November started with a trip to Seattle with my brother, Brian. We went to visit my Mom who had arrived a day earlier by helicopter after suffering from stroke-like symptoms. While it was a precarious reason to be traveling, there are few cities I’d rather visit and the fact I was with one of my most favorite people in the world was like homemade whip cream. The month ended with our families and some friends celebrating Thanksgiving together. While company and meaningful conversation were highlights, I’ll be honest shopping until we were made to come home for family dinner dropped was the most amazing highlight of them all. Black Friday shopping is joyous for us when we shop local businesses and warehouse sales. We left with ear to ear smiles and possibly sore feet, which went undetected until we sat.
Visiting with my Mom was meaningful and special. I’m so grateful she is on the road to recovery and it turns out it was a hemorrhage, not a stroke.
My brother and I enjoyed good food and enjoyed the company of our gracious hosts, Tom and Charl Jensen.
We didn’t get to see the Seahawks game live but we enjoyed watching the crowds from my Mom’s hospital room window.
Entertained all month by interesting hats worn by lil e.
Love Fall Colors!
Memorable Quotes:
“The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.” — Hans Hofmann
“You don’t have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body.” — C.S. Lewis
“The immature character asks life to meet his demands. But the mature character meets the demands of life.” — Integrity: The Courage to Face the Demands of Reality by Henry Cloud
Instead of hating the people you think are war-makers, hate the appetites and disorder in your own soul, which are the causes of war. If you love peace, then hate injustice, hate tyranny, hate greed– but hate these things in yourself, not in another. — Thomas Merton
“…according to the myth of scarcity, ‘there is never enough to go around. But it is not simply the hunger of those who lack sufficient food to keep their bodies in good health. Scarcity is the more general hunger of those who want more, without reference to what they already have.” — William Cavanaugh as quoted in Slow Church
“If God is for us, who can be against us?” – Romans 8:31
“Bask in the moment, in the gift of everlasting life. Feel it…take your imagination beyond forever.” — from sermon by Daniel Long
The thing about life is that one day you’ll be dead. — David Shields
“Hope is like a path on the countryside. Originally, there is nothing — but as people walk this way again and again, a path appears.” — Lu Xun
Songs on Repeat Mode in November:
What If by Five for Fighting
It Ain’t the Whiskey by Gary Allan
Parachute by Kris Allen
You Make Me Brave (Live) Bethel Music
Shut Up and Dance Walk the Moon
May you have a paradoxically restorative December.