The only appropriate response...

"The only appropriate response is gratitude."




{HT-Ken Gire}

All work and very little play...

Cerulean sky, bright sunlight, cool breezes - it's a stunningly beautiful day here on Pollywog Creek.

But I'm writing on assignment {with a deadline breathing down my neck}.

Be mature, I tell myself, and disciplined. 

Work first. Play outside later.

{Photo}from our visit to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, Nashville, March 2009 - wouldn't writing be so much more fun if we had a laptop painted like that?

I {LOVE} Sunday::to walk in the light and know...

But if we walk in the light,
as he is in the light,
we have fellowship with one another,
and the blood of Jesus his Son
cleanses us from all sin.
1 John 1:7 ESV

Linking with Diedra's beautiful Sunday community...




{Photo}on my backyard swing

Week{ending}...

This time last Saturday, a quiet weekend appeared before me. How grateful I am that it unfolded instead into all that joy and laughter and fun.

My only expectations for this weekend are that the Lord will be in it, as always, and if I open my eyes and be attentive to His presence, He'll show me wonders anew.

And you? I'd love to know what you hope your weekend will bring.

{Photos} a cloudy, rainy Friday morning on Pollywog Creek {thank You, Lord, for every nourishing drop}

Each word a gift...

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths,
but only what is helpful for building others up
according to their needs,
that it may benefit those who listen.
Ephesians 4.29 (NIV)

We talked about it earlier this week, Emily and I - that passage from Ephesians and the power behind our words to build up and encourage or wound and tear down.  

But God has been showing me that my words not only have the power to hurt others, but to wound my own  heart, sabotage my work, and worse yet - undermine and cheapen God's gifts in me.

You're too old. 

A wannabe-psalmist-with-a-camera? Really?

Who do you think you are?

Please hear my heart in this. I'm not trying to be humble or scheming for compliments. I've an abundance of cheerleaders in my life, and I get it. Thank you - each of you - a million times over. Your encouragement  spurs me on and gives glory and honor to the Giver of all that is good in me.   

My problem isn't you, it's me. 

When I disqualify my gifts in how I lack confidence to walk in them or speak {and think} falsely about them, I am denying the work of Christ in me - to equip and gift me for His glory. 

For we are his workmanship,
created in Christ Jesus for good works,
which God prepared beforehand,
that we should walk in them.
Ephesians 2:10 ESV

Ephesians 4:29 is interpreted in The Message...

Say only what helps, each word a gift.

What about you? Have you been gifting yourself with words that help or have you been speaking unkindly and undermining your gifts? 

{Photos} it's spring-like in January in my Pollywog Creek backyard {My Project 366 photos are here.}

{Wordless Wednesday} Cardinal at dusk...

To run the course with joy...

A thin layer of fog floats misty over the river as the rising sun paints peach across the south. 

I steer the car across the narrow bridge and continue toward the highway and my appointment in the city an hour from home - a weekly routine for over a month.

I must hurry. Once dawn gives way, there's no holding back the fiery orb's rise over the pasture just around the bend.

As I stop the car on the side of the road, my soul swells hallelujahs, and I remove my camera's lens cap - hoping to capture a glimpse of glory in the foggy horizon's blaze.

The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
Day to day pours out speech,
and night to night reveals knowledge.
There is no speech, nor are there words,
whose voice is not heard.
Their voice goes out through all the earth,
and their words to the end of the world.
In them he has set a tent for the sun,
which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber,
and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy.
Its rising is from the end of the heavens,
and its circuit to the end of them,
and there is nothing hidden from its heat.
Psalm 19:1-6 ESV

Nothing can hold back the sun or my praise - to run the course with joy.


God writes the gospel not in the Bible alone,
but on trees and flowers and clouds and stars.
Martin Luther

Project 366::Day 24...

{Photo} Project 366::Day 24 - learning to embrace 3:00am

The mess that's a gift...

Without my glasses, I squint in the dark across the room. The red numbers on Louis' alarm clock on the dresser flash 3:12 am, and I sigh. It's much too early for prednisone, but I can't stay in bed, so I shuffle my way to the bathroom and groan at the bags under my eyes.

In the lounge chair in the living room I doze off and on for an hour or so - heating pad wrapped around my wrist - before I consider unloading the dishwasher and gathering up and sorting the piles of dirty sheets and towels and Emily's laundry from a weekend retreat and the tablecloth sticky with pancake syrup - and I smile. What a gift.

I decide to wash the bath mat first - the one black with dirt that I'd just washed last week before little boys played hard in the dirt pile and tracked black clumps through the house and into the bathroom to take off shoes - and I laugh. Honest.

It's the mess that's a gift - children and grandchildren laughing and playing {hard} and eating - and the mess that's left behind makes me smile.

It's the mess that means that people I love filled this place - that they stayed long enough to eat and bathe and change diapers and sleep and wake up to papa's Sunday morning pancakes.

It's early afternoon and the last load of laundry is spinning and I miss the mess already.

{Photos}a beautiful, dirty, messy weekend on Pollywog Creek

Project 366::Day 22...

{Photos} Project 366:Day 22 - These two Hunter cousin cuties - the babies. By summer's end, there will be two new babies, but these two seem to be forging a friendship to weather soon-to-be-the-middle-child together.

I {LOVE} Sunday::to know God is my refuge...

But I will sing of your strength;
I will sing aloud of your steadfast love in the morning.
For you have been to me a fortress
and a refuge in the day of my distress.
(Psalm 59:16 ESV)

{Photos} female cardinal hiding in the frost-bitten flame bush

Linking with Diedra's beautiful Sunday community...

Project 366::Day 21...

Week{ending}...

What I had anticipated would be a wonderfully full weekend with family has opened instead into quiet with just the two of us. 

I don't know what the day now holds as the sun rises on chilly 40's and Louis builds a small fire out by the pond, but it's offering abundant sunshine and warmth for whatever opportunities await.  

What about you? What does your week{end} offer?

{Photos}Azaleas in my brother's yard in Winter Haven, down by the Caloosahatchee River, my Pollywog Creek backyard, a field in Ft. Denaud, in the Cemetery in Bowling Green