Friday's Fave Fives #263

Well we made it through Christmas.  Through all the preparing and baking and cooking and shopping.  All be visiting and parties.  All the chaos and fun and exhaustion.  There was much to be thankful for.  Yes, there was presents and all the hoopla but in the midst of that was the real things that I am truly grateful for.  Please join in and share you 5 favorite things from your week.

1.  Safe travels for all my kids as they came home.  The weather held out, the roads were in good driving condition and my girls made it home safely last weekend.  My son had made it safely to his job on Christmas Eve and back home again safely on Boxing day.  I'm so thankful for that.  I try not to think too much when I know they are on the road, I pray and try to keep giving it over to the Lord, or I would drive myself crazy with anxiety.  

2.  A chance to see all our relatives at some point.  Sometimes it doesn't happen.  There are just too many dinners and parties all happening at the same time or close together or just too many, period.  But this year, without feeling like we were always on the run, we actually managed to have a visit with everyone.  I enjoy seeing family at Christmas, they are what is important to me, so to be able to see them all was extra special.

3.  A relaxed Christmas morning.  Because my son was working at his job on a ambulance service Christmas Eve and Day, we waited to open our gifts on Boxing Day morning when he was back and our stockings on Monday night before he left.  This opened up a really relaxed Christmas morning to celebrate T's (my youngest) Christmas Day birthday.  It was so much nicer, at least in my opinion.  Wonder if I can talk everyone into making this a new tradition.

4.  The food of Christmas.  I'm the first to admit, I love the all the delicious food of Christmas.  I love tasting other's favorite Christmas fare and I love to cook.  So this is one yummy week I'm very thankful for.  Gym tomorrow!

5.   Moments of quiet to reflect on the whole reason we celebrate Christmas.  To remember that Jesus came to earth in the humble form of a human baby to draw us and to show us God's love for us and to bring us back to Him.  How very thankful I am for such a loving God!

How was your Christmas week?  Did you have moments of calm and quiet where you could reflect on your favorites?

I wish you all a very Happy New and all God's best for 2014!  I can't believe our next FFF will be in 2014.  Thank you all for being a blessing to me and joining me in the last year!  I look forward to you sharing your favorites throughout the next year.

Friday's Fave Five #262

    

Hi everyone.  It's the last Friday before Christmas and even though it's soooo busy, that is the perfect time to take a moment to take notice of the good blessings brought out way, things we might miss in the hectic Christmas rush.  Please join in as we find our five favorites.  

1.  The room with only the Christmas tree lights on.  So relaxing and so pretty.  The perfect way to just let the stress of the day melt away.

2.   Our ladies bible study Christmas evening.  So fun to just have an evening of chatter and laughter and gift exchange.  The goodies everyone brings always add to the evening.  We like our goodies.  ;)

3. Simple goodies that are put together quickly.  One of my favorite things for a finger food buffet is so simple yet so delicious.  A block of room temperature cream cheese on a pretty plate with red chili pepper jelly spooned over the top and puddling along the sides.  A little bit of a kick, lots of creaminess. Serve with a variety of crackers.  Yum.  And no stress!

4.  My hubby who is out shoveling snow early in the morning so that the driveway and steps are clear for the dayhome families arriving.  He is such a blessing to doing this for me.  Although I don't mind shovelling snow, doing it before it's even light out is not my idea of fun.  But he's out there every snow fall clearing it away.

5.  Big fluffy falling snow. We had yet another snow fall but this time it was the very pretty huge fluffy flake version.  So pretty.  And may I say the easy kind to shovel.

What were your favorites this week?

Friday's Fave Five #261

Whew, where did that week go?  It just zipped right by.  So glad to have FFF to force me to take a pause and notice the good things that God has blessed me with.  Please join me!

1.  Staff Christmas dinner.  Hubby's staff dinner was this week.  They are a very small staff of three so it was a really nice intimate dinner at a really great restaurant.  I ate entirely way too much but every bite was delicious from the coconut shrimp and deep fried pickle appetizers, cooked to perfection steak and sides and finishing with white chocolate banana cream pie.  The company was great and it was nice to celebrate with the people my hubby works with.

2.   Learning the ins and outs of my new phone.  While I have to admit technology strains my brain, I have really been enjoying learning what this phone can do.  I've actually enjoyed the challenge.  While I have no delusions and know it's going to take me a while to learn all the things this phone has to offer (and probably won't use nearly all of them), it has been fun playing around.  I've especially loved the great camera it has and the fun features and modes the camera can use.

