Recycle a Door- Potting Table/Server

Years ago, I heard that a child's boredom was good for them.  Keep them away from television and they will take that boredom and turn it into something creative.  When I have enforced this, I have seen my children come up with some very creative things....and so has their mother.  So I allowed some boredom to set in while thumbing through Pinterest and I started to create.  This project on Pinterest was much more elegant. In order to copy it, I would have had to spend too much money.  Instead, I decided to use what I had and only invested a few dollars for this unusual transformation. 

So, here is what happens when I get bored....I go get some boards!

I bought a piece of plyboard and two staircase ballisters .  The door came from Habit for Humanity...solid door with the insert replaced with peg board to add more stability. A table top will be added with L-brackets..legs are put on with L-brackets and then screwed in from top of table.

This bookshelf has been around since the early 80's. I think it has been found in everyone's bedrooms and has layers and layers of paint.  Boys' rooms, as well as our daughter's..now  it's time for the new location, the back patio, so let's cut it apart.  I will take the top portion to make a shelf on the door and the bottom to stabilize the door and table.  I pulled in an extra hand... and a talented one, at that.

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Attached shelves to the door with L-brackets. The table top was attached on top and the painting began. I wanted an old, used look.  The top of the bookshelf was turned upside down and attached with L-brackets for a shelf.

La-Te-Da....this is what you do with a door, bookshelf, ballisters and plyboard!!!

Here is the finished product, my potting table!!!  I bought more red plastic baskets to place things on the shelves.  I also wanted to use it as a serving table when we eat outdoors.  I painted the top of the table to look like a table cloth.  

I dressed the table up differently and served dinner outside!  So, multiple uses! Now you see what I can do when I get bored.  I am hoping it survives the storms...I don't have a covered patio and as soon as I finished, here came the rain!  I am not complaining...Ben's garden needs the rain.

Are you creative when you get bored?

Oh Let Me Tell You!

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When I get together with my friends we start to babble and share life.  It usually consist of talking about our families and then we move on to what we have read, seen and  learned.  So today I wanted  to share with you...what Benjamin's class calls "Show and Tell".  I could never tell you all the blog post which teach me, convict me, inspire me or make me laugh, so today I will just share just a few from this week.

Oh! Susan at My Place to Yours made me laugh.  This post is right on.  The other thing I enjoy about Susan is the fact that we both grew up in the same city, graduated the same year from high school and can share some past milestones, even though we have never met. There is even a possibility our parents crossed paths also.  We have now crossed paths in the blog world and she lives a few states away.  Maybe one day we will meet.  In this post she is sharing a milestone I am walking in also.
Did You Earn Your Merit Badge?  You will laugh and find out if you have earned your Merit Badge.
http://myplacetoyours.blogspot.com/2012/05/do-you-earn-merit-badge.html

Petra at This Good Steward just seems to always convict and inspire. I  usually leave her post in deep thought as I feel "the iron sharpening my iron".  Her writing inspires me to hear from God through her words, usually on multiple levels.  Cute Cupcakes are not the Problem...well it nails it.

http://www.thisgoodsteward.com/2012/05/cute-cupcakes-are-not-problem.html

Cecilia at Out of the Closet and Into the Light...now how do I say this, well she challenges me to new levels of spiritual depth.  It is very rare for me to come away from her blog and not want to say, "okay God I heard you loud and clear....and now I am responsible."  I would say her post on Ego ranks in my top 10 and propelled a wonderful discussion around our dinner table.

http://outoftheclosetintothelight.blogspot.com/2012/05/ego.html

I could fill a page of posts that the Lord has used in my life, to correct, convict, inspire, encourage and draw me closer to Him.  Thank you all for blogging...I am one who is blessed by you!  I hope you enjoy..if you haven't already visited these posts this week.

My past post on "fake" dress-up items - Is She Real?  http://www.janettessage.blogspot.com/2010/09/is-she-real.html    My response to the younger generation.

