5 Tips to Keep up a Youngster for New Year 1)Party! Party Hats & horns broke out around 11:00 PM New Year’s Eve kept our children engaged. We also watched the exciting sights and sounds of “Dick Clark’s Rockin’ New Year’s Eve”: A 40 year tradition for Sean and Haven. 2)Talk it up for several days beforehand. On New Year’s Eve morning, the first thing Carter said was, “Happy last day of 2014!” when he got out of bed. 3)Toast the New Year before bedtime just in case they fall asleep: Carter and Ammon knew the New Year was a special occasion when we broke out the chilled Champagne glasses and drank our Welch’s Sparkling White Grape Juice. We also joined hands and prayed for 2015 before we toasted. They loved it and kept on toasting to each other. 4)Late, lite snacks high in protein with caffeine: Ammon & Carter ate some peanut butter and crackers around 9:00 PM. Our soft drink of choice in this household is Coke Zero. Ammon & Carter drank quite a bit. Don’t worry, it was all “gone” from their systems by 12:30 AM 😉 5)Play some new,exciting game several hours before midnight. . Ammon had received a Monster High Share or Scare game. All 4 of us played. We couldn’t believe that Carter enjoyed it too. We played for over an hour, and I think it got us to about 11:00 PM!
Not the best video to watch, but the audio is great. I’ve always loved “Auld Lang Syne”…The Good Old Days. Of course when it is sung slower, it is so melancholy and lonesome, but Mariah jazzes it up and gives it that happy, new, fresh feeling that the New Year deserves.
I wish there was a better title like “The Passed Loved Ones”, because that is really what it is about for me: Daddy, Nanny, Granddaddy, Mamaw Wimpy, and my dear, dear “Adopted” Grandmother, Remell Hall. Oh, how much I miss them, and “We’ll take a cup o’ kindness for old lang syne!”
To My “Old Lang Syne” departed loved ones, Ammon, Carter, Sean, and all of you all. Happy 2015
Friends, loved-ones, and relatives, keep your eyes on Jesus every day in 2015. He is the way, the truth, and the life. If you already have a relationship with him and love him, maybe make a conscious effort to “fall in love” anew with Jesus the Christ every single day. I hope and pray that God blesses every one of you with your best, calendar year ever. With lots of love, Haven
From the first moment I hear the song “ White Christmas” between Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve it gets my hopes up. Now that we have the Oldies Christmas satellite channel in our vehicle, I hear it even more! Am I dreaming of a white Christmas? Possibly. I love the fantasy of a white Christmas: six inches of snow on the ground, Christmas lights on all the houses and store fronts reflected on the white-blanketed earth. If I stretch my thoughts to the countryside, I can see miles and miles of snow-covered rolling hills, evergreens laden with snow on their branches, and, yes, a one-horse, open sleigh with a family going to grandmother’s house for Christmas dinner a painting right out of Currier and Ives! All that in Southeast Tennessee? No, not on your life. Here in the Southeast we get cheated on our Christmas snow! However, I learned a life lesson several years ago when my children were only six weeks old: be thankful for whatever your situation might be.
For several years I have kept a journal. On January 1, I list hopes and prayers for the coming year. When it comes to the weather for Christmas Eve and the following day, I always include “ 28 degrees, snow on Christmas Eve, and plenty of snow on the ground on Christmas day.”
In 1969 (I was 3 years old so I cannot remember much), it snowed several inches on Christmas. I remember my green Tonka® pick- up truck and farm set with those awesome black and white Holstein milking cows I received from Santa Claus.
I wanted to take those cows out in the snow, and I also took them to my Mamaw’s (a name for a grandmother here in the South) house that afternoon. We had a four- wheel drive jeep, and we took it to see my grandparents who lived some 15 miles away. I remember playing with those cows as we went. Old-timers such as my Nanny (my father’s mother) said the Christmas snow of 1969 was the only real accumulation of snow she had ever seen on Christmas day, and the meteorologist’s archives say the same.
