Crazy Times

So this is the first time in my lifetime anything like this has happened.  The world is shut down.  Weird.

We are all trying to be content in these times.

How did our grandparents do it?  No entertainment, no Netflix or Prime.

I'm reminded of my grandparents.  We used to go to their house in the country for weeks in the summer.  And we had a blast.  We just made up stuff to do.  We rarely turned on the TV.  It only came on to watch Mutual of Omaha on Sunday nights and Hee Haw.  Other than that, we entertained ourselves.  With no internet, tv, or movies.  Imagine that.

We made up games, we cut out magazines, we made mud pies out in the woods.  We played with the neighbor kids that lived down the road.  We rode our bikes, listened to the radio, tried to ride our roller skates on their old tar road. (that was tough!).  My grandma would let us play with flour and water on the kitchen table and make dough balls and use cookie cutters to cut out shapes.  We took walks down to the railroad tracks and picked wild flowers.  We played school, and tea party, and made up our own songs.

We had so much fun and never thought one second about being bored.

So, now as an adult, as I sit here in this weird world where everything is closed.  I've found myself thinking.. there's nothing to look forward to, every day is the same, i can only clean our condo so much!

So what can we do during this time?

One thing we've been doing a lot of is walking.  We walk in the morning, we walk at lunch, we walk after work is done, we walk on our breaks.  Short walks, long walks, random no where to go walks, walks to our local restaurants to get a coffee or lunch, walks to just get out and get some vitamin D.

I've cleaned, organized, and cleaned out stuff.

We listen to sermons and podcasts and music.

I'm drinking a lot of tea and coffee.  Ha!

We dug out the old school WII and started playing some old games.

We've taken our speaker up to the pool and just hooped it up and had a great time dancing.

I need to find some good books to read and start that again.  I need to find a place to work my puzzles! (our dining table is covered right now in our work from home computers!)

I dug out my knitting that I haven't done in years.

A friend texted me yesterday and asked about revisiting our Philippians memorization. I had gotten up through halfway chapter 3 a few years ago!  I will work on pulling that back into my memory banks!

There's lots to do.  We just gotta have the right attitude.  (Which is super hard for an Eeyore like me).

Hang in there folks, be safe and healthy. Don't go berserk.  Don't freak out. Enjoy your time with your kids if they are home.

Who knows how long this will last..but we can still enjoy our time!

How are you all surviving this crazy time?

Something to lighten up your Friday

It's been a bit of a heavy week, so just to lighten things up--here's a few true funny stories that really happened to me!

One day I was poaching an egg in the microwave.  I pulled it out of the microwave after it was done and I was standing there face over it looking at it.  When all of a sudden the egg explodes!  Right in my face! BURNING HOT!  Larry, being the quick thinker that he is, was standing at the sink and he pulled the sprayer out and sprayed me right in the face. Well, it cooled me off, kept my face from burning.  But now I was standing there in my pjs, covered in egg and soaked head to toe.  I just died laughing!

Another one..this one kinda recent.

As we were walking back to the hotel in Amsterdam, it was cold and I had my hands in my coat pockets.  There was a small little bump in the sidewalk.  Just enough to catch my shoe.  As I was falling toward the sidewalk, hands in pockets, I thought -Man I don't want to hit my face-so I turned ever so slightly and landed rather ungraciously on the sidewalk on my elbow and knee.  I wasn't hurt bad but still... had to laugh.


One from my childhood. 

My sister and I were so excited that the snow cone man was coming down the street!  We ran to get our change and ran out to get our yummy snow cones!  As we were walking back to the house, my sister was just eyeing her snow cone and just couldn't wait to dig into it..  the newspaper guy just happened to be driving down the street right at that time.  He threw the paper into our yard and it hit my sister right on the back of the head causing her snow cone to just fall right into the grass.  Poor thing!  You can't really wash a snow cone off either.  Was that newspaper guy aiming at us?? 

Ok..one other.

For some reason, things fly out from the sky and find me.  We were all sitting in our backyard one time, playing a game at a table when all of a sudden a baseball flew down and landed right in my stomach!  No one else saw it fly down but there I am on the ground! And then, another day, we were at a playground when a bicycle helmet came flying out of nowhere and conked me on the head. Ha! Still don't know where that thing came from.

Life is so very short

A friend from high school passed away today.  We went from elementary through high school together.  I just saw her at our 30 year high school reunion a few months ago. She was my age.  That's surreal. 

Over the last few years I've had friends that have passed away.  As I get older, it will be more frequent, I'm sure.  We've already lost my parents, my in-laws, my brother in law.  I lost my grandparents long ago.

Death is a part of life.  Life is so very short.  Except for those long days in school when that clock would not budge!

It's something we all know.  Life is short.  Yes, got it.  But we forget.  We get caught up in the mundane.  The tedious.  The drama.  The wastefulness.

Our lives go on after the memorial.  But theirs will forever be changed.  Her husband, her daughter, her family.

Stop and smell that rose.

Hug your friends and even your enemies.

Take time to dance.

Enjoy the sun.

Make a difference.

Smile.

Make someone else smile.

Take that vacation.  See that bucket list place.

Most importantly though is this.
Get your spiritual life in order.  There's only one way to Heaven-through Jesus Christ.
Romans 10:9 "if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved"
.
Don't take a chance with your soul.

Our life here on earth is short but our soul lives on forever.

Love and hugs my friends.