wisdom wednesday – 29 aug. 2012

The past few weeks my sweet friends Bonnie and Roger have brought me gobs of goodies from their garden, including my family’s all-time favorite, corn on the cob!

Today’s post isn’t so much words of wisdom, but a short snippet by one of my favorite author’s, Garrison Keillor, in honor of their generosity…

“Back home, our fridge was always getting full in July. We took tomatoes to church to give away, as Christ said we should do, and arrived late and in the cloakroom we found paper sacks full of Christian tomatoes and cucumbers…

Sweet corn was our family’s weakness. We were prepared to resist atheistic Communism, immoral Hollywood, hard liquor, gambling and dancing, smoking, fornication, but if Satan had come around with sweet corn, we at least would have listened to what he had to sell. We might not have bought it but we would’ve had him in and given him a cup of coffee.”

~~ Garrison Keillor,  ”Leaving Home: A Collection of Lake Wobegon Stories,” p. xv-xvi.

wisdom wednesday – 18 Jul 2012

Quote

Going through some hard times round here, which seem to have drained away all my energy, not to mention my love of writing on this blog o’mine.  However, this quote makes me smile and gives me hope that I’ll be back to “normal” soon…

Count the garden by the flowers, never by the leaves that fall. Count your life with smiles and not the tears that roll.

~ Anonymous

wisdom wednesday – 20 june 2012

This week finds Braden, Savannah, and myself in Tennessee for a few days, finally getting to visit with my new grandson and his beautiful mama!  Savannah gets to stay here and love on him for a few weeks, lucky girl.  Braden and I will be leaving tomorrow, flying to New York on the next stop of our journey that is taking us to help out in an orphanage in Haiti for the next few weeks (I’m sure there will be lots to blog about when we get back!).

In honor of seeing my adorable grandson, this week’s “wisdom wednesday” pretty much has to be about grandparents and grandbabies… :)

“Grandparents are similar to a piece of string – handy to have around and easily wrapped around the fingers of their grandchildren.”

~~ Author unknown

I cannot imagine who I would be in life if I hadn’t had my own grandparents. I can only hope that one day our own little J.T. will look back and say the same about me…

wisdom wednesday – 6 June 2012

Quote

Sorry for the long silence here on the blog.

Lots going on in my little corner of the world that I really can’t – and won’t – share with the whole world.

However, today’s  quote is my new mantra that I’m clinging to, along with oodles and oodles of prayer.  I’m a big believer in pestering God so much with my prayers that he’ll answer them just to shut me up!

“Don’t tell God how big your storm is,

Tell the storm how big your God is…”

                                            ~Anonymous

wisdom wednesday – 16 may 2012

Can I just say how stressful life is right now?

Some good stress, some bad stress, some stress of my own making… (Hello. My name is Tracy and I am completely incapable of saying  “NO.” To anything.  It certainly comes easily enough for my kids!)

In my quest to get through school quicker, I decided to sign up for two summer courses. One on “Stress Management” – which, ironically, is totally stressing me out with the workload – and the other, a one-week Folklore Conference which will be chaotically jam-packed as well.

In addition, I am actually doing some major traveling this summer: Continue reading

wisdom wednesday – 9 may 2012

As I mentioned here recently, Savannah has entered that wonderful stage of her childhood/adolescence where everything that I say, do, or even think is either an evil plot to ruin her life or a giant embarrassment the likes of which she many never recover from. Continue reading

wisdom wednesday – 2 may 2012

This coming Saturday is graduation day at the University, so I’ll be giving up my day to work it.  I remember how much I hated my high school graduation (lo, so many years ago!): it seemed like the speakers went on for hours, and it was sweltering hot in our gowns. However, this will be the 4th year in a row that I’ve worked graduation, and I have to admit that I actually enjoy seeing the excitement on faces and the sense of accomplishment after so much hard work.

Continue reading

wisdom wednesday – 25 april 2012

This is the last week of the semester for me, and I honestly have wondered more than once this last week if I will make it to Friday without totally losing my mind.

For today’s “Wisdom Wednesday,” I had planned on having some sort of an inspiring quote about the value of education. However, after posting news of my impending breakdown on Facebook yesterday, one of my friends posted the following, which has become my rallying cry to get through the next few days.

So, without further ado, here is what’s inspiring me this week:

“Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming…”

I’m trying, Dory. I’m trying…

wisdom wednesday – 18 april 2012

“Mother Nature is providential. She gives us twelve years to develop a love for our children before turning them into teenagers.”

~William Galvin

Savannah turns 13 in a little over a month, but she may as well be 16 already with her emotions running the gamut from giddiness, to anger, to sadness, all in a 5-minute span.

It’s making my head spin trying to keep up!

For years she has wanted to take dance lessons, but it was never in the budget, either time- or money-wise. This year, I finally relented and she started once-weekly lessons in January.

Continue reading

wisdom wednesday – 11 april 2012

In dishonor of tax time, I thought I’d highlight a few of my favorite tax/IRS quotes:

“What is the difference between a taxidermist and a tax collector? The taxidermist takes only your skin.”

~Mark Twain

“I’m proud to pay taxes in the United States; the only thing is, I could be just as proud for half the money.”

~Arthur Godfrey

“It’s income tax time again, Americans: time to gather up those receipts, get out those tax forms, sharpen up that pencil, and stab yourself in the aorta.”

~Dave Barry

And, finally, another Mark Twain quote (you’ll be seeing lots of his on this blog -  I think the man was a genius!):

“We’ve got so much taxation. I don’t know of a single foreign product that enters this country untaxed except the answer to prayer.”

Happy filing!