Celebrate Today- ceremonies and celebrations to make your days count

I almost left this hat at home this weekend, but I'm so glad I didn't.  This ridiculous birthday cake hat certainly brought some joy this weekend to some friends who were celebrating another year around the sun.  On Saturday morning, we surprised our friend Liz at Green Lake on her 50th birthday when she thought she was just going for a run around the lake with Elizabeth. But when she arrived at the lake, some of us were waiting with hats and banners for a fun run together to celebrate 5 decades.  The sign on my shirt also drew some attention for Liz, and she got lots of birthday greetings from other runners and walkers around the lake that morning who were happy to chime in and add to the festivities.   And the hat made another appearance tonight to celebrate Kelly's birthday since we had small group tonight on the night before her big day tomorrow.     Sometimes it's the little things that bring the m...

I woke up to the news that on this day (National Talk Like a Pirate Day 2017) that Krispy Kreme was not going to be in the spirit giving away doughnuts like they've done in the past. As the article below says, "SHIVER ME TIMBERS!"  Please note that I did look to see if we have a Long John Silver's for a free deep-fried Twinkie. (ARE YOU SERIOUS?) The closest Long John Silver's to our house was in Kentucky. Needless to say, that did not happen today.  Never fear- I decided that doughnuts were still in order so I picked up some Top Pot doughnuts for the celebration after school. However, in order get the doughnut, pirate speak was the payment required.  ARRRR!  http://metro.co.uk  reports, “ The International Day of talking like a pirate began in 2002 and is still going strong in 2017 as people gear up to speak a new sea fairing language for the day.  It was initiated in 2002 by two guys who started to would start conversations by sa...

Ben Reaoch writes , " When it comes to remembering God’s faithfulness, we can be especially forgetful. One striking example of this is found in the book of Exodus, chapters 14 and 16. In the span of just a couple of chapters, we see the Israelites delivered from slavery and brought through the Red Sea, and then they are grumbling about not having food to eat. We want to say to them, “Don’t you remember what God just did for you? The water stood up like two walls, and you walked through the Red Sea on dry ground! Don’t you think that the God who can do that is also capable of giving you food to eat? Trust him!” And then, of course, we remember that we do the same sort of thing. God brings us through a trial, answers a prayer, and within a few days it’s almost forgotten. We’re already looking to the next struggle on the horizon and finding reasons to gripe and complain. We have to find ways of remembering God’s faithfulness ."  One of the ways we have tried to remembe...

Today is the 25th of July which is celebrated as Christmas in July by some.  When I sent some candy canes this morning for Anna to share with some of the girls at her running camp for the occasion, she loved it and described me as "festive" when she passed them out and explained the reason behind the peppermint treat.  On the other hand, when Taylor saw that I had gotten out a few Christmas decorations for a dinner party tonight, he pretended to gag and thought I was so weird to get out Christmas decor in the summer.  Oh well- it was indeed festive at our house, and I'm grateful for a chance to be merry anytime of the year.  with the Whites and some new friends we met from UPC from Brazil 

Every year at our Teacher Brunch, I pull out these two copies of this classic Dr. Seuss book Oh, the Places You'll Go!   We started getting teachers to sign these since Anna and Taylor were in preschool and kindergarten, and it's turned into quite the time capsule through the years to have this window into teachers' comments through the years.  I sent the book to school with Anna and Taylor the last week of school to get the final signatures from teachers who could not come to our brunch, and I finally pulled the books out of the kids' backpacks just last week. I am grateful for these teachers who have invested in them and who have been a part of their stories this past year. 

Pentecost always reminds me of this favorite benediction  from our sweet church family in Knoxville at St. John's Lutheran.  "It is time to go and be His witnesses. And as we go we pray that the Lord would bless us and keep us, the Lord make his face to shine upon us and be gracious unto us. May God give us grace never to sell ourselves short, grace to risk something big for something good, grace to realize that the world is much too small for anything but love, and much too dangerous for anything but truth. And now may God take our minds and think through them, and may God take our lips and speak through them, and may God take our hearts and set them on fire. In the name of Jesus Christ who goes with us always. Amen." red decorations at UPC today to celebrate  balloons from our kitchen today to mark the day... 

Easter was on April 16th. Today is May 11th.  We just got around to digging up the Alleluia ribbons that we had buried on Ash Wednesday.  In some traditions, the word "alleluia" is not used during Lent, but then the word is brought back on Easter with great celebration throughout the service with shouts of praise and with songs.    These ribbons that we stick in a bag and bury underground during Lent serve as a tangible picture of that.   The thing is that this year, we just forgot to get them on Easter and then we kept putting it off. On one day that I remembered, it was raining hard and we did not want to make a mess with the mud. Another time I remembered, but it was getting too dark.  So, finally today, we got out the shovel and freed them from their time underground.  According to the church calendar, Easter is a season (like Advent or Lent) that lasts 50 days. So, it's still Easter and we can keep on celebrating the resurrection...