Today She is FIVE!

Happy Birthday Olivia!!

I prayed for this child,
and the LORD has granted me
what I asked of him.
--I Samuel 1:27

For the Enlightenment of Brillo Man's formerly youngest and forever oldest:

Click here.

Word Association

I saY ....

YoU SAy....

Spatter

Gnarly

Rudbeckia

Paint

Space

Squelch

Quench

Limitless

Infinity

Friction

Superfluous

Intimidation

Bubbles

Gargantuan

Pomegranate

Dreamy

Cantankerous

Executive

Infamous

Passion

Splendid

Scandal

Tragedy

Masterpiece

Art

my passion...

...is
my art

there are days i feel like my life
is passing by and i’m not doing what
i need to do

.art
.a part of me.
.which i can’t deny
.it’s who i am –and i’ve suppressed that part of me for so long there are moments when i think that part is lost forever.

Creating.
.yes, let’s get the doors
.and finish the ceiling
.so I can make the art
.and be who i am created
.to be


Then I was beside Him
as a master craftsman;
And I was daily His delight,
Rejoicing always before Him…
-Proverbs 8:30

---

regarding the above reference to the doors...
...we're converting one bay of our garage
into my art studio and planning to place
a whole bunch of old wooden doors on the ceiling.
.just because

Praying!!!

All my blog buddies are praying for Arlene today. Please join us in storming Heaven's gates on her behalf.

If you make the Most High your dwelling
even the LORD, who is my refuge
then no harm will befall you,
no disaster will come near your tent...
"Because he loves me," says the LORD,
"I will rescue him; I will protect him,
for he acknowledges my name
He will call upon me,
and I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble,
I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life will I satisfy him
and show him my salvation."
-Psalm 91:9,10,14-16

Famous Words

...or things that have come out of my loved ones' mouths on more than one occasion:

Olivia: “It was Dorothy.” - spoken whenever she needs someone to blame. Dorothy is her imaginary friend who takes the rap for quite a bit.

Mom: “This too shall pass” –an always encouraging reminder that God is working things out for my good –regardless of how things may appear to me.

Dad: “Deb, you’re beyond hope!” -spoken to me on any one of the MANY occasions that I would be ‘gung ho’ interested in a project or scheme.

Grandma C: “Many are called...but few are chosen”....one of her ‘famous’ lines. (Which I still think about to this day –especially when the things of my life seem to take up all my time and I sometimes neglect to spend time with the Lord.)

Char (my long-time college friend): “Tell me more! I want to hear more!” - spoken whenever she thinks that I’ve left out important information when sharing the events of my life.

Grandma P: “Deb, when are YOU going to get married and have children?” -spoken to me almost every time she saw me –and especially if she had just received news of a recent marriage or childbirth.

Lori (my sister): “Ewww! That’s Nasty!” - spoken on various occasions whenever she sees something...uh..er...nasty.

Olivia: “Oh COME ON, Mom!” –spoken whenever I refuse to give in and let her eat a second ‘chocolate popsicle’.

Brillo Man: “I’ll be right up. I’m working on something. Let me finish it” -spoken a dozen times over the course of a two to three hour span before he actually DOES EMERGE from his office downstairs...

(I’m composing this post while waiting for him to emerge. He’s been coming “right up” for the past hour now...)

When he caught up with them,
he repeated these words to them.
-Genesis 44:6

To Honor Dad

In loving memory of my Father

Robert Alan Plohr, Sr
September 2, 1936 - November 7, 1995

My Dad was a quiet man.
A man of few words.
But when he had something to say -
he always spoke with lots of wisdom
and plenty of dry wit.

He had a neat little ‘smirk’ about his expression,
and always a twinkle in his eye. Often, he would
shake his head, smile and tell me I was beyond hope
whenever I would share with him one of my
latest schemes.

He lived through more suffering than any human
should endure –but did so with nary a complaint -
always giving God the glory for the awesome place
He had on the throne of his heart. Grateful for the
second chance at life –and living it with a smile -
always ready to share with anyone who would listen
the miraculous things the Lord did
in and through his life.

Today he sings praises with heavenly choirs
and I’m sure spends much time at the feet of His Savior.
...waiting for the day when we’ll all be united again.

I miss you Dad.
And honor you today.
...until we meet again....
.....I’m still and always ‘beyond hope’.

Above all, love each other deeply.
–I Peter 4:8

The New Food Group...

...I call it ORANGE!!!

For dinner tonight:















Give me some credit --I DID eat some broccoli...

...but realized later that I SHOULD have eaten this:


Tomorrow night, I think I'll choose RED foods.

What can I say? It's the artist in me.

(Can you tell I had nothing to blog about?)

Just call me Techno-Impaired...

Thanks to Pat, my cell phone bill may have increased by $30 this month. And it's not because I spent a bunch of minutes talking to Pat on the phone, because, if you follow her daughter, Sara's blog, you would know that Pat, like Sara, doesn't like to talk on the phone. (I won't mention that twice in my life, I have picked up the telephone and filled Pat's ears with tales of woe...and since then, I've learned that she hates to talk on the phone....she's in Michigan, I'm in Pennsylvania and gas ain't cheap...so guess what? In the future, if I need the advice of a friend, she will have to suck it up and endure the dreaded phone conversation.) Anyway....

Today, on Pat's blog, she posted the lyrics to a song by Toby Mac.
Toby Mac? Pat listens to Toby Mac?
wow.

