medial // caesura

Joy Dare Day 23:  3 gifts found around the table Today as D and I sat around the table at breakfast, we planned our week alone.  Knox and Ben are at Camp Mawmaw-Daddyghee's, where they will have at least one fun activity daily.  So gift #1 is D's excitement over our relatively mundane plans:   playing the guitar, giving him a daily piano lesson, painting furniture, cleaning out the attic, swimming, and shopping.  Not very exciting and certainly not expensive especially since shopping is just the regular grocery trip, but he was happy to hear what we would do together.  To be fair, I had really not considered the painting to be a "together" activity.  I had thought I would paint, and he would watch.  Well, that's not exactly how it happened.  When I was on the phone with Mawmaw to say, "No, Knox and Ben are right.  They are not allowed to have Coca-Cola yet."  D took to painting on his own. I added a little to what he had started and gift #2 is

I know--it's not a word, unless you count the poorly written entries in the online urban dictionary.  But that's what this weekend has been about.  Having 160+ relatives in one place, seeing old pictures, hearing letters written nearly 100 years ago, witnessing how much my third/fourth cousins' children have grown:  such fun! It was amazing to see my Great Aunt "Lig" who is as elegant and ladylike as I remember her 20 years ago.  Not only is she perfectly lucid, she is also witty.  Oh and the food--my uncle and cousin, official grill masters, treated the Martin family to excellent BBQ, and everyone else brought fresh veggies and delicious desserts. What a blessing it was to be there!  Having 11 children certainly has its perks. Friday the 13th was the first time I had driven with the boys by myself from NC to AL which brings me to my Joy Dare Day #14:  three things unexpected, unwanted and unlikely.  Unexpected:  a peaceful ride to AL and a stop at the Revolutio

“Let us believe that God is in all our simple deeds and learn to find Him there." --A.W. Tozer The decor I enjoy most in the Ellerbe manse kitchen, next to my children's artwork, are the antique magazine grocery ads that my parents acquired from a dealer in Wichita Falls, Texas, many years ago.  There's one Coca-Cola ad that stands out, calling Coke, "The Pause that Refreshes." This weekly blogging is just that for me, a refreshing pause in the week's busy-ness.  This past week, I joined a few friends in Ann Voskamp's Joy Dare--we find three things each day in June for which we are grateful.  Voskamp's book One Thousand Gifts was what inspired this blog in the first place .  I've been sharing June's list on Facebook as a way to testify to the things around me and the wonderful Creator responsible for my joy.  After all, it is in the little things that we often find the most joy. Like when we mentioned gardening and where we would put ou

Our middle son Knox is a voracious reader.  He reminds me of myself when I was a few years older than he is now, but with one major difference.  After he reads a few pages of a new book to ensure that he will like it, he reads the last few pages.  That is something I would never do.  I don't even want to finish reading a good book; knowing how it ends would spoil the whole delightful process. This habit of his makes me think of that moment in the movie When Harry Met Sally by the director Nora Ephron who died today at age 71, (I am not recommending this movie by including it here, but this scene is apropros.  :) : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gow9u1ol8a8   Afraid our 8 year old might have a dark side, I ask why he reads the ending first.  Knox replies that he didn't want to waste time reading a book if he didn't like how it would end. I discovered this habit when he had stopped reading The Summer of Riley about a boy and a dog because it was too sad.  I told him to k