Hold on to Him

This is another great teaching that is directed to ladies and will surely bless you.
Go here to get your blessing.

Missing Pennsylvania

The pictures are smaller that I would have liked. My wife and I always look forward to seeing the bear carving in the yard leaving Lancaster going in to Bird-In-Hand. It was carved out of the trunk of a tree and the big bear is holding a baby bear. Oddly enough he seems to look better each time we see him meaning the owners take very good care of him.

We could literally spend a day in the farmers market in Bird-In-Hand and it has just about anything a person could want from fresh veggies to fine crafted items.

We could never leave the area without stopping at Deaners Cafe for a turkey burger or the Intercourse Canning Co. for a case of their fine canned veggies and other tasty selections.

Wishing I was there right now instead of here where all thoughts are of acquiring "things" to give to folks that really didn't need them in the first place. I guess I just needed to vent a little as it is very hard for this old guy to get and keep the Christmas spirit amid so much stress and commercialization.

I have a friend, Kari, who just returned from ministering in Siberia to an orphanage. She arrived in NY and was hit with the feeling of disgust seeing everyone buying too much, eating too much while at the same time her children she left behind in Russia want for the basic necessities. I feel her pain. Hopefully she and I will make it through this season one more time. Pray for us.

Multiple Posts

Just a reminder not to overlook the post on birthday fun a few posts down and I corrected the problem on the post for Kleenex time.

Oops trying to fix the last post.

The letter that was sent to Mel from her husband seems to not available with the clickable area so I will try again as everyone needs to see this awesome letter. So try here.

It's Kleenex Time

I have a couple of friends in the blog world that touched my heart with a post each lately that I just felt like they needed to be shared. Each one has a posting of a precious letter given to them by their husband.

Barb's husband died but before he departed he wrote her this wonderful piece sharing how much he loves her. Read it slowly and feel the love.

Mel and her husband just completed one of many moves because of her husband's work and she received this letter from him and also needs to be read slowly and feel his undying love towards Mel.

I know they will touch you as they did me. Enjoy.

What happened on your birthday in history??

Ever wonder what happened on your specific birthday (month & day) in history. Who was born, who died, important events. If so go here and have fun finding out how special your birthday really is.

Fun to see and share with your friends.

Food is a wonderful thing

I felt it was time to share some recipes we love:

Appetizers

Bacon Roll-Ups

1 lb Bacon cut in half 1 loaf of white bread

1 8 oz Cream Cheese with chives Tooth Picks

Cut the edges off each slice of bread and then cut the slice into 3 strips, continue with the rest of the loaf. Spread cream cheese on each strip, roll it up, wrap a half slice of bacon around it and stick a tooth pick through to hold it together. Continue the process until all are rolled up. Place on a baking sheet and bake @ 350 degrees until bread is lightly brown. Serve immediately.

Meatless Meatballs

1 cup pecans chopped very fine 1 tsp poultry seasoning

8 oz grated cheddar cheese 1 can tomato soup

5 eggs dash of salt

1 cup cracker crumbs dash of sage

1 large onion finely diced

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Mix all ingredients together except the tomato soup. Allow to sit for 10 minutes. Form into balls and place on an oiled dish. Mix 1 can of tomato soup with the soup can of water and pour over the balls. Bake for 30 minutes. Allow to rest for 20 minutes before serving. Will help them to firm up. Unbelievably good.

Macaroni Salad

1 lb of macaroni or baby shells 1 1/2 cups celery chopped fine

1/2 cup carrots chopped fine 1/4 cup onion chopped fine

6 hard-goiled eggs sliced Paprika

Cook macaroni as directed, drain & cool. Set aside 1 hard boiled egg; then stir together gently the cooked macaroni, celery, carrots, onion and remaining eggs.

Dressing:

1 Pint Miracle Whip 1/4 Cup Vinegar

3/4 Cup Sugar 2 Tbl Prepared Mustard

Blend together the ingredients and fold into the salad mixture. Garnish with 1 hard boiled egg and paprika.

This recipe taken from an Amish cookbook and modified.

Marinated Cucumbers

8 cups cucumbers, peeled & sliced 2 cups white vinegar

2 tsp celery seed 1 tsp ground black pepper

20 cherry tomatoes cut in half 1 tsp salt

4 cups sugar

Combine all ingredients and cover. Refrigerate for at least 10 hours. The longer it sits the better it gets.

Breakfast Casserole

1 lb cooked bulk sausage 8 slices of bread cubed

1 1/2 cups grated sharp cheddar cheese 2 tps. dry mustard

1 1/2 cups milk 8 eggs well beaten

Grease 2 qt baking dish. Put cubed bread on bottom. Put cooked sausage on top of cubed bread. Combine beaten eggs, milk, mustard and cheese together and pur over the sausage. Cover with foil & let set in the refrigerator overnight. Remove foil and bake the next morning for 45 minutes at 350 degrees.

