Dear Reader:

Yesterday I received my monthly newsletter from Kelly rae Roberts, creator of the Possibilitarian Movement, and a wonderful whimsical artist. I love looking over all her angels and other paintings that seem to speak to me so often through her newsletters and websites. I own several of her artworks around my home…including my favorite clock with wings…literally time flying.

In this newsletter you could pre-order her latest 2018 calendar and daily planner…which I did. Then as I started browsing through some of the sample calendar pictures for each month I saw the title photo.

It is a painting of a postcard “Dear You, You have what it takes. Sincerely Courage. (P.S. “You heart knew it all along.”)

The more I stared at it…the bigger my imagination grew. Even though we know that our favorite nouns, adjectives, and adverbs are Faith, Hope, and Courage wouldn’t it be wonderful if they could speak to us from outside our body, as well as inside. These nouns are alive for us…but if they were truly our personal nouns and we could communicate as such…as with another person…how cool would that be?

For example we could call up our friends, Faith, or Hope, or Courage and talk to them about our ups and downs and they could direct us, encourage us, and guide us through the problems of life we all face?

We could also get snail mail from them (my favorite kind of correspondence) in the form of post cards.

Wouldn’t you love to go to your mailbox and find a post card from Faith or perhaps Courage…with a little upbeat message on it letting us know we can handle this problem because God will supply us with the faith or hope or courage we need to overcome any obstacle in our life?

Then, my next thought was, what if we become the noun we know that a loved one, family member or friend, needs. Instead of signing it with our own names…we send them a card signed simply Faith, or Hope, or Courage. I am going to try it soon when the next occasion arises. I think it would be a wonderful “message gift” to receive. A “Prop Up Postcard!”

So until tomorrow…Let’s take encouraging words and turn them into words of comfort…personalized for others by attributes of love.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

*Cindy shared with me a french expression from the website…A French Word A-Day. The expression was:

“donner le meilleur de soi-même”

It means: to give one’s best

The visual metaphor for this meaning comes from the grapevines in southern France. I love this little tidbit of information on growing grapes for wine.

(Chateau La Canorque, Provence)

(” to give one’s best”) Vines are like humans. The older they become, the more they give their best thanks to their roots rooted deep in the soil. There is a simple reason for this. The older a vine is, the more it is rooted in the soil and the more it can feed the grapes with all the under ground components.

Paradoxically, the more the vine is “old”, the less it will produce grapes while its nurturing potential becomes more important. As a result, the grapes produced are of better quality because they are brought to perfect maturity.

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I like the idea that though, as we grow older, we perhaps can’t produce as much (do as much or do it slower) but the quality of what we do, say, act upon, is at a much wiser, richer, more mature level than when we were young. (I’ll take that and run with it…or maybe walk with it!)

What is that expression? “One man’s poison is another man’s candy.”

I bought two adorable penguin Halloween costumes for Lachlan and Jakie  two Halloweens ago. Neither were amused with the costume…all I got for buying the penguin  costumes were two crying, sad faces. Then the costumes came off!  (Left to Right) Jakie and Lachlan

But then there is hope…Mandy passed Jakie’s Halloween costume down to cousin Rhodes and this was a young man who appreciated being a penguin…(Maybe it was the top hat that was too much for Jakie and Lachlan.) Too cute Rhodes!