Saturday, 30 November 2013
Lessons Millie Learned in November 2013
1. I can write a 50,000 word novel in one month. Yup. With two days to spare. Check this web-site out: http://nanowrimo.org/about. If you've ever wanted to write a novel, but have lacked the gumption to do so, plan on taking this challenge next November. It will make you overcome all your fears and turn you into a writer.
2. The most important writing advice boils down to this: Just start writing. Start typing one ridiculous seeming, silly sounding word after another. There's no other way to go about it.
3. Always, always, always remember to look behind you when backing up a car, especially when it's your Grandmother's car. Enough said.
4. Don't endeavour to share a sleeping space with a large dog. You will either be smothered with his large body draped across your chest or be drowned in his slobber.
5. Dogs are just big babies, but a lot harder to pick up.
6. Everything costs a lot more money than I would have imagined. It's kind of depressing, actually.
7. The French word for "sun" is "soleil." I'm so glad I have a five year old niece who can teach me French. What a good girl to have around!
8. Keurig coffee makers are awesome as are the cappuccinos and white hot chocolate you can make in them. Minimal effort for maximum deliciousness.
9. As Olivia and I wandered around the grocery store, today, looking for some special food to celebrate finishing our novels, I learned that I've kind of grown out of the excitement of junk food. All we could muster up was some chocolate pudding, chips and cheese salsa. How blaise we have become! (Blaise is a word, right?)
10. Norland College, a famous nanny school in England, actually offers a course in car seat fitting. Any one who has ever struggled through getting those stupid seats actually securely fastened in a car would heartily concur that this is a wonderful idea.
Did you have a educational November? Comment and let us know!
- Millie
Monday, 18 November 2013
On Turning 20
(Just as a side note, I think I get exceedingly boring when it comes to my post title choices. But, really, what can I say? This is a post about turning twenty.)
I'm sitting here, writing a superfluous blog post, when I should be doing other writing, but I've decided to throw caution to the wind. It's my birthday today, after all.
It's been a good week-end. Six children sang to me, over a teddy bear cake on Friday. Greek food was et on Saturday. I was toasted with beer and wine on Sunday, and got special birthday phone calls on Monday. I know it's rather a tired, old sentiment, but really the best gifts aren't the ones you can see, feel, or (yum) taste, though I must say I'm pretty delighted with the presents I received as well. It's the friends, the new and old and unexpected. It's the prayers, and benedictions of well-wishing. I guess it's the love.
And speaking of tired and old, that's the way I've been feeling lately. I've found myself thinking many times during these last few weeks, "Am I really only turning twenty?" It seems like I've been living for so much longer than that. And, I know...Anyone who is anything older than twenty-one is thinking, "PATHETIC!" But, I'm being honest, here. This is "real life" for me.
This past week was a rather hard one - it seems like God was teaching me what it is to be humbled and say "I'm sorry" - to make mistakes and recognize my sin in jarring technicolour. I was thinking about these things when I went on a walk, today in the part rain and cloud, when I just happened to look over my shoulder and gasped. There was a rainbow, arching in the sky above me. I could see it from end to end.
It whispered "Happy Birthday" to me and I thanked God.
But, that's not all. As I stood and looked at the rainbow with something reaching awe in my heart, I glimpsed through the clouds a second rainbow. A double rainbow....
Not just enough to get us by. Lavish gifts.
In just a few seconds, they were both gone.
Life is a gift. And, like every good gift, it's a sequence of total surprises. In the friends I've made, the places I've found myself, the little things that brighten my days - it's often the most unexpected that become the dearest.
I've always admired the people who can make and keep resolutions. It's not that I don't have the willpower to stay with something. It's just that I can never decide what the resolution should be. But, walking home today, I had a glimpse of what I might just want my life to be like in the next year: Open-palmed. Taking what comes without fear - with even eager anticipation. Life is too short for anything less than that. Whether it's a rainbow, or a rain cloud just over your shoulder God can turn it into a gift with a bow on the top for extra good measure.
- Millie
I'm sitting here, writing a superfluous blog post, when I should be doing other writing, but I've decided to throw caution to the wind. It's my birthday today, after all.
It's been a good week-end. Six children sang to me, over a teddy bear cake on Friday. Greek food was et on Saturday. I was toasted with beer and wine on Sunday, and got special birthday phone calls on Monday. I know it's rather a tired, old sentiment, but really the best gifts aren't the ones you can see, feel, or (yum) taste, though I must say I'm pretty delighted with the presents I received as well. It's the friends, the new and old and unexpected. It's the prayers, and benedictions of well-wishing. I guess it's the love.
