Is it eternal?

Sometimes in the midst of the busyness of life, we can become overwhelmed by the demands on our time and energy.  I can literally become stressed by the simple act of looking ahead at my schedule for the week to see what lies ahead.  It can cause me to begin the week with a defeated outlook before I even get started. 

When I get myself in this state, I try to take some time to evaluate where and how I spend my time and energy.  One way I do this is to identify the amount of time I am spending on not eternal things versus eternal things.  When I am stressed, I always find that I am not spending enough time on the eternal things in my life such as family, friends, and quiet time with God, spending time in His Word.  I am caught up in the not eternal such as becoming a workaholic, television, and activities that are not important in the eternal realm.  It helps me to look at my schedule through this filter.  I then can delete some, but unfortunately not all, of the things that rob me of valuable time and energy.  There are some activities and responsibilities we cannot control, but I always find some time robbers that I can control. 

Approaching my schedule in this manner helps me to spend more time and energy in areas that matter.  It helps me feel that I am more in control and that I am investing my energy in things that matter.

This week I intend to look through the eternal filter.  I hope to find ways that I can spend time in the eternal realm.  A few ideas - Plan time with family and friends.  Turn off the television and spend some quiet time with God.  Look for the eternal things in my life and make time for them.  I encourage you to join me in seeking the eternal in every day life. I hope you have a blessed week. 


Love to all of you out there or no one - whichever fits!  J

Sweet random family recollections

During the past thirty years of raising kids, we have enjoyed countless precious moments.  Today I am sharing just a few with you.  I hope they bring a smile to your face.  They never fail to make me happy.

I always loved when our kids first learned new words and didn't get them quite right.  I wouldn't let people correct them - I wanted to savor the sweetness of cute before it passed.

A few favorite mispronunciations of our family from many years past:

• Mohog - Mohawk - created by Jammie
• Callepitter - catapillar - created by Lauren
• Cheater chess - cedar chest - created by Allie
• Flix Flags - Six Flags - created by Allie
• Bollyball - volleyball -   created by Tyler

And then there are those sweet little moments that have become part of our family's oral tradition:

Conversation overheard between Jammie and Lauren  (age 6 years) regarding the Dennis the Menace cartoon show:

Jammie:  That Margaret is so mean.

Lauren:  But she's such a good actress.  (Get the funny - the Oscar worthy actress was a cartoon!)

Allie gathering her big sisters around the laundry basket so she could get in the basket and have the starring role of baby Jesus - a regular family Nativity scene acted out in our very living room.

Tyler as a 3 year old commenting to his dad in the restroom at his big sisters' middle school award's night, "Luke, I am your father."  (Certain details have been left out to protect the innocent)

And so many more stories. Such sweet memories. Oh my, where have the years gone.  

Love to all of you out there or no one - whichever fits. J

My feared legacy to our children

On my last post, I shared with you the legacy that Soulmate and I hoped to leave with our children.  Those were important lessons we have learned in life and hope that they saw in us at least some of the time.

Unfortunately though, I am afraid that the following is probably the real legacy that I left with them.  I will not implicate Soulmate in any way for the following.  It was all my doing.

1. Don't put Christmas decorations out before Thanksgiving, and Christmas lights on the exterior of your home should be straight or why bother!
2. No white shoes after Labor Day or before Easter
3. No tolerance for people who eat with their mouths open
4. Always have your toenails painted
5. A total irrational fear of the dentist and all things mathematical
6. Your teeth should not in any circumstance touch your fork (or any metal)
7. Unless someone is bleeding, I don't want to  hear it. (Refers to childhood tattling)
8. Rodents should die.
9. Presentation is everything.
10. The movie theater is not a place for talking.  Ever.  Under no circumstance.  In fact, it is perfectly normal to move to another seat at least once per movie to get away from those who talk.

All I can say is - I'm sorry.  I hope this is not the only thing you learned from me.  Feel free, my sweet children, to not pass on my obsessions to a future generation.