In 1976 on Christmas day, my sister and I played television-tennis on our new Atari (dinosaur predecessor of X-Box® and the Wii®…you people over 40 remember) and watched a light dusting of snow fall in the woods behind our house.
We had wonderful, sliding glass doors, and we could see that precious, coveted, white precipitation fall. We kept hoping that it would accumulate so we could go out and play in the snow…on Christmas day, but it wasn’t meant to be! It was at least 36 degrees, and by 3 p. m., the white dust had melted.
The third and final snow I remember on Christmas was in 1989. It was my first year out of college, and I was teaching Spanish in a North Georgia middle school. We awoke to about an inch of snow on the ground. Our front yard was blanketed in beautiful white snow and huge snowflakes were showering down upon it. I had such high hopes! I looked forward to playing in the snow with my 8 year old niece who had never seen a white Christmas. My niece and her parents would be over for Christmas lunch, and I envisioned snow men, snow angels, and snowball fights. After the outside activities, we would go in to drink some hot chocolate, eat our lunch, and open presents as we gazed out the living room window into the snow-coated front yard with those snow men waving to the passers by’s on the road. But as usual by the afternoon, the snow was all gone. There were no snow angels, no snowmen, nor snowball fights; however, Christmas lunch with my family was delicious.
I really wanted a white Christmas in 2008. My husband Sean and I had been married for four years. We had our religious wedding on September 3, 2004, and we had our “legal” civil marriage in San Diego, California on August 22, 2008. The following Christmas our children were 6 weeks old. They are kind of twins. They have the same, anonymous, egg-donor mother, but our son, Carter, was fertilized by Sean, and Ammon, our daughter, was fertilized by me. Carter and Ammon each had their own surrogate. Though Dr. David Smotrich the owner of the La Jolla IVF Clinic said we could have one surrogate with both Ammon and Carter being implanted in her, we did not want any twin “complications” in the womb or at birth. Our experiences with both Dr. Smotrich and Extraordinary Conceptions (our Surrogacy/Egg Donor agency) were beautiful blessings. In the end, we recruited two surrogates who delivered two healthy babies one in San Diego, California and the other in Mission Viejo, California. Carter and Ammon were born six days apart.
The new babies came just in time for the Christmas season. Sean and I were adjusting to our new life. Sean is a medical doctor, and I am a doctor of education. I quit my job in the regular classroom, and I began teaching online for a state university here in Tennessee, which turned into a blessing. During the work-week, I had decided that the babies and I would sleep in our living room which is connected to our bedroom. Sean slept in our bed, I slept on our couch, and the babies slept nearby in their bassinets. That way Sean would not be disturbed, and he could wake up fresh for work. We would feed the babies around 10:30 at night, and put them down to sleep. Around 2:30 a.m., one of the two hungry babies would make a peep, and I would dash off of the couch, grab the baby, change it, feed it, rock it back to sleep, get it back in the bassinet, and whether it was awake or not, do the same for the other baby (parenting at this age is all about the routine!) During the day in between feeding babies, changing babies, washing bottles, doing laundry, and doing other chores, etc., I was able to “work” online with my students. I was so thankful to have job teaching online, so I could dedicate the majority of my time to our children.
Aside from the fact that I had spent the Christmas season as a decently functioning somnambulist, it had been a true blessing and joy. First of all, Sean and I had two, healthy and beautiful children. Second, as a family, we four lit the joy candle on our church’s Advent wreath. As Sean and Carter read the liturgy, Ammon and I lit the candle (I can still see Carter in his red and white argyle sweater, white shirt, and black, corduroy pants, and Ammon in her red and green plaid dress with its red ribbon and red tights….ah, cute little baby clothes). That event had been special because many members of our mainstream, open and affirming, Protestant denomination were so kind and congratulatory of our new family and our special, holiday moment we had experienced. Third, I had done quite a bit of shopping online, but Carter, Ammon, and I had also spent a whole morning and afternoon buying gifts at our local mall. It was the first time we three had been out by ourselves. It was a challenge, but we did it! I was sleepy and had two, six week old babies, but the Christmas season was going nicely; however, I was waiting for my white Christmas.
