A forever remembered, "Homemade Christmas."

     

     It's the last thing I do before going to bed and the first thing I check on when my feet hit the floor. My projects. My Christmas. It came out of a need to save money, so I've been treasure hunting. I decided to make all my Christmas gifts this so I've been collecting things that have a past. I am going to make them new and they will become the next chapter of stories for my family.

      Today, as I began to sand through wood trying to erase scars and scratches I suddenly picture the hands and feet of Jesus. His scars changed everything, so I stop sanding. The nicks and notches in the old wood have suddenly become beautiful.

     I can't explain exactly how I feel doing this. but it's a joy I've never felt before. I  have come out of a really hard season, but I feel God's presence beside me. In this quiet time alone in my greenhouse God takes me back to places where I planted Memorial stones. He's been reminding me of the Praise on the hilltops, and also staying close beside me as go back together and skirt the darker valleys. He reminds me that my story was written by Him and he wants me to leave behind a part of Him in it, and so...

     I sand and stain and arrange and glaze and paint and wait and check on...

     Weeks go by and I sit here still, in this place of remembering. A place where God's truth, power, and promise rush around and through me so fast that I spin. Mostly with joy and love...and yet...most of my Christmas still sits in piles unfinished. 

     This room...a mess. But beautiful chaos I think. In the corners lay lovely things that wait. On a table, ruined by glue and paint, sits three cut out's of little boys hands and a box. The box is for Stella Grace.

     And then Fall came...

     And with God's very breath over our country mountain home, fresh inspiration came over me in the season I love the most. So I started to collect the pieces of our home that I can give away to remember. Our leaves. 

      I preserve, and paint and make remember...and I nowchave faith for my pile of unfinished...because there will be birthdays and weddings and babies and graduations and God stories. May our lives be full of these.

     And on Christmas I will give away forever remembered moments of a season in my life. A season written by God where a greatly loved daughter had a heart full of praise.