Tag: Family

Sky Writer

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ Leave a comment

Friends, Happy Weekend, Happy Mother’s Day. 

Wishing surprises of joy, endless time around table with words of mothers, words of children dancing and skipping from lip to lip;

wishing moments of happy punctuated by loud barks of belly laughs from deep down deep;

wishing rest here and rest there, quiet here and quiet there

and time  alone to focus on His  unfailing love, to feel secure in His warm embrace,

to give thanks  to God for this gift of motherhood

 seeing anew the privilege that it is of raising a child, or two, or three or……….

wishing His grace…

Life’s Ooh’s and Aah’s

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ Leave a comment

We have a little family joke that started with my grandmother.  She would ooohhh and aaah at every gift that was opened at Christmas and  any and all special occasions. It was delightful behavior  to be around as a child.

Pure joy.  Pure excitement.  Unrestrained rejoicing.

She, my Gama, was a child of the Great Depression.  One of thirteen children, she was appreciative of everything.  So when the bows and the wrapping were thoughtlessly tossed aside, she would gather up the bows and salvage any of the wrapping she could.  She’d gather and save.

And as each gift was revealed she would say, with her beautiful big smile and her beautiful big eyes, oooh and then aaaah.  She just simply delighted in the gift and the moment.  Large. Small.  Modest.  Simple.

The gift didn’t matter.  It was just the moment and the exchange, ever so small between family.

So we adopted this custom.  Truthfully we poke mild fun at her dramatic response as we  have family fun ooohing and aahhing over the unwrapping of gifts. We remember her.  Her joy.

But truly, isn’t life more fun when we celebrate the small unwrappings.  Delighting in the small things that border on just mundane.  When we celebrate small milestones, or small joys.  When we take a moment to rest in a moment of beauty.

Breaking out a smile, broad and wide, all toothy and glistening over a kind remark from a devoted friend, a text of encouragement or endearment from a woman who walks out life with you, an email that says simply. ” I am missing you terribly.”

Aren’t these moments worth busting out cheerfulness and joyfulness.

I delivered news this morning to a friend which I felt would disappoint and maybe cause her to feel that I had let her down.  Her response was one of affirmation.  You are choosing rightly, you are doing as you should, go and enjoy and have fun.  This is important, she says to me.

We have been deep cleaning and spring cleaning my house.  I look on the fruits of the shared labor, and smell the clean, and see some progress toward de-cluttering. I smile and say this is good.  This is better.  I am encouraged.

Such small things often delight the heart.  And they are worth taking a moment to say, “This is good.” To give it a simple label of “nice” or “good” or “beautiful” or “kind”. To release an ooh or an aahh over a favorite meal when fellowshipping with family or friends.  This is good. This is yummy.

Finding the moments that are gifts of life, ever so small and allowing them to be named as good.  To savor for more than a second.

This morning for me it was the smell of cut grass.  They say that the sense of smell is the memory which we hold on to the longest.  I don’t know if that is true, but a wave of memories poured into my bedroom and delighted my soul as I thought of times that were good as fragrant cut grass stimulated my memories, all tucked away and resting.

Words were said.  There was a disagreement.  I would not have won any mother of the year awards for my part, for my responses to the situation.  But in a moment of reconciliation my child told me how very much he loves me.

I was humbled.  I am deeply touched by a love that forgives and works through and doesn’t stay stuck.  This is good.  This is healing.  I stop and say this is unexpected grace.

I am looking for things to celebrate this weekend.  We are cheerfully and happily celebrating a graduation of a precious young woman in our life.  We love her so and we rejoice at this milestone.

But I am looking to rejoice in the small things too. The little oooh’s and the little aaah’s.  The shell on the beach, the giggle around the table, the crisp spring air with birds singing overtime, a clean fresh start for some places in my home, a comment in love, a comment in friendship, a word of encouragement. A gesture toward forgiveness.  A gesture toward healing.  A word of praise.  A word of thanksgiving.

I am seeking to rejoice in all that He gives.  And while I don’t have my Gama’s eyes which saw the world so differently than I, I can seek to  see what the Lord has placed before me as blessing and gift.

