Fall Photos...so far

October 6, 2017

Today, I have done a whole lot of nothing.

For some reason, this year has been incredible busy.

I don't want to complain about how busy I have been because I have had some amazing opportunities this year.

But today, I really enjoyed staying home. Which gave me the chance to edit a few photos.

This week, I was able to take my camera with me to a couple of our favorite California locations, and take some photos at home.

3Strands bracelets from Mercy House Global

What photo is your favorite? And what have you been taking photos of?

Fall Photo Challenge

October 1, 2017

My daughter recently purchased her first DSLR.

She has quite a good eye for photography and is already using her camera on manual mode, which took me quite a while to learn.

The first day she had her camera, we drove around our town looking for a couple of good spots to attempt to capture sunset.

Since I have done a terrible job of keeping up with the Capture Your 365 photo challenge this year, I decided today would be a good day to start taking pictures every day for this month. I might not post them every day, but I will commit to pick up my DSLR and take pictures with it every day this month.

Since today is the first day of October, I found a couple of orange things around my home to photograph.

I really want to practice portrait photography. But in the meantime, I can practice with objects around my home.

"To me, photography is an art of observation. It's about finding something in an ordinary place...I've found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them." - Elliott Erwitt

Making Time to Speak Up

September 8, 2017

Last night, for some reason, I was thinking about our Compassion trip to Mexico my daughter and I took in January.

And then, when I started checking Facebook this morning, I saw reports of an earthquake that hit off the coast of southern Mexico last night.

I immediately starting thinking about Alfredo and his family, and the many other Compassion children and their families that live in Chiapas.

In 2014, my son and I were on our first trip with Compassion. And where did we go? Chiapas. The most southern state in the country of Mexico.

See that pink building in the photo above? That is the church in this community. The church had no glass in the windows, and the restroom? Basically an outhouse with no roof out behind the church.

Do you think this building is up to earthquake standards? I am sure no building inspector has even seen this place, let alone ever traveled to a location like this.

Why am I sharing this with you?

"You may choose to look the other way but you can never say again that you did not know." _ William Wilberforce

Recently, I finished reading 'Amazing Grace: William Wilberforce and the Heroic Campaign to End Slavery' by Eric Metaxas.

I have seen extreme poverty and I have to speak up about it. I know that we live in the most prosperous nation on earth.

I know that there are families in other countries living with next to nothing. They do not have the resources we have to rebuild when everything around them is destroyed.

We cannot sit back and do nothing.

If you can and are willing, Compassion has a fund set up to help families in disasters. You can visit this link to make a donation today.

Short and Sweet

June 14, 2017

When was the last time you received a note in the mail? In and amongst the junk mail and bills, our mail boxes rarely are filled with notes and letters from friends and relatives. We live in a world where encouragement and praise can be received on a daily basis by those who we live life with.

But imagine you live in a world where you have no mail box.

Imagine you live in a world where there are no house numbers and street names.

Imagine you live in a world where no one gives you encouragement and praise.

Many of our Compassion sponsored children live in areas where it is very rare for them to receive mail of any kind.

But you can change all that!

Just yesterday, reading the Compassion blog, I was reminded how simple it is for me to set aside time to write a short and sweet note to the children we sponsor.

Here is what I wrote to Lina yesterday:

Hello Lina,

I hope you are doing well! I was thinking about you today, so I decided to write to you to remind you how special you are to God. He loves you and is always watching over you.

Here is a question for you: If you could invent one thing to make life easier, what would it be?

I encourage you to spend time reading your Bible every day, learning more about God and His plan for you. Matthew 5:16 would be a good verse to read.

Love and hugs to you!

Short and sweet, and it didn't take much time for me to write this to her either.

Since I know the kids love receiving photos, I included this with the letter:

Click on the link here to download and add this image to your next letter — Click on the link **here** to download and add this image to your next letter

So what are you waiting for? Will you write a short and sweet letter to your Compassion children right now?

I love a good list!

May 31, 2017

Not sure if it is due to my somewhat Type A personality or being the first born, but I certainly love a good list.

And I love summer.

So imagine how excited I was when I found not one, not two, but three lists for this summer!

Today, I discovered a new website called Sacred Holidays.

Their tagline is "Less holiday chaos. A lot more Jesus."

I love the idea of less chaos and more Jesus.

But what really caught my eye was the three lists they are sharing for this summer.

A 90 day plan to read the Bible, a women's summer bucket list, and a summer photography challenge. All three lists are free on their website, you just need to share your email address with them.

It has been quite a few years since I have read through the whole Bible. This is going to take some dedication on my part. But even if I get up a half an hour earlier each day (and cut out a little social media time), I believe I can make this work. Even if I get to the end of August and still have some reading to do, it will be better than if I had never started the challenge. Plus, spending time reading God's Word is always a good thing.

Speaking of reading, I have been working on my Goodreads challenge to read 30 books this year and I am making good progress. This year I am really trying to focus on reading books that have been living on my Kindle for too long. I printed up a list, but recently I learned about Bullet Journals. Have you heard about them?

You can get lost on the internet reading about Bullet Journals (go ahead, do a 'Google' search for them. Just be sure to come back here to read the rest of the post!). Anyway, I like the idea of having paper to do a 'brain dump'...things that take up space in my brain that I want/need to remember, but they really don't make sense to put on a calendar.