about the dog who gave me a complex but i still love him

let me introduce our dog buddy a 3 year old jack russell extraordinaire. my daughter saw him in a pet store and could not go to sleep for thinking about the sad puppy with the one spot. when we saw him we were smitten. i being of a not so sound mind and the mom bonded with him...did you hear me... i ... bonded with the little guy. i was there for his every beckon call. we were in love, me and the little cutie pie. then came the time he was old enough to go for w a l k s that is when my husband took an interest. after all, the work was done. i turned the little guy in to a doggie genius and bam i'm out he's in. the little rascal dumped me like a hot potato.

the relationship he has with my husband is nothing short of worship. he is always at his side, they look each other in the eyes and love, can you feel the love. buddy is my husband's shadow from the moment he gets up in the morning and gets ready for work, patiently waits for his car to return in the evening and their eyes meet again then the worship starts all over again. don't get me wrong, buddy loves everyone (and squirrels more than everyone) it's just he has this extra level of love for greg and no one else. sure i take him for walks, but in doggie, that is just frosting on the cake. because cake is when dad gets home.

i'm saying i got dumped by a dog. a smart dog with a big vocab who can sit, lay, crawl, shake with either paw, clap, roll over, catch a ball in mid air, knows what go is, walk, car, grandma's house, cheese burger, chicken, water, squirrel, bunny, birdie, family member names, names of neighborhood dogs, cage, get dad, bed, bath (a four letter word). i mean this dog is a four-legged daniel webster. refuses to acknowledge down or no. are dogs born with original sin? just wondering . he paws you to get your attention. his kisses are stealthy. his tongue is faster than a speeding bullet.

my dog is so smart he runs up-stairs when i go near the stove. yep. when i turn the cook top on or turn on the oven he stands in the hall looks my way and turns and sprints up the stairs. he has only lived with me 3 years. he is so judgemental. even my dog prefers carry-out.

dogs. they just seem to get it. us people don't.

L O V E, unconditional love for all man-kind (ya even me)

worship, they worship with every thing they got

loyalty,
faithfulness,
honesty,

dogs, they really do the thing don't they. they just get it.

p.s. i'm really crazy about this dog

now this is special

bethanne at waiting for the shout.blogspot.com graciously passed along this award to me. she has a big heart following hard after the Lord. in this internet community who would have thought such encouragement and love could be truly felt. i have felt the love of Christ from you ladies. i am blessed by each one of you. we are trying to be women of faith who make a difference for Him in our everyday worlds encouraging one another to press on to the goal. so thank you sweet bethanne. i would like to pass this award to another source of encouragement to me in the Lord my siesta Jenny Hope at jennyhope-jennyhope.blogspot.com.

so ladies lets press on together toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called us heavenward in Christ Jesus Phil. 3:14

my 28 answers to 28 questions

1. What is your favorite cereal?
quaker oat squares, honey nut cheerios, crispix, i like cereal more than i eat it, does that make sense

2. What is too gross to eat in the morning?
i love breakfast food, even pizza for breakfast is great, so probably something like soup or left-overs from dinner

3. What time do you go to bed?
way too late usually 1 am sometimes later (did i hear you gasp?)

4. Where do you put your keys?
in my purse, sometimes on the cute snap thing to aid my pre-menopausal mind (doesn't work)

5. What vegetables do you love?
i love them all, just had sweet potatoes w/brown sugar -- yum!

6. What is the last thing you cleaned?
my mom's sink and counter and stove top just before i left there tonight

7. Do you measure with a ruler or do you eyeball it?
both, depends on the project

8. What do most people compliment you on?
um, i don't know maybe decorating

9. What is behind you right now?
chair with two pillows next to the coffee table with lamp

10. Favorite pastry?
well to use bethanne's words this computer does not have enough space for my list. i love pastries, crullers, canolis, coffee cake, anything from panera bread, need i continue i do have a sweet tooth.

11. How do you like to waste time?
actually, if i were honest, this would be it, i don't like tv except news, and talking on the phone to those i love i don't consider a waist of time, i probably waste time doing housework too slowly.

12. How would you describe your complexion?
i'm fair, i tan in the summer but usually burn first, i don't use self tanners (probably should) or do the fake and bake (probably should do that too)

13. What do you hang onto that you should really get rid of?
oh my, don't let my husband read this, stuff from my aunt who died 4 years ago that are in boxes in our garage that i keep saying me and my sister are going to sell.

