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Book Review: “True Life: Practical Wisdom from the Book of Ecclesiastes” by Carolyn Mahaney & Nicole Whiteacre
Introduction Have you ever felt like no matter how much you try to organize things, they never turn out quite how you’d like them to? Do you spend your life trying to make special moments happen, only to watch them slip through your grasp? Do you feel like life is an endless cycle of repetitive activities that you must do over, and over, and over again? How can you find joy when things go terribly wrong? True Life: Practical Wisdom from the Book of Ecclesiastes provides you with answers and encouragement from King Solomon himself, who had every earthly pleasure and found no satisfaction in any of it. “Vanity of…
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The Cozy Season
This post was written by my friend, Danielle Roberts. Danielle and I knew each other back in high school, and recently reconnected after discovering that we had attended the same church for a while, just at different services. Danielle is a wife and mom of 4. She helps burntout mom business owners make room for rest through productivity. She is the host of the podcast Created for This and author of the Christian devotional of the same name. She and her family love to travel, be outdoors in beautiful Wisconsin, and curl up with a good book. You can connect with her on Instagram @danielle.m.roberts. By the way, I wrote…
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Bonding Through Work Instead of Play
Maremmas are incredible dogs. They’re smart, funny, and affectionate. They know their herd (in our case, our family, our cat Rex, and a growing flock of chickens) and they know how to guard their herd. They won’t do anything they don’t want to do, or rather, anything they don’t see as their job to do. They can be stubborn and sweet, obedient and obnoxious. In short, we love our Maremma, our “little” Luna. I noticed something different about training Luna from what I could remember about training the dog my family owned growing up, a Springer Spaniel named Daisy. Daisy lived a full and happy life, digging up rocks in…
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Piles: A Poem for Exasperated Moms
Piles and pilesAnd piles galore,Piles all over the floor My son came homeAnd stacked up a pileOf papers returned that day My daughter stayed homeAnd built many piles Of delightful, five-year-old play The man of the houseStores his socks in a heap;I imagine things I’ll never say Really, they’re all heathens!But me?I’m perfect in every way Piles and pilesAnd piles galore,Piles all over the floor *** This post also includes something special! I had a good friend mention to me earlier this year that including an audio reading of blog posts, articles, etc. is becoming more popular online and allows more people to access information. So, without further introduction, here’s…
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Bill and Margie On the Open Road
School started about a month ago, and I can’t believe I haven’t posted since before then. I’ve been doing a lot of writing, but haven’t had a free moment yet to collect my writing and publish it here. I hope that now that the school year is underway, I’ll be able to start posting regularly again. This year I’m doing something new at school. I started a Story Club, inspired by Anne Shirley, which meets Friday afternoons during the school day. Each week I give the students a writing prompt, and then the following week we give each other feedback and talk about a writing-related topic. The students can write…