Terribly Interesting

It seems that books come alive to introverts. Well written characters especially do. The characters in these pages are no exception. I loved Atticus. I loved Scout. I loved Boo. Some of my earliest memories include people around me referring to eclectic characters around us as Boo Radley. It is most likely what led me to investigate the book in the first place. What on earth was a Boo Radley? I saw the movie come on television a time or two when I was little. I can remember sitting in my grandmother's floor watching Scout, Jem, and Dill. I wanted to know them. Harper Lee charmed my heart. I was drawn to her deeply honest and simple style. I wanted more of her books. When I read an article that her earlier manuscript was being released, I was elated. Of course, there is quite a bit of drama surrounding it. No matter, it made me want to reread my copy. Years ago, my stepmom gave me an original 1960 copy. I cherish it. I pulled it off the shelf and read it in a matter of days. ...

 Every year in honor of the memory of my brother, Mike, we take a trip to the Cameron Park Zoo to celebrate his birthday. It is a great way for us to enjoy life like he did and focus on loving each other. It is also neat to watch my girls grow up in these butterfly photo ops.    Denbigh Cherry is a fun dad. He will don a bow, pink superhero cape, and matching pony tails with his girls. He won't even really mind that I am telling you that. He will wear Barbie bandaids and pose in butterflies when his girls ask him to.  Here's my mama and my stepdad. Sorry for the solar flare in your photo, mom. Your hair looks real nice. My mama always says, "the bigger the hair, the closer to Jesus.  Here's my Yaya!  Miss Chayah wasn't totally sold on this slide, but she pulled up her figurative boot straps and slid on down.  This is one of our favorite places at the zoo.  Dori lives here.   This has nothing to do with anything,...

For several months, Jesus has been pressing in upon my heart. Get rid of sins. Pursue hearts. It's hard. People have a hard time being loved. This recent revival of my heart began as I was reading  De Niro's biography. It seems a strange place for revival to begin. The book is not written to draw upon the spiritual side of man. As I read about his lonely childhood, pain began to prick at me. As I sat in the bath one night, tears slowly made their way down my cheeks. Within in a few days I also watched the movie Ragamuffin. Apart from the actor's terrible wig, the loneliness conveyed again struck me. I could feel God plowing ruts into my very soul. I could only think of one reason for this.  Painful soil is demonstrably fertile.  My church is in a Schmita year. The Schmita is the seventh year when the Israelites rested their land in order to produce a greater harvest. I don't know exactly how to apply this practically to every day life, but I am com...

I am thankful for people who teach me the truth, who lead me to refreshing and grace. I am thankful that these ladies were not intimidated by the many voices coming at them to not "hate" on someone's sexual preferences. The Bible does speak to our sexuality. Faith does call us to a deeper life on every level.  I'll be honest. I have not read Fifty Shades of Grey. I really had little idea of what it was about. My sweet 70-year-old friend told me that she was going to read it, but her sister told her it was porn. I had never even read a synopsis of the book. When my friend started talking about it, I really couldn't believe that people were so in to this. Having been abused as a little girl, this mentality of willingly subjecting yourself to this sort of thing scared me.  I was given the opportunity to read and review the book Pulling Back the Shades by a dear friend who is on the release team. She is passionate about marriage like I am. As I began...

Last week, I surprised my people with a little Gomer's House loving just for them. I did not tell them where we were going or that we were meeting two of our dearest friends there. You should have seen the wonder of the faces of my three beauties when they saw that we were staying in a tree house for three days. This place was amazing. It would be an wonderful place to stay in warm weather. We still had a great time. The creativity that went into building this is simply fascinating. It looks like the people bought a salvage yard and started building in the most unique ways possible. We stayed in the Redwood Tree Haus. It was a two bedroom, 1 bath with a full kitchen and living room. Right underneath us was a park. I highly recommend it. Since it was overcast when we were there, I added the link to see the professional pictures on their site. You can view pictures of the tree house we stayed in here:  http://www.guadaluperiverhouses.com/index.php?id=gallery&galid=redw...

When you go into a candle shop, there are glasses of coffee beans sitting around. Those beans are there to clear the smells out of the nasal cavity so that all of the scents don't run together. It's why ginger is placed on a plate of sushi. It helps you enjoy the individual flavors by cleansing the palette. In a sense, that's what made me select this book to review. I read so many nice Christian books that they all start to run together. I needed something to break that up so I could enjoy each one for what is.  On another note, I just wanted someone to tell me a story about someone. I wanted to see them just as they are. In Christian literature, we often try to make every thing into a moral tale or a how to (or how not to). Sometimes it is nice to just hear something unfold without any sort of spin on it. I truly appreciated seeing a raw, untainted portrait of a man. I like De Niro, but as a mom I can't watch most of them due to content. Of course, I saw...