My response to what is happening with my own looks - Painting My Barn - The Older Version   http://www.janettessage.blogspot.com/2010/09/painting-my-barn-older-version.html
                     
Both are for a laugh....if you haven't joined me on these post before....I invite you to enjoy the laugh.


I will be back after Memorial Day to show what a girl, who is trying to find a life, does with a door, bookshelf, banister post, and a sheet of plywood. I know...I truly need to find something better to do with my time, but for now, let's create.  See you next week.  Happy Memorial Day...and thanks to all those who have served, still serving and their families.

They Are Back!

I can still vividly recall my mother's dressing table.  Sta-foam heads, we had dressed up with colored penciled, held her wigs.  The boxes of false eyelashes and glue set on the table.  My mother was in-style.

My neighbor has just struggled through three of her five chemo treatments.  She planned  in advance and bought wigs long before they were needed.  She came over one day and ask if I would be truthful and let her know if they looked good on her.  I was so honored, and they did.  I kissed her on the cheek while reminding her of her beauty .  This week held another part of her journey...the hair loss has now taken away her eyebrows and eyelashes.

With life-filled laughter she said, "well one good thing about all this is, I am learning to be more stylish. I never would have tried shorter hair and even eyelashes!"  I just loved it.  She is facing the cancer giant and staring it back with laughter and style.  She looks beautiful and excited about her new adventurous look.

Hey all of it is back in style!   Her and I both agreed it was time for both of us to become less frumpy.  I think I will go down and find me some eye-lashes.  I think I will join her at her make-up table and together we will laugh while we apply eye-lashes and maybe some Pinterest style eye-shadow.  I am sure I will learn more from her than just how to apply the stylish make-up.

A cheerful heart is good like medicine. Proverbs 17:22

Eye-lashes even come for cars now!!!

I have had fun jumping out and taking pictures with my phone...Ben, not so sure about his mom!

Are you wearing fake eye-lashes?  Are you going to try them?  How about for your car?  What style is coming back that you remember and plan to repeat?

Don't Throw Me in the...........

image on google search from Walt Disney Song of the South

Recently, Brer Rabbit's reverse psychology came to my mind.  I contemplated my own train of thoughts on being a wife and mother.  Let's just throw out Dr. Sears, Dr. Spock, BabyWise and any marriage book I could think of and I will just become Brer Rabbit.

Brer Rabbit was able to escape all kinds of mischief by manipulating his opponent.  He would just tell them exactly what he didn't want.  "Oh pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease Mr. Fox.........pleeeeeeeeeeease don't throw me into that there briar patch."  Mr. Fox thinks, okay if he doesn't want to go into that brair patch then that is exactly what I am going to do.  Mr Fox throws him into the briar patch and Brer Rabbit hops off with a joyful shout, "Mr Fox...I was born and raised in that briar patch..................born and raised."

So my thoughts went down Brer Rabbit's reverse psychology trail.....

Here I am speaking to my family:

• Oh pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeease, oh pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeease don't clean that garage! I just love the garage with all the tools all over the floor!
• Oh pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeease, oh pleeeeeeeeease don't clean your rooms! I love cleaning them myself!
• Oh pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeease don't dress up when you come to my house for dinner!
• Oh pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeease _________________________________________!!!!

You can fill in your own blank.  It is easier when they are little, like Benjamin, and you are training habits in their lives, while they are hiding God's word in their hearts through memorization.  You can cheer and feel so accomplished over their made beds and their walk in spiritual disciplines.  It is harder as they enter their world and start to throw out your convictions to form their own.  You pray they will turn to the one source that doesn't use reverse physiology, but is ageless truth.

God's word doesn't change with the culture, the new trends, or  the younger generation that says, "well it truly is okay."  His word has seen every culture and it stays the same.  There truly isn't anything new under the sun and the only thing to truly keep us grounded is His Word...while the culture turns to Brer Rabbit mentality or the newest phase.