And speaking of tired and old, that's the way I've been feeling lately. I've found myself thinking many times during these last few weeks, "Am I really only turning twenty?" It seems like I've been living for so much longer than that. And, I know...Anyone who is anything older than twenty-one is thinking, "PATHETIC!" But, I'm being honest, here. This is "real life" for me.
This past week was a rather hard one - it seems like God was teaching me what it is to be humbled and say "I'm sorry" - to make mistakes and recognize my sin in jarring technicolour. I was thinking about these things when I went on a walk, today in the part rain and cloud, when I just happened to look over my shoulder and gasped. There was a rainbow, arching in the sky above me. I could see it from end to end.
It whispered "Happy Birthday" to me and I thanked God.
But, that's not all. As I stood and looked at the rainbow with something reaching awe in my heart, I glimpsed through the clouds a second rainbow. A double rainbow....
Not just enough to get us by. Lavish gifts.
In just a few seconds, they were both gone.
Life is a gift. And, like every good gift, it's a sequence of total surprises. In the friends I've made, the places I've found myself, the little things that brighten my days - it's often the most unexpected that become the dearest.
I've always admired the people who can make and keep resolutions. It's not that I don't have the willpower to stay with something. It's just that I can never decide what the resolution should be. But, walking home today, I had a glimpse of what I might just want my life to be like in the next year: Open-palmed. Taking what comes without fear - with even eager anticipation. Life is too short for anything less than that. Whether it's a rainbow, or a rain cloud just over your shoulder God can turn it into a gift with a bow on the top for extra good measure.
- Millie
Wednesday, 6 November 2013
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Friday, 1 November 2013
What I Learned in October 2013 - The Liv Edition
1. I can make a shaped cake. Cool.
http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/peter-rabbit-cake
P.S. I didn't use a cake mix...fortherecord.
2. Naptime is always the best time.
3. Nothing is as hard as the anticipation of that said same something hard.
4. That I no longer need to sign my name to every journal entry. Who else would be writing in my journal anyway?
5. Fiction is a legitimate form of brain food and soul growing. Fact.
6. The Red Sox have this beard thing and it is perhaps the most endearing/amusing sports related thing I have seen in a long time.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/sport/boston-red-sox-players-using-power-of-the-beard-in-baseball-world-series/story-e6frg7mf-1226746745070
7. Green mountains of Vermont. White mountains of New Hampshire.
They are just as beautiful as they sound. Go see them if you can!
8. Friends means that you can disagree and still...be friends.
9. Cornmeal coconut pancakes are too good, BTW and whatever some may say.
Here! http://pollyspancakeparlor.com/
10. The word poiema is where we get poem from, and it is the same word used to describe God's workmanship in us.
In other words, we are God's poem. Do we live like it?
If you want to have it explained more eloquently, and have every art making cliché turned on its head...this book may be helpful.http://www.amazon.ca/Million-Little-Ways-Uncover-Were/dp/0800722442
11. Kids are really the very funniest things going.
Duh.
And that's that.
Join in the learning fun if you like. Just post your aha things in the comments...we'd love to read them!
~Liv
http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/peter-rabbit-cake
P.S. I didn't use a cake mix...fortherecord.
2. Naptime is always the best time.
3. Nothing is as hard as the anticipation of that said same something hard.
4. That I no longer need to sign my name to every journal entry. Who else would be writing in my journal anyway?
5. Fiction is a legitimate form of brain food and soul growing. Fact.
6. The Red Sox have this beard thing and it is perhaps the most endearing/amusing sports related thing I have seen in a long time.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/sport/boston-red-sox-players-using-power-of-the-beard-in-baseball-world-series/story-e6frg7mf-1226746745070
7. Green mountains of Vermont. White mountains of New Hampshire.
They are just as beautiful as they sound. Go see them if you can!
8. Friends means that you can disagree and still...be friends.
9. Cornmeal coconut pancakes are too good, BTW and whatever some may say.
Here! http://pollyspancakeparlor.com/
10. The word poiema is where we get poem from, and it is the same word used to describe God's workmanship in us.
In other words, we are God's poem. Do we live like it?
If you want to have it explained more eloquently, and have every art making cliché turned on its head...this book may be helpful.http://www.amazon.ca/Million-Little-Ways-Uncover-Were/dp/0800722442
11. Kids are really the very funniest things going.
Duh.
And that's that.
Join in the learning fun if you like. Just post your aha things in the comments...we'd love to read them!
~Liv
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