5 Years

"The Biblical view of things is resurrection - not a future that is just a consolation for the life we never had but a restoration of the life you always wanted.  This means that every horrible thing that ever happened will not only be undone and repaired but will in some way make the eventual glory and joy even greater...This is the ultimate defeat of evil and suffering.  It will not only be ended but so radically vanquished that what has happened will only servce to make our future life and joy infinitely greater." (Timothy Keller)

"They say of some temporal suffering: 'No future bliss can make up for it,' not knowing that Heaven, once attainied, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory." (CS Lewis)

"I believe like a child that suffering will be healed and made up for, that all the humiliating absurdity of human contradictions will vanish like a pitiful mirage, like the despicable fabrication of the impotent and infinitely small Euclidean mind of man, that in the world's final, at the moment of eternal harmony, something so precious will come to pass that it will suffice for all heart, for the comforting of all resentments, for the atonement of all the crimes of humanity, of all the blood that they've shed; that it will not only be possible to forgive but to justify all that has happened." (Doestoevsky)

..Redeeming love has been my theme and shall be till I die..

No Compromise

Some C.S. Lewis that I've been pondering lately...

"Our temptation is to look eagerly for the minimum that will be accepted.  We are in fact like honest but reluctanct taxpayers.  We approve on an income tax in principle.  We make our returns truthfully.  But we dread a rise in the tax.  We are very careful to pay no more than is necessary.  Any we hope -- we very ardently hope -- that after we have paid it there will still be enough to live on."

"For it is not so much of our time and so much of our attention that God demands; it is not even all our time and all our attention; it is ourselves...For He claims all, because He is love and must bless.  He cannot bless us unless he HAS us.  When we try to keep within us an area that is our own, we try to keep an area of death.  Therefore, in love, He claims all.  There's no bargaining with him."

Salvation is free, but it costs us everything.  He is more than worthy.

Well, Hello There

Sorry.  Totally forgot about the blog.  It's been a busy school year.  I'm going to start posting though because I've got lots of things I want to share, want to remember....many of them half-written in a notebook on the kitchen table already. 

Forgive me.  I am alive.  I am doing very well.  So is my sweet boy, Finn.  He's grown a lot and has the most wonderful personality.  More about all that later.

By the way...

I got a puppy 11 days ago.

His name is Finn, though I wanted to name him DannyCoale.

I love him.

As Promised...New Looks

So official...poor Grade 9 doesn't get represented :(

This post was a little long in coming....the past four weeks have been extremely busy at work, but we had a FANTASTIC first week of school this week!!!  Hopefully soon things will start to fall into a routine.  For now, though, here are pictures of my new office and of my newly refurnished living room (and my home "office" that now actually has furniture). :)

Looking in..

Now for the living room...

The room is so small it's hard to get it all in one shot, but I love the new look!

And here is the den/office/storage room, that I most often use for folding laundry and ironing :)

I also did some work in the kitchen this summer.  I decided my wonderful table I bought in Williamsburg, though dearly loved, was just too big for my kitchen and completely overwhelmed the room.  I had to keep it against two walls to fit and it ended up more being used as an oversized counter.  So I gave it to my sister to use in her townhouse and borrowed this smaller one from my parents.  It really opens up the kitchen and I feel like I can move around so much better!

Now if only I could do something about how dark the kitchen is...

That's all for now.  Soon I will post about my life lately, and show off some of my recent knitting projects.  I've been quite productive!