3.  Discovering a family favorite dish.  The other night I had a pound of pork cubes and had no idea what to do with it and not much motivation.  I googled pork and rice and came across this recipe:  Slow Cooker Thai Pork with Peppers.  I changed it up just a tad; I didn't have fresh ginger, but had this wonderful Thai spice called Thai Sigh.  So I cut the garlic in the recipe back to 4 knowing that there was garlic in the blend and skipped the fresh ginger, again knowing it was in the blend.  I added a teaspoon of dried cilantro and let it cook away.  Oh my goodness it was delicious.  Definitely was a big hit!  I've got fresh ginger on the grocery list so I'm going to try it exactly the way it was written and I'm thinking it will be even better because of the fresh ingredient.

4.  Candy Cane ice cream.  A seasonal favorite, I found one that has some chocolate pieces in it too.  Yummy!

5.  Covergirl LipPerfection.  Love this stuff.  Very light with just a hint of sheer color, a touch of gloss and tons of stuff that makes my lips really soft.  And with this crazy Alberta weather we've been having my lips have been getting so dry.  This is the perfect thing for them.


What have been your favorite blessings for the week?

Friday's Fave Five #260

Here it is, Friday already and time to recall our blessings over the last week. Other thank the frigid deep freeze we are in right now, feeling like -39*C (-38,2*F) with the wind chill, It has been a wonderful week of some real obvious blessings and then some more subtle ones.  They are all good to take notice of!  Please join me and my fellow bloggers in finding our favorite five.  Here's mine in no particular order...

1.  Early Christmas present.  My sweet hubby got me the phone I was really hankering for.  It was on a great deal and I got it already because it had to be activated in store to get the deal, which meant turning my other phone off.  So now I'm a bit fuzzy brained from the learning curve but I love it.

2.  Google.  When the kids were in school and I couldn't come up with answers to their school work for them I used to jokingly tell them to "google it, google is your friend".  This week I found it super beneficial in helping me with the new phone.  There was something that happened with it, that even a visiting teenager couldn't figure out.  I phoned my carrier who had no idea and who then connected me with Samsung, and even they were having a tough time helping me out.  So it dawned on me the other day to "google" it.  And within 15 seconds I had the problem fixed.  Love the google!

3.  T coming home.  Even if it was only for one night.  The speaker at our Christmas party was the director of the bible school T is attending and asked Tamara to accompany her here.  It was so nice to have her home and to attend the party with her.  More on that is here

4.  An unexpected day off.  Came as a by product of the blizzard we had on Monday and Tuesday.  Nice little bonus, even though I did have to spend a few hours of it shoveling!  I also did spend time giving the play room and craft room and good cleaning and doing lots of reading and drinking nice hot coffee.

5.  Christmas decorating done.  Inside and out.  Such a good feeling having it finished and just getting to sit back and enjoy for this season.

What have your favorite blessings been this week?

Friday's Fave Five #259

Happy Thanksgiving to all my American friends.  May you have a very blessed holiday!  I've had a very crazy week with handling details for the silent auction and prize giveaways for our Ladies Christmas party which is tonight.  We also received devastating news on a tragic accident that took the life of a family friend.  So with all this going on I just did not make it to the computer in time to do a full list for first thing this morning.  But please play along and I will add more as soon as I can!

1.  Anticipation of Youngest Daughter coming home.  Even if it is only for one night.  The bible college director is the lady speaking at our Ladies Christmas Party and because this is T's home town she asked T to accompany her.  I'm so excited, but boy do I have a lot to do to get ready!

2.  This post contains the next two favorites...God incidences and the beginning of a special trip.

3.  A blessing of a great hotel room.  To take J. to the airport we booked a hotel near the airport because he had to be there so early and none of us felt like a 2+ hour drive in the middle of the night.  I went on hotels.ca (com) and picked one that looked decent and had really good reviews from guests.  I got a great deal on it saving $80.  And it was a wonderful hotel!  New, modern, huge room, very comfortable bed, delicious breakfast included.  We'll stay there again whether we need to go to the airport or not.

4.  Big City Farmer's Market.  So much fun and so many delicious looking foods and wonderful products for sale.

What have your favorites been this week?  If you don't have time to share what you are thankful for this week with us on the computer, considering sharing it with someone you are spending time with this weekend.  And don't neglect to ask what were the blessings in their own week.  Gratefulness can be contagious and brightens the day!  Happy Thanksgiving, American Friends!

