Christmas Competition?

We find ourselves sandwiched between homes that are definitely vying for the neighborhood association Christmas decoration award. Last year the above house won an honorable mention. I think they have added the deer and a few more swags this year in hopes of actually winning. The house on the top has this great train set up in addition to all the lights. Their five year old son must love it.
This creates a dilemma for me. I would like to do a few lights, but anything we do will look pretty tacky compared to our neighbors. So then I swing to the other side and think, "Why do anything at all?" Other than that I would like to do something.
I'm trying to go for simple elegance; minimalism at its best. I put a few trees on the front porch today and hope to do luminaries tomorrow. I'll see how far I get and how it looks.
I'll post a picture of our home when I'm all done. You can send in your votes when I'm done.

New Traditions

“Gratitude as recognition, receptivity, and response is a basic attitude and action of the Christian life. We not only recognize and are aware of God’s gifts to us, but also continually find ways of saying thanks to God in worship, prayer, and “whatever we say or do.” Our aim is to live our whole life as a sacred gesture of thanksgiving, a deep bow of gratitude, solidifying our relationship with God.” Don Postema - Space for God

Our Thanksgiving devotions started with this quote and followed with nine different places in the text that command us to have an attitude of thanksgiving in our daily lives. We shared these verses around a table filled with family and friends. My brother Hugh and his wife Gretchen, their sons and soon to be daughter-in-law, my sister Susan and her husband Brad and their four sons, and Brandon and Amy Deur joined us for Thanksgiving day.

In addition to Thanksgiving festivities the Vander Plas clan blessed Cristin and Jake with a bridal shower. What fun to see them open the items they had chosen for their bridal registry. Of course, there was the traditional griddle that no new couple registers for, but I always buy in memory of Grandma Trudy and her buttermilk pancakes. Gretchen also gave Cristin six different handkerchiefs from her grandmothers and aunts. They are so beautiful.

We had a wonderful day remembering our blessings with those around the table.
The festivities continued into Friday as we visited the Tacoma Museums to see the quilt exhibit from Gee Bend. What a story of creativity and ingenuity!

Sunrise in Tacoma

Sunsets in Maui and sunrise in Tacoma. This morning the sky began to faintly turn red above the Cascade Mountains and then the color began to spread over the mountains. When the sky began to explode I decided to run out on our front porch and share the beauty of a Washington sunrise with you. Mt. Rainier is in the right hand corner of the picture.

Marriage Retreat

During conversations at our week long 'marriage retreat', we realized that ten years had passed since we had taken a vacation with just the two of us! Now, granted we have been half way around the world with wonderful friends, and spent many exciting days with the family we love. However, a vacation with the two of us was long overdue. We spent a week together in Maui. Every morning we were able to take a walk/run along the ocean. The picture of the two of us shows you the view we enjoyed.
The week was relaxing with not one appointment scheduled. The greatest adventure was to Lahaina to have our sunglasses fixed at the Maui Jim headquarters.
We had a wonderful week of sitting in the sun and reading. Together we read A Work of Heart by Reggie Mc Neal and discussed how to care for our hearts as God calls us into places of spiritual leadership. Processing this book together provided much stimulating conversation. We are grateful for the friend who recommended it.
Right off the edge of the cliff where we sat most every day we saw sea turtles feeding one day, hence the picture of the turtle.
After a day of rain on Sunday there was a magnificent sunset. Every minute the sky would change and new colors would appear. What a Creator we have!
And of course, David enjoyed many opportunities to take pictures of beautiful flowers of which I have included only one.
We are so grateful for the grace of God in our marriage for thirty years. God has richly blessed us and our family. Our hearts are full of gratitude.

Being vs. Doing

"We mostly spend our lives conjugating three verbs: to Want, to Have, and to Do. Craving, clutching, and fussing, on the material, political, social, emotional, intellectual -- even on the religious -- plane, we are kept in perpetual unrest: forgetting that none of these verbs have any ultimate significance, except so far as they are transcended by and included in, the fundamental verb, to Be: and that Being, not wanting, having and doing, is the essence of a spiritual life." Evelyn Underhill

I can distinctly remember the conversation on a Tuesday morning around a friend's dining room table as we met for Women's Group from Covenant Life Church in Grand Haven, Michigan. The voices of our small children carried up the basement stairs and through the closed door. Above the backdrop of children's voices, we discussed what it was 'to Be' and how important Being vs. Doing is in our spiritual journey. We all decided that would be a wonderful possibility once our children were all in school all day, every day. If we went home 'to Be', and forgot the doing for an afternoon, our husbands would come home and really know what we 'do' every day.
Since that conversation some 15 years ago, I take notice of the discussion around Being vs. Doing. Once again, the reading from Evelyn Underhill brings up the importance of being in our life. A member of our small group here in Tacoma pointed this reading out to me, because at small group last week we had a discussion about how important playing with blocks has become. Two of us have had the privilege of playing blocks with our grandsons. One of us made the statement that while playing blocks with her grandson, she has never felt more in the center of God's will!
Playing blocks, being with our grandsons, the center of God's will - is being at peace. "I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation", is the way the apostle Paul would phrase it. (Phil. 4:12)
So I post the picture of our grandson Malachi and our great creation with blocks. Who would have ever dreamed that an 8 year journey of seminary brought me to the place where I am content to play blocks. God is good and his love endures forever.

An Added Bonus

I don't think I mentioned that we have an added bonus in visiting California these days. Our son Dirk has recently moved to California. So, not only do we get to see our favorite grandsons, we enjoy seeing our favorite son, too.

David and I are back in Tacoma. Winter has arrived here - or at least that is what people are saying. I'm hoping for a bit of sunshine this week so I can finally do some gardening. For those of you who followed my back saga, I have been pain free since the end of July and finally I'm able to get out in our yard. I am so grateful.

The Pumpkin Patch

We enjoyed a great day literally running around the pumpkins and 'hay maze' at Irvine Regional Park. We had tried and tried to get Malachi to sit and look at the camera, but he was too wound up to sit for us. At one point, after running around for an hour, he chose to sit down by himself and actually looked at the camera. Ryan and Malachi had a great time running through the hay maze. Malachi loved having Daddy chase him through the maze. Rachel and Malachi rode the train. What a great discovery - Irvine Park!