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Our Daily Thread 12-31-12

Good Morning!

It’s the last day of the year, so 2 QoD’s. First I’ll ask the obvious question.

Do you have a New Year’s resolution?

And then,

What was the highlight of 2012 for you?

Quote of the Day

“In  the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your  years.”

Abraham  Lincoln

62 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 12-31-12”

  2. I dpn’t make New Years resolutions. I made one about forty years ago not to make anymore resolutions.
    I don’t have a highlight of the year. Rather sad isn’t it?

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  3. Actually, it isn’t all bad. We have been greatly blessed.
    At this stage on life, you want little change. Most change is bad.
    Bad report from the doctor.
    Somebody fell. -That’s a big one.
    A child, or friend lost a job.
    Good things?
    Two granddaughters got master’s degrees.
    Great granddaughter is walking and starting to talk.
    The good things are happenings to people you love.
    🙂

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  4. I try not to set myself up for failure thus no resolutions . Highlight? It was an eventful year with a lot of changes . I had enough of Guy I Worked With and made up my mind to find something better . I am still quite pleased with my decision .
    I decided I was tired of sitting home alone so I decided to find some o be o go to a movie or dinner with . Nothing serious . Just a friend/escort so I wouldn’t always be the odd person . Instead I found a wonderful,kind,sweetheart of an adorable man . The bonus is that he came pre- packaged with three boys of his own and a grandson on the way . I am still deciding if I am going to be Grammy or Mimi .
    We are going to visit them (who am I kidding? We are going to see Silas ) the weekend of January 18th.

    My computer is having issues and I am typing on a tablet . Forgive any errors . Some aren’t even mine . Gotta love auto correct .

    I told you about the family that lost their almost three year old Christmas Eve due to a sanitary accident . You wouldn’t believe the outpouring of love shown to this family and the people from all over posting to the FB memorial page . After the service Saturday the mother took so.did the flowers that had been sent to the nursing home to share .

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  6. A huge highlight of the year was coming out of lurkville at WorldMagBlog and meeting all of you. The prayer support and the encouragement I’ve received from you have blessed me more than words could ever say. Thank you.

    Thought for the new year: Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,
    I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.     Philippians 3:13-14.

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  7. we have been greatly blessed by you 6Arrows . I don’t know where I would be today if I hadn’t stumbled e d a cross Worldmag years ago . it saw me through some of my darkest days . For that I a m thankful .

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  8. From the first, I wondered how you could have a swing set accident.
    I used to swing Becky, and Mary and Jenn on the swings in the park and couldn’t see how it could be dangerous.

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  10. The highlight for me was the arrival of the third adorable granddaughter in three years. 🙂

    Everything else in this crazily busy, emotionally and physically challenging year pales in comparison! 🙂

    2013? I can’t think that far ahead . . .

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  11. I never make resolutions. As for 2012: #3 grandchild born. Not much else out of the ordinary.

    Kim- I guess I read the original post wrong. I thought you wrote “almost lost a 3 year old” not “lost an almost 3 year old”. Quite a difference when the words are reordered.

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  12. Hmm, highlight of 2012, probably getting water in the form of a new well. You don’t realize how nice being able to turn the tap and have water come out is until you can no loner do so.

    2013 – looking forward to a wedding (hopefully this year)

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  13. One highlight of 2012 has been seeing how God has provided for us when things looked dim. Lee could see Hostess wasn’t going to make it, then God provided another job (temporary), then another, & some opportunities to consider.

    Another highlight is an on-going one – Forrest’s learning to talk. He is quite a verbal little guy, & it has been a delight to hear his vocabulary & grasp of language grow.

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  14. Kim (7), I am humbled. That I have been any kind of blessing is entirely the Lord’s doing. I am so grateful. And you are a great blessing to me, as I know you are to many others, as well.

    Love and blessings to you in 2013, Kim.

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  15. New Year’s resolution: exercise more, lose more weight, stay on track more with reading through the Bible in a year, pray more, write more, learn more, cook more healthy foods, sleep more on a regular schedule,,,does anyone see the key word is MORE/ More is good! I have heard less is more, but that is not always the case. LOL!