Friday's Fave Five #258

Is it Friday already?  Where on earth did this week go?  Seems like I just typed up last week's FFF and here we are again.  But that's the perfect time to intentionally pause and look for the blessings.  Please join in!

1.  Operation Christmas Child boxes loaded and delivered!  I had a car load from my church to take to the collection center.  Once again I got such a thrill imagining each box being opened by a child.   I love being involved with this ministry.  For everyone who packed a box or two (or 6 like one special lady at my gym!) this video is for you!

2.  Connections Pot Luck after service on Sunday.  A special lunch so that new people can meet and connect with others in our church.  I love events like this.  Sometimes it's so hard to meet people as they are rushing out the door to get home to that roast in the oven.  This gave opportunity to sit and relax and just get to know someone I might otherwise not have met for quite some time or someone who was normally out of usual comfort zone.   3.  A surprise lunch with a friend.  My friend and I were scheduled to work at the soup kitchen last Saturday but when we got there they had an over abundance of helpers, so she took me for lunch and we did a bit of Christmas decorating shopping.  What a nice time with a good friend. 4.  Brandied Pear candle.  Purchased at above mentioned shopping trip.  Smells. so. good.  And it was a great price on top of it all.
5.  Saving the best for last, cooking Hubby's favorite dinner for his birthday!  It was a real pleasure cooking his favorite meal for him, a small way of letting him know I love him, knowing how happy he'd be about it.  Happy birthday, Sweetie! What were your favorite blessings this week?

Friday's Fave Five #257

Welcome everyone.  It's been a really full and busy week and I've been quite missing in action all week on the old blog but I sure don't want to miss these Friday posts.  It helps me to slow down and notice the good things that might otherwise slip past with me being barely conscious of them.  Please join us as we find our fave five blessings of the week!  If you need the guidelines they are linked in the sidebar.

1.  Road trip to see Oldest Daughter on the long weekend.  It's a long drive, 6 1/2 + hours, but oh so worth it to see her smiling face.  With it being Remembrance Day on Monday it gave us that extra day to go see her.  We need at least 2 nights there otherwise it's not worth it go because of the length of time spent on the road, so this long weekend was the perfect opportunity.  The weather held out and we had a great weekend.

2.  Shopping excursion in one of my favorite stores.  While visiting our girl, we went to Homesense which is one of my favorite stores.  We don't have one here, so I'm always happy when hubby suggests we go there.  He knows it will make me happy and he's willing to indulge me a bit.

3.  Butter Trufle Tea.  Smooth and buttery, perfect for cooler days.  A touch of honey and milk, a blankie and good book and I'm set.

4.  Some good reading time.  Road trip means lots of pages are going to be read.  Relaxing in the evenings in the hotel room means extra time to read too.  Love it!

5.  Starbucks Creme Brulee Latte is back.  What a nice surprise it was to find the Christmas drinks at Starbucks are featuring and that means my favorite of all is here!  Yummm!

What were your favorites from the week?

Friday's Fave Five #256

Oh my goodness, is it Friday all ready?  Where did that week go?  Fast or not, nevertheless it's still Friday and that means it's time to look for our Favorite Five blessings of the last week.  Please join on in with us.  If it's your first time here you can go here for the guidelines.


1.  Movies with friends.  Last Friday Hubby and I went to see Gravity with our friends.  It was fun just to escape into a movie, another world for a couple of hours.  I love movies about space to begin with but this one was in 3D and really unreal how they did all the shots.  Hubby and I kept looking at each other saying, "I wonder how they did that".   Nice outing for the two us with good friends.

2.  Amazing service in church.  We had a special guest speaker at church on Sunday.  Jeff and Rowena Pessina from Philippine Frontline Ministries .  These two have been ministering in the Philippines for 28 years and reach out to all but they have an amazing outreach to the thousands of kids who live on the streets in the Philippians. His message was touching and challenging.  So good.

3.  Lost 2 more lbs.  'nuff said.

4.  Enjoying the Halloween leftovers.  Hate Halloween, but sure do like the leftover mini chocolates.  How I lost the 2 lbs eating those goodies this week, I'm not too sure.

5.  A clean kitchen.  A night where all the counters are cleaned off, the dishwasher is filled and humming and even the plastics are washed and out of the sink.  Feels good.



Well my blessings were pretty simple this week.  But I think I noticed them because my week has been hectic and they soothed my soul with their simple moments.  Blessings don't always have to be huge and shouted from the rooftops, they can come quietly and subtley too.  What were your favorite blessings from your week?