I'll add more later. Hope you all enjoy these tried & true recipes.

Simple Pleasures Revisited

Well turkey day is over and so is black friday. Hopefully the weekend will be calm and uneventful. I was thinking today about how so much emphasis is placed on acquiring things and too much on electronics in general. My mind drifted back to a time when I wrote a blog about the "simple pleasures" that mean a lot to me.

I thought it would be good to revisit that time so to find out what Odie thinks are simple pleasures go here. Oh, & thanks Debra for teaching me how to do the link magic. Hope you enjoy that post as it really said what is important to me.

Thankful Thursday

Happy Thanksgiving everyone from my family to yours. My blog family is growing by the day and I am thrilled to be able to know you all and share in your experiences.

Today the world is filled with many emotions. Some are happy and some are sad as in the loss of lives in New Zealand. Lets rejoice in Thanksgiving for all the Lord has blessed us with but at the same time offer up prayers for the precious families that have lost loved ones this week. It's so easy to forget them while enjoying the food and family of the season.

I am so thankful today for my God, my family, my friends all over this wonderful world. May God bless you all today.

Wordless Wednesday

Almost Wordless Wednesday

So very sorry for your loss

Sometime Reruns are Awesome!!

I have mentioned in a previous post about Rhema Marvene. She is only 7 years old and has such a wonderful ministry bringing the joy of the Lord to so many people with her amazing voice.

Today I invite you to do something simple. Just type in www.youtube.com or click there. When there just type in Rhema Marvene and you will have at a click many of her songs to enjoy and bless your day. I especially like her doing Jesus Loves Me.

Give it a try and you will be happy you did, I promise.

Random back yard pictures on Sunday morning

Rocky has company in our new member of the family "Lilly" which will be an "OUTSIDE" cat and is Beth's responsibility. So far all she does around Rocky is hiss at him.

Rocky checking out all the new smells on the farm behind our house where they have been harvesting.

Lilly's usual spot to find her on our back porch.

Two of the 5 or 6 bales of cotten just combined in the last few days behind our property.

A field of soy beans that is beside the cotton field that was just harvested. Soy beans seem to always be the last crop to be harvested.

Rocky & I had a nice walk getting to the farm area behind our property separated by a narrow row of growth. Deer had made us a nice path through the brush.

Don't know how many of you are familiar with the Hickory tree. It is a very hard wood and produces the hickory nut. As you can see it has a thick outer covering and after falling from the tree it dries and opens up revealing the nut inside. The nut is also "very" hard. Many times I have used a hammer something hard like a cement block and would break them open trying to get to the nut meat inside. I like the taste but there is so little inside the effort really does not pay off in the end.

Found a baby picture of Rocky

Hard to believe our Rocky was ever that small. Oh, and this is Beth, Linda's daughter.

Just because I wanted you to see them.

Happy Saturday everyone. I just found three pictures on my computer in "my pictures", not sure where they came from but are so good I had to share them with you.

Devotional Sites You Need To Visit

I have encounter a couple of sites recently that are projected for women but have really wonderful messages for anyone that is fortunate enough to spend a few minutes there.

One is http://www.incourage.me/ and the other is http://lysaterkeurst.com/ & I guarantee if you go there you will get a blessing, I know I did.

Making my co workers crazy

Yesterday I had my co-workers wanting to rob my office where I had a small crock pot with chicken legs cooking in a mixture of cream of chicken and cream of celery soup. It smelled like coming to grandmas house and tasted great at lunch time.

Today I am worrying them again with a beef stew mixture that is already smelling great and it is only 7:25. Sure beats having to run out and deal with fast food places at lunch time.

Friday, there is just something special about that day. Hope yours will be a great one.

Thankful Thursday

This Thursday I am thankful for a lot of things:

For my God & savious Jesus Christ

For my sweet wife that takes such good care of me and our home

For my sister Linda who loves me enough to meet every Tuesday for breakfast

For my girls who are all grown and doing so well in their lives

For my little Rocky who brings such joy into my life every day

For my blog family that is growing daily and becoming more special by the day

For my ability to still be working a 40+ hour work week at 63

For the beauty of this season with the colors & the bright stars greeting me in the AM

Wordless Wednesday #2

Wordless Wednesday

Boiling Mad

I had breakfast with my sister this morning which is always a treat on Tuesday mornings. She told me something that made anger swell up in me. Last week my Aunt Katie (102) who has people that come in to help her from time to time had an afternoon person that went into her bedroom, found the key she had hid to her dresser, and emptied her wallet of the money she had. The next morning she was going to give her "good" helper money to buy groceries and found it empty.