Wednesday December 24, 2008
On January 1, 2008, I had asked for the 28 degrees and snow on Christmas Eve. It was now December 24th, and it was 45 degrees, gray, humid, and cloudy; typical for a Southeast Tennessee Christmas Eve. Because it was Carter and Ammon’s first Christmas, they needed, nay, deserved a white Christmas!
We were looking forward to the church’s Christmas Eve candlelight service, but both of the babies had the sniffles, so we stayed home. Staying at home kept the babies from getting out in the elements, and it gave me time to clean more in the house, wrap my last presents, and prepare some Christmas day foods for the following day when we would be hosting the Christmas lunch for our families.
For several years, Sean and I have jogged in the evenings on a track we keep mowed around our 6 acre field at the base of a low-lying mountain behind our house. We always jogged together, but since the birth of the babies, we had to take turns while one of us attended to them. On this Christmas Eve, Sean jogged first. When he came in, I took my turn. When I jog alone, I plan the rest of the day’s activities, pray, sing, or simply admire my surroundings. This evening wasn’t any different, and as I jogged, I watched the gray clouds roll over the house and the field, and I talked to God about a white Christmas. I joked and smiled that He did not answer my prayer about a white Christmas yet again for another year. At the top of the field, I tried to envision our house, our red barn, the field, and the rolling hills in the distance all blanketed in six inches of snow. I made a huge sigh of disappointment.
I was finishing my last lap, and as I reached the summit of the field where I always go from a jog to a walk, a gust of cool wind surprised me and compelled me to fix myself on our house. It was the gloaming of a cold-steel colored evening, but I could still see everything well. I gazed at our house. Our living room, which is in the back of the house, has two huge windows, and I could see the lights of our Christmas tree. The gloomy disappointment I had experienced a few moments before gave way to an illumination of joy and thanksgiving. Inside that house were my two blessed children and my husband who loves me, and in my heart was Jesus Christ, the real reason for Christmas not snow. It may have been a gray, Tennessee Christmas Eve outside but everything, even the cloud-covered, humid evening was perfect. I didn’t need snow or one-horse open sleighs! I smiled and tears unexpectedly ran down my cheek. I went down on my knees and thanked God for all my blessings and for a perfect, gray Christmas.
Haven, Ammon, Carter, & Sean “Gray Christmas” 2008
There are people in history whom God has blessed and used joyously and from them flowed wonderful and positive events. I immensely enjoy the story of Squanto, the Native American who befriended the Pilgrims. He lived from 1590 to 1622.
He was a contemporary of John Smith, Pocahontas’ famous, English friend, and he even met him in 1614. It was not the honorable John Smith who fooled and kidnapped Squanto (Tisquantum) and took him to Europe but an English sea captain named Thomas Hunt. Hunt took Squanto to Malaga, Spain and sold him as a slave, but by God’s grace Squanto wound up with Christian priests who freed him and sent him to England. By 1619 he was returning to New England with the help of another sailor, Thomas Derer. Unfortunately, the inhabitants (including Squanto’s wife, children, & parents) of Squanto’s village had been all but eradicated by European diseases.
Squanto became a “prisoner” of another Native American tribe, the Pokanoket, whose leader was Massasoit. Squanto was treated well, and Massasoit saw the importance of his English interpreting skills. Squanto was eventually set free. It was Squanto along with another Native American, Samoset, who on March 22, 1621 walked into Plymouth to help the Pilgrims with their new land. Squanto taught the Pilgrims to hunt better and most importantly how to raise and care for corn, beans, and squash. Squanto along with the other Pokanoket Native Americans and the Pilgrims celebrated that first Thanksgiving in October of 1621. Most scholars say it lasted for two weeks.
