Paper Stained Glass
Part of my job description is to throw parties. No joke. I am to provide social activities for our congregation. So, as I mentioned in last week’s post, I threw a party last Saturday in the church hall.
The Messy Table
More Lenten creativity
The Spouse was ranting this morning at breakfast. Okay, an exaggeration, that. No one at our breakfast this morning could muster the energy required for a rant. We’ve just had a very full weekend. Friday was Beangirl’s first Photo Day at school, and, in the evening, I had a Kirk Session meeting. Saturday was spent at church, enjoying a rather chaotic and happy afternoon of messy crafts and games with the Sunday School children. Then yesterday…
Got Laughed At.
When I started this blog, I was thinking about the on-going lived theology of living with little ones. I wanted to look at parenting as an experiment in the best possible sense: living out your beliefs with those you love.
Well, in the midst of the experimenting this past week, I got laughed at.
A little Lent reading
There are two weeks now until Lent, so I thought that this might be a good moment to share some resources with you. Close enough to the date to be immediate, but with time enough for you to still do some planning.
Labour pains in Egypt
“Look at the streets of Cairo; this is what hope looks like.”
Ahdaf Soueif, author of the Booker prize nominated novel The Map of Love.
Messy Table Survey
Okay, it’s time for a friendly neighbourhood survey from the Messy Table. Let’s talk tables.
What’s your table like?
Jonah and Bieber Fever
My niece is crazy about Justin Bieber. I don’t quite know what to do with that. We were at her birthday party this past summer and got to watch the swarm of small girls on the sofa pass around a freshly-unwrapped album and swoon together. Like watching a nature film, I thought. Choreographed at the instinctual level.
Okay, Open or Shut?
On Monday morning I went to ask God for a sign and found the cathedral locked. I’m trying hard to read this as a sign to look for God in other places than cathedrals, and not to stop looking for God.
Vancouver Poet, Adrienne Smith
Listening to Sermons
I was washing the dishes when I heard the speech. There’s something about the hands-in-suds pose, isn’t there? I do a lot of listening at the sink. The radio murmurs on during the clatter of dinner prep or in the quiet in the afternoon, but when I run the hot water tap and pile in the plates and the ears turn on. Of course, speech is the same speech everyone else has been talking about this past week – US President Barack Obama’s speech at last Wednesday’s memorial service in Tucson, honouring the victims of the January 8th shooting.
I Like the Blue Butterfly…
“I like the blue butterfly.”
“I like the blue butterfly, too.”
“NO! No, you don’t! You like the green butterfly.”
“Okay. I like the green butterfly.”
Bread and New Year
Happy New Year. Here’s a recipe for you. A messy table gift, if you like, maybe a challenge. You can do this with your kids, if you want a family adventure. Or lock them out of the kitchen and tackle it on your own. Let me know how it goes.
How I Will Be Spending the 27th of December
I work 20 hours a week. So the theory and the job description go. But Christmas doesn’t work that way. Churches are busy places, and there are so many things to do. Which is fantastic and amazing and now I am tired.
Christingle Novice
I’m new to the world of Christingles. And a bit boggled by symbolic oranges.
Maybe this tradition hasn’t yet scaled the walls of Canadian Presbyterianism. Or maybe I’ve been sheltered.
Gospels and 3D Vision
I expected to open the typical virgin birth kettle of worms, but no one mention it. So I pushed a little bit, wondering aloud if maybe the non-parallel nativity accounts were at all feather-ruffling. But the group was nonchalant. No specific Yuletide troubles to be reported.
Jesus in Embryo
There’s a new image on the streets in the UK this Christmas. It looks like an ultrasound. No, it is an ultrasound of a regular, healthy-looking infant. With a halo.
Do I Tell Them About the Reindeer?
I’ve been living in the future for a while. It’s working for the church that does it, but it happens to most writers, too. You end up planning life months in advance, putting thoughts and words around the upcoming seasons. At least I don’t have it as bad as the writers in the glossy foodies mags, posing for photos with their festive turkeys in the middle of a sweltering July. For me, it was September before I was into the thick of Christmas.
Walking Weekend
I spent last weekend away from my family. I left the Spouse and the kids at home and headed north in my hiking boots. When I told people at church that I was going, the response was twofold: “Without the kids?” and “Good for you!” And often both responses delivered one after the other.
Wild Goose Flight
There’s a French boy in my daughter’s class. It is a very multicultural school–26 languages spoken in total–but it is the French kid whose cultural difference gets most discussion time at our dinner table. Probably because he tends to be bit naughty.
Biblical eating: Take Two
So I left you with veal and the promise of fish. I thought this week I would focus more on New Testament story. And it started with dessert.
Sadly, There Are No Recipes in the Bible
I’ve decided to put together a bit of an eaters’ guide to the Bible. From Old Testament roast lamb and fresh bread to Jesus’ own fish barbeque on the beach and the promise of banquets to come, there’s a lot of foodie talk happening between those mighty pages.