Snow is whipping powdery sugar gusts round the eaves of my little bungalow tonight. It’s frosting and frothing the frigid air, stirring up occasional white-outs. Turning the skies misty pearl.
But out in the center island across the way, our little gazebo string of jewels is still (unusually) glimmering brightly, merrily, cheerily through, as if tsk–tsk-ing any who would pack up Christmas on a certain date. I think I hear it singing out – hah!
From my own windows, I place winking candles for my neighbors. My ornament-less tree lights still twinkle, Greetings!
There is a friendly camaraderie with the world, the feel of festive joining of hearts, that shines in those lights somehow… makes us feel less alone, more a part of God’s design for brother and sister-hood…and I could wish them unending upon a year of eves…
“Ring! Ring in the new year with joyous heart!” is a thought winging through the snowy night and warming me with a fun and bloggy idea of keeping the lights glowing in different ways…
An invite I want to send you all… an RSVP I hope you’ll take me up on!
As I drew this one recently, it reminded me of a house in one of my favorite Christmas movies… “Holiday Inn” – the film that puts forth the premise of keeping holiday spirit alive throughout the year…
Fred Astaire: Open holiday’s only? Say, how many of them are there?
Bing Crosby: [excited] About 15. That gives me 350 days to kick around in!
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THE FIRST ANNUAL 30-DAY
RING IN THE NEW YEAR
UN – HOLIDAY
BLESS AND BLOG PARTY
WHEN: BEGINNING JANUARY 14TH 2015 AND GOING THROUGH FEBRUARY 14TH 2015
HOW TO PARTICIPATE:
FOR 30 DAYS, WHAT IF YOU AND I INVITED THE HOLY SPIRIT TO INSPIRE US WITH IDEAS ON LITTLE VALENTINE WAYS WE MIGHT BLESS A DIFFERENT PERSON EACH DAY?
THESE MIGHT BE LOVED ONES, NEIGHBORS AND ACQUAINTANCES, OR EVEN STRANGERS…
AND WHAT IF WE KEPT A PERSONAL JOURNAL OF THOSE VALENTINE BLESSINGS – SMALL WAYS OF SAYING “YOU ARE LOVED?” – AND RECORDING ANY THAT MAY COME BACK TO US FROM HIS HAND…
SOWING SEEDS… LIKE SPRINKLING FOR MAY FLOWERS…
CULTIVATING A BLESSING KIND OF HEART LIKE HIS?
.
Recently, I saw a dad interviewed on television, telling about his new book… Napkin Notes. In it, he shares his daily habit of writing inspiring and touching notes on his daughter’s lunch napkins. How he began this practice when he was diagnosed with a serious disease and wanted to leave a legacy of thoughts for his child… and all the blessings that have come swirling back to him from these tiny valentines…
Another day, I heard a writer sharing true stories of how our words make or break a child and who they will become. Stories like the one of the little boy who never volunteered in class because he considered himself too stupid… how one day when he felt his teacher standing behind him, he was shaking with the fear, Now she will see just how dumb I am! Instead, her whisper tickled his ear as she bent over him… “You are SO smart!” she avowed. “You are going to grow up and be a life-changer in this world!” From that day on, ideas of what greatness he might do and be led him on… The writer encouraged listeners to see every encounter with a child… even if just for a moment in time… as Divine appointment FOR BLESSING.
As I begin to ponder blessing ideas, the typical ones come to mind.
- Send someone an unexpected thinking of you note.
- Pass on a DVD to someone you know would enjoy it.
- Bake a small treat for a neighbor.
- Surround someone in prayer, or even send it.
- Allow somebody to go ahead of you in line…
But, I believe as we ask His leading, the Holy Spirit has tons more out of the box ideas He wants to whisper into and through us…
I’ve also been praying a lot about something that many of us are experiencing in this time of our lives...finding ways to manage sometimes overwhelming care for elderly with all the other responsibilities of family and work, perhaps our own health and financial situations, and with daily life. So weighty is this that we begin casting our own lives twenty, thirty years ahead, pressed with urgency of ways NOT to become burdens to others down the line.
Some of these thoughts are good – we need to think ahead.
But in other ways, I am wondering – Father, if we try to keep others from caring for us, are we unintentionally robbing them of some blessings you plan in their midst?
And I think I hear Him telling me…
Perhaps… the greatest “feebleness,” the true burden to those who might eventually care for us, is growing older in bitter, joyless spirit…
Lately, I am finding it so easy to slip into disgruntled. To let the minor turn into major. But also, there are so many days and times wrapping us darkly… when life is truly, seriously, hard. Loved ones lost and grieving hearts. Physical stuff that trails on and on with ongoing problems that wear the soul and body.
That’s why… more than any plans I might try to establish for years ahead… I want to strengthen my joy in the Lord.
And 30 days of Holy Spirit valentine thinking seems a great way to ring in this season of blessed to be a blessing, doesn’t it? 🙂
I don’t have techy-know how or ability to create those beautiful web buttons… I am not on Facebook to announce this. And I don’t have a linky tool here…
But I would love to enlist your help in this.
- Won’t you pass this on by talking it up in your own blog posts?
- Invite others on your Facebook to join us in this 30-days of New Year’s Valentine blessings?
- Leave me some of your blessing ideas in comments?
I look forward to seeing the fruit the Holy Spirit yields in our hearts and others!
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P.S. I was just giving this idea to the Lord. It’s truly up to Him whether or not anyone joins in this… And then I debated whether to link this up at Jennifer’s Tell His Story. It isn’t really a story, I thought. But when I just hopped over to read her post today, my eyes widened even at the title, and more as I read… Beautiful sacred echoes about “fighting back with His joy…” as she tells the story of a couple who blessed another in the midst of their own deep concerns… I encourage you to read it here: http://jenniferdukeslee.com/tellhisstory-fight-back-with-joy/
Thank you, Lord, for Holy Spirit confirmations.