I don't own any of their CDs. Although I am familiar with some of their music, I hadn't yet heard the song that she posted.

When ‘googling’ the lyrics, hoping to find a site with an MP3 file where I could listen to the song, I found this great site where I was going to be able to download the song's ringtone to my cell phone. Cool.

I also found a bazillion other neat ringtones such as the theme songs to some of my favorite childhood TV shows: The Addams Family, The Munsters, Popeye, Little House on the Prairie, (aka Little Shack on the Grassland if you ran in my circle),

Mission Impossible, Perry Mason, The Twilight Zone...(okay, anyone who knew me as a child - Mom, you know who you are - will know that I was PETRIFIED of the Twilight Zone opening where that big eyeball appeared on the screen. But, I digress. Again.)

I had so much fun clicking and listening to all the different ringtones, that it wasn’t until I read the fine print in the ‘terms of service’ agreement that I realized I had just committed Brillo Man and myself to paying an additional $30 a month in fees to be a member of all these ringtone ‘clubs’.
Oy-vey!

It turned out that it was a simple fix. All I had to do was text the word “STOP” to the companies and I could opt out of the agreement. Problem. How do I send a text message? As techno-savvy as I like to believe I am, I had never sent a text message - because they cost a whopping 15 cents each - unless you have ‘the plan’ - which we do not.

The first text message “STOP” went to my Aunt Carolyn - since she is the first person in my phone address book and I had no clue (obviously) what I was doing. Aunt Carolyn will retrieve this message from her phone (probably about three weeks from now, knowing how frequently AC checks her cell phone messages...)...and she is going to wonder what in the heck “STOP” means. I’ll get a call. (Of course, if she would read my blog, she would know and could save herself the trouble.)

After a phone call to the cell phone customer service rep, she ‘walked’ me through the proper way to send a text message and thankfully, I was able to prevent the certain-to-be stroke that Brillo Man would have had had he opened the cell phone bill and discovered it was increased by $30, thereby sparing me much grief and him months of rehab...

I considered telephoning Pat to share all of this with her personally....but....she hates talking on the phone.....

..."What is this babbler trying to say?"...
-Acts 17:18 (taken SO out of context, it isn't even funny...)

Prayer for Healing

I'm joing with all other prayer warriors in praying for Arlene today.

Please join me in speaking God's Word over her life --as Jesus sent His Word and healed them, let's do the same!

There is GREAT power in prayer!!!

But he was wounded for Arlene's transgressions,
he was bruised for her iniquities:
the chastisement of her peace was upon him;
and with his stripes Arlene IS healed. --Isaiah 53:5

ha ha!! groan....

Who said, "Duh suddle cub up to borrow"?

























Little Orphan Annie with a cold!!!

---

A cheerful heart is good medicine.
Proverbs 17:22

The One I Love

When I was praying for a husband, I had a list.

The top three things were:

I want a husband who loves the Lord with all his heart, mind, soul and strength.
I want a husband with the same beliefs as I.
I want a husband with a servant's heart.

On Christmas Day in 2000, I turned on my computer and logged on to a Christian chat room. There were approximately 15 people chatting about everything from what they ate for their holiday dinner to what Aunt Martha bought them for a gift. I was beginning to think it was a big waste of time for me to be there. So, I typed, "Well, since none of you are ready to prophesy that you are my future husband, I'm outta here. Merry Christmas everyone."

Just before I clicked the "sign out" button, someone typed, "Wait, don't go."
My very first thought was, "Who is this bozo?"
He invited me to go into a 'private' room and chat.
I did.
And five hours later, I knew that this was the man that I was going to marry.

He had shared with me that he was a Christian --shared his testimony about the time he received the baptism in the Holy Spirit (aha --someone with my same beliefs). He talked about how he would lie prostrate on the church altar praying for his daughters. He shared his heart --and I knew that he loved the Lord with all of his heart, mind, soul and strength. Then he said that he was on the staff of an Assembly of God church (the denomination in which I was raised.) Hmmm? perhaps a pastor? No --he was the Chief Operations Manager --with a staff of six or seven --in charge of maintenance, setup and upkeep for Wekiva Assembly of God - a church of over 1000 members. He was also in charge of their Christian school. ....there --was my 'servant's heart' that I had on my list.

There were a whole BUNCH of other things on my list --way too numerous to list here. But suffice to say that while we were courting, I checked off EVERY single item on my list. Brillo Man didn't even know about the list --until I had checked everything off --because I didn't want him to "cheat" and tell me (for example) that he loves to go to auctions and yard sales just to win my heart!

Two months later, in February, he flew up from Florida to Pennsylvania to meet me. He stayed a week. He met my Mom. Just before he was to fly back home, we went to a state park nearby (McConnell's Mill State Park). It was an unusually warm day in February - in the mid 60s. After hiking a while, we stopped to rest on some boulders. Brillo Man pointed out that behind us, carved in the rock, was a cross. Just then, a breeze blew some seeds from a nearby tree. One landed on his shoulder - it was in the shape of a dove. (I'm not kidding). At that point, he turned, got down on one knee, pulled a beautiful ring from his pocket and asked me to be his wife.

Tomorrow is our sixth anniversary. I love him more today than I did six years ago. And can't wait to grow old with him --as the best is yet to come.

Happy Anniversary Honey.
I love you!
With all that's within me....



...a threefold cord is not quickly broken.
-Ecclesiates 4:12