 

Friday Fave Fives #255

Welcome to Friday's Fave Five, a little meme that helps us to focus on the good things that we are blessed with, the big and small that brings a smile, encourages and uplifts us through our days.  Please join us.  Guidelines are here if you are new.

1.  Sleeping in and a mellow start to a Friday.  This month I started my workday every single day at 7:30 a.m.  For a night owl, that is a tough stint.  Last Friday a parent of the early arrivers decided to keep the kids home with her.  What a difference that simple half hour made to the start of my day.  It was so much more relaxed and I savored every second in that 30 minutes.

2.  Operation Christmas Child kick off.  Last Sunday was the kick off to Operation Christmas Child at my church.  I have the privilege of heading it up and what fun it is.  To me it is not even work.  Love, love, love this ministry and my dream is to go on a distribution with them, hopefully in the next year or two.



3.   My guys all to myself.  Dinner out with my hubby and my son was a real blessing last Friday night.  We went to my favorite restaurant, I had one of my favorite meals and enjoyed the company of my two favorite guys.  Then Son left early to get to worship practice and it turned into a wonderful date night with my beloved.  Come to think of it, last Friday started great and ended great, it was pretty darn good all around.

4.  Coffee and dessert with a friend.  An evening opened up where my friend and I could get out and just have a great chat, sharing our lives and lots of laughs.  Dessert was pretty darn good too.

5.  Top Chef Online University.  My oldest girl gifted me with the Top Chef University Online Culinary Course last Christmas.  It's been fun going through the courses and though I know some of it, it's exciting to learn proper techniques and new to me ideas.  It's easily doable, most of the segments no more than 10 minutes at the most so far.   I can hardly wait to get to some of the tougher stuff that I have no idea how to cook.

Well that wraps it up for me.  It's going be a fun but busy weekend for me.  Hopefully the weather continues on it's nice trend after that snow dump last week.  I can't hardly believe it is November already!  What were your favorite blessings this week?

Friday's Fave Five #254

Welcome to Friday's Fave Fives!  Whew, it's been pretty busy in my life but this exercise slows me down and causes me to purposefully take a look at blessings in the busyness.  So glad to have you all join me in it!

1.  Trees turning golden.  Our row of Colorado Aspens up until now have just dropped boring, dull leaves.  With a couple of crazy wind storms most of the leaves that blew down were actually green, then eventually they turned an ugly blacky brown color on the ground.  But all of a sudden overnight, we have the golden glory.  Love when they all turn at the same time.  A feast for the eyes right in my backyard.

Haven't boosted the color at all in these photos.  Gor-ge-ous!

2.  The wonderful toy that leaves become when they fall.  When leaves turn golden, eventually come on down.  They then provide hours of play for the dayhome kidlets.  Throwing, piling, jumping, raking, shovelling, moving, driving trucks through.   Anything their imaginations can think of.  And believe me they think of all sorts of things to do with a pile of leaves.  It's awesome!

3.  The smell of said fallen leaves.  Love, love, love the scent of the fallen, crunchy leaves.  One of my favorite all times scents.  I can't get enough of sitting out there and taking a nice deep breath of it.

4.  Two heads are better than one.  A lady from church and myself spent a good hour at the church's power point/computer system last night trying to figure out how to get the Operation Christmas Child video working for my presentation on Sunday.  She is just learning the ins and outs of working the system and me, well, I have no clue and am totally not computer literate.  But between the two of us we clicked and thought and clicked and thought some more and we figured it out.  What was totally funny was we had to do it all over again because we didn't write the steps down so when we had to repeat it, we'd totally forgotten what the pattern was in all the missteps we'd taken.  But we did it again.  Hubby would be so proud of me because at home I so quickly default to him to "fix it" because I don't want to take the time to learn when he knows it all in this department.  But he wasn't around and neither was anyone else who knew what they were doing and me and S. just applied our selves and got the job done.  By the grace of God we didn't even crash the system.

5.  I already mentioned this but it makes the list because it was an absolute favorite and highlight of my week.  Meeting in person a young lady who, as a child, received and Operation Christmas Child box.  Hearing her speak and talking with her personally and learning how those little boxes changed her whole community was totally inspiring.  If you pack a box, never discount what your simple little gifts do in the life of a child!  Don't weary in packing them each year because they do so much that, this side of heaven, you will probably never realize.  To watch some powerful stories of how boxes have impacted children and whole communities you can go here!

Well that wraps up my five for this week.  What were your favorites this week?  