The tide comes in, the tide goes out.  The bumps and bruises and dust ups in life will come and go.  But I choose today to look for joy.

Will you join me. Won’t you join me. It’s more fun doing life together.

Wonderful Weekend Full Of Grace, to you all.

And may you ooooh and aahh all weekend long at all the joy that comes your way.

Blessings….

wynnegraceappears

A Wink, A Blink, And A Nod From Heaven

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 1 Comment

Confusion bends the heart and warps the spirit.  And we cry for peace and we cry for understanding. And the tears like cripples crawl wobbly down the slow rocky path from the eyes  to the chin.

But oh, how His word soothes the soul.

The soothing repetition of God’s word sings sweet comfort to confusion in our world.  Over and over it speaks sweet truth.

And slowly confusion bows to peace.  And peace brings comfort and a restoration of hope.

I stare at the computer screen and try to unscramble the code that asks me if I am spam, am I human.  Confusion looks like that.  Letters warped, unrecognizable, sideways turned, oddly shaped, gross distortion.

And confusion blurs the focus, like this intentional  filter questioning before allowing you to pass go, continue on to the next step.  This code to filter out the bad, eyes strain at the distortion to make sense and attempt to get it right.  To straighten out and make it plain and clear.

Confusion rocks our word leaving a seasick queasy, lost and vulnerable uneasiness in our spirit.

I step outside and throw myself on white rope hammock, fall into the arms of the Master softly swaying on the netted bed.  He has caught me.  I am His .  My gaze goes up.

It always heals, this black lit sky presenting one ultra brilliant star, like eye wink from Him.  Winking, blinking Mercy.  Assuring me there is a way out of misunderstanding and confusion.

The looking up always restores Hope.  The gazing skyward always meets my eyes with Mercy.  In the moment of raw human need.  And raw human heart.  He stares back down to a hurting child, swaying slow and steady under His sky at night and whispers calm in the black of night.

And because He loves so deep and wide and all black sky cavernous, I speak apology.

I know the path out starts here.  So what love falls out of the sky at night to a busted heart seeking solace on the ropes of life, in the woven hammock must be extended horizontal now.  Given out as freely here as it came down from the heavenly eye wink from the Merciful one.

Confusion rocks.  But He steadies.  He gives gift of solid rock to stand firm upon.

Confusion blurs who we are, what we are, and WHOSE we are.  He loves through a lense of everlasting love, with a clear and pure abiding Love, always and everytime.

Confusion breeds pride and anger.  He gazes down with unfathomable Love and ushers in a spirit of humility, peace, and calm.

Steps from the front door of my heart and my home I run into His arms, caught in the black of night.  Tears wiped by the One who extends Grace upon Grace upon Grace.

Winking and blinking and saying from His throne, sweet words of Comfort soothing the soul.  Tender words of Mercy mending the brokeness.  Gentle words re-building Trust.

One black night, one sweet star, and one Tremendous God.

One fresh start with new Mercies leading the way.

Five Things A Field Trip To A Mexican Restaurant Will Teach You about LIFE

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 4 Comments

{wynnegraceappears.com has its own facebook page.   It would be a gift if you would pop over and “like it” on FB or you can scroll down to the bottom of the blog home page.  Thank you for that.}

I am amazed at where and when I learn some of the most important truthes.

How God can take  and use the mundane, gray, ordinary. Turn it into a way to grab hold of the eyes of my heart.  Hold firm to my jawline in love and say “See this, right here.”  I love you too much for you to miss it.

How sparks of sweet knowledge fly off the life pages, there.  In the everyday.  In the messy, the plain, the simple. How sparks of knowing and seeing shoot out and turn the head like walking into a firestorm of shooting stars.

Life is messy.  Life is loud.  People are hurting.
I sit and catch up with an oldish friend.( She is  a decade younger so its not she that is oldish, it is this thing in our life which is a friendship). We have done life together for quite awhile but we often go for long periods without having heart chats.  Linking up and digging deep.