    Highlight of the year is that our son finished all his classes to get his undergraduate degree. He has a few loose ends to tie up to go through graduation in May.

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  16. Highlight of 2012 would probably be our second honeymoon trip. It made up for us getting sick on our “real” honeymoon.

    And also we end 2012 “feeling” like a family, whereas we ended 2011 acting like a family, but awkwardly.

    I don’t have any actual New Year’s “resolutions” (I don’t make those, not since I was a teenager), but several New Year’s “plans.” For several years I have been wanting to learn to draw better, and specifically to learn how to draw people. I also have always enjoyed colored pencils, but not really learned how to use them well. And I got to a certain place of “settling in” in this house, and then I got the the place where it’s hard to figure out where to put the rest of it, so I still have boxes lining the hallway. Also, now that I’ve done most of the tasks of “settling in” to married and family life, I have other things I want to get back to, that were temporarily put aside.

    So these are my plans for 2013:
    -to read through the Bible in a year again (I haven’t done so in recent years)
    -to take 15 minutes a day (manageable) to deal with “clutter” (boxes in the hall, mostly)
    -to go systematically through one or more of my drawing books (as though it is an actual “art class”) and learn to draw better (in general) and make at least decent progress toward my goal of being able to draw recognizable people
    -possibly to then work through a colored pencil book and make decent progress in that medium as well
    -to rework the books I laid aside (my own writing) to aim toward publication
    -to determine my next steps in writing
    -to rework my website and probably begin a blog
    -to create my wedding scrapbook (I started it but didn’t do many pages this year, since other issues were more “pressing”)

    I imagine that is plenty. That is in addition to being a wife and mother and doing my usual editing work.

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  17. I posted this rather funny You Tube ad last night so I will post it again today for any who did not see it. Our son said this was popular with the guys last year. Pet owners do not worry, he does not do pets.

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  18. I enjoy drawing people and animals. Maybe some day they will be recognizable. For now, a tiger is recognized as a tiger, a horse is a horse, etc. Meanwhile, if I draw my grandchildren, people think it is my son. If I draw my bio sons, people think it is my husband. A bit of work to do yet….. I have managed a truck and people were able to identify the actual truck. And, no, it did not have the name written on it.

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  19. I have no artistic skill whatsoever, but my husband’s is amazing to me. He doesn’t have a lot of time to draw now, but in the early years of our marriage, he did.

    We’ve talked about me renting a cello for a time, and hubby drawing me playing the cello out in a field. Rather a nice creative outlet for both of us, if we ever follow through on it.

    I’m so pleased that more of our children inherited my husband’s drawing genes rather than mine! First Arrow, unfortunately, takes after me in the art heredity department 😉 and I’m not sure with 6th Arrow yet how her art skill will develop, but the four middle children show much giftedness with drawing and other visual art forms. Their work is inspiring, and it does encourage me to want to try to develop even a small measure of skill for myself, too, rather than dismiss it as something I’m not cut out for.

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  22. You can’t keep New Years resolutions?

    I never have a problem keeping mine. I make ones I already keep.

    Like:

    I promise not to drink a drop of coffee all year.

    🙂

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  23. We love 6 Arrows. 🙂

    JaniceG & the stuffed animals commercial 🙂

    Kim, you’re definitely more a “Mimi” than a “Grammy.”

    You really had me scratching my head over the “sanitary accident,” though. All kinds of things were racing through my mind trying to figure that one out.

    Seriously, though, prayers for the family of that little one. How awful. And what a difficult time of year to lose a child especially.

    Resolutions. Well, I don’t so much “call” them that but I do think sometimes they get a bad rap. As Christians, we should always be looking for ways to change and improve — probably most importantly in our devotional lives but also in how we can make better use of the talents, opportunities and abilities God has given us.

    And the beginning of a new year is as good a time as any, I think.

    True, I tend to have the same things on my “list” each year — like many, I suppose I just struggle with some of the same sins & weaknesses, it’s a battle that wages on.

    I’ll have to look it up again, but I believe Jonathan Edwards came up with a very worthy list of ‘resolutions’ that would challenge any Christian.

    This year, though, a new one is to do at least some strengthening exercises. I ordered the book. So we’ll see, I just wanted to start with something easy to do at home.