• Hebrews 13:8 -- Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
• Malachi 3:6 -
  I am Jehovah, I change not
• Isaiah 40:8 -  The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God stands forever."-
• Isaiah 54:10 -  Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed," says the LORD, who has compassion on you.

I am glad I stand on solid ground when everything else around is sinking sand and the wind will change in a new direction tomorrow.


*A note in my defense...I had not read Kathleen at Sassy Granny's post before I wrote this, nor had I even read the title of her post.  When I got to her post and saw we were on the same subject of Brer Rabbit, I stopped myself from reading until I posted.  You might enjoy what take she has on Brer Rabbit....I am going there now.

Sorry about the blue text...I have no clue, blogger has a mind of its own today.

Who Got the First Shot?

Gunshots rang through the air on the grounds of the courthouse in Granbury, Texas.  Men dressed in period clothing and shooting guns caused me to run back around the courthouse grounds to grab my camera.  A first-time meeting with a fellow blogger had brought me to this city, and like all good bloggers, cameras are now an accessory. I just couldn't miss getting the pictures for Benjamin. I circled one side of the courthouse, while without my knowledge, she circled the opposite side.  As I was asking permission from the cowboys, she got the win by getting the first shot.  That's right...she saw me first and caught me in action.

  She should have been warned...look, my mouth is already engaged.

Jill of Pathway to Purpose and I were among each other's first followers.  Through the last two years, we have read each other's blogs and woven our hearts together through e-mails.  We decided it was time to meet and so, last Saturday, I headed to Granbury to meet this Godly woman.

After I put down my camera, I looked up to see the woman I recognized from her blog pictures....I didn't know until she sent the above picture that she had caught me on her camera.

What happens when two bloggers meet?  Well, you run to each other and hug, of course.  She came with a gift in hand..isn't this adorable?  I came with cash for lunch at the Bistro....talking kept us from taking any more pictures.

How creative is she?  My name was on my gift and there were home-made cookies, too. But they were inhaled before I could find my camera.  "True friendships leave footprints in your heart."

What do two bloggers do from 10:30 in the morning, until 5:00 in the evening?  Well they  just talk, talk, laugh, talk, laugh, and talk some more.  You see how God can take bloggers and join their hearts in a instant.

Jill is a doll.  I was so blessed.  Here are some things we share in common:

• We both wear the Tool Belt in our homes....this was too funny to compare our fix-it-notes.
• We are both too practical to buy most of the items we saw in the shops...I mean who wants to fill the tiny humming bird feeder everyday, even if it is cute....and forget that price...we could figure out how to make it.
• We both laugh while we talk....so that saying of cackling hens...well, they heard us coming.
• We could figure out how to settle all the issues in this week's newspaper, from breastfeeding to raising teens to issues that are concerns in the church...and we could get it all settled in one day!
• We could relate as wives and mothers...even though I am decades ahead of her in both, our hearts were the same.
• We could give each other a hug at the end of the day and Praise God for allowing us to come together to meet...promising to do this again.  

The plaque she put in my gift became a reality.  I even felt so comfortable, I used her youthful eyes instead of getting out my reading glasses, as we strolled through the stores with their little hand-written tags.  She joyfully read me anything I couldn't see and we discussed how I could keep up with my much-needed reading glasses.

I leave you with the best pictures Jill  took.  We were sitting with a timer on the camera.  Jill didn't tell me that she would be taking four shots. I was ready for the first picture and then began to have conversation after the first pic...can you guess?  Jill also took the best picture of me I have had in years...it is now my profile picture.

I was on one flight of stairs and she was on the opposite flight of stairs...we took pictures of each other...I have had more compliments on this photo...thanks Jill, I think these pictures summed up the day....JOY!

What a wonderful day in Granbury...and it all started with gunshots!!

