Puppy Love

Today, my little dog, Blondie, is 13 years old. She's been a sweet, faithful companion all these years. Here's a couple pictures of her when she was just a couple months old.




























In this recent photo she seems to say, "Mom, can I bite him?" (Poor Blondie has to put up with 6 cats at our house!) :-}

















Here is a little poem I wrote about her several years ago:


Faith waiting beside the gate,

Hope dancing under the dish,

Love lingering in a lick,

Steadfast canine friend, teach me to worship!






Thank God for all His little creatures that teach us so much!

Two Recipes and a Movie

For those of you who wanted the recipe for the muffins I showed in the last post, click here to link to the allrecipes.com recipe that I used.


Next, is a photo of the pineapple upside-down cake that I made for the guy's graduation ceremony at church tonight.










It is my version of a very simple recipe, but it is Steven's favorite and I have made it for the guys in his study group before, so I know that they like it! All it takes is a plain yellow cake mix with the ingredients called for on the box, except that I substitute the drained juice from the canned pineapples for the water. I use two 9" round pans instead of a rectangular pan. In the bottom of each pan, I put a half stick of melted butter and a quarter cup of brown sugar, which I spread around evenly to cover the bottom. Then in one pan I put a layer of canned crushed pineapple. In the other I put a layer of canned sliced pineapples with maraschino cherries to fill all the holes. Next, I pour half of the batter, that I have mixed according to directions on the box, into each pan. You may want to mark which one has the sliced pineapples and cherries by sticking a toothpick into a cherry if you're prone to forget like me! lol! Then I bake them in the oven according to directions on the box. You may have to cook them a bit longer, since the ingredients are heavier than the box ingredients. But when the tops are medium brown and a toothpick inserted comes out clean, they're done. Then you take them out and let them cool for about 10 minutes. After that, you invert them to make a two-layer cake on a plate, with the sliced pineapples and cherries for the top layer. The cake is good warm, or cold.


Lastly, I want to share with you about a movie that Steven and I got recently. It's called "The Fabric of Time". Here's a photo of the case with the 3-D glasses that came with it.










You might enjoy this documentary more if you have some scientific background. But I found it fascinating, even though I have a hard time wrapping my brain around some of the concepts. Basically it's about some of the latest studies and theories about the Shroud of Turin. Now, admittedly, I have never really put much confidence in relics. And even if these studies and theories prove false, my faith in Christ will stand. But if you enjoy studying the mysteries of the universe, particularly as they relate to what the Bible says, this movie is for you! The makers of this documentary spend some time pointing out problems with the carbon-14 dating that showed a recent date for the Shroud and theories that a great artist like Da Vinci painted it. Then they show more recent scientific studies of the Shroud that demonstrate that early photographic records of it are holographic (the reason for the 3-D glasses). The studies of the flowers and coins found in the image on the Shroud are very intriguing. The exact matching blood types and stain patterns of the Shroud with the Facecloth that is in Spain, (that has its own separate ancient history)is fascinating. And the fact that the image on the Shroud is a negative, like for film photos is interesting. The part that blew me away (and I'm still trying to understand), is the theory that the Shroud is not so much a record of Christ's death, as His resurrection! And it relates to Quantum Mechanics, black holes, event horizons, and the beginning of time! Whoa! Yeah!! You really need to see this movie!

God bless!

Hello Friends!

I haven't posted anything for about a week and a half and it really feels strange! This blogging really gets into your heart! ;-)

It's just that the weather has been so gorgeous here, that my hubby and I have been working many hours in our garden trying to get some projects done that we can't do in the winter weather. When we finally come into the house in the evening, we have to play catch up with housework and other things. By then we are VERY tired. You get the idea! lol

I have been taking photos, but then when I reviewed them for posting I realized I had the camera set to black and white mode! That really will NOT do for a color lover like myself, especially of my garden! So I will post just a couple photos of us that turned out okay, with a promise of more colorful flower photos to follow in a future post.

On the other hand, I do have some color photos of some of our indoor pursuits.

The first is the Beth Moore workbook for the Bible study on Daniel. Our church offered this 12-week video series through our Women's Ministry starting last fall. We completed it in February. Then they decided to do it again for those who missed it the first time or who wanted a refresher. I decided to repeat it, this time as a small group discussion leader. It is a fantastic study! Although I have studied the book of Daniel several times in the past, Beth Moore offers many new insights. I highly recommend it to the serious student of the Word.






Also, my hubby, Steven, has been very active in the Men's Ministry.











Last year he completed a 27-week study called "Quest for Authentic Manhood" with about 70 other guys at our church, and was very much blessed by it. They decided to offer this video-driven series again last fall. But since there were fewer guys this time, they had several small groups which met in individual homes. So for twenty seven weeks Steven has led a group of eight guys for the study at our house on Monday nights. Most times I was gone, since that was also the night of my Beth Moore study. But I was involved in getting the house cleaned and set up. And I almost always baked some kind of dessert snack--cookies, cake, or muffins were favorites. Above is a picture of the workbook for "Quest for Authentic Manhood" with the workbook for a follow-on study that they are doing called "Winning at Work and Home" and the facsimile sword that the guys received who completed "Quest". Nice, huh!