Friday's Fave Five #253

Hi everyone, welcome.  Last weekend we Canadians celebrated Thanksgiving.  It's one of my favorite holidays, but really there is no reason to keep thankfulness to just one weekend a year.  How much better to be thankful for all the good things in our daily lives?  Did you know that thankful people who realize their blessings are generally more happy.  And so they are thankful.  And again they are happier.  Sounds like a good circle to get into, doesn't it?  Well that's what FFF is all about.  Looking for our blessings, being thankful for the big and the small and being a more content and happy person giving glory to the Lord.  We invite you to join in!  Guidelines are linked in the sidebar.

1.  The holiday of thanksgiving being an opportunity for my family to come together.  Now that we're spread out a bit, a holiday presents a great time to all get together.

2.  The foods of thanksgiving.  I'm very thankful that I am  able to cook a dinner for my family.  My favorite foods happen to be a lot of the ones I serve at Thanksgiving.  Turkey, stuffing, spaghetti squash, pumpkin pie.  Okay I didn't make the pie, but the others I sure did.

3.  My daughter being safe and sound after her car broke down on the highway. It's that phone call that makes a parent feel so helpless.    On the way back to her home Oldest Daughter's car just quit on the highway.  About 4 hours from  here, 45 minutes out of a city.  The tow truck an hour away.  I am so thankful she had her boyfriend with her and they both remained safe.  A hefty repair and towing bill but it doesn't compare to the both of them remaining safe and finally making it home safely.

4.  A Sweet Hubby who cleaned up for me last night while I had a horrible headache.  So appreciate his jumping right in to help even though I know he was pretty darn tired from work.

5.  Another dandy breakfast from our favorite breakfast place.  This time I chose a "April 89" crepe.  Filled with fresh fruit and custard, it sounded delicious.  Imagine my surprise when it arrived and was set before me.  It was almost as wide as my shoulders.  I may or may not have eaten almost the whole thing.

What were your favorites from the week?

Friday's Fave Five #252

Hi everyone, she says, scuffling her toe on the floor.  I totally apologize for the absence of FFF last week.  For those who didn't read my post yesterday, I was away at a women's conference and had auto-posted the FFF.  Or so I thought.  Apparently, in all the hectic moments of getting ready, I pushed the save button rather than the publish button.  So no FFF showed up.  Which leads me right into my first FFF for this week.

1.  Caring bloggy friends who checked up on me to make sure all was all right.  What a sweet bunch of friends I have made in this world of blogging.  Thanks so much for the care.

2.  The women's conference.  I am still processing and thinking on everything experienced and learnt.  It was amazing to meet together with 600 other women.

3.  Getting to know other women from my own church.  There were 6 of us who drove up and attended the conference and I roomed with 2 I didn't know well.  What an honor to get to know them better and hear their dreams for their families and lives.  Deeper friendships formed from this weekend.

4.  A surprise great deal.  Last night hubby and I did our Thanksgiving shopping run.  If you aren't Canadian you might not know it is our Thanksgiving this weekend.  Anyway, hubby and I were keeping an eye out for a small carpet we needed beside the bed.  Nothing seemed to suit or was way over what we wanted to spend.  Finally we came across one we agreed on.  It was the last one left and it was sort of tossed on a pile in the $49.99 bin.  After humming and hawwing over the price, it was still too much in our opinion, we rolled it up and took it to the till.  It rung in at, wait for it, under $14.00 including taxes.  We tried to tell the girl it was wrong but she insisted it was right.  Whoo hoo.  We paid and skidaddled out of there thinking someone would surely be running after us to tell us it was a huge mistake.  Sorta felt like the lady in this commercial:



It just wasn't that store.  And we did try to say it might be an error but apparently it was our day to be blessed with a rug for next to nothing.

5.  I'll leave you with a thanksgiving quote on this Canadian thanksgiving weekend.

“A thankful heart is not only the greatest virtue, but the parent of all other virtues”

                                                                                                        Marcus Tullius Cicero  

Happy Thanksgiving to all my Canadian friends.  May you all have a great weekend.

Friday's Fave Five #251

Welcome to Friday's Fave Five!  It's been one busy week over here.  Fall is really upon us.  A good time to look back over the week and notice some of those good things that uplift us in our our lives.  It's easy to join in.  The guidelines are here, take a look at them and then just jump right on in.

1.  Everyday heroes!  This video just made me cry.  So thankful for those caring fireman and other first responders.

The scene was captured on the fireman's helmet camera.  Fifteen minutes and a tank of oxygen later this kitty is onto his 2nd of nine lives.