    Work-related issues include improving my attitude (this is admittedly a very difficult stretch we’re in) and digging back in on the pets blog. Ever since we changed to the WordPress platform, I’ve felt less adept at posting for technical reasons. I keep telling myself I have to use it more to get more proficient at it. But then as soon as I think that, I find something else (a story, etc.) to do.

    So I also ordered the WordPress for Dummies book from Amazon yesterday. 🙂

    And I’m going to sign up for at least one Mac training session at the Apple store, they’ve recently revamped iTunes & iPhone — and the phones also are interfacing differently with the computers (and I’m a bit lost in learning the ins and outs of the iCloud system) — so I’ve decided there’s nothing wrong with taking advantage of the freebie training sessions the store offers as opposed to struggling to figure it out myself.

    And, yeah, reading the Bible through in a year is back on the top of the list. 😉

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  24. I meant to say they revamped iTunes & iPhoto (not iphone, though the phone also is posing some challenges for me sometimes).

    It used to be where you could easily import photos from the phone to your computer, but so far I’m just having problems figuring out how that all works now with the iCloud storage. Ugh.

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  25. Part of my issue with WordPress is that now I have a couple log-ins (one for here, one for the blog at work) — I can’t tell you how often I’ve had to re-set passwords (for Apple, too, actually) in the past several weeks for some reason.

    So annoying. And I have no idea what passwords work for what anymore. 😦 I’m going to have to go back to keeping a written log of them all.

    Going in to work a little late today as I need to make cop calls in the very early evening.

    This being New Year’s Eve, let’s hope nothing big is going on that soon … Otherwise, I could be there a lot later than I plan to be.

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  26. We didn’t get the snow they said we would get…it drifted south and east…we have glitter falling from the sky from time to time this morn…but…it’s not going to add up to 5 inches!
    When I read the Qod I got a knot in the pit of my stomach…this year started out quite difficult…this time last year, I was sitting at Daddy’s bedside…holding his hand as he was preparing to be embraced by our Lord Jesus. Tears flow easily at the remembrance….but, I will say…the highlight to that experience was that Daddy drew his last breath in peace…and he did seem to have a smile upon his sweet face…January 3, 2012 Daddy finished the race…and he finished well…the Lord has seen us through….He has held us close….He has given me the assurance that Daddy is with Him…it is well with my soul….
    And to those of you here who prayed me through…what an incredible blessing…I cherish you all
    For the new church the Lord directed us to this year…what an amazing blessing…
    This year…..I will work out more….dig deeper in the Word…strive to know Him more fully…pray that I might be a light in the darkness of this world….
    And I hope the Lord will direct me into a new ministry in which to serve…I am feeling a bit lost now that the kids no longer need me…a stay at home Mom with nothing to do…oy vey
    Bless you all this last day of 2012…and my our Lord keep His ever watchful eye upon you and yours…

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  28. Re: New Year resolutions. They Y was almost empty this morning. I told the supervisor/trainer that there would be a big crowd Wednesday. He said it would last about three months. I said, a month, at the most. It’s his business, but I’ve been at it for forty years now.

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  33. I have never really understood the difference between resolutions and goals. I am ten pounds lighter from a NewYear’s goal in 2010. I have more upper body strength from my 2012 goal. Setting attainable goals is required on my job and my husband’s so it has become a yearly habit we don’t want to break. We even get some of our BHAGs (Bit Hairy Audacious Goals).

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  34. WASHINGTON – The Manassas News & Messenger is no more. The paper printed its final edition after 143 years of covering the news in Prince William County, Manassas and Manassas Park Sunday.
    The paper’s parent company, the Warren Buffet-owned World Media Enterprises, decided to close the paper and its website InsideNoVa.com in November, saying the paper was losing money, was in a competitive news market, and “had a tough time finding the sense of community that a community newspaper needs to prosper.”     .

    Sad, we used to take the Fairfax Journal, it served the purpose of a local newspaper. You can’t expect the Post or Times to be interested in the suburbs.

