I woke up to the wonderful smell of hot cinnamon this morning! Michael had one of his famous cinnamon/pecan coffee cakes in the oven and boy! did my mouth water. I am blessed with a man who likes to cook and I thank God for him every day. It was delicious and a wonderful way to start my morning. And I managed to stay with just one piece, too. That was hard because it was so good.

Yesterday I commented that I thought my blogging was going to need to be regulated and I laid in bed last night thinking about that. So what I have decided is that I can't start my blog until I have my morning chores done. It was interesting that Franci (http://skatemama.blogspot.com) talked about discipline this morning in her blog because that was one of the things I thought I wanted to write about. Because I don't work I have no real schedule and I had gotten into the bad habit of just "going with the flow" every day. Not really doing anything during the day except sit on the couch and watch a lot of TV (which I don't even like). So about 2 months ago I decided things had to change. I established evening chores for myself. Just a short list of things I must do every night before going to bed, without fail. Then I added a short list of morning chores too. So far things have been working great. But then I started to blog. Yeah. My morning chores got pushed off until sometime in the afternoon and I wasn't happy. So last night I decided that I couldn't work on my blog until all my morning chores were done. This is the first morning I've done that and it worked out fine. I'm sitting here not feeling guilty because I don't have my bed made, not dressed, kitchen a mess, etc., etc. It's a wonderful feeling having everything done and knowing it while I blog. There is freedom in discipline. We don't tend to think of discipline like that but it is a positive thing, not a negative one. When discipline comes around we need to open our arms wide and accept it as something constructive even though it is sometimes painful. And anytime discipline shapes our lives into honoring God it is a joy to experience. As Paul wrote, "Consider it all joy..."

I will usually be writing my blog in the late mornings so you might want to check me out sometime in the afternoon. I'm a late-ish sleeper so by the time I get all my chores done and I'm free to blog, it's going to be late morning, I can guarantee it. Please feel free to share my blogspot with anyone you think would enjoy reading it. I know it's sometimes going to be boring but I will do my best to keep that at a minimum. Like today. I have the feeling today will be boring. But then my life is sometimes boring just like everyone else's. Life isn't just about all the fun and interesting things we do. Most of the time it's just about getting through the daily bumps and grinds and the occasional speed bumps God puts up to keep our eyes focused on Him. God wants us to have life in abundance and as strange as it may sound, bumps and grinds and discipline are all part of the abundant life He promises us in John 10:10.

Well, Ken's computer did crash after all, or that's the last word I've heard on it. He was able to get up and online last night but I guess he lost everything. Major tragedy in that household. It's like a death in the family. I wish there weren't disappointments in life but as long as we live in a fallen world we're going to have problems and trials of every kind. Tamara came over and taught me a lot of stuff on the computer yesterday (I think she needed to get out of the house atmosphere for a little while LOL) and we discovered that I do have the capability on my computer to do photos. So one of these days I will have Michael scan some pictures into his computer and send them to me so I can put them in my blog. But that will be awhile because I'll have to take a few pictures first. I haven't used my camera in years! I always enjoyed photography but for some reason I let is slip by the wayside. Why do we do things like that? I don't have a clue, do you?

My Bible verse this morning was 1Th. 5:21-22. "Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid every kind of evil." Boy! is that ever good advice! "Test everything..." I test everything against what I know the Bible says. What do I test? Everything. And that gets me right back to discipline. Everything about my life should be God-honoring and that includes my morning and evening chores. This may sound dumb but it's the way things are in my life as a Christian. I want to honor God in my thinking, my actions, my speech, yes, my entire life. Everything about my life should honor God. And that is what I strive for. I don't always reach that level but it's what I shoot for all the time. And then there are those times when I do/say/think something that isn't God-honoring and I know it isn't but I do it anyway!! That's when I fall back onto Jesus and say, "I'm sorry. Thank you for your life. Please live through me." Discipline. It's all about discipline.

Well I see the hummers have finished off the nectar in their feeder. That's something akin to an emergency so I'm going to go take care of that right now. Be right back. There, that didn't take long. (For some reason my delete button just stopped working. If it isn't one things it's a dozen others!) I noticed the feeder was low yesterday. When I cleaned the feeder I found a tiny little feather stuck to one of the flowers. I hadn't thought about how small their feathers are. Put that feather against one from a red-tailed hawk. What a difference!! Wow, nature just blows me away sometimes. You know back in '89 we had a forest fire come our way when we were living in Arnold and we had to evacuate our home in record time. I think they gave us something like an hour to get packed up and out of there. But I can remember checking to make sure the hummingbird feeders were full before we left. Funny thing to think of, huh? Here I was, leaving with no idea if we were going to have a house to come home to and I'm worried about the hummers. We didn't lose our home. Some neighbors down the Hwy lost their's but our little group of homes was spared. We had lots of burned sticks and branches on our deck and heavy ash everywhere, but we had a home. Which, by the way, we lost a year or so down the line but that's another story for another time.

My dog, Pepper, has adopted the empty chair lately. He's an overweight Chihuahua (did I spell that right? I can never remember if its "ua, ua" or "au, au" but it looks right), white with black spots and spoiled absolutely rotten. But he gives us so much joy. He's such a fun dog to have. I mean, we really have fun with him! He does so many cute things. But he doesn't like other people so we usually have to put him in the bedroom when people come over. He's a pill about that. He's really such a good dog but nobody else gets to see that. All they see and hear is the snarling part.

Okay, I told you about my dog, let me tell you about my cats. I have 7, that's right, 7. Five inside and two outside. And they are all spayed and neutered. The outside cats are Moody and Mama. The inside cats are Mario, a black and white Italian cat; Mulder, our tall 25-pound cougar (not really, he just looks like one); Hissy, Mulder's sister who happens to be a bit squirrelly and lives primarily in our bedroom by choice; Pretty, my black cat with turquoise eyes; and Punkie, our orange tabby. We love our animals. They're our babies since we don't have any children living at home. They add so much goodness to our lives. I think most people can identify with that.

I think that's about it for my blog today. Thanks for taking the time to read it. Be sure to add your comments at the end. I'd love to hear from you. If I get boring let me know because I won't know if you don't tell me. Just take a second and let me know what you think. Bye!