And finally, here is a batch of banana muffins that I made recently to share.


Steven got the recipe off Recipes.com for me. They turned out yummy!















Well, I hope you enjoyed this little update. I will try to squeeze in a further update soon. God bless!

Wordless Wednesday--Dance

For more Wordless Wednesday please join Dixie at French Lique.

Show & Tell Friday

For Show & Tell Friday, I would like to share with you a ceramic figurine I bought several years ago at a thrift shop in California. I usually display this little figure in the spring, because the pastel colors remind me of spring and I do so love spring flowers! I paired the figurine here with a little carved alabaster rabbit and have shown them from three different angles. The reason I was drawn to the figurine in the first place was because her face reminded me of my sister Linda when she was six.

Here is Linda's picture.











Do you see a little resemblance? Happy Spring, Linda!

To see more treasures and join in the fun of Show & Tell Friday please go to Kelli's blog, "There Is No Place Like Home".

Happy Birthday, Dad!

Today I would like to wish my precious Dad a Happy Birthday! His nickname is "Gentle Ben". And he truly has been a gentleman! (Although his Amish upbringing would deny such "airs".) What I remember most about my Dad when I was growing up was his quiet, gentle strength. I always felt safe in his care. And he was very hardworking and steadfast in his provision for our family. Thank you once again, Dad! You set the example in your faith, gentleness, and example of serving God!
God's blessings on you today!!






















Dad in 1950 in Portland, Oregon




















Dad in the middle of his "kids" in 2006.

Wordless Wednesday--Friends

Please join Dixie at French Lique for more Wordless Wednesday.

Happy Birthday, Elena!

I would like to take this opportunity to wish my baby sister, Elena, a Very Happy Birthday! I was seven years old when we brought her home from the hospital on our Dad's 30th birthday. I remember looking down into the snowy receiving blanket in Mom's arms and seeing a little round red face with lots of dark hair. A week or so later, I got to go to a baby shower with Mom, that the ladies of our church were putting on for Mom and my new baby sister. I thought it was so cute that Elena just slept right through it laying on her tummy across Mom's lap! I was always so proud of my little sister. She was just adorable with her soft, dark curls and chubby cheeks with dimples. When she got to be a toddler, she was a challenge to watch when we were playing outside. She kept wanting to put little pebbles in her mouth and then run away! The trick was to get them out of her mouth without her choking on them, or biting me!--lol! She didn't much like minding me when she was older and I was left in charge, either! :-) However, as we grew older, we got along better and better. We seemed to like a lot of the same things: doing arts and crafts and flower gardening, especially. But the best thing of all is that not only are we sisters in the flesh, but we are sisters in the Lord! And I was oh, so happy when my dear sister, after many years of waiting, found her precious husband. And then the Lord gave them a beautiful baby girl of their own! Now their family is complete.

Elena is the one who got me into the blogging world. She started a blog in 2008, and kept encouraging me to start one of my own. So here I am! Thank you, thank you, Sis!! After you watch the little slide show I put together here, why not pop on over to Elena's Garden and tell her Happy Birthday, too!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Loving Reminders

I am joining Kelli's Show & Tell Friday with a little doll quilt that I have had for 53 years.


It is 16 X 21 inches and made of plain white muslin with narrow blue binding machine-stitched on the edges and as an inner border on the top. The picture of the puppies in the middle and the lettering is done with fabric paint pens. The quilted grid is hand-stitched in blue thread.

What makes this little quilt so special to me is that it was made for me by my grandmother (my father's mother) who was of the Old Order Amish faith. Of course, it is not in the style that one typically thinks of Amish quilts, but then again she made it for her "English" (non-Amish) granddaughter! My father had left the Amish way of life when he was sixteen. My grandmother lived in Indiana and we lived in Portland, Oregon. She had never seen me and I had never seen her. The Amish didn't believe in photographs or telephones, so mostly we kept in touch by the occasional letter. Then she sent this little quilt and a matching one to my sister, Linda, just before my third birthday. Mom and Dad had gotten Linda and me baby dolls for Christmas and Dad had made little wooden beds for the dolls. The quilts from Grandma fit the beds perfectly! So they got played with a lot! It didn't occur to me until I was much older what loving care had gone into their creation. I think the baby dolls and even the beds were given away at some point when we outgrew them, but Mom made sure we put the little quilts away as keepsakes. I only got to see my grandmother for one visit, when Dad, Mom, Linda, and I, along with our Cocker-Spaniel puppy, took a trip from California to Indiana during the summer of 1958. To my five year-old mind that trip seemed like something out of a storybook: experiencing the old-fashioned farming way of life of my Amish relatives. But when we came back to the West Coast, I always had the little quilt to remind me! ;)