I love the Sabbath

A wonderful rainy, thundery day here with tons of rain.  Wow, how we need it and how good of God to lavish this gift on us.  Second storm in 24 hours so surely our trees and growing things will explode with happy growth this week.  Good to have a legitimate excuse to nap, read, sip hot tea and soak in the refreshing, inside and out.

It's been a whirlwind few weeks here finishing up the end-of-year activities...a very fun Field Day with our support group, a mini-writer's conference for SweetPea and a couple of her friends, piano recital and Piano Guild for her, a few days' at-home vacation time with Hubby, and all the daily stuff.  Yet to come in the next couple of weeks are the push to finish Sonlight Core 6, SweetPea's biennial testing, switching out winter for summer clothes (you should see my mountain of ironing!), a wedding, and the fun prospect of a visit from a folks for a couple of weeks.  And of course, the yard work looms; I've hardly begun raking, much less pruning and planting.  Ah, well...what's really important will get done and I'll just content myself with that.

I've now gained the significant distinction of being the mother of a teen-ager!  SweetPea turned 13 this week, excited but feeling some qualms about all the horrors she's heard about the teen years.  I've seen some lovely growth of character in her the last couple of months, and I hastened to assure her that as long as her heart kept the Lord in first place, He would be faithful to make these years blessed and good.  My parents were always my best friends and I pray that I will give my daughter the trust and closeness they always gave me.

Gotta go smell the air outside!  It must surely be medicinal.

All things bright and beautiful

I've been basking in the incredible joys of spring these past few days.  It's finally been both warm and sunny so we've been able to really enjoy our back yard.  And as with every year, I forget how astonishingly colorful the whole scene is, like Dorothy stepping out of the house that just landed in OZ.

The blessings of the week...

- lilacs bursting into bloom, dispensing their heady fragrance

- roly-polys, spiders, and flies doing their bug thing

- the sound of lawn mowers buzzing around the neighborhood

- smells of flowers, warm soil, fresh-cut grass

- gaudy splashes of pure flower color everywhere

- dirt under your fingernails you can't get clean

- a puppy crazy with spring excitement

- flip-flops and bare feet (too sensitive from a winter entombed)

- first sunburns

- first BBQ's, picnic lunches

- dinner on the patio to soak it all in

- green, green, green, green

- happy, happy, happy birds

- the end of school and schedule pressure, the prospect of lazy, free days stretching ahead like a golden beach

Sigh.  What a gracious reprieve and gift after the long, gray months indoors.  Thank You, Lord of All.  We'll see if this year I can get all the projects done this season inspires!

Why I like old movies

There are a lot of reasons, of course--nostalgia for a simpler, more virtuous time, quality stories, moral uprightness, wonderful actors.

But watching the original "Father of the Bride" with Spencer Tracy and Elizabeth Taylor last night for Friday Night Family Night, I was struck again with one of the very significant changes that has taken place in children and their relationship to their parents in our culture.

Throughout the movie, "Kay" was respectful and loving to her parents, trying to submit to their wisdom and keep the peace, quick to forgive and not hold a grudge, very connected relationally to them, especially her father.  No sassy talk or backtalk, no rebellious overtones in everything, no implications that her parents were the get-a-life dummies to be tolerated.  Even the young fiance showed the same basic respect and honor for his elders.

I've seen this in so many other old movies.  Two wonderful kid movies that come to mind are "Flicka" with Roddy McDowell (and it's sequel, "Thunderhead, Son of Flicka") and "Misty" with David Ladd.  Let me tell you, it's almost a shock to see their "Yes, sirs" and submissive hearts to their parents and grandparents.  Not to mention, deeply refreshing!

I could almost cry for the loss of this fundamental--and Godly--virtue in our society's family structure today.  It shows up in cocky independence that hides only thinly behind a veneer of niceness if it's demanded at home, school, on the job, or wherever.  The fruit is that we carry a basic suspicion about people.  We don't trust them, believing they really have a hidden agenda or attitude of scorn or mocking.  If you compare the old movies with the fare produced today, you see what has amply fed this downward spiral.

This whole idea makes a case for selective viewing, doesn't it?  I pray that these 'voices from the past' will continue to speak a better way to this generation.

That's my Saturday Soapbox!