Summer! How nice to see you!

{taken by my sister, Leah}

The season's thoughts turn to summer. The sun gets hotter and clouds of mosquitoes appear. The nice spring flowers shrivel up and die, followed by delicious vegetables. School books are closed for months. Lemonade, ice cream, and popsicles can be found in the fridge, and t-shirts and shorts in the closet. Swim suits come out for an outing in the pool. 

{I love the summer season.}

Even though it gets hot and sunny, and my face gets pink with sunburn, my legs covered with itchy bites, I love everything that spells summer. Catching lightning bugs and eating out on the porch, having water balloon fights and spraying each other with the hose, sweet and fruity treats like popsicles or smoothies, smearing on bug repellent and sunscreen, going to the park and the pool, it's all been a part of summer in Georgia. It's practically the biggest part of the year here. Summer is getting hot and cooling off. Summer is eating watermelon. Summer is a million different things. What is summer to you?

Scriptures

This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil.
Hebrews 6:19

It's wonderful to be able to think of the hope of Christ to be like an anchor. It really is. 

  According to the grace of God which was given to me, like a wise master builder I laid a foundation, and another is building on it. But each man must be careful how he builds on it. For no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each man’s work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man’s work. If any man’s work which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.
1 Corinthians 3:10-15

 Every man's work will be revealed by fire. No matter what your work is, if you don't build it on the foundation of Christ, you will suffer loss. Very thought-provoking. What are you building with?


What have you learned from the Scripture you have read? 




Grace be with you,


Abby :D

Busy with everything but blogging...

{via Miss Raquel}

1.The rain. It's been raining all day. Everything is wet and soggy. And I love it. :)

2. Writing. I've gotten stuck at a certain point in my novel (if you can call it that) and I'm going to have to do a complete re-write. I need to give my characters more definition, methinks.

3. Reading. We've been reading a lot of classics in school. Like Jane Eyre, Treasure Island, and Oliver Twist.

4. Party. We went to a birthday party on Friday, ate cake and ice-cream and pizza, and played games: Capture-the-Flag (♥), Ghost in the Graveyard, and Killer. Those last two are sort of grisly names for such fun games.

5. Recital. Piano recital is next week. I'm doing The Swan (or Le Cygne, I believe is its name), All I Ask Of You, which is a song from Phantom of the Opera, and Irish Air, a duet with my sister. I might be doing El Risoluto, as well.

6. Bible reading. Last night, it was Philemon and 1 Peter. What have you been reading?

7. Hats. I really like redecorating them and wearing them, even though I don't do it often.

8. This blogger. I wish my writing was like hers. 


And with that, I bid you adieu. Adieu!

Hopeful of a better blog post next time,

Abby :D

The Treadmill

When doing school, or something that you do every day, it is easy to get discouraged. 

“What’s the point of my doing this well, or even at all? I only have to do it again tomorrow.”

Your life gets stuck in an endless whirlpool of meaninglessness. You feel as if there’s nothing to life, like it’s a treadmill that you are chained to or a hamster wheel that you’re trapped inside of.

But then you think.

“Wait a second, I should be doing everything for the glory of God.”

And then you look.

“Wow, I could do so much better than this! If I’m doing it for God’s glory, then there is a point to life: to please God, and glorify Him forever.” 

Then you look at the world around you, and see so much more than you saw at first glance. Look what God has given you, the One who made you. The One who loves you. The One who had no obligation to you at all. He made you, He can destroy you, He can just snuff you out like a candle. And since He is just, that’s what you and I deserve. What we should get.

But instead… He died for you. 

He DIED for YOU. 

 And that's something worth celebrating, every day! Here are some nice things God gave me today.

Some absolutely delicious cookie dough stuff for dessert//Liking the outfit + hairstyle I had on today//Having fun playing mandolin//Playing tennis out-of-doors//Treasure Island (for school, but it's a really good book)//Getting all my school done relatively early//Making blue cheese salad dressing//Eating dinner salad with said dressing//Playing Trust and Obey on the piano for family worship//

What are some things that you are celebrating today?

Grace be with you, 

Abby :D

Occupatus sum...

You know, I'm tired of the word 'busy'. Why don't we find some other words for it?

How about...
...industrious...diligent...employed...engaged...engrossed...persevering...hustling...studious...active...?

Whatever the word, that's sure what I've felt like these past few weeks. This has been our usual week.
Monday: Handbells, mandolin and guitar lessons
Tuesday: Tennis
Wednesday: Violin lessons
 Thursday: Piano
Friday: Whew! Nothing, finally.

Add school and some distractions to that formula and voila! A recipe for... well, all those words up there. :)

Tennis is fun*. I didn't know anything about tennis before (I mean, besides that you have to hit the ball), but now I know a moderate amount. Enough to play mediocre-ly, which is not a word, by the way. Does anyone out there play tennis? Any other sport?

And I'm still learning mandolin. It's real fun (ha) too. But eighth notes are hard, and so are scales. I wonder if I'll ever become a famous mandolinist bluegrass player (my dream :)

And without further ado: pictures.

*clap, clap, clap, clap* 

Me playing the mandolin.

I've been reading Acts lately. You?

I'm also learning to crochet. So much easier than knitting!

I FINISHED ALGEBRA 1!!! Now I'm working on All The Math You'll Ever Need. Good book.

Metal stamping.

 So that's what I've been up to. What has filled your life with pizazz lately?

Grace be with you,

Abby :D






*a rather over-used word around these premises

Stamp! Stamp! Stamp!

Hey everyone! I haven't posted in-- what? Fifteen days? Now I know why you guys aren't keeping up with me. Ugh.
Anyway, it's been too long.
I've been feeling pretty busy lately, but this week I was able to do some metal stamping. I got the stamps from beaducation.com at Christmas time.

 I finished a project on Friday: making napkin rings for a certain family I know. :) My mom really wanted napkin rings that were pretty and that wouldn't get squished easily. So she set me to work on making some out of thick-ish wire and stamped charms. How do you like them?

Here are all the stamped charms. As you can see, I *ahem* made a little mistake on one of the names. I was doing so well, too! Can you find it?

Here are some finished ones.

On a napkin.

And here are some necklaces I've made.                                        

This one is interesting, because I accidentally used the Qs instead of Os.
So it says, "FAITH HQPE LQVE" Whoops. 

What are your hobbies?

Grace be with you,

Abby :D

The Mindlessly Busy Rut: A Rather Rambly Post

I understand why people aren't looking at my blog much anymore. It's because I've gotten boring. Stale, and unpredictable. That makes sense.
I wish I could have everything figured out in life. Where everything fits: Devotions, school, music, tennis. It's hard to balance all of the busy things that we have to do.
"To the left! Right! Too far! Noooooooo....." as you fall into a deep hole of busyness without any productivity. And as you try to sort it out, blogging gets left on the very bottom as I sink into a daze of mindless internet surfing.
 I think it happens to everyone. To me, that's the dreaded curse: Loss of being productive and helpful.
How do I re-balance my stack? I'm not really sure.

But here's my plan.

This idea is from Preparing to Be a Helpmeet.
Quote:
"Start today going up and down the library aisles and plan to introduce yourself to a new subject each week. Or, if you are computer-oriented, spend your time studying vital subjects rather than idly 'surfing'."
End quote


So that's what I will do, to get myself out of this mindless rut. Is there any subjects that you like that you think would be interesting? I would love it if I could get a list.

Expect to hear about the things I'm learning, as soon as I figure out what to learn.

Thanks for any suggestions!

Grace be with you,

Abby :D