She is the sweetest, kindest and lovingest lady I know and it really hurts that anyone would take anything from her. The agency that had been sending the help over has been notified not to send any more afternoon help since when they do come mostly they are just a bother and sleep. Can't get good help these days.

My sweet cousin from NV is here and has the bull by the horns so to speak and I am so glad of that. She is a blessing and takes such good care of our aunt. We'll make sure that this doesn't happen again.

Otherwise the day is good, my meds are working and God is good, all the time.

Update on Odie

The Gabapenin is actually working. After taking 2 doses I can say that the pain went from steady to only minimal. Praise God for medicine. I know it is only masking the real problem but the MRI should tell the story soon. Just wanted to keep you posted.

What a Sunday

I have written before about having pains in my right leg even while I was on the cruise. It started about Oct. 15th and as of today I still have the problem. Didn't get much sleep last night because it was throbbing and I couldn't find a comfortable position.

So this morning Linda and I headed for Durham and VA hospital to be seen by their ER doctor. He is relatively sure that it is a pinched nerve coming from my lower back and spine and had X rays done and is preparing to do an MRI soon.

The doctor gave me a prescription of capsules that is supposed to act on nerve problems so hopefully it will get better by tomorrow. Time will tell.

Hope all of you are doing great and feeling fine.

My first letter from Jackson

I received my first letter today from my new friend Jackson Malya in Africa. According to the date of Oct. 7th it takes a little over a month to get a letter from the time the interpreter rewrites the letter.

The letter was not very long for the first one. He did share with me his two favorite memory verses from the bible. Psalm 4, verse 1 "Hear me when I call, O God of my righteousness! You have relieved me when I was in distress; have mercy on me, and hear my prayer." The other verse is Psalm 5 verses 1-2 "Give ear to my words, O Lord, consider my meditation. Give heed to the voice of my cry, my King and my God , for to You I will pray."

Jackson is convinced that if you depend on God in your life, you will see Him. I am so glad that he seems to have a very strong spiritual value for his life that is guiding and comforting him .

Along with his letter there was a drawing attached of a mountain with a village and trees at the base. It was great to have something personal from him.

You too can experience this same closeness with someone from across the world that needs your love and concern. If you go to www.compassion.com and ask to be a letter writer they will provide you with a name and a picture of a needy child waiting for you. I am glad I did.

Memories of a secret place

Let me take you back in time about 50 years to a time when Odie had daily adventures. Look at the school bus and imagine seeing it without wheels or the front portion sitting on the ground.

On one of my many journeys into the wilderness of the woods behind our home I was trailblazing with my hickory stick helping me clear a path through the growth and ahead I saw the figure of the bus. No telling how long it had been there. I cleared away any vegetation from the opening and went inside to find it really free of trash or anything. What a find. Now I had a place I could go to sit and think about whatever went through my young mind.

I had a white, 5 gal. bucket that I turned upside down and used as a seat and made many trips to my secret place. On rainy days I especially loved being in there out of the rain listening to the drops hitting on the roof and feeling such peace.

Today with all the nice things we have I think back to a time when a discarded old school bus body made a young guy feel so very good. I miss that bus.

Local Native American Presence

Not far from my home is the reservation for the Haliwa-Saponi Indian Tribe located in Hollister, NC. There is a pow wow the 3rd weekend in April each year that draws huge crowds from all over the country. Other tribes come and compeat in dance and drum performances. The little ones really get into the spirit with the fancy dress and their chance to show off. My family has been many times and it is unique every time.

Thankful Thursday

This is of course the month of thanks with Thanksgiving just around the corner and a time to think of the importance of family.

I sit here this morning realizing that there are so many people out there in the world today that literally have no one. No one to share their joys, faith, fears or love with. Not even God.

So today I am truly thankful for my God who has always been faithful to me. There is a song sung by the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir called "He' been faithful" and it talks about a God who even when we are down and cannot pray, He is faithful. He is always waiting with open arms ready to welcome us back into His loving presence.

I don't know how to put the song in the middle of this post but I guarantee if you go to youtube and key in He's been faithful and look you will find it and be blessed by it.

Right now God I thank you that you saved me, I thank you for the family you have blessed me with, for the extended family in my blog world. I pray that today you will be so very close to everyone in my family touching their lives with your awesome love and grace. Amen

Wordless Wednesday

Don't Miss it - Please!!!!

Hey all you guys.... Don't forget to check out the "car commercial" a few blogs down. It's one of the things that when you see it your day just got made better. Trust me, you'll love it.

100th Post on 11-9-10

It is hard for this old guy to believe that my last post was number 100. Quite a milestone from when I started back in June. Of course the most important part of all of this is the number of friends that I have accumulated.

As well as the USA I now have friends in Russia, England, Malaysia, Phillippines and Finland. Fortunately there are no language barriers. Each of you are special and unique and I have learned so much from you and you have provided me a way to express myself which I appreciate.

