Home baked goods and stories and sledding... the stuff to make us pine for goodness

Hello world.

Yesterday I led the worship service at church with the drama ministry students (my class this term).  It was wonderful just to see nine young people up front singing and praying and leading announcements and so forth.  Then we did 3 scripture pieces scattered throughout, one being snippets from Psalm 139 and I borrowed this image from the internet as our backdrop.  That piece was my favorite because it only had four speakers (people) but each had a silent partner behind them who loved and supported them with a look or a touch and they embodied God hemming them in being behind and before, etc.  We also led a brief share time and as is so often the case, I was touched with both the praises and challenges in folks lives.

The sun is bright, bright and the snow is soft and wet, but not too cold so it's perfect for sledding.  The boys and I made two jumps down Hamm Hill and oh, that was fun to watch!  They would catch such air!  Both had rosy cheeks and bright eyes and they would howl and giggle all the way down.  They're good sledders, these little Canadians.

Then last night I attended a Playreading festival with new playwrights here in Rosebud taking the class I took last year from Lucia.  It was really compelling, some more than others, and today (Monday) I will direct and coach a reading of a new play for tonight.  Busy day off, eh?  So, I see the sun is bright again and everything feels mild and bright.  The snow is piled high on the edge of the highway but the road is now bare.

I made some more whole wheat goods: foccacia and biscuits.  I ground the wheat twice so it was extra fine, and Doug Madge brought us some more free wheat!  Yippee.  We're going on four days without milk again as the last jug was sour.  So, bring on the oatmeal.  I used cream to make the biscuits; no wonder they were so crumbly.  Then I used the rest to make raspberry, chocolate, maple yogurt, vanilla, coconut, peanut butter ice cream!  That's what my family is enjoying at the table, as well as some chocolate macadamia nut cookies, but I hardly worked for those.  In shuffling things around in my freezer so I could make ham soup with broth I had frozen, I found a tub of cookie dough Dave had bought as a fundraiser for Donovan's school last fall.  Bonus!  Fresh cookies with the scoop of a spoon!

Weston is listening to "The Last Battle" on tape.  We're so hooked on that story.  I totally cried yesterday when we listened to "Prince Caspian" and Aslan finally came into sight of Edmund.  "Oh, Aslan" he cried out.  I wept because I imagined what it would be like to finally see that everything I cherished most was assuredly true and right before my eyes!  I know I would weep from my innermost being (to borrow from Psalm 139).  Then as we read in "The Last Battle" when the last king of Narnia, Tirian, gets thrown through the stable door and then the ground shakes and he turns to find Aslan face to face, CS Lewis narrates, "and then he turned and saw his heart's desire."  It's so apt.  it's so wonderful and important and makes sense of the small and the tall and past and the need for a purposed future.