Drive through Results

Brian Moore, Mark Roye of "Blood and Fire" and my son Kenny

Our society could be called the drive-through generation.  We want our results to come quickly, without hardly slowing down, as we speed through life.  Starting at an earlier age, it appears to be getting worse.  Just put your info in Google and in seconds your answer comes back.  Why wait?

This speedy type of response is, well let's be truthful, rarely how God answers our prayers.

I could never have imagined that prayers released back in the early 90's would be walked out decades later. But I stand now with open eyes, mainly tearful eyes of gratitude, as God removes the cloudiness of my vision to see the answers before me.

Is. 55:11
"...so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it."

The non-conventional sanctuary held young families with young dreams, young prayers and young children.  I stood in my early 30's with four children at my side, while their Dad played the grand piano for Praise and Worship.

The Spirit fell on the worshipers as they entered into praise with the song Ancient of Days.  Our youthful mindset allowed us to step outside our conservative heritage to bring in an element of worship that would be recalled this past week.  As the song began and voices were raised, huge beach balls with the world imprinted on them were released into the congregation. They were inflated globes.  As they bounced above and throughout the congregation, we declared His rule and reign over all the earth.  Every nation and tongue would declare His glory.  Every knee would bow in worship.  Our children just giggled in delight as they bounced the balls back into the air, touching the images of the nations.

Debra Brown and Bonnie Roye teaching the children in Cambodia

On Mother's Day, God brought this scene back to my memory while I rejoiced in all the pictures being sent back from Cambodia.  Distance, time and changes in churches had separated all those children who had touched the nations in their praise and worship...but God had sent out His word in the 90's over their lives.

In Cambodia, there are four of those little children ministering together... they are now adults.  There are three older adults, who were in attendance all those many years ago when the globes bounced through the sanctuary, guiding the work in Cambodia.

Jim Brown and our son in glasses, construction is almost finished on play ground in Cambodia

Two of my little boys....then we only had four children...have ministered in Africa, Germany, Russia and now, Cambodia.

Their mother still doesn't own a passport...but her prayers back in the 90's didn't need a physical passport.

The prayers are still being answered and I will not see the answers as a drive-through, but only as God continues to uncover my eyes to the work He is finishing.

May we all be diligent in our prayers...even when we can't see the answers or understand His timing.  He promises His word will not come back void until it has accomplished all He has called it to accomplish.

My Mother's Day began with a call from Cambodia and ended with a video sent from all four of the young adults who bounced those balls of the nations through the sanctuary....how totally awesome is that?  I also enjoyed my other five children and precious daughter-in-law for lunch.  I look forward to a lifetime of watching answered prayers...many that were made decades ago, during a time of life that seemed slower.

If you are unfamiliar with the song Ancient of Days, I would encourage you to hear it and read the words. (click on Ancient of Days for the you tube link)

It is Possible

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Okay I have to set the scene first.  I am an over-middle-aged woman, trying to bring some youth back into her 50-plus-pounds-overweight body.  So what do I do?  I go to the gym.   I am a member of a very small gym which affords me the luxury of exercising alone many days.  This has made sweating my fat off more comfortable to me.  The other day I was fine with this "exercising alone" routine when my 16-year-old had to remind me that there were cameras....well thank-you very much!!  I am sure they caught me getting tackled up in the machine the other day and falling on my face...just great!

So last week I hauled my reluctant body back to the gym hoping few, if anyone, would be there.  It wasn't bad, only two young men, ages of my own sons.  One a trainer for motor-cross riders, the other a motor- cross rider...not too intimidating.

Adele's voice came powering through the gym.  I enjoy her voice and she motivates me to run faster.  While sweating and desiring to stop  I was propelled to continue as one young man began to sing with her.  It was comical.  Something I would hear at my own house.