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  35. Hey, for those who have posted them before, where is a link to a through-the-Bible plan? When I’ve done it before, I’ve simply started in Genesis, but the chronological one or some other version might interest me. We had some at church, but I was out sick last week and I forgot to check yesterday to see if any were left.

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  36. Donna (23), you brought me to tears.

    Donna (27), that’s quite a list. This one, under the heading Character, number 32, really stood out to me, and I think I will start there: “Resolved, to be strictly and firmly faithful to my trust, that that in Prov. 20:6, “A faithful man who can find?” may not be partly fulfilled in me.” An excellent exhortation.

    Donna (tap, tap, tap, “Donna! Donna! Donna!” — have I chewed your ear off yet? 🙂 ). I thought of you yesterday when we were on the way to my husband’s family’s Christmas gathering. Yesterday morning you had described what your grandfather looked like, tall and wearing his hat, and I told you what a neat picture that had put in my mind. Anyway, we stopped at a gas station en route to our destination yesterday, and while I was sitting in the car, waiting for my husband to come back out of the building after paying for the fuel and buying a couple items, I saw this tall, sturdy and distinguished-looking older gentleman walk into the store wearing a long coat and a black hat. He looked very much like the picture I got in my head after reading the description of your grandfather! I just had to smile! 🙂

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  38. The highlights of my year are our vacation to California and the new Kitten.

    Cheryl, the years I have done that I used the guidelines form the Upper Room. It has a passage from the Old Testamen, another from the New Testament and a Psalm.

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  43. Here is a copy and paste from our church newsletter about our church wide Bible reading plan. I do something else, but have used this plan once in the past.

    “Read the Bible in 2013
    There are schedules to read only the New Testament through in 2013 (one chapter a day, five days a week) or the entire Bible through in 2013 in the foyer, in the church office, and on the website under “Resources.” If you have a computer or mobile device, you can use YouVersion, which has promised to have our entire Bible plan available by December 30. It will be under the Whole Bible plans and our plan will be called in their list “The Distributed Plan.” I think you will see the strength of this plan as you read throughout the year. Go to YouVersion.com for more info or search for the YouVersion app from your mobile device. Remember, they have said the Distributed Plan should be up by December 30, in time for the new year’s readings to begin.”

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  44. I posted that without checking first to see if the “Distributed” Bible Reading plan was posted. It does not seem to be there yet. There are a number of other really good looking plans to choose from at YouVersion including several chronological plans. I have read the Daily Chronological Bible before in a year and used the companion journal that went with it. I really liked doing that one.

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  47. The beach at Hilton Head is lovely today with the high near 60 and very little wind. So many people were out playing games on the beach, riding bicycles, walking dogs, building castles, and one man was intent upon making useful his metal treasures finding rod that he must have gotten for Christmas. I saw a cute little puppy that was probably a Christmas present, too. One playful dog happened to get the ball that some younger children were using for their game, and the dog did not want to part with the ball that he then claimed as his own. You know the old, finders keepers, losers weepers routine in full action.

    Someone had dug a pretty deep hole in the sand. Our son said it looked like a bathtub. I felt concern because later, after dark, a lot of people will be out on the beach to see the fireworks on the boats and across the way in Savannah. I hope no one falls in the hole and has a problem. We always take a flashlight when we go out there at night. Once we were out there and the fireworks on the beach were landing dangerously close to people when they did not work properly. It was one of those occasions when it strikes you as funny as long as no one gets hurt.

    When my husband and I first got this timeshare most of the people coming here at this time were older, retired couples. Now those people must have all given their ownership to the younger members of their families because it seems there are a lot of families with young children here. We seem to always be out of sync. When we were DINKs (Double Income, No Kids) we were here with the retirees. Now we are out of sync with the young families. Even so, it is a nice time to be at the beach. I like the way people dress for going to the beach in winter!

    Walking in and on the sand has been good for my leg. I have done better here than I expected. Again, thank you to those who prayed.

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  51. First Arrow has been awake at midnight on New Year’s Eve in our time zone every year since he was born! And tonight won’t be any exception, as he is working 3rd shift. Well, it better not be an exception, anyway. 😉

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  52. Thanks for posting the chronological Bible reading plan, 6 Arrows. I printed it out and posted it above my desk. I think reading it straight through chronologically will bring some new insights. :–)

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  53. Elvera used to attend watch night services during our early courting and married days. They don’t have them anymore, that I know of.
    I have seen the ball come down before, I doubt that I will see it again.
    But the Tiger/Tiger game will last past 10:30, so who knows?

