Monthly Archives: March 2024

Joy to the World? At Easter?

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Who needed baskets? Our kids thought “Easter shoes” were normal.

Does your family celebrate Easter in traditional ways?

My siblings and I hid Easter eggs so well, truants were located weeks later by their potent odor. We awoke to yummy treats … in our polished shoes. Years before, Mom had possessed only pennies to spend on Easter. Having poured out frustrations in prayer — Mom talked to Jesus about everything — she recalled reading about Dutch children receiving Christmas candy in their shoes and nested jelly beans in ours.

My father, a pastor, celebrated Easter wholeheartedly, his bass voice leading “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today,” “He Arose” and … “Joy to the World.”

Image by AvocetGEO from Pixabay.

I thought everyone sang that hymn at Easter. As a teen, though, I realized other churchgoers sang it only at Christmas. I kept our odd custom a deep, dark secret, hoping no Easter visitors knew me.

Fast-forward 20 years. My children and I dyed eggs, their clothes and mine. One helpful toddler knew egg-zackly what to do with eggs.

Crack them.

Image by Couleur from Pixabay.

Our family could afford Easter baskets. Repeating the story of their grandma’s faith, though, I filled my kids’ shoes with grass, chocolate bunnies and jelly beans.

My grandchildren still receive Easter treats in their shoes and hear of their great-grandmother’s prayer. They will dye Easter eggs — and their clothes. Our congregation will sing “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today” and “He Arose.”

Joy to the World”? Probably not.

I’ll save that hymn for a visit to our parents’ graves. I didn’t want them to die. They weren’t crazy about the idea, either. But because Jesus came alive again, they will too. Someday, we’ll all be together with Him.

Joy to the world! To all who believe in Jesus’ Resurrection.

Image by Arnie Bragg from Pixabay.

Your Extraordinary Ordinary: How do you celebrate Easter?

OMG, It’s Monday! Prayer: Unholy Holy Week

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Wow, Jesus, our politicians feel as if they’re being crucified this election year, but their pressures can’t begin to match those of Your last days. Unlike them, You could have zapped Your enemies with a wave of Your hand. Instead, OMG, You gave Your life for their sins — and mine.    

Protest image by Bruce Emmerling from Pixabay. Christ image by marinas32 from Pixabay.

His and Her To-Do Lists

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Should I bother with a spring to-do list?

Image by Michéle from Pixabay.

This past winter, I could have scraped old wallpaper in three rooms. Instead, I read books. Enriching my mind inspires me so much more. Hubby’s enriched his mind too, finishing a thousand-page book on American history.

We’ve enriched our minds so much we’ve lost them — when recalling winter to-do lists. But a little repression never hurt anyone.

Besides, it’s spring. Why waste time indoors when we can stay outdoors?

Between snowstorms and tornadoes, I mean.

The only problem: our enriched minds cannot agree on priorities.

Items on his spring to-do list:

Clean the camper versus clean the garage? On Hubby’s list, the camper wins every time.
  • Conducting intense research on camping gear.
  • Buying lots of it.
  • Arguing with umpires and Cubs podcasts while cleaning our camper.
  • Arguing with mice that established winter quarters in the camper.
  • Tilling and planting the garden he knows deer will eat.
Image by Teodor Buhl from Pixabay.
  • Negotiating with dandelion and violet armies determined to conquer our yard.
  • Coaxing the mower into eating grass, despite its lack of appetite.
Image by forstephany from Pixabay.

My list:

  • Conducting intense research on spring shoes.
  • Buying lots of them.
  • Arguing with The Weather Channel.
  • Arguing with ants demanding the deed to our house.
  • Buying enough plants to create a second Eden.
  • Planting maybe four I know the deer will eat.
  • Applying fertilizers only weeds like.
We should move spring walks on Taylor University’s campus to the top of our lists.

Do Hubby and I share any common items on our to-do lists? A few:

  • Taking hand-in-hand walks, spotting new blossoms on Taylor University’s campus.
  • Pretending we’re students again.
  • Glorying in growing old like two aging maples sporting rings of experience, yet plenty of new buds.

Maybe we should put these — and, of course, enriching our minds — at the top of our spring to-do lists.

Your Extraordinary Ordinary: What’s on your list?

OMG, It’s Monday! Prayer: Beautiful God Loves the Odd

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Jesus, our pear tree seems out of sync with most flowering trees. Every spring, it insists on producing scrawny, green leaves first and luxuriant flowers later. ??? OMG, I’m so thankful that when I, too, get life backwards, You still help me bloom.   

Night Fright

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Image by 51581 from Pixabay.

People often say they conceive their best thoughts at night.

I’m missing this microchip. My mother often told me that even as an infant, I wasn’t a positive thinker during the wee hours. When I grew old enough to read, I added hundreds of new items to my nocturnal Scary List. Take, for example, the 1960s obsession with outer space. If I read a story in Look magazine about flying saucers above a wheat field near Boring, Nebraska, I knew the little green guys would like Indiana sweet corn better. I resolved to eliminate bedtime in order to protect my state from alien invasion.

NASA spent millions to supply me with worry material — until monsters took over the task: Frankenstein, Wolf Man and TV vampires. When tired Mom nixed movie and television viewing, the local paper kept me informed. I read about a hairy, Bigfoot-like creature that cried like a baby and haunted Detroit. Nowadays, sports writers would deduce it was a Detroit Lions lineman, lamenting their playoffs loss. But then, I never knew whether the unearthly wails from the next bedroom came from my baby brother or the monster.

Image by Dimuth Amarasiri from Pixabay.
Image by Josep Monter Martinez from Pixabay.

Thankfully, I outgrew all that. The Wizard of Oz’s Wicked Witch of the West no longer scares me.

At least, not much.

Image by 51581 from Pixabay.

Your Extraordinary Ordinary: Do some childhood boogeymen still haunt you at night?

OMG, It’s Monday! Prayer: True Dedication

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Jesus, thank You for brave pastors who preach to cranky congregations the day we spring forward. Because, OMG, if I were a minister, I’d be tempted to refuse until every member had consumed at least two espressos and a giant jelly doughnut.

Image by Günter from Pixabay.

Image by Wikimedia Images from Pixabay.

Stupid Spring Flowers

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Have you noticed spring flowers don’t possess high IQs?

After years of “surprise” March blizzards, you’d think clueless flowers would wait until April before peeking out.

Brave or foolish, my crocuses herald the hope of spring.

My daffodils also are poor communicators. Having often turned into flower-sicles, they should have the decency to warn the younger generation. New bulbs should don furry little mittens like spring-smart pussy willows. But they never do.

So, every March, I lecture my flowers about the virtues of sleeping in.

I never had to instruct my children about this.

But flowers don’t get it. Each year, they hear the same weather wisdom: come out too early, and you’ll freeze your buds off. Wait until the sun shines more than one day out of 30.

But do they listen?

Image by Ryan Minion from Pixabay.

No-o-o-o. While the ground remains iron and silvered with snow, dumb flowers poke their heads above icy earth and shiver in their shoots.

Not too bright.

Though I admit that doesn’t apply to color. Yellow daffodils and purple crocuses look like fresh, brilliant paint dropped from God’s brush onto a color-starved landscape. His gift after a long, weary winter?

Maybe spring flowers aren’t so dumb, after all.

Image by Ralph from Pixabay.

Your Extraordinary Ordinary: When does your favorite spring flower first appear?