No one is ever perfect, but thanks to Squanto and his vision of peace and brotherhood of different races and cultures, we have the wonderful example of how people who are different can entwine their lives into a peaceful existence.
Every year during our holiday of Independence Day (July 4th),
I think of my Caylor ancestors. They had come to the colony of Pennsylvania in
the 1750s from Germany. They were Caylors (Kahler & Humbert were two of the families I know for sure) I am not an expert on the genealogy of that group, but
knowing linguistics like I do, I doubt those that came in the 1750s were very
good with the English language by the Revolutionary War; however, their teen-age children who were born in the colonies probably did quite well with English. The Caylors
must have been visionaries. They first came here to get away from over-population,
land shortages, and food shortages in Germany, and when they arrived, they
arrived to a group of disgruntled colonists who were tired of Great Britain’s
tyranny. In their vision of the future, they could see the importance of the
colonists (British, German, or French descendants) working together for freedom
and for making their own country, so they did it. They fought with all the
colonists, and they won the United States Revolutionary War. In a few years, the rest of the world looked upon
these rag-tag freedom lovers who ousted an empire and bestowed them the name “Americans”.
What an honor it must have been. They weren’t German -Americans, or
British-American, or French-Americans. They were AMERICANS equaling a group of
people of different nationalities, languages, and cultures that had come together to make the United States of America. My German ancestors knew they were doing something special, but they had no idea that they had laid the ground work for the
greatest country this world has ever seen or will ever see again. I am so proud
of my ancestors, my country, and my freedom. I am so looking forward to Carter
and Ammon knowing the love of freedom and of country and understanding their
proud heritage. God bless you all, and God bless the United States of America. Happy
Independence Day!
[Christ] himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.
– 1 Peter 2:24 (NRSV)
Jesus’ crucifixion had probably begun the 6th hour of the day as Apostle John records, and that would have been 6:00 in the morning. Jesus was so popular (remember his triumphant entry just a few days before there in Jerusalem), and the arrest, the trumped up charges in the “Jewish court”, the beatings and the questionings had been done in the early morning hours so the general public would have no idea Jesus was on trial. Jesus’ followers probably would have revolted, but it all happened according to God’s plan.
Imagine Jesus’ garments had been divided, Jesus had been taken down from the cross, and he had been placed in a tomb bought for him by Joseph of Arimathea. What a bleak and sad Friday for Jesus, his family, and his friends. However, as we know, and as we should always remember, it is our “Good Friday”: the day our Jesus (the sacrificial lamb without sin) took on our sins so we could stand before our God cleansed, sinless, and as white as snow.
Matthew 26: 17-29; Mark 14: 12-25; Luke 22:7-19; John 13 & 14
Jesus instituted communion the night before his crucifixion, and it is has been a part of Christian worship ever since. I have met several, wonderful Jewish people, and one Holy Week in the future, I hope and pray Carter, Ammon, Sean, I can sit and partake of one and think of Jesus and the 12 Apostles eating in fellowship. Passover Seder
Being a Christian/a follower of Jesus Christ and partaking of the bread that represents his body on the cross and sipping the fruit of the vine that represents his blood that was shed for me and all the billions of people on the earth for the remission of our sins is what puts my heart and soul in “communion” with all the billions of saints who are partaking of the Lord’s supper with me. That is a powerful component of Christian worship
I know everyone doesn’t take communion every Sunday, and I kinda wish we would like the Christians of the New Testament (all it takes is a little research of first century Christian worship to understand they took it every Sunday), but in the scheme of things, it doesn’t matter. However, it’s a part of worship in remembering the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. The next time you partake of the Lord’s supper, think of all the billions of Christians you are communing with as well. It’s a pretty awesome thought.
If you knew you would be dead in the next 24 hours, would you take time to wash your friends and family’s feet? Wouldn’t that be a bizarre act? Well, that is one thing Jesus did KNOWING he was going to die. Jesus wanted the 12 disciples to know that he did not think he was any better than they. He was their master yet he wanted to serve them. The serving wasn’t to stop there but to continue with them serving others.