To celebrate this day I have decided to give away a "Palm M500 handheld organizer with a 2 GB card for memory storage. Comes with a stand for charging and to dock with your computer. Software is included. The first one to respond to this post saying they want it can have it. I will work out the details of where to ship it when I see your comment.

A car commercial that makes you say Ahhhhh..

This is a car commercial that was done over in Europe and has blessed me time and time again because it is so sweet. I hope you get as much enjoyment out of it as I have.

Book Review

Woodrow Kroll is one of my favorite authors and the leader of Back To The Bible heard on christian radio. They are based out of Lincoln, Nebraska and have been blessing me with their ministry for so very long.

This book "Stories of Little People in the Bible Used by a Big God to Impact Their World" is one of my all time favorite books and one I keep going back to. There is story after story about how God takes an ordinary, insignificant person to boldly do a work for Him that has miraculous results. Most of these characters only surface for the work God has for them. You never heard of them before and will not see them afterwards in the bible.

What Dr. Kroll tried to accomplish was to give you so many examples of how we, like the characters in the book, can be used by God if we will only be open to Him and be sensitive to His urgings. You can find it at Amazon for less than $10 and I promise it will be a blessing that you will want to share with someone else. I did.

Missing the NC Mountains

Kitchen with a "huge" sink that I think about every time I have to wash a stock pot in our itty bitty sink at home.

Step down bedroom that was so roomy and comfortable.

Rustic porch roof covered in moss that made the experience that much more enjoyable.

Rocky loving to explore along with his new friend Jack.

The mountain stream that kept a gentle sound the entire time we were there. So peaceful.

Neighbor's back yard.

Jack wanting some attention as Rocky looks on.

When you gotta go you gotta go as Jack irrigates a plant on his way out.

I might not be there in body but my mind is there constantly.

What's going on?

Was thinking today that just maybe there are those of you out there that might be interested in seeing what is happening in my neck of the world. Just happens you can view our newspapers on line so here are the ones I look at often.

In my little home town where I grew up and spent most of my life, Nashville, NC you have the Graphic http://www.nashvillegraphic.com.index.php It only comes out once a week.

Then there is the bigger newpaper that is in Rocky Mount, NC where I work and spend most of my time these days and it is a daily paper. Rocky Mount has I guess about 60,000. http://www.rockymounttelegram.com/

Where I live now in Halifax, NC which is a 30 minute drive up the interstate you have the Daily Herald. It is in Roanoke Rapids about 10 minutes away from my house. http://www.rrdailyherald.com/

I usually check the Nashville Graphic and the Rocky Mount Telegram daily to see if anyone I know has passed on for the most part. Happy surfing and have an awesome friday.

Thankful Thursday

Today I am so very thankful for my blog family of friends. I feel like I get to know you a little better each day and have been able to share in your joys, sorrows, excitement, talents and instruction.

Regarding talents, some of my friends are great at creating jewelry, clothes, cooking, ministry, photography and singing.

Talking about singing, I was at a friends blog this morning and discovered that she can sing beautifully along with her other talents of photography and being a mom. I also discovered that she is in Finland, which I could have known earlier if I had gone to the complete profile, but didn't know. I invite you to go to her blog and listen to a lullaby that she wrote and recorded. She has a beautiful voice and is being sung for her little girl Mila. You can find her at this address.
http://milasdaydreams.blogspot.com

I am still new to the blog scene and find it amazing that I am approaching my 100th blog in the near future. You are all very special to me and I appreciate so much you allowing me to share in your lives.

Wordless Wednesday

In Case You Didn't Already Know

This has been a good morning blogging and I have enjoyed some sites so much I just had to share with you. Can't keep all the fun to myself now can I?

First I found a link on one of my blog friends post that has truly touched my heart forever. It is a site where you get to meet children that are suffering from various illnesses and we have the unique opportunity to communicate with them and bring joy into their lives. Go to http://www.postpals.co.uk and all you have to do is click on one of their pictures and it gives you numerous ways you can bless them. I am already hooked.

Second I have a blog friend in Siberia that works with an orphanage and these are precious children that need to know someone cares. Go to her site and let her know that you are willing to do something. I plan to send her a package with small items and cards to give out around Thanksgiving. Go to her site please at:
http://creatingmyownlittlenirvana.blogspot.com After seeing their faces I know you will share my enthusiasm.

Finally there is a family in the NC mountains that gives the worlds best tours of the most interesting places I have ever heard of and the pictures are awesome. I shared this morning that I am jealous that they live so close to so many wonderful things to see and do. Please take time to visit their page if you haven't already.
http://wncmountainliving.blogspot.com

I hope you all get blessed by these sites like I was and will continue to be. Happy Tuesday everyone.