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  55. Debra, chronologically means jumping around a lot. In some places you wouldn’t expect, like Jeremiah. It does give insight into how long some of those prophets prophesied. The book of Daniel covers about 70-80 years.

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  56. Well….as I was pondering the things I am most thankful for this year, it occurred to me that I truly need to tell AJ that I am most thankful for his taking the initiative to launch this site after WMB gave us the boot!!! THANK YOU AJ….I am so thankful for your heart towards our Lord…and for your love for everyone here….you have blessed us all…Happy New Year…God Bless you and yours 🙂

    The clouds have socked in the mountains…it appears we won’t bee viewing fireworks going off on Pikes Peak tonight at midnight…..it’s too cold to drive out of the trees and sit by the field at midnight anyway!! Sweet dreams everyone….

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  57. YES! Many thanks to AJ.
    Clemson is off to a real bad start.
    Like South Carolina/Florida. Florida led USC 21/0 at halftime and had less than 50 yards total offense.

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  58. Greetings from 2013! We welcomed the new year around the bonfire and Phos even serenaded us on the violin for a while. Only 7 of us here on the compound right now so a much quieter bonfire than the one last week when there were 22 of us.

    I don’t really make New Year’s resolutions. I try to make the changes as I go along and the Lord impresses them on my heart. The Lord gave me a huge wake-up call a couple weeks ago and I have been in “boot camp” about this issue ever since. I am looking forward to how the Lord changes me in 2013. I can either resist or cooperate, but I don’t really have the ability to really change by just resolving.

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  60. The 18 month Women’s Inspirational Daily Planner I got last summer has a good One-Year Bible Reading Schedule that I started using last July. The books are in the usual order, but the Old and New Testament books are intertwined so, if you choose to read from Genesis to Revelation, you don’t have to read all of the OT, then all of the NT.

    The feature I like best, however, is that the layout separates the books one from the next, so it’s easy to read a book ‘out of order’ and still stay on schedule to finish in a year. For instance, I was just finishing Hosea when my Bible Study group re-convened in September to study John. It was easy to move in the schedule to the book of John, read it through before classes started, then go back to the schedule’s order and read Obadiah, followed by 2 & 3 John and Jude.

    BTW, I had started with Isaiah in July, added my twice-a-year one chapter of Proverbs a day in August, then continued in order [except for John] through Malachi. In October, I went to the start of the list, and read Genesis, Matthew, Exodus, Mark, then skipped Leviticus to read Luke during Christmas week.

    This sounds complicated, but having the check-off pages in the back of the planner keeps me organized.

    The schedule doesn’t have a name, so I don’t know where it might be found on line, the planner comes from Thomas Nelson Publishers.

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  61. I’d like to thank AJ, too, for stepping up and providing us with this forum. He’s a natural, but I’m sure this also takes much effort and time. It’s much appreciated, AJ.

    Nothing shaking on the cop calls earlier this evening — except one traffic cop reminded me that we were going off the fiscal cliff; yeah, I said, I suppose that’s a traffic-related disaster in a way. 😉 Although I heard on the radio coming home that it sounds like some sort of tentative deal is finally in the works.

    Just a temporary stop-gap measure, but maybe something at least.

    I got the dogs walked a little while ago, it’s pretty quiet out there so far but we always get lots of home-grown fireworks going off at midnight. I suspect I’ll be in bed before then.

    A friend is coming over tomorrow for a lunch out on the waterfront then maybe a walk through the marine care center where they keep all the injured and sick sea lions and seals that are recuperating before being let back out into the ocean.

    And I still haven’t “de-“decorated. Oh well. So it all stays up a bit longer this year.

    Prayers for Hillary Clinton, sounds a bit serious though I haven’t heard any mention of surgery so maybe they can take care of it with just the medication. Scary-weird stuff, I’ll tell you. It’s like our bodies are time bombs just waiting to go off.

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