I’ve often thought of Jesus washing dirty, stinking, calloused feet of his friends. Here is the son of God that came down from heaven and all of its glory sitting on the floor of an upper room in some home in Jerusalem almost 2,000 years ago, humbly and gently washing 12 burly men’s feet.
During the Holy Week, the main idea is that Jesus was crucified and while being crucified took on the sins of the world. However, we sometimes skip over the fact that the one of the last things he taught just hours before his death was to love and serve others.
To answer my own opening question, I’m not sure how and where I would fit serving others in, but, yes, I would serve others in fullest capacity I could in those last hours. However, I can do it HERE and NOW without a “death sentence”….that is what Jesus wants us to place in our hearts and act upon immediately. Have a blessed day, friends.
Matthew 21:1-11, Mark 11: 1-11, Luke 19:29-42, & John 12: 12-19
Jesus was a human who experienced times of elation just like us. How many times have we had the thought, “It can’t get any better than this?” buuuuuuuuuuuut, we know it is fleeting and cannot always be this way. Our lives are not this way.
It is important to first mention that all four of the Gospels write of this event. Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem must have been quite a sight to behold. The clamor, the hubbub about the Messiah/Hosanna, and the spiritual excitement of the King of Jews entering Jerusalem to “reign forever” must have been a glorious moment. It was a fulfillment of prophets from Zechariah (9:9): Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion. Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem. Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, and riding on an ass and upon a colt the foal of an ass. The people even lay palm branches on the street like a red carpet for their king. What deserved pomp and circumstance for Jesus yet what physical and mournful tragedy awaited our Lord!
If you will, imagine all the Gospels from their beginnings to this point being like a roller coaster that chugs up a hill: Palm Sunday is the top/pinnacle of the hill. For Jesus, his physical life creeks over the top, then begins to plummet. In five days, Jesus the future Christ would be humiliated, beaten, and killed on a cross a criminal…to the world a crash at the bottom of the hill. However, it wasn’t the end, but the beginning of our assuredness of eternal life though Jesus Christ.
Enjoy Palm Sunday and get ready to walk Holy Week with Jesus anew.
St. Patrick’s Cathedral Dublin, Ireland: June 13, 2011 I’ve always enjoyed all the “wearing of the green” and the leprechauns on St. Patrick’s Day. However, it wasn’t until our day in Dublin, Ireland June of 2011, that I felt a “spiritual conncetion” with Saint Patrick. I had even read several times yet without absorbing much history of Saint Patrick to really know his story.
St. Patrick
He had been taken from homeland in Wales (Great Britain) to be a slave in Ireland. He was approximately 16, and by his early 20s he had made it back to Wales. He then became a minister and returned to Ireland. He writes that he “baptized thousands of people”. He ordained priests to lead the new Christian communities. He converted wealthy women, some of whom became nuns in the face of family opposition. He also dealt with the sons of kings, converting them too.
Carter, Nana, Haven, & Ammon (admiring the vaulted ceilings) June 13, 2011: St. Patrick’s Cathedral Dublin, Ireland
My favorite building in Dublin, Ireland was St. Patrick’s Cathedral. It had such a warmth and “spirit” about it. It wasn’t like other cathedrals I have been in where it was like a museum instead of a place of worship. St. Patrick’s work was filled with love and giving, and his spirit seems to permeate his cathedral.
I’ve seen several picturesque frosts on the ground these past few days. Mother Nature and the art that she creates is incredible: the ice crystals on the clover or the feathery, ice designs on the sheets of ice on our pond. The frost was so heavy that there was still frost on the ground in the shaded areas at 10 o’clock that morning.
The frost reminded me of the opening lines of “The Christmas Waltz” song. I never really appreciated the song until one of my favorite singers/actresses, Kristen Chenowith, sang it on her Christmas album from 2009.I appreciate her vocal talents, sense of humor, and Christian spirit.I want to share the song with you all.
Haven's Ideals by Haven Caylor-Brown 