The song was Set Fire to the Rain.  He was having fun, although no one would vote for him on American Idol or the Voice,  his comical singing inspired his trainee to continue.  Then he commented, "now listen to the words...set fire to the rain.  How dumb is that?  You can't set fire to the rain."

I started to grin as my head started rehearsing the story of Elijah and the priests of Baal.
I Kings 18:38Then the fire of the LORD fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench.

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I resisted the urge to tell this young man he had forgotten his Sunday School lessons, instead, I just continued my rehearse of the Word of God. Isn't that what happened, God set fire to the rain?  Yes I realize it wasn't literal rain and it was "licking up the water", but God was going to move me to another truth. This scripture ended my thought process as the timer went off on my work out machine.

Luke 1: 37

For nothing is impossible with God."

You see, going to the gym can be good for your spirit also.  That day I left feeling I had improved my physical and spiritual health.   All it took was for one young man to start singing...oh the power of music.  Even these 50 extra pounds that need to be shed aren't impossible with God, nor anything else in life.

Cowboy Room Reveal

Benjamin has been very patient with his mother.  He can't recall the wonderful room I had decorated for him as a little guy, since he was moved out at the age of two.  The next three years were in a rental that only allowed us to live there as "captured-mortgage-paying guest." My creative juices were bottled and walls stayed bare.  So when we moved I determined to make this rental our home...and I could paint over anything the landlord didn't like when we moved out...until then, we are going to live!!

Sonja of Bits and Pieces,  had encouraged me to decorate Benjamin's room anyway he wanted it.  He had his own ideas and even drew them out for me last summer.  So patiently he waited for his mom to bring his vision to life.  He agreed to stay with the theme I had on his bedding...thank goodness.

I started with these "green" walls...now surely I can't make it worse.  I painted a solid color over the green giving me a clean slate.

He had requested cactus and these were draw on his paper....so I gave him a cactus, barb wire, post and horse shoe.

You can enter into his farm..."it is not a ranch." he said.  He loves Sue@PearTree Lane Farmhouse and wants a farm like hers.  Forget the fact that cactus and gardening don't go together...we will use our imagination...when we enter his farm.

After buying a art projector off of Craig's List I was able to take the cowboys from his sheets and bring them to life on his wall.

This cowboy was funny. I decided that I would have him swinging his hat, so I started to add the hat in his hand.  Benjamin kept protesting, but I couldn't understand why.  I was busy painting as he kept saying, "you have to take his hat off his head!"  As I stepped back I started to laugh...you can't have a cowboy swinging his hat if his hat is also on his head. Benjamin was insistent the lasso rope was to be brought down across the cowboy to his other hand where there were loops of extra rope. He is  a boy of detail.  His distance gave a better perspective.

So instead of a hat he got a lasso!

Finished Product....and now it is done.  What a fun project.  Now on to my room...maybe I will be finished by the time we are here one year....oh my!!

The riding cowboy is on the wall at the end of the bed.  The standing cowboy is on the wall next to the door going out of the room.  Woodiy from Toy Story sets on the dresser looking over the whole room...I think he likes it too!

From the Farm of Benjamin!

Operation Justice

How easily the Lord can grab your heart and say, "Go".  In my case this e-mail from a friend of 28- years grabbed this mother's heart and she just knew who was to "Go".  Tears rolled down my eyes with compassion while my prayers ascended before the throne for the sons I felt the Lord was leading to this place.   It would take a miracle...as Beth Moore calls it, "an elephant prayer".  I started my "elephant prayer" in January for God to soften, provide and convict my sons to go.  As moms of grown children we walk such a fine line.  We gentle suggest and step back.  I gentle forwarded the e-mail, allowing God to speak through the e-mail to my sons.

In a few days I will be leaving for Cambodia to begin a new relationship with some ministry partners that work with children and adults that have been rescued from sex trafficking. Specifically, I am going there to finalize plans to return there in May, with a team, and build a playground area for over 130 children that have been rescued and are in the process of being healed and restored. The playground will be located at a school founded by Cambodia Hope Organization in Poi pet, Cambodia. My good friend, Mike Lynch of BnF Minneapolis, will be traveling with me to help set up this very challenging project.