Love to all of you out there or no one - whichever fits. J

Our hoped for legacy to our children

As parents, Soulmate and I hope we are building a legacy for our children on how to live their lives.   We see this as an important role for us as parents. These would include those important lessons we have learned in life and hope that they saw in us at least some of the time.  Most of these are things that we learned along the way from God, from His Word, and from others God placed in our lives.  

Our hoped for legacy to our children include the following beliefs:

1. The sufficiency of God in all circumstances
2. In a hopeless world, He is our hope.
3. There's always room at our table for others.
4. There is great joy in giving.
5. When you point your finger at someone, there are three pointing back at you.
6. Love deeply and freely and unconditionally.
7. A true leader serves.
8. Forgive 70 x 7.
9. The importance of saying I love you regularly and especially to people in our life who don't hear it often.
10. We have a God placed responsibility to the whole world not just our community or country.

My prayer is that in my flawed living, my children saw some small evidence of these in my life along the way.    

Love to all of you out there or no one - whichever fits. J

Three signs of middle age

Tomorrow is my 56th birthday.  56 - wow!  I am well into the middle age bracket of life.  There is something about being closer to 60 than 50 that is a little unsettling.  I don't mind getting older. It's just a little weird to me.  I don't feel that old in my spirit.  My body - yes, but not in my mind!

However, when I think about it, there are a few behaviors that have crept in. A few signs of getting older. A few things that Soulmate and I never did in our thirties or forties and even early fifties.  I think they definitely indicate that we are in a different season of life.

Sign Number One: Identified chairs
We not only have chairs that we always, and I mean always, sit in.  We refer to them as "our chairs." Common dialogue between us:  "Let's go home and get in our chairs."  "I am so glad that we don't have anything planned tonight except for sitting in our chairs" and so on...
I love our chairs.  I love an evening in our chairs.  I don't like it when others sit in our chairs.

Sign Number Two:  The weather
I lived the first fifty years of my life only marginally aware of the weather.  Sure, if something big happened like a tornado or hurricane, I was concerned or interested.  But other than that, I really characterized weather in one of four ways:  hot, cold, wet, or dry.  That was really it.  Weather just really wasn't important to me.
But now, channel 214 is occasionally visited, while we sit in our chairs, of course.  For those of you without our TV service, that is The Weather Channel.  For whatever reason, the weather has become of great interest to us.  We click on the digital "eye" to check the five day weather outlook, or we catch really interesting shows like "Weather Caught on Camera"  or "Storm Riders."
Better than TWC on TV is the TWC phone ap.  I can be frequently found checking not the five day but the TEN day weather outlook on it.  I work my weather knowledge into conversations with others like the following: "Well, looks like we might get a little break in the weather a week from Thursday."Sometimes I check the weather in places we have visited.  For instance, did you know that on Tuesday in Thessalonika, Greece, there will be a high temperature of  63.  Oh, and by the way, R and R, you may need your umbrella - looks like scattered showers.

Sign Number Three: Our shows
On the nights we get to sit in our chairs and we aren't preoccupied with the weather, we watch our shows.  That's what we refer to them as - our shows.  When one of the kids calls and asks "What are you guys doing?", we say "We are sitting in our chairs, watching our shows."  Sometimes our shows get watched in real time, but even better is when we watch them recorded so we can skip through the commercials.  Our identified shows that we watch together are not many, mainly detective shows, but we like them.  Watching them .... together....in our chairs.  It's not so much that we have shows that we watch - it is the identifying them as "our shows" that seems middle aged.

Ok - I'm going to say it, proudly and without restraint.  I am getting older.  I'm more set in my ways.  Less spontaneous.  I like a routine.  I prefer things more predictable. I even like the weather - go figure!

I am proud to be 56 and all that goes with getting older.  I like this season of my life.  I am blessed.

For now though I have to go.  It's time to sit in our chairs....about to start the final season of Monk...and it's raining outside.  Life is good. Happy Birthday to me!

Love to all of you out there or no one - whichever fits. J

Family Night!

It's Friday and if you are a Wynnederson, you know what that means!  It's Family Night!

