prettymuch speechless

This was my drive to work Tuesday. Lucky me!

oh. come. now.

Behold, my own fruit leather. Blueberries, Raspberries and honey for sweetner. It was pure joy getting to use my dehydrator, lovely thing that it is. And the fruit leather would have been perfection. Except that when I took this final picture it was 11:30 pm, and if you look closely, the very middle of the fruit leather needed a bit longer in the dehydrator.

So I went to bed, thinking that if I wake up in the night, I'll just unplug it.

But I didn't wake up. Instead, I left my dear fruit leather to dry another 7 hours. And when I woke up, I had made something very brittle. Rory was very kind and tried it first. His words: "You know it's not that bad. Honestly, if it wasn't crunchy on this one side it would be amazing."

my word for the year

Ali Edwards is a digital scrapbook rockstar whose blog I have read for years now. Every January she picks a word that she uses to be her focus for the year...sort of a word to guide her priorities, choices and attention. Last year I tried this, but I chose four words, and honestly, that just isn't that effective. This year she wrote a beautiful post about the word she chose and why she chose it. And recently she posted a huge list of words to choose your own word from.

So I read through the list, and the first time through the list the words that stood out for me were: relax, calm, renew, and peace. But see, that's four words again. And honestly, not one of them really sums it up.

Yesterday in church we sang a song we have sang a lot lately. It's a slower song that sings the words of the 23rd psalm moving into a chorus that sings slowly, "And I will trust in you alone. And I will trust in you alone. Your endless mercy follows me. Your goodness will lead me home."

And I found my word: trust.

The roots of this word are found in my relationship with Christ, and it brings peace to my heart, renewal, rest and causes me to breathe deeper and relax.

If you'd like to listen to a version of the song from church, click here.

snow drifts in nebraska

The thing we are still getting used to in Nebraksa is the wind. It is amazing. Even in the summer it is impressive how windy it can get with no buildings or hills or mountains to block it. This winter the wind has given us three blizzards.

Blizzards move the snow around so some areas are left without a whole lot of snow. But wherever the snow is collecting it can make some impressive drifts. We drove down this road today, a few blocks from our house, and had to get out to take some pictures. I'm only in there for perspective but based on the fact that I am 5' 10'', those are some large snow piles.

Believing God kick off day

Today is the day we begin Believing God! If you're interested in joining, please do. You can go to this site to register.

Today's task is simple: Just log into your account on this page, print the listening guide and watch the 60 minute video. When you click on "View Video," six segments will appear next to the icon, and you click on each segment one at a time. When I clicked on the first segment, I had a pop-up blocker. This is a yellow strip at the top of the screen...click on the yellow strip and scroll down to, "always allow pop-ups from this site." Hopefully that will do the trick. Then go back and click on first segment again and enjoy!

I have started a google group to organize all of our conversation. If you haven't been invited to join, and would like to be, email me at beccagroves (at) gmail.com and I'll add you to the list.