14. What is the last thing that made you hurt?
leaving my parents home last night, i just want to stay and take care of them. i am living out the sandwich generation experience to the max. aging parents, children and grandchildren, a little job.

15. Tea or Coffee?
i'm coffee all the way - i love tim horton's coffee

16. Do you speak your mind?
to my family yes, to others no

17. What is your escape?
being on the computer, riding in the car with praise and worship music at 50 decibels (i mean loud, i don't even know what 1 decibel is :), reading, prayer, having a cup of coffee.

18. When is the last time you cried?
today, back to that pre-menopause thing

19. What are your bedtime rituals?
this is bad, put my pj's on, read a little, take my glasses off, and climb in bed

20. What troubles you?
our se*ually charged culture
i'm with bethanne on Al Gore winning the Nobel Prize
legalism
unbelieving family members
things on tv
people i should have witnessed too
the younger generation who what it all now with no time or effort
the power of oprah

21. Do you like thunderstorms?
yes, i love them as long as the winds are not too strong, i fear tornados, never been in one tho

22. Do you sleep easily or toss and turn?
mostly toss and turn, sleep easily if i take a tylenol pm

23. What do you offer a friend?
loyalty, compassion, a listening ear, prayer

24. If you could have a superpower what would it be?
i would like to heal the sick

25. Which is more attractive - personality or physical appearance?
um, i appreciate both. god made us all unique. i appreciate those who try to look their best no matter what their genetics. i love to hear beth moore talk about fading beauty, she makes me laugh.

26. Who did you last fight with?
fight would be too strong, put it this way, had a discussion with my son as to his managing his finances or lack thereof :)

27. What did you eat last night?
roast, baked potatoes, corn, cantaloupe then around 10pm taco bell

28. Who are you mad about?
my grandson Jack, who rolled over at 3 months, he is now trying to figure out the other way, smiles a lot, talks very seriously with grandma and grandpa with his hands together, and smells like heaven, soft as a cloud to hold, lets me praise dance him to sleep.

prayer oh sweet prayer

yesterday we had an occurrence at our house that has not happened in a long time. all four of us were at the dinner table together, on a sunday none the less, and had dinner that began with family prayer (not counting the bites my son had down before i sat down). between their work and other things we just don't get the four of us together all at once. i miss it. it was what we did every night as they grew even into high school we managed to be together most nights. it was such a blessing.

something my husband said yesterday stuck with me. "we praise you father that your name is proclaimed in this house". it is.

my dad is 88 and very sick. he has moments when he is talking and totally not making any sense. he sometimes doesn't eat, or only eats things like broth. i was there on saturday. my mom and i made dinner. he came to the table. my older brother usually prays but if dad is at the table he gives him the option to pray or not. saturday he prayed and when he did the spirit of God took over his weak voice and he prayed magnificently. it was the most lucid thing he has said all week. we all lifted our heads and looked at one another and all of our mouths were dropped and we smiled and secretly praised God for what we just heard. i wish you could have seen it, i wish you could have heard my dad. i will never forget it. thank you Jesus.

prayer is the sweetest thing isn't it. when it's just my husband and i we take turns or sometimes when my heart is heavy he prays then i pray. once we walked the dog and we each prayed one sentence prayers over our children taking turns.

if you have any special prayer habits share them with me, or a special time prayer meant so much or what prayer means to you.


~janel

praise report

thank you all for all your prayers. we definitely feel God answered them in a BIG way. we originally hired a somewhat larger company. they gave us 2 dates to take down the trees and each time that date arrived they had a reason for not being there. due to our time constraint with the city on the cited tree, i said to my husband honey i think this is a sign. let's get someone else. so he did. we never heard of this guy or his work, just picked him out of the phone book, he could start on friday and be done on saturday, music to my husbands ears.

#1 the workers showed up with six workers on friday. they began scoping out the back yard, my neighbor with the flowers on the lot line just feet from the tree trunk made an appearance on her patio and yelled to the guys "i don't want any holes in my lawn" with an i mean business voice. she prowled about all day like a cat, the long and short of it is that these guys caught branches that were coming her way and her flowers didn't even take a hit and when all was said and done with her she said to the workers she thought they did a good job.

#2 my neighbor's on either side one with an air conditioner and one with a gazebo sustained no damage. when the gazebo guy got home from work he checked his place out thoroughly. but he found nothing to complain about because we know God new that this was the company who we needed to be meticulous for us and they were!!! they had clean-up paddle brooms we never new existed that even cleaned the wood chips out of the grass. i know that was impressive to my neighbor next door because he is a real grass guy. even the guy across the street had an estimate taken.

