JOY JOURNAL BLOG

family life, spiritual life

A Life In Pieces

The mid-life lesson I'm learning from a winter's worth of frantic quilt completion is not about skill. As you can see, I have little. My stitches are free range and low on the count-per-inch chart. My seams rarely line up in proper fashion. No, the message in all those bits of fabric -- coming together… Continue reading A Life In Pieces

marriage

Why we’re not toast

Our "new" toaster ticks like something that needs to be defused. That's not its only unusual feature. When my husband decided to make late-night toast without turning on the kitchen lights for some reason, we discovered it also glows. In a hot-red-wire, pulsing kind of way. Like really pulsing. Pulsing that would have alarmed most… Continue reading Why we’re not toast

family life, spiritual life

The Power of Oranges

There was a time in the 1900s -- beginning by at least the Great Depression and ending sometime in the late 1980s -- when brown paper bags filled with fruit, nuts and candy were a thing in the low-church world. On the last service before Christmas Day, each person in attendance (including babies) received a… Continue reading The Power of Oranges

family life, spiritual life

My coat vs. God’s plan

It was a nice coat that Joseph had. Full of color and such luxury as was possible for a family living in the wilderness. But, it wasn't enough to keep him. In a single day, his brothers stripped him of his coat, dipped it in animal blood and convinced their father -- who had given… Continue reading My coat vs. God’s plan