIS LINK and give the song a spin
you will help raise their profile!
THANKS!

TTFN

Autumn Walks and Bearded Dragons

by admin on September 30, 2011 in Better Check Out Links, Bits Of My Personality, Dem Kids Sayed WHAT?, Little Things, Mama Heart Mushings, The Pet with No comments
(Yes this is a picture from last fall… with no camera I have to try to enjoy my favourite season without picture taking and so I have been looking through last years collection.)


Baby Boy, Riddick and I walked the big kids to the bus. As the bus pulled up my littlest guy yelled ‘LOOK a clue!’… he had been watching “Blue’s Clues” just this morning so I suppose he was still hunting down clues. It was so lovely that we walked slowly home kicking at leaves and talking about the wind… Baby Boy doesn’t like the wind… “Iz nice out Mama. Iz windy dow.”

We had to kick around at home for a while before going for our walk. We had decided to go to ‘Tumble Weed’, a thrift store just down our street, but it wouldn’t be open till ten and we where home by 8:30. When we did head out Riddick had to stay home so we could shop. My boy lead the way and so we took it very very very slow. I was such a well behaved Mama today and even pointed out possible distractions for him. “Look honey a big bunch of leaves! Throw them at me!”
Some how we still arrived at Sherbrook half an hour before the store was going to open!

Thank goodness for Bonny and Clyde! They are the residents bearded dragons and are still little and very social. They where watching my little man just as much as he was watching them. The lady who takes care of them noticed how nice Baby Boy was being and so showed him how she gives them a bath. “It is more of a shower,” she explained as she sprayed them down with a little spritzer bottle. They obviously thought it was cold as she blinked at her and tried to get away from the spray. She then set out their morning salad and we enjoyed watching their sticky tongues pop out and snatch food. She then got them to jump for us, a cute trick of theirs and petted them and carried them cradled in her hand. You could tell they just loved her, for as soon as her hand was in the pen they ran and climbed up her, even rubbing at her wrist almost like a cat or dog would. One of the few lizards awake during the day and even friendly when wild I could see why they where a popular pet. We decided we will have to come visit them again.

We did a little shopping and my little man found a noisy 50 cent truck while I was tickled over the two pretty tea cups I got (only a buck each). As we left Baby Boy thanked the volunteer at the store and said good bye to everyone we passed. He is a very friendly guy to all the residents there and we will have to pop in more often.

Walking home was just as slow but also just as lovely. Crisp fall air, beautiful colors and me and my boy holding hands meant I was in no hurry to get home. By the way we where home before eleven and so still have so much more loveliness, in this day, yet to come.

TTFN

Lit

by admin on September 17, 2011 in Better Check Out Links, Bits Of My Personality, Feeling It (Thankful), People In My Heart with 1 Comment


Hours… I have been rocking for hours. The night is old, the house is still, with the exception of my whole body moving the rocker back and forth back and forth. All would be silent if I was not still humming a lullaby softly, almost mechanically, to my baby girl.

She is my first baby… I am a first time mommy… but the transition from woman to mother was instantaneous. The learning curve steep, the hours long… the stress unlike anything else I have faced… I am bone tired, my brain is on autopilot most of the time and I am often weepy BUT I am a fighter. I am devoted. I am with out a choice and yet I still choose to be her long suffering mommy.

There is a fire in my chest that was lit the moment we began our relationship and each subsequent sibling would add to that fire. It is a unquenchable passion for my children that is beyond the physical. It doesn’t require me to be loud and proud or to express enthusiasm physically… it is deep and constant and certain.

For the first time ever I listened to a message on passion in the Lord that didn’t involve PROVE IT techniques . It wasn’t driving us to be loud personalities or vibrant movers and shakers. The speaker compared passion in the Lord to that calm solid passion I just spoke of… a mother for her new baby… I was completely able to identify and it made me think long, feel deep down, about what kind of bonfire is in my heart for my Lord… how unquenchable and consistent, even more then that, constant is it…

Some of the most passionate Christian brothers and sisters that I have know in my life weren’t necessarily loud and proud, but they had a solid heart ablaze and that warmth flowed from them as they moved full of peace, grace and dedicated devotion to love… to love their Lord, love their brothers and sisters and even love their enemies. They have spoken much into my life with their passion for Jesus.

I am thankful for encouragement to fan the flame of passion in my life… to dig deep and find it still there, burning in my heart for Jesus.

TTFN

Apple Sauce Every Where

by admin on September 13, 2011 in Better Check Out Links, Domestic Damsel, Foodie Like Me with No comments

I am SO done with apple sauce this year. I have made more then enough frozen bundles of the stuff for us to have a batch of it a week till June. Over 100 cups of boiled and sweetened apples. My hands are cramping and sore and my feet are killing me so I told my man not to bring another single apple off that tree into my kitchen.

I am really happy with all the work done though. We are really enjoying the treat already and will all winter with the amount I stored up. The apples where nice and big, reddish and juicy this year. I hardly had to add any water. Needed less sweetener this year and we went with coconut sugar so Garnet can enjoy the sweet treat too. I then added a generous amount of organic cinnamon to each batch. All mixed together to a smooth sauce this year. I have done chunky in the past but thought if I want to add the sauce to pie or squares I can just chop up some extra apples at the time. I like my apple sauce smooth.

Not sure how I missed out on rhubarb this year. The whole time I was working on the apples I was kicking myself that I forgot about making our winter store of rhubarb strew! Oh bother… we will have to do without this favorite this year.