#3 and most importantly. no one got hurt. this was a big job. it was 87 degrees here that day. we handed out cold waters and they were appreciative. one fellow my husband caught saying "man i need to take a pee but if i go over there in those pine trees that lady in the doorwall will probably see me and i'm not going to show her anything." (she would have had the police there in 1 second) my husband said to the guys hey if anyone needs to use the rest room come on in it's ok. so this guy i just told you about used it first and came out and saw someone else waiting and said "i don't know if you want to use that bathroom because you might have to do a bible study while you are standing there" my husband was there when he said that and he smiled at him and said "hey now that wouldn't be a bad thing now would it?" the worker said "no, no". in my husbands bathroom he has 3x5 cards he is currently memorizing on his mirror. they were pretty interesting for them to read.

Prov. 5:21 for a man's way's are in full view of the Lord, and he
examines all his paths.

10:19 when words are many, sin is not absent, but he who holds
his tongue is wise.

his 365 devotions for a righteous man was out and a picture on the wall with
Jer. 29:ll printed on it.

so ladies thank you for your prayers i will do the same for you anytime. this situation couldn't have come out any better.

Lifehouse's Everything Skit

2 Corinthians 10: 4-5 the weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. on the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds.

i saw this on another persons blog so that would make me a re-blogger but it was so powerful i began to cry out of sadness for those (especially our teens) who do not have victory over the darkness of this world (i believe we are at it's darkest point ever) and gladness over the the fact that my battle with satan is done. Jesus fought for me.

the skit shows the girl (me,you) being enticed, satan taking her (me,you) as far as she would go, to death if he could get her there, but she (me,you) fought back. wasn't that an awesome scene, Jesus was there for her (me,you) the whole time but she (me,you) had to make the descision to fight, He was there to fight with her and for her (me you). He promises to never leave us, He never left her. in the skit did you see Jesus, brush her off, cleaned her up, embraced her, loved her. He loves us so. He sets us free.

My Cross Story/Prayer Request

I have a story that has been going on for, well, since 1990 when we moved in to our home. We're second owners in this small but nice colonial in suburbia. I hate to get too detailed but basically our family has been targeted by one or many of our neighbors almost since the onset. They like to call the police/city/leave notes on our mail box, come into our yard as we are talking to contractors and shout orders/opinions, call us on the phone and express what they would have us to do, etc. We live a quiet reserved life, no wild parties ever, cut and manicure our lawn, plant flowers, maintain our home with some finesse, decorate with things that are nice and not tacky, wicker chair on porch, wreath, nice address sign. We keep it updated when needed, storm doors, gutters, roof. It has a lot of curb appeal for our price range of homes. We EVEN talk, smile, converse on a pleasant level as though nothing has ever happened to us like this in any way. So what gives we have NO idea really other than we are christians.

One reason we liked the house was we loved the trees (9 in the back 4 in the front and we already took down 1 in the front and 3 in the back in past years) plus two tall pine trees in the corner of the back yard that are beautiful and no fences, everyone takes well care of their homes and the home had some very nice architectural detail the original owners had done we loved it then and we still love it....except we never know what "they" are going to do next. Our latest saga is we are forced to remove a tree a corkscrew willow to be exact within an allotted amount of time or else pay a fine...OK. We were onto it before any neighbor was because two weeks before our notice from the city we had 2 estimates taken and it was coming down. It was so weird to get this notice it was as though someone saw my husband talking to men in the back yard by the trees and thought well I'm gonna give you some grief. It is in the very corner of our property, it looks dead from the bottom because there are too many trees shading it, some not ours, and is only green at the very top some 60 feet up there. Our neighbor has a gazebo in his corner of his lot near to where this tree stands.

So with so many trees, lots of fall clean up, the trees are getting bigger and we're getting older we are taking down 3 in the back and 2 in the front. So, next Wednesday (it was to be tomorrow but the tree guys said they had some trouble with their chippers, can only take their word for it) they will be here.

Here is my prayer. We need these guys to do no damage to any of the 3 adjacent properties while taking them down or getting the logs out to the front for grinding/disposal. It is a tight fit in between the homes. They said they will have wood to protect things like the next door neighbors air conditioner, bushes on the side of the next door neighbor's house. The gazebo cannot sustain any damage (i know the contractor is licensed and insured but no damage please Lord) and the lady directly to our back planted a perennial flower bed (probably somewhat over her property line we think but let it go) and we don't want it to get ruined or damaged. We want whoever this is for the last 17 years to get a life and leave us alone.