It even made a news program.  And it made me smile that there were caring everyday heroes out there who take the time to help even a helpless little cat.

2.  Reconnecting with a friend I haven't seen in probably about 20 years.  And she's coming to visit this weekend with her 19 year old son whom I've never met.  I'm looking forward to lots of catching up.

3.  Fall decorations out.  I finally got around to breaking out the fall decorations.  I love the colors that fall brings in and it was nice to see them gracing the decor around here.

4.  Flannel pj's.  Yes, I broke them out too.  We haven't got our big duvet out yet on the bed and I was a little chilly at night with it getting down to single digits (that would be celcius so in the 30's for F).  So my solution was to put on the flannels.  We are cozy once again.

5.  A great night at Lady's study.  Not everyone was there but those who were really contributed and we had some great comments and observations and study of  "Being blessed so that we can bless others".  It all ended with a good time of prayer for each other.  Love it when the ladies come ready and willing to participate rather than just someone spending the whole time being the only one talking.

What have your 5 favorite blessings been over the week?

Just a reminder that the Linky is for those that are participating in the Friday's Fave Five meme.  Please don't add a link if you have not written a Friday's Fave Five post.  In respect to those who are participating, unrelated links will be deleted.

Friday's Fave Five #250

Welcome to Friday's Fave Five.  The last one of summer 2013.  It's hard to believe that another summer has come and gone and fall is now upon us.  Back to pants and socks, comfy sweaters and hoodies,  heaters kicking in and pumpkin spiced coffee!  Join with us as we look back over our week and find some blessings, big or small.  Guidelines are here if you'd like to do a FFF post and/or link up.

1.  Back to routine.  I love the laziness of and relaxed attitude of summer but I always look forward to the routine of fall.  I exist better in a routine, not a rigid one, but one with some expectations accomplished during the day.  I find the kids thrive better in some kind of routine too.  So love ya summer, but I'm glad you're here fall.

2.  Back to massages.  My massage therapist lady took the summer off after having major surgery and boy, of boy, did my neck and back feel it.  But now she's back and healthy and I had an awesome massage this week.  With my tight back and neck issues that stem from a car accident from when I was a kid, this definitely made my favorites for this week.

3.  Back to cooler evenings.  Love, love, love that the evenings are cooling off.

4.  Back to pumpkin spice lattes and chai tea lattes.  I love the warm, spicy flavors of fall.  Especially so in hot drinks.  Yummy.

5.  Back to a in-depth study at ladies group.  Summer is fun because we are much more casual because people come and go due to holidays.  We don't do an in-depth study and we focus more on the friendship aspect of our group and doing some fun things together.  Love that but I'm raring to go on cracking open the Word of God and studying something specific.

What were your favorite blessings from the week?

 

Friday's Fave Five #249

It's Friday and that means it's time for Friday's Fave Five.  Join us as we choose to look for the blessings that come throughout our week.  It can come in all sorts of forms.  A happy event, a simple or profound quote, a child's comment, a gift presented.  Those are just a handful that come to mind.  You might find yours in other moments during your week.


1.  Spoken so well.  This post.  I love when there is a well spoken post that makes a great point without crushing or putting  another person down.  This is one of those.

2.  Sung so well.  Love this kind of performance on a popular talent show.  That she put her faith totally out there in such a bold and beautiful song and how it touched everyone, most of whom did not know the song at all.  This lady brought the touch of the Lord to a secular show.  Gave me chills!


She starts singing at 1:48 but her background clip is interesting.  Can you believe this lady is 54, a mother of 3 and a grandmother of 7?

3.  Works so well.  My air conditioner.  This week we are in a heat wave.  Today was 30*C (86*F).  That is getting up there for us even in the midst of summer.  But for September is hot!  So thankful for an air conditioner.

4.  Checked in so well.  This week was my check in with my fitness goals and results at the gym.  Ugh.  I've been discouraged lately.  For some reason, I think I'm working so hard but the results just don't happen fast enough or show fast enough.  Especially since I had not one, but two knee injuries, that put a kabosh on my workouts for more than 2 1/2 months!  But lo and behold when weight and measures were taken, there was progress made since the last check.  Not huge, but still not stagnant and thank goodness, not going the wrong way!  Thankful for slow and steady change.

5.  Reconnected so well.  Blessed this week to have lunch with a couple who both were friends of mine in elementary school and are now married.  It's nice to see people from when I was a kid and to be able to catch up and see how their lives have fared and the road they are travelling.

What are the moments in your week that brought you blessing?