Sharing with:
vintage bells –http://thegraphicsfairy.com
pen and ink inn – mine. Please do not copy without permission. 🙂
Writing... Apples of Gold 
What a beautiful idea! Blessing others through the dark months is a wonderful way to shine the light of Christ into this world!
Blessings,
Kamea
incrementalhealing.wordpress.com
Thank you, Kamea. I LOVE your name! The first is beautiful music on the tongue, the second is beautiful promise for the soul! Keep HOPE in your heart and know you are loved beyond our imagination! 🙂 Blessings pour from His heart shining over you, in you and through you in this season!
Thank you for the wonderful blessing! And yes, Kamea is a beautiful name. It means “precious one” and I know that is who I am in Christ, His precious child.
I have subscribed to your blog and look forward to getting to know you better. I hope we will be able to connect at incrementalhealing.wordpress.com as well!
Blessings,
Kamea
Thank you, Kamea! I love the meaning of it… 🙂 and you are right about being His precious one. I will hop over to your blog too! I look forward to getting to know you here (and there) more too…
Pam, I am soooo glad you sent this to me. Not meaning to be lazy whatever to look up your blog on the Net, but I just get caught up and busy and then i forget and realize I am missing your lovely, lovely, lovely posts~! oh my. Kel has started to fwd her posts, and I hate the pain for her, but I have to get this thing figured out. I am truly wondering if WP is the culprit. In analyzing this, I’m thinking maybe it is. But I will need Mike’s help in figuring it out, and he has been so busy. Anyway, I love this!!! and for me, little notes are the way I reach people best, I think, and I still send actual Valentine’s. I’m hopeless! =] I just bought my box of V-Cards the other day at BN. You can still find pretty ones there. And I love your wriitng her…….just ethereal. So I think it is a great idea. And I will try to find a way to link this on my FB page on the other computer. Happy Valentine’s Day, early .
Love
Lynn
Thanks, Lynn. I just keep thinking of how we gave each other valentines as children – it wasn’t just for romance then. So why limit it now? And why not begin with doing something small to bless like that every day? It might be fun to get a whole basketful of valentines, a day at a time, too. 🙂 I love those old fashioned valentines. I actually am trying to come up with some ideas to draw some quickly and put them in the local bookstore here… but the snow is bogging me down. Today, is so bad here, and I don’t really need to be out in it, so I’m not. But I really want to be running some errands to get started on some of these ideas! Glad you are joining in on this! I want to blog more about that book I mention above regarding blessing children — I loved so many of the stories he shared , some as simple as noticing a mom who was so engaged with her small child at a car wash. How he went up to her and complimented her – she got tears in her eyes and hugged him (a stranger) for just taking time to tell her that. Because she said, she tries so hard to be a great mom and no one had ever told her that! Such simple ways to be a blessing with our words, written and spoken, if we just open our eyes and let the Holy Spirit lead, aren’t there? Happy note blessing! Love, Me
Do you know how to “bookmark” our blogs online? If you did that, you could just click on it everyday or so to check blogs you want… rather than typing in blog sites all the time till you figure out the problem you are having with getting the alerts…
The book sounds fabulous, and also your idea to draw/create your own. They would be so lovely and nostalgic, K now. You are soooo creative artistically (as well as verbally, of course….art with words!) The ones I bought at BN are very nostalgic, and though I didn’t read the source, I’m thinking likely they are orig. old ones that they have replicated (or, rather, copied). I’m going to tyry to post your site to my FB page later today. And no, not sure about bookmarking. Wil ask Mike. You can tell I”m such a relic! =]
I want to look at B&N for those! I love vintage valentines!
there is a “sharing button” on my blog posts – hard to see. But you can link up a post I think to your facebook by clicking there. When you are in the “comment mode” here, just scroll up to just above where the comments first appear. You’ll see something that says SHare, and then a link to facebook that you can click on. Not sure how it works from there since I don’t have facebook… Thanks!
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Hi, Pam!
Such a great idea.
I crochet afghans and give them away to the unsuspecting.
Last year the Lord laid on my heart these ladies that are in their 90’s.
So, I asked them to name two of their favorite colors.
Truth be known, life got in the way.
However, my plan is to crochet them their own afghans in their favorite colors.
Now is a great time to actually begin those projects.
I am visiting from Spiritual Sunday’s.
What a lovely thing to create and give away, Michelle! I don’t knit or crochet, but my grandmother’s both did, plus my mom and sister. I have a beautiful afghan from one Grandmother that means so much to me still. Thanks for sharing that, and blessings to you as you begin these for these ladies!
Come back and share more about them when you finish and gift them… or any other ideas you might have for this 30 days! 🙂
Fabulous idea! We don’t bless others enough and 30 days of kindness will turn into more with the help of the Holy Spirit. Blessed by this post and thankful you shared over at The Weekend Brew. Blessings, Mary!
I agree! Life does get in the way and we are so caught up with day to day… but blessings are something we all can use, both in giving and receiving! 🙂 Thanks Mary! As I was reading your post today, it seemed to hold a bit of a sacred echo to this too.. 🙂
Pam- I love this idea! I will be sharing it at my blog and facebook…I was just chatting with God about being more intentional with being the encourager he created me to be…:) thanks for the encouragement!
Thank you, Kel! I have been praying that too… I hope to write a lot more over the next 30 days about this to keep encouraging us all in this way… Thank you for being an encourager to me!
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