Surprise! Meals!

I just read my daughter’s blog about meal planning (http://cherrycokecruising.com/.  She gave detailed steps to careful planning for 2. I realized that weekly meal planning is long gone in my life. When I was a stay at home mom raising 4 children planning meals, making careful shopping lists, and clipping coupons were all important duties.

Now, my life is just not quite so organized. As the Women’s Minister, I host various dinners, showers, brunches, and lunches very often. So, I have leftovers which we eat for a while, then I recycle some into new dishes, and freeze some to use later. (sometimes I remember to label the things I freeze, sometimes I don’t).

And, I also lead Celebrate Recovery. We serve snacks every week, a meal once a month, and regular special occasion dinners. So, the word around the church is, when there are leftovers from any event, “Give it to Jeannette. C.R. will use it.” So, my freezer is full of strange food items all the time. In fact, after reading Katy’s blog, I found some unidentified meat in my freezer. I plan to cook it and find out what it is! I need to go look for recipes now!

ZIP LINE

It has been a busy summer!

Our trip to Costa Rica was wonderful. The highlight of the trip was the zip line. Flying through the trees a hundred feet in the air, looking over beautiful green valleys and mountains was exhilarating and exciting.  We have not always been “thrill seekers”.  We want this stage of our life to be the best.

A couple of years ago, my husband was contemplating the first miracle of Jesus, found in John

Jesus was at a wedding feast when the couple ran out of wine. Jesus commanded that the servants fill pots with water, which He turned into wine. The wedding host tasted the new wine and said  "Everyone serves the good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the poor wine. But you have kept the good wine until now."
Les felt that God was speaking to him, that although the world thinks  that the best time of life is youth, that God is saving the best for last, that our best times are still ahead of us.

That has sort of been our motto since that time. In the last few years, we hike more than ever, we canoe when we can, we travel more, we make time with friends a priority, we sit on the front porch a lot, we try new things,  and, given the opportunity we zip line!

God’s Sweet Gifts

A few months ago, I realized that I had a a lot of advantage miles with American Airlines, enough for 2 round trip tickets. After a lot of discussion, we decided to go to Costa Rica for our 40th anniversary, a free trip. Les checked the points he had on business credit card. We found a bed and breakfast that accepted the points, and we booked it, free lodging! That was exciting. We have been planning the trip for these months, planning to do at least 2 canopy, zip line tours, hopefully go white water rafting, and do some rain forest hiking.

(At this point, I am probably going to share more than I should on a public forum, but I have to tell this story. It’s just too good.)

This week, we are ready to go, with money set aside to take with us for meals and fun things. Yesterday, I realized that I had a big expense that I had not paid, that is now due (not related to the trip). That payment took almost all the money we had set aside for the trip and the money to cover expenses when we get home. (I will just say the economy has not been good for a small business owner in a small town the last 2 years, so there’s not a lot of extra)  After paying all the bills, we could manage about $200 to cover a week in Costa Rica!

This morning, as I prayed about the situation, God reminded me that we had a stash of savings bonds. I checked, and sure enough we still had several bonds hidden away. When I worked for the state in the 90’s, I had money taken from my check every month to buy a $100 bond. We still had several in our “important papers box.”

GRATEFUL! I am sure there were a lot of times we would have used those bonds if we had thought of it. I am so glad we didn’t. After finding the bonds and getting them out, I went to my special hiding place of cash. When I get paid, I get cash for the month and put it away. I went to get the last 2 $20’s, and LOW AND BEHOLD one of the 20’s was a $100. SURPRISE! 

Now, we are getting ready to leave for a week in Costa Rica, a special gift from God. So sweet, not a necessity, not deserved, just a very sweet extra gift from our loving Father.