It's SUNDAY…
BrrrChill!
It continues to be bitterly cold here. We are staying in the 20’s and the teens and going no higher for most of the week to come. It is 10 degrees right now.
I’ve enjoyed my 3 day weekend and on the calendar for the week to come it looks like the only thing I may have to do besides work is to get a haircut Tuesday after work. We may have bible study on Thursday but I think it way too cold to venture out in the evenings so I’m going to stay home and try to keep warm.
This coming Saturday is a baby shower for DDIL#6 so that is something to look forward to for sure. Their baby is due in early March and this will be the last time they’ll be traveling home for awhile. They did do a lot of traveling coming in for our Family Christmas and then her family Christmas and also for New Years so I think they are pretty traveled out at this point. After Saturday, I’ll probably not see them till when the baby arrives. This will make grand’babe’ # 13 for me!!!
THINKING
On the 10th day of Christmas my true love gave to me...
10 Lords A-leaping = the ten commandments
From the east came the Magi to Bethlehem to adore the Lord; and opening their treasures they offered precious gifts: gold for the great King, incense for the true God, and myrrh in symbol of His burial
Today our Savior was adored by the Magi.
Let us also worship Him with joy as we pray
Light from Light, shine on us this day
NEW IN THE KITCHEN
I always hand out Christmas Crackers on New Year’s Day. Most people give them for Christmas but somehow I started using them for New Years. They contain a little toy and a joke and also a little slip of paper with a fortune on it for the New Year. Paper crowns also come with them and you see us wearing them in the pictures I’ve taken.
A cracker consists of a cardboard tube wrapped in a brightly decorated twist of paper, making it resemble an oversized sweet-wrapper. The cracker is pulled by two people, and, much in the manner of a wishbone, the cracker splits unevenly. The split is accompanied by a small bang produced by the effect of friction on a chemically impregnated card strip (similar to that used in a cap gun)
In one version of the tradition the person with the larger portion of cracker empties the contents from the tube and keeps them. In another each person will have their own cracker and will keep its contents regardless of whose end they were in. Typically these contents are a colored paper hat or crown; a small toy or other trinket and a motto, a joke or piece of trivia on a small strip of paper. Crackers are often pulled before or after Christmas dinners or at parties.
Crackers were invented by Thomas J. Smith of London in 1847. He created the crackers as a development of his bon-bon sweets, which he sold in a twist of paper (the origins of the traditional sweet-wrapper). As sales of bon-bons slumped, Smith began to come up with new promotional ideas. His first tactic was to insert mottos into the wrappers of the sweets (fortune cookies), but this had only limited success.
He was inspired to add the crackle element when he heard the crackle of a log he had just put on the fire. The size of the paper wrapper had to be increased to incorporate the banger mechanism, and the sweet itself was eventually dropped, to be replaced by a small gift.
ATTIRE FOR TODAY
This is the last of my new year’s shirts. It has a little sparkly silver thread in it and that ‘s why I save it for New Years. Now that the holidays are over with I don’t know if I’ll be showing what I wear everyday or not. The fun of Christmas shirts is over and from now it will just be layers of normal warm clothing as I try to stay warm.
We’ll see…
PRAYERS
Blessed are you, God of all creation, for you give us shelter from the cold and the light of your Word to brighten the night. We come bearing no gifts for everything is a gift from you. All we can offer is our love for each other and our faith in your Son.
Amen
Please pray for God's protection of
our troops and HIS wisdom for their
commanders.
Lord, hold our troops in
your loving hands.
Protect them as they protect us.
Bless them and their families for the
selfless acts they perform for us
in our time of need. I ask this in the
name of Jesus, our Lord and Savior.
God Bless You all!
AROUND HOME
Those 3 Kings have finally ended their journey and with Epiphany we come to the end of our Christmas Season. Every year on this date I do a door blessing at my house.
This is a blessing of the home and the inscription of the initials of the three Magi are placed above each door with chalk. The inscription is made above the door, so that all who enter and depart this year may enjoy God’s blessing.
Bless, O Lord God almighty, this home, that in it there may be health, purity, the strength of victory, humility, goodness and mercy, the fulfillment of Thy law, the thanksgiving to God the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit. And may this blessing remain upon this home and upon all who dwell herein.
The initials of the Magi are inscribed above the doors with the chalk. The initials, C, M, B, can also be interpreted as the Latin phrase Christus mansionem benedicat which means Christ bless this house. At the same time the letters are the first letters of the names of the wise men: Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar
Example: 20 + C + M + B + 10
Another tradition is to take the first Christmas card received that season with the image of the magi and tape it above the inside lintel of the front door. Both traditions remind us to seek and welcome Christ every time we pass through the doors
I found this blessing below on line and it didn’t say who wrote it but I thought it very appropriate for today
A Blessing
Think of the year as a house:
door flung wide in welcome,
threshold swept and waiting,
a graced spaciousness
opening and offering itself to you.
Let it be blessed in every room.
Let it be hallowed in every corner.
Let every nook be a refuge
and every object set to holy use.
Let it be here that safety will rest.
Let it be here that health will make its home.
Let it be here that peace will show its face.
Let it be here that love will find its way.
Here let the weary come
let the aching come
let the lost come
let the sorrowing come.
Here let them find their rest
and let them find their soothing
and let them find their place
and let them find their delight.
And may it be in this house of a year
that the seasons will spin in beauty,
and may it be in these turning days
that time will spiral with joy.
And may it be that its rooms will fill
with ordinary grace
and light spill from every window
to welcome the stranger home.
May the Lord watch over our going out and our coming in, from this time forth and forevermore.
FAMILY ALBUM
Here are the 5 of my babes that joined me in celebrating New Years Day. It occurred to me that this is only 1/5 of my family. We now number 25 and of course I’m one of that number too. DD and her hubby and DS#5 and his wife are the only ones of my family that live here in our hometown. DS#6 and his wife regularly travel back and forth from their home to ours for the holidays.
COUNTING THE DAYS
The custom in Germany is that of the children’s' festival between January 1-6 (Three Kings Day). After a service at the churches the children go from house to house to gather offerings for poor children in poor countries. They are dressed as the three kings and carry sticks with stars on the top. At the homes they sing songs and recite messages of Christmas.
We wish you a Merry Christmas!
74 DAYS UNTIL SPRING !
102 DAYS UNTIL CAMPING SEASON BEGINS
Keep looking ON THE BRIGHT SIDE of things.
A little smile, a word of cheer,
A bit of love from someone near…
Love,
ma
Pictures mostly taken by ‘ma’ and courtesy of the camera provided by my ‘babes’
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