Gravel Road Musings

Unfortunately, this was the third book in a three book series called the Two Blue Doors  series, so it really jumped into the middle of the story.  While it can definitely be read on its own and it flows nicely there is a lot of questions that are raised that would have been explained in the first two books. This is bummer, especially beings I had the options of reviewing the first two books but I didn't know the author and so I passed. Oh well. Anyway, on to the book. It's very much fluffy reading with the typical romance. One interesting part of the book is that they found the diary of their grandmother and were able to see how life was back then and also read of the struggles their grandmother went through during World War II. The book was well-written and interesting. There were recipes scattered throughout the book at the end of various chapters which is kind of interesting, but I don't very quickly think to grab a fiction book as a place to find a recipe for suppe...

This week contained my birthday and I turned a year older. Pretty surprising huh? Anyway, not too long ago a couple friends and I were discussing birthdays and if we liked a big hullabaloo about birthdays or if we preferred to pass the day quietly with little fanfare. I think we all agreed we liked to keep the hubbub to a minimum. Now, I've had my birthday again, I've had a few in this life and I loved the day. It has to rank as one of the top birthdays ever. Was there a big party? No. Did people remember? Yes. Was there singing? Unfortunately yes and some awkward hugging too, which was not my idea, but memorable I suppose. But mostly the day was special because I got to spend it with people I love. I went for a walk with my sis-in-law and niece, spent the morning and lunch with my mom and sister and all of the above with my daughter. Then, wonder of wonders, Dave took off work early, as in mid-afternoon, as in that never happens just because (actually his truck was gettin...

Wow!! This is a book worth reading. Our pastor this morning in his sermon was talking about duty versus safety and which should you put first. So much of today's culture is "Safety first". But what does Jesus call us to do? He calls us to lay down our lives and follow Him. While our pastor was preaching, Virginia came to mind. She was raised in communist Russia under the rule of Nicolae Ceausescu. She became a lawyer because she wanted to know what truth was and she wanted to defend truth. While a lawyer, she found Jesus and the course of her career shifted. She was still a lawyer, but a lot of her work was defending Christians who were being wrongly treated, caught for carrying Bibles or whose churches were not being allowed to expand or even restore. She started to get threatened by the Securitate and realized that her life was not her own but she still determined to help those who asked for her help. What really saved her life, I think, is the fact that the Ame...

You know how when you get excited about something you learned or something you've done, etc. etc. you want to share it with someone? Well, that's the reason for this blog. I've been listening to some stuff online that is making me think and causing me to reexamine my own thoughts and it makes me need to dig in and make some changes. Now, I haven't necessarily done all of these things, but they need to be done and I want to do these things. Earlier, I read the book #Struggles by Craig Groeschel and I really enjoyed his style of writing. (Warning, this is a bit random and may be a little hard to follow my thinking here). Also for one of my New Year's Resolutions, I put a goal of reading four marriage books this year. I have one done, so I need to get on this goal. Anyway, one of the books I wanted to read was From This Day Forward by Craig Groeschel. Why? Because I enjoyed his #Struggles book. Are you getting the spaghettied up connection here? But, our dear little ...

So it's the end of the day and I want to post something, so I am simply going to post the lyrics to a song. I am very bad at actually thinking about what I am singing in church, but Sunday these words reached out and grabbed me, I might do a longer post examining the words later, but just think about these words. O to be like Thee! blessèd Redeemer, This is my constant longing and prayer; Gladly I’ll forfeit all of earth’s treasures, Jesus, Thy perfect likeness to wear. Refrain O to be like Thee! O to be like Thee, Blessèd Redeemer, pure as Thou art; Come in Thy sweetness, come in Thy fullness; Stamp Thine own image deep on my heart. O to be like Thee! full of compassion, Loving, forgiving, tender and kind, Helping the helpless, cheering the fainting, Seeking the wandering sinner to find. Refrain O to be like Thee! lowly in spirit, Holy and harmless, patient and brave; Meekly enduring cruel reproaches, Willing to suffer others to save. Refrain O to be like ...

A Beginner's Guide to Elegant Lettering I read a few reviews before I picked this book to review and the reviews suggested that it was a pretty simple book and they were right. I took calligraphy classes many years ago and that is what most of this book is about, the basic italic letters in calligraphy. However, I like having the review and it all neatly done up in one book. Plus the book did offer some way to add a bit of elegance to the letters with embellishes and flourishes. It also offered two other alphabet "fonts" though not with any direction, but they should be pretty easy to follow. If you are looking for in depth lettering, this book is not for you, but if you are looking for a review on the basics of calligraphy, this might be just the book you need. It made me want to go do practice calligraphy again and also gave me a good idea of a fountain pen that would be good to start with. I have a true fountain pen, as in pen and inkwell, but I don't really...

An Evie Blackwell Cold Case I like Dee Henderson and this book totally met expectations. I liked it because it had the intrigue of a mystery with out all the suspense and wondering how the heroes were going to get out of that tight spots. There were no tight spots, it was cold cases, but sad, sad, heart-wrenching cold cases that are so true to life to what we face today. There are bad people in this world, people who abuse, people who murder, etc. etc. The book left so much unfinished though. The big cold cases were solved, the family of Thanes and their personal lives were left hanging. There is still Karen who is hiding from a murderer who's still running free because the jury didn't believe her story. She is fast becoming an important part in Will's life. There's Grace who is having to deal with the fact her uncle killed her parents so he could become her legal guardian and then molest her for 6 years and then when he got tired of her, pick another 6 year old to...

So I have a few things I want to say in this post, but let me start with the good stuff. ********************************************************************************* I have a really great mom. She has given me many things that I could learn from. I'm not saying I've learned them yet, just things I could learn. She has taught me to be tough or strong or whatever word you want to use here. When the going gets tough and life seems hard, mom gets out there and keeps moving. She doesn't curl up in a ball or expect people to cater to her, she goes and sews a quilt or something like that. She has imparted to me her love of quilts. I love to sew quilts and decide what pattern to make and help pick out the colors. I would say most of the time, she just gives in to my color choices because I don't think she always likes them, but she's gracious about it. She listens. For much of my youth days, she would wait up until I would come home from volley ball or where ...

So I'll be honest, the idea of not putting a picture with this book was tempting. How much more chick flickish can you get than a picture like that? It oozes that the book is going to be all romance and mush and gush, doesn't it? And then on top of that, it makes me feel like a shallow reader for picking it up and reading it. Well, the truth of the matter is this is the second Melissa Tagg book I've read and I really like her as an author. Yes, she writes romance and yes the main characters get their happily ever after, but not without some struggles. Logan had his wife die in a car accident. Amelia had her husband divorce her because she was "too much" and also went through a failed adoption. Now the divorce was a strong pull back in this book and I didn't like the fact that Amelia was divorced and then is obviously going to marry Logan. That bothers me. But the fact of both of them rising up out of their pasts and allowing God back into their lives and...

my life with asperger's This was a very interesting memoir of John's journey with Asperger's in a time when Asperger's wasn't even a known or recognized thing yet. He talks of his difficulty in communicating because of his inability to respond the way "normal" people responded. He flunked out of school and yet got a 97 on his GED. He had an incredible memory and an insatiable appetite to learn about things that interested him. He had a very rough home life, a mom with a mental health disorder and a dad who thrived on drinking and then got very mean when he was drunk. He left home at 16. He joined up with one of the biggest bands of the time, KISS, and worked on making sound effects for their tour. He had an amazing ability with figuring out special effects and knowing how to put it all together. He later went on to help develop some of the first electronic toys, but once he had worked his way up the ladder to management, he ran into the familiar probl...