Well after days of a kitchen filled with jars and freezer bags and wooden spoons, great big pots boiling away and apples in buckets, in the sink being washed, on the counter being chopped or in the pot being sauced, all of this STICKY, I am thrilled to clean it all up for another year. This mommy is putting it away knowing job well done.

P.s. Related POST HERE:)

TTFN

A Plot Of Veggies

by admin on September 6, 2011 in Adventure and Me, Better Check Out Links, Bits Of My Personality, Domestic Damsel, Foodie Like Me with No comments

We have been eating very very well off of our little plot at the community garden. I was so prompt about posting pictures of this spot, while it was still dirt, I thought I had better show you the lovely luscious life that is now abundant.

Here are some pictures from a harvesting trip we did as a family this past long weekend.

(South side of the garden is seen above and below is a picture of the north side.)
(Not from our plot but I had to show you these sunflowers and the prairie water melons that someone successfully grew!)
(Here is our plot, half cleaned out already but still full of veggies!)(Herbs, hanging to dry in our basement, grown in our garden.)

I had more pictures of our produce but have misplaced them so I hope to find them and share them soon.

Gardening is hard work. It took some help from family, to water and watch over our plot when we where away this summer. It took many many night walks over to water it during the dry days. It took days of me and my girls, hands and knees in the dirt, going after weeds. It took nights of me walking over with my oldest boy to pick something fresh for supper. It took more then that too but it gave so much more then just produce back. The garden added family time and quality outdoor time to our summer.

P.S. Check out THIS POST and THIS ONE TOO to see the humble beginnings of our community garden adventure!

TTFN

Tea Partying It UP!

by admin on September 3, 2011 in Better Check Out Links, Bits Of My Personality, Domestic Damsel, Foodie Like Me, People In My Heart with No comments

Tea parties make me feel so domestic:) I love the group pictures we have taken over the years. Year after year of different ladies, all dressed in different colors and styles. More hats have shown up over the years, as that has been a personal aim of mine (to encourage more hat wearing that is). Next I would love to encourage the wearing of gloves and caplets!
My mother and a favorite auntie of mine travelled all the way down to be at this party. Mother in law and sister (Mirelle) made it, they are always so supportive of me and the icing on the cake was my ‘college mom’ making it out. Nancy was the lady I lived with through my college years (first few years away from home) and although she has always been the kindest of friend, she was also like a mom… a less bossy mom:) It was great to have her over! Three dear friends came. Two of them being pals of mine for years and the third is a new girl friend who is really game and I like that about her! All of us ate very very well and enjoyed fabulous conversation. Though the wasps chased the little girls in early, we women endured for the sake of more socializing.Why do I do this? Because I love being a woman. I loving being with other women and I love to see them enjoying femininity! It is a grand thing to have a time so full of girlyness that men would be afraid to accidentally intrude:)

It almost always feels doubtful that it will all work out for me to have a tea each summer and then when it is all pulled together it is so worth it. Here’s hoping I have time for one winter-y tea this year and another fabulous summer one next year!

P.s. I have been blogging for a few years now and boy do I love to go back and look through the archives. CHECK OUT THIS LINK to the last tea party I had two summers ago.

TTFN

Favorite Delusion

by admin on September 2, 2011 in Better Check Out Links, Bits Of My Personality, Feeling It (Thankful), Music Flavor, People In My Heart with No comments

We all like to think we are in control… we think this idea is what carries us through the day, how we cope…

We are so fragile, we are so diluted if we think we are in control.

There are those of us who have been painfully awaken, all naivety removed, as the control is so obviously taken from our grasp…we find our way through the day, we cope, with Christ’s strength.

“It’s out of my hands

There’s nothing I can do

The best laid plans

Again have fallen through

I thought my world

Was under my command

Now I can’t believe

Just how glad I am

It’s out of my hands

My favourite delusion

I must control the universe

Failure brings freedom

You are God, and I’m not so…”

~CAROLYN ARENDS

TTFN

Summer Reading

by admin on August 16, 2011 in Better Check Out Links, Book Flavor with No comments
In reading, a lonely quiet concert is given to our minds; all our mental faculties will be present in this symphonic exaltation.
~Stéphane Mallarm

Silver Wing by KENNETH OPPEL

A fantasy novel in the world of a war between bats and birds, written for young adults.

Reading to the kids in the evenings.

Always Now, Volume 1 by MARGARET AVISON

A delicious collection of this Canadian writers poetry (a sweet gift from my little brother).

This is just for mommy in my all too precious alone time.

A Princess of Mars by EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS

A fantasy/science fiction classic.

Enjoying this little easy reader with my man. We are taking turns reading it to one another.

The Lost Princess by GEORGE MACDONALD

A fairy tale type fantasy, by one of THE first fantasy authors. George was C.S. Lewis’s inspiration for his Narnia collection.

This was a little book so it was perfect for my purse book. Carried it around in my purse all summer to pass time if needed.

The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood by HOWARD PHYL

Another childrens book but a classic, so I am reading through it first to see if the kids can get into the old English and more graphic adventure scenes… truth is I couldn’t wait till we finish the bat story.

Not a big bold reading kind of summer. With how busy it has been I have been enjoying mostly easy to read pieces of literature that fit in my bag. You know, great away we go stories. I plan to leave the heavy reads on my list for a cold winter day.

TTFN

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