200th Birthday March 1, 2010

Spring is approaching as anticipation lingers in the cool breeze  March 1st announces earth's waking from her slumber.

March 1, 2010 also marks the 200th Birthday of Frederic Chopin, known as "the poet of the piano".

Can you even imagine anyone 200 years from now knowing you were alive?  I am sure I will just be dates in the record books, but some people leave their marks behind for centuries.


Today, I will play our Chopin CD's, stop a few minutes to read a short biography on his life and let my little one attempt to play a piece on the piano.  We might be able to coax my gifted husband's fingers to fly across the keys as we close our eyes to enjoy this beautiful, God-given gift of music from a man who lived 200 years ago.

A man that has a taste of music, paintings, or architecture is like one that has another sense, when compared with such as have no relish of those arts.  - Joseph Addison

As we look forward to the spring season, may we find ways in which to bring another sense, the love of the arts, into our home.

 A Source for reading from my home school library - "The Gift of Music" Jane Stuart Smith

Roses, Thorns and Beauty

Welcome to the new face lift of Janette's Sage.

I am still learning about this new form of communication.  I felt that the rose expressed visually the thoughts of my blog.  The background was chosen to continue this theme.

This rose is called "Aging With Beauty".  That is my heart's desire, to age with beauty before my Lord and my family.

A rose has thorns along the stem before you get to the beauty of the rose.  Examining Valentine roses,  the scent, the delicate rose, the sharp thorns reminded me of life.

We hear the saying, "I never promised you a rose garden".  Well that may be true, but each of us have thorns in our life or have experienced the hurt from thorns.  I wouldn't avoid buying roses just becasue of the thorns, nor would I want to go back and remove the thorns that created such beauty in my own life when I allowed the Lord to bring forth that beauty.

So, I continue to learn how to set up a blog.  I hope you enjoy the new look and continue to have patience as I move through this adventure of blogging and learning to age with beauty. Check out both of my new buttons for my blog and business, grab one or both, and leave comments along the way.

Enjoying the adventure, even with all the thorns.

It is All in Your Perspective!!!

It is all in your perspective.


Isn't that statement so true?  Just look at the picture to the side, we have all done this one before.  Is it a picture of a beautiful young girl or an old hag?


The older I become, the more I see this statement  as true.  Our own perspective can change everything.


We can remember our childhood with loving memories or choose to focus on the trials our family went through, as if other families didn't have their own trials.


Our financial attitude  can also be altered by our perspective for good or lead us down the road to poverty, either physical or mental poverty. 


Our family has suffered through some hard financial struggles, but compared to what?   Our definition of what is a "need" in comparison to a "want" can alter our perspective. Some will say they are poor because they don't want to touch their 401K,  savings, or that account for their next vacation.   Others will say they are in hardship and it means the water is being turned off, they are losing their possessions or worse .  


Our perspective becomes our truth.


It becomes a choice to see the young woman or the hag.  We can change our perspective, even when it isn't changed in the natural.  This change of perspective can give a marriage a new start, a teenager the belief he will make it, a mother a breath of fresh air and a family stress relief from a difficult situation.


Recently, as I came through a battle and started to breath again, I heard a friend say, "Doesn't the change in perspective really help?"  Yes, it does.  My situation may not have changed, but it has brought forth a change in  my perspective.


 Proverbs 23: 7, “As a man thinketh in his heart, so he is."