We have also been invited to go on a tour with other church and business leaders to see the conditions that the people of Cambodia live in. The extreme poverty makes them very vulnerable to abuse in many forms. One of those forms being that of an ever-growing sex trafficking industry. This billion-dollar business takes children of all ages for purpose of selling them to others. I know that this is a hard thing to imagine, but it is happening all over the world. The region that we are going in is what is called the “Golden Triangle”. It is a place where over 60% of all sex trafficking victims come from. Poi pet is a place where the love and justice of God needs to come.

I waited!  One grabbed it as soon as it came through...but he had conditions.  The other said he would think about it...now we all know that usually means "no" and is said to appease the person so they will back off.

Months started to fly by and I prayed and waited.  Justification started to come...I listened, nodded and returned to my prayerful knees.  "Please God...I know you want them there!"

As we all set at the Easter lunch table one son shared who all was going. He had just spent the weekend around those planning to go.  I held back tears of frustration that they had both decided the cost was too much for them to go.  I just kept saying "oh, oh!" when he listed the names.  Inside I was crying out, "God please...you put it on my heart, can you not soften their hearts?  Can you not let them step out in faith? Lord please."

Text went back and forth...one brother waiting on the other to go in order to justify going.  Business was good this time of year, so it would be a double sacrifice of loss business and the cost of the trip for one son.  The other son trying to meet another job "goal" couldn't justify the time off.  One son and I text back and forth... "it takes faith"... "faith isn't logical"...."it wasn't logical  to be thrown into the fire"..."no, but when they were they saw God and lived to tell about it"...silence from the texting fingers.

Monday after the discussion around the Easter table one son went to re-new his passport.  The other...silence.  They had shared the joy of building a playscape for inter-city children in Atlanta  11 years ago.  One son had also built a playscape in the inter-city San Antonio four years ago.  This would be their second one together.

Text came..."got my passport renewed".  Mine back, "why?"  "Because I am going to Cambodia."  Joy flowed from the other end of the hand held phone...one had said "yes".  The Lord provided jobs that evening after his step of faith to re-new his passport, which would provide money for the trip and the two weeks of missed work.  Isn't God good?

Other mothers joined me in prayer for this trip....one prayed as if the second son would also go.

May 6th our oldest child steps on a plane to Cambodia.  Would you please join us in prayer for the safety of all going,  for the power of God to be seen in this place,  for captives to be set free,  for each person on this trips hearts...for hearts to be forever changed for the kingdom of God.  As they come back, may they touch and bring revival to us back in the States.  May we all learn to say "yes" when God says "GO!"


I guess all my mommy post this week...praying knees...is appropriate as we enter the month of Mother's Day.  It truly is more than just giving birth....it is a life time commitment to seeing God work in and through our children. Praying when we don't understand, yet believing He holds them in His hands.

Heirloom - What a Surprise!

heir·loom  (ârlm)

n.

1. A valued possession passed down in a family through succeeding generations.

How would I have guessed that the works of my hands would be passed down from one generation to another.  As a  young wife and mother, I loved creating with my hands.  One of the first substantial purchases my husband made for his new bride, other than kitchen gadgets, was a new sewing machine.  I still have that machine all these years later. It has served me through the decoration of two homes, six baby nurseries, smocked dresses and multiple business ventures.  Creating was one of my purest delights.

When the first e-mail came, I was shocked.  I had been commissioned to sew smocked dresses for clients in the 80's.  One of my repeated clients was the mother of one of my best friends from high school through our mutual stands in each others' weddings.  While I was having boys, she was having girls.  So grandmother would order a Christmas dress and an Easter dress for her granddaughters.  I only got by with a couple of boys' smocked outfits before my Dad's protest was heard loud and clear....releasing my sons from wearing Lord Fauntleroy clothing.  I never thought about those dresses beyond the 90's.  Then one of those precious little girls grew up and had a little girl of her own.  Her e-mail that was recently sent to me was a picture of the dress being passed down....a true heirloom.  I had created a true heirloom.