One of our favorite traditions when we were raising kids was family night.  Ours was always Friday night. Our friends, the Tullos family, had family night on Saturday night with Walker,Texas Ranger, but Friday was definitely our night.   

The formula was simple, but it worked for many years.  The following ingredients were critical:

1.  Two comforters with balloon print spread across the floor
2.  Everyone in comfy clothes
3. Everyone present.  Friday nights were sacred.  I remember how sad Tyler was when he was still young and thinking family night would always be. He couldn't believe that when  his sisters went away to college, they wouldn't be there for family night.
4.  Some form of pizza - sources varied through the years depending on where we lived - Little Caesar's, Domino's, Pizza Hut, Papa John's,  frozen Totino's during lean years - you could get them for less than a dollar - and even a few times when Soulmate decided to make pizzas,  That man - he can do it all.  Through the many years of family night, the menu never varied. Always pizza.
5.  Dorky Friday night TV - for years it was TGIF.  Do any of the following sound familiar to you? Family Matters, Full House, Step by Step, Boy Meets World, Hanging with Mr. Cooper.  Occasionally, it was old movies like A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court with Bing Crosby and The Court Jester with Danny Kaye or Calamity Jane with Doris Day.   At Christmas time it was always Christmas movies like White Christmas and the original Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.  

It seems so simple, but trust me it worked for years.  Just bodies of children spread across the comforters enjoying pizza and watching TV together and enjoying being together.  Often our own four were joined by friends who had come for a sleepover.  The friends knew what Friday night was like in the Wynne home, and I think they liked it too.

Now on Friday nights, there aren't any balloon comforters on the floor and TGIF is no more and there aren't sweet children strewn across the room angling for their space on the comforter, TV show or the last piece of pizza.

But habits die hard.  Most Friday nights, Soulmate and I are in our chairs eating pizza and watching TV.

It is quieter but still as sweet.

And every so often, the phone will ring, and one of our four will say "Are you having family night?  I'm on my way."

That's when I know that family night was about more than pizza, and silly TV shows.  It was about family.

Love to all of you out there or no one - whichever fits. J

I do not like green eggs and ham!

We love books in our home.  Always have and still do.  Some of my favorite memories of our children involved books.  I loved watching Soulmate read to them - so sweet.  I enjoyed reading to them myself until they began to read on their own.   The same treasured volumes were read over and over again until we could recite the words.

Indulge me while I take a trip down memory lane as I share a few of our favorite books from our kids' younger years.

• Goodnight Moon - all time favorite bedtime story for our children when they were itty bitty.  We love to give this book to special new babies in our life.
• Curious George and Corduroy - Jammie loved these books.
• Angelina the Ballerina and The Very Hungry Caterpillar - La's faves.
• The Monster at the End of this Book - oh, silly Grover - you weren't scary at all!
• All books by Dr. Seuss - we love the doctor in our house!  The Lorax, The Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham... - Soulmate was and still is the best Seuss reader!
• Ramona Quimby, Age 8 - Ramona, you rock those bangs!
• Junie B. Jones books - Allie lived for these books.  Thanks, Mrs. Lackey - we love you!
• Captain Underpants series - Tyler's alter ego!
• Where the Sidewalk Ends and Falling Up by Shel Silverstein - our children's introduction to poetry
• Madeline books - Twelve little girls all in a line, and the littlest one is Madeline  Allie and I read these together.
• The Secret Garden - I read this one aloud to Jammie and Lauren on the way to Washington DC
• All books by Eric Carle  - wonderful illustrations (see Caterpillar above)
• Jumanji
• Where the Wild Things Are
• Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
• If You Give a Mouse a Cookie

This is just a small sampling... I got a little misty eyed just typing these sweet titles.

And what about you?  What favorite children's book comes to your mind?

Send me your favorite title as a comment by October 15th.  I will hold a drawing of those submitted and buy a copy of the winning title to donate to the Union Gospel Mission children's program.  Maybe your favorite will become the favorite of a homeless child in our community.  

Love to all of you out there or no one - whichever fits. J