But in the middle of the loud and the messy, over the guac and the chips I hear the remarkable.  I hear about God’s love lately in her life.  I sit with what feels like one hundred loud high school students buzzing around us  and press in to hear about her son. How God is doing a loving work in his special life.  The waitress buzzes, the kids are rocking the place with their energy, but God’s mark on his life in the last few days is soft and sweet and deep and wide. One special teacher choosen for one special child.  An amazing choreography in this dance of life–connecting two, partnering up a child with one to walk through life as friend, mentor, teacher guide for a long season.  He loves so deeply, this God of ours.

I am changed in the knowing.  My Faith gets a re-boot.  As she Mom- proud raises her ipad to the table and shares the pictures of him running the good race, then standing on the podium at the Special Olympics, I glimpse a mother’s heart hard at work navigating through life, seeking the best always for her precious son.

Life is unorganized.
There are three of us now.  Talking, sharing, remarking, reviewing, observing life and our children and how crazy this field trip scene appears in its many facets of planning. How they move from Point A to Point B and all the logistics.

But I know now that what seemed like an excessive amout of time away from school was carved out for fellowship and community.  I know that their hours and their days lived out in the halls can be burden.  Can wear heavy mundane.  Can stiffle in the routine of the everyday.  But change the scene and joy pours out like notes from a saxaphone all happy wafting out, inspiring and infusing music and grace notes on the pages of their day.

I know that long expanses of time where we feel stuck and caught are really times to capture community and catch up in fellowship with each other, on life.

Drowning happily in story and shared experience. Freeze framing life, capturing it in one still-frame on one Monday in the middle of messy living.

Life is learned outside of books.
I know that they are learning about sixteen.  They are learning how to order in Spanish and pay the bill too.  But they are learning more I know it about friendship and fellowship.  Because it was there in all caps and all bold.  The things we learn when we heart listen to others.  The sad and the happy, the joy and the pain come out off the shelves when we listen.  When we invite.  When we ask the life story to come tell it all.

Life is best lived when slowed down and there is no agenda.
She calls me from school to co-ordinate my coming on the field trip and I grumble.  Who eats lunch at a Mexican restaurant at 10:30 in the morning.  I pass on a complaint to a child, allowing her to be exposed to my disease, its contagious, of grumbling, whining.  Not a proud parent momment, this, in hindsight.  But when there my heart delights in the energy.  It catches the happy and the smiling while chip dipping and straw sucking diet coke.  Where in the world would I rather be than smack dab deep down in the middle of salsa and chips and children on a Monday morning

Because we can count now, on a couple of fingers, the time that they are here now with us.  We discuss SAT and school and college and futures as Dentists and all such.  And I look with one eye at the Joy of these girls. They were there at the Special Olympics cheering, they were there in pre-school a yesterday ago, they are here and this is now and it is raw and real. This group, these girls, becoming women soon.  Learning Spanish and much more right here on a Monday.  And it smells like spicey, mexican restaurant Grace.

Agenda robs, and steals, and obfuscates the present. And who doesn’t love chips and dip and fellowship all cozied in on a gray day at a long table of giggling girls with their happy spread from one end of the room to the other.

I hug and say good bye and that I must press on down the very short to-do list.  By my design, I keep them short now.  It must be an over 50 charachter trait.  But I leave and I take giggly Joy with me.  And I smell all day like the memories built here with friends, with teenagers, in the middle of a very long lunch catching up on three of  the most important things in life– community, friends, and matters of the heart.

And Counting Gifts, this Monday, with Ann @ A  Holy Experience.

*for running into a friend on the beach.  Catching up and hearing how a gift I gave her years ago is still being used.  How our lives intersecting in the past was a good thing–for us both.  Realizing how I am the blessed one to have had her and to re-connect.

*time on the beach with The Patient One to bask in the sun and just be

*an email, sweet so sweet, from a friend of a friend who was sent here, to check out this blog.  Unexpected Grace on a Monday.

*News of improving health for college man-child and counting the days until he is under this roof again, for a short season.

*Sweet projects around this nest that I am dreaming of, inspired by a big project and garden undertaken by The Patient One over the weekend.

*Laughing often at a new blog I have discovered.  I will provide the link soon.  She is fun, she is funny, and she is passionate about life and the Lord (its contagious).

*New friends

*Old friends

*A month of birthdays and celebrations for people I love.

*A summer plan coming together