I also hosted a craft show in my home one year... sewing Christmas skirts which were large, reverse- able, muslin-stenciled skirts.  I didn't even remember who bought those skirts...each with different designs.  Then the phone call came. "Janette, I thought you would enjoy hearing this."  She had bought the skirt in the early 80's. Her son, a close friend of our son, had been going through a difficult time and lived many states away. She had asked if she could send him anything and he replied, "yes, the Christmas skirt."  He didn't even know I had made it, which enlarged the story for him after 26 years.  Again, how could I have known.

Recently, I received an email from a friend I met back in the 90's.  Moves had taken us to different states, until God miraculously had us standing in the same basketball arena years later.  We reconnected... we both now had six children and home school athletes.   She was now watching her sons marry and wanted to give each daughter-in-law an "heirloom".  She wrote to ask if I would help her make this dream come true with her cross-stitch.   The piece of art arrived in the mail and I began creating a pillow to enhance her work.  For the first time in my life, I knew there was a chance this piece would be an heirloom.  I was honored and fretted over it like I have never fretted over any of my own work.  She was so pleased....and I was so humbled, that I could be a part of her dream.  I will receive another piece from her soon.

As I now venture into my magnifying-glasses-wearing season-of-life, I am contemplating what I want to learn or re-learn as I began to increase my creating.  "Heirloom" has now taken on a special meaning for me.  I am glad I am leaving behind some works of my hands. But more importantly, I pray that I am also leaving behind some things that point to my Creator, the author of any gifts I possess.

Better Than A Home Run

Last Friday I frustratingly, eyes fighting back tears, left the baseball field.  I am a sports mom and for the last 21 years you could find me in the stands for basketball, baseball and softball games, yet this time was different.  The season had ended along with all my expectations.  I didn't understand.  I had a firm word from the Lord that this son was to play baseball.  I saw his skills explode early at the beginning of the season, then all expectations dashed as he was taken from first string to the bench.  His disappointment and loss of confidence could be read in his eyes...ours showed up in our conversations reserved beyond his hearing.  Friday night began  the tug-a-war of questions as I left the ball park.

Two A.M. in the morning my dear Lord called me to His side to answer this mother's heart.

Me - "Lord, why?  You said for him to play, what was the purpose?  Show me. I don't understand,"

Lord - "Did you see him tonight?"

Me - "Yes, I watched him cheer from the bench.  I watched him not play."

Lord - " That isn't what I saw.  I saw him play a game as a team member.  He cheered on other players. He served the other players.  He put himself second.  He didn't pout or disrespect his coach."

Me - "But Lord his skills are unreal.  His abilities are at the top of the stats.  His grades are high. He earned this."

Lord - " I know his physical abilities well, I gave them to him.  I also know what I wanted to build in him.  Now did you see him tonight?  What did your spirit see?"

Me - "I saw a son in whom I am so proud.  I saw character, that can't be bought or even taught.  I saw a vessel willing to not pout at unfair treatment.  Yes Lord, I saw."

Lord - "Okay, Janette, what was your question?  Aren't my ways higher than yours?  Aren't my purposes to bring glory to myself?"

Me - "Yes, Lord."

Lord - "You saw my purpose not yours.  Mine are not the worlds.  Could I have been humbling some whose words were harsh?  Could I have been instilling in your son something that can't be earned by a home run?"

Me - "Yes, Lord."

Lord - "Janette, I know his future.  I know the plans I have for him. I have heard your heart for your son.  Stand back and watch.  Let your ideas of success fall in order to see my work."

Me- "Yes, Lord.