What I did: I had purchased some rusty iron scrolly crosses to put on the wall near our patio so I could take my Bible out and have a nice inspiring place in the summer to read and pray. Well last weekend I had an epiphany! No back wall......no, no, no......FRONT PORCH!!!!!!! They look so nice, one by the wicker chair on a side wall and one under our porch light. Ya, baby, I feel so goooood. Vengeance is my saith the Lord. We truly try to abide by this, but I just wanted someone to think who they might be dealing with. I want to put up some pics for you all to see but I haven't learned that yet.

I know my God is a God of details and He can do this. These guys need to be meticulous. Would you be my prayer partners until next Wednesday on this? I'll update the story after to let you all know how things went and see if I can figure out posting pics. Thank you so much.

~Janel

the crowd or the cross

i love word pictures

propitiation is only used four times in the bible. here is the word picture i just learned. propitiation is another word for the mercy seat on the arc of the covenant. the arc was a gold covered wooden box about 3 feet long that held the tablets of the law given to moses. on the ends of the arc were cherubims with their wings spanning over the arc to where they were almost touching each other. God hovered over the arc and His presence was between the wings of the cherubim looking down on the mercy seat. and what He saw was the tablets of the law inside the arc which everyone in israel had broken. once a year on the day of atonement the high priest would enter the holy of holies to make atonement for the people. He entered to make propitiation. the word propitiation in greek means to be satisfied. what the high priest did was take a basin of blood from a sacrificed animal and sprinkle the blood on the mercy seat so now when God looked down thru the cherubim wings He did not see the law inside the arc He saw the blood which covered that law which could not be kept by anyone. this was symbolic of the blood of Jesus that would be shed on the cross and that blood would be enough to cover our sin no matter who we were or what we had done. when God sees the blood of His Son Jesus He is satisfied and we are not considered guilty grace is accomplished thru propitiation. just like when the israelites placed the blood over their door posts in egypt God promised them that when He saw the blood He would pass over them. when He sees the blood on the doorposts of our hearts He says I am satisfied and we are forgiven. thank you dr. david jeremiah i think i'll remember this. (september 20, 2007 broadcast)

beauty

is it just me or what. you've probably had this conversation with one of your gf's at some time but i need to talk to you blog gf's a minute. i've been married now for 29 years and my husband has had basically the same hair cut for almost the entire time, give or take the request i once made to "tell her to leave it a little longer in the back". no not a mullett but you know what i mean. me, on the other hand, have had more hair styles than oprah and beth moore combined. long, shoulder length, chin length all with various shapes and colors and now i wear a boy cut with highlights of course. My big thing is my husband always looks good. i never say to myself, "he needs a new look" - never. He wears docker like-pants, shirts with button down collars and basic brown business casual shoes every day. each and every day i see him i think he looks great because he does. he's happy as a clam. i don't know about you but i can't get away with that. he has 1/1000 of the surface area to shave, uses soap, most days his deodorant is his cologne, his hands sometimes get dry in like february. now i know you live in my shoes gf's. it's no simple task this beauty thing. cut, color, highlights, lowlights, hair products galore, blow dryers, flat irons, manicures, pedicures. i just know when i sometimes go to the salon where they dont's speak english, they are talking about my feet to each other. alot of shaving with gel, moisture filled bodywash, more lotion, body cream and exfoliation, can i get a witness! not to mention, fine line treatment and make-up. i'm stessing out reading my own blog for heaven's sake. sometimes being a women comes right down to perseverance. no, not really. we thrive in the isles of beauty. we love every minute of it don't we. that is how we were created. we are lovers of beauty and we want to make all things beautiful. ourselves, our husbands, our children, our homes, our yards. everything we touch we want to leave our mark of beauty. this is all great. God gave us beauty for our enjoyment. His creation cries out with beauty that takes our breath away. but gf we must never forget to make that unseen spot on the inside beautiful. our hearts. when God checks out beauty that is where He looks.

1 samuel 16:7b the LORD does not look at the things man looks at. man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.

psalms 139:23 search me, o God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. see if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.


more than anything else gf i want Him to find me beautiful on the inside. and gf this is no walk down the isles of beauty.