Pause, breathe, smile

Please, allow me to vent and to listen to myself talk.  And come along, if you want, on a trip through my mind (I apologize in advance for how the messy it is😉.):

Are you exhausted?  I am.  I am sick and tired of all the craziness out there, all the chaos, fighting, hate, lies, fear-mongering, violence, increasing prices (for less product or services), natural disasters, wars, rumors of wars, AI this-and-that, Big Pharma, social deviance/immorality, efforts to force people to tolerate social deviance/immorality, political posturing and mudslinging and nonsense, etc.  

I'm done with it.  I just so done with it all.  "You can stop the world now, God.  We wanna get off."  

I am sick of both social media and the news - because everyone just wants to fight, scream their opinions, demand their way, calls names, make accusations, and force everyone else to agree with them and do things their way.  Everything's an "us vs them" thing, and "if you don't agree with 'us' then you're a bad bad person who shouldn't be here."  It's sick.  And everyone reacts to soundbites and snippets, instead of getting the whole story and wisely responding.  There are no attempts to understand, to really listen, to connect, to talk through things, to be tolerant of other opinions.  (Maybe younger people don't know this because they've been fed bad definitions, but tolerance used to be about respectfully agreeing to disagree with someone, allowing others to have different opinions, even ones you don't like or agree with.  But now - due to social brainwashing - it's about supporting, affirming, condoning everyone else's view, over and above your own... or else you're "intolerant.")  

Roses and Peonies, filtered

It's been a long time since I put any garden photos on this blog, and so I decided to post some favorites now (from my picture blog).  Because I could use a little "pretty and pleasant" in my life right now.  I took pictures I already had and put various filters on them, just to see what it would look like.  And I like it a lot.  

"Water Colors" - Painting to Relax

 I was talking with a friend recently about ideas of things we can do to relax during these crazy days or during times of depression/anxiety.  Obviously, there's reading and baking and taking walks and gardening.  And drawing or painting have become quite popular.  (And I know lots of people were painting because all of Walmart's little bottles of acrylic paint were sold out for weeks during the lockdown in March.)

And I was telling my friend that I always wished I could draw.  Goodness, if I could draw like this guy, in his time-lapsed drawing of Gandalf, that would be freakin' incredible!  (If I could have any piece of art out there, it would be this one.  I love it!)  

2018 Peonies and Roses

It's been awhile since I've posted my pictures here.  I've been putting them on Glory In Beauty, but I'll start adding them here again too.

My Favorite Verse: Joshua 24:15

            Joshua 24:15:  “But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve . . . But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” 

            This has got to be one of my all-time favorite verses.  And one of the most timely verses for our country today.  Our country is getting more and more polarized when it comes to the Bible, God, morals, etc.  Our entertainment has gotten shockingly ungodly and immoral.  Our schools have become more than just educational centers; they have become battlegrounds for the minds and souls of children.  Laws are being created to weed God out of everything.  Atheism, New Age, “tolerance,” homosexuality, gay marriage, abortion, and other such issues are causing sharp contrasts and divisions among people, even among various Christian denominations.  It seems as though today – more so than any other generation – we are being challenged to “choose whom we will serve.”

Last of the 2017 Garden Pictures

Things should be freezing around here soon.  So while all my boys are at the movies with my husband, I went outside to take some final pictures of the flower garden before saying goodbye.  Here they are (with a bunch of earlier ones that I might have posted but I'm not sure ... so why not do it again):

 

God's Way of Saying "Good Morning"

 

 

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.  (Psalm 19:1)

 

 

This is the day that the Lord has made;

let us rejoice and be glad in it.  (Psalm 118:24)

 

 

Because of the Lord's great love, we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.  They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.  (Lamentations 3:22-23)

 

 

 

Can you find the bunny?

Took this photo in my backyard today.  Can you find the hidden bunny?

 

 

 

My Favorite Garden Beauties

I need a break from the serious posts.  And so I am going to repost some of my favorite garden photos.  A time to inhale deeply, exhale slowly, and enjoy some beauty.

 

 

 

 

And a few more good pictures

 

 

 

 

Bright and Beautiful

I love taking over-exposed pictures.  It's a delightful surprise to see what shows up.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Waves of Pink

 

 

 

 

Raindrops on Roses

 

 

 

Easy Does It

This rose is one of my favorites.  It's called Easy Does It.  And it's striking with it's sunset colors and wavy petals.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 (over-exposed)

Greens and Others

 

Dreamy Whites and Palest Pinks

For the first two pictures, I used two different exposures and got two different tones:

Bright and Cheery

I like to over-expose a lot of these.  It adds an interesting touch.

 

My "Red" Beauties

Beautiful when it's normally-exposed or over-exposed...

 

Interesting Purples

 

 

 

Pretty in Pink