Note to self: read the tag

 

Dear Tennessee condo dryer,

I cordially apologize for blaming you for the past three months for shrinking my underwear while we were on vacation.  I confess I have repeatedly and unfairly disparaged you and I humbly beg your forgiveness.  You are not culpable for my erroneous laundry sorting.  The fault is mine for wearing my daughter’s underwear for the past twelve weeks while fidgeting, squirming, and loudly complaining that the vacation dryer shriveled my skivvies.  

In reality, you treated my unmentionables with utmost respect and care, and for that I salute you.  In future I will consider that the cause of my discomfort may lie closer to home.  Please accept my humblest apologies. 

Sincerely,

Mindy  

Photo by Charles Deluvio on Unsplash

Links from the bunny trail

These first three are from a new blog I stumbled upon and really enjoyed; the last is from an article I found when I was searching for some help in understanding difficult passages I was reading in Judges.  I hope they bless your mind and heart too.

The Corners of Life That Are Laden with Cobwebs 

Boy, she puts her finger on it when she says of the draw of social media, “These mediums are places without toilets.”  And the bottom line of dissatisfied envy:  “Wherever you are, you still have to clean the toilet.”

Believing Doesn’t Make It Real

You may assume about me, as about the author, that because I believe in Jesus, I have never asked hard questions; that I have never done wicked things; that I’ve never wondered if it was all a made-up story; that I’ve never investigated competing claims about the universe; that I’ve never suffered deep grief.  In both cases, you would be wrong.  Yes, the claims of Christians (Miracles? Rising from the dead?!) seem fanciful and laughable.  But I have wondered the same things you have, struggled with doubt and skepticism…and have landed in the same place as the author.  “I do believe this Christ business.”

Choice Cargo: Or, What Planned Parenthood and the Slave Trade Had in Common

Far be it from me to hold or blog any controversial positions, but really, I can’t see how anyone can argue with the logic of this comparison, which is grievously obvious.  We are all willfully blind when we need to be, aren’t we?  Though particular evils will come and go throughout the duration of this fallen world, let us take heart (and warning) that God’s definition of good and evil doesn’t fluctuate with the times, and in the end, His Kingdom will triumph.

Counting With God

This is actually academic enough to start with an abstract, but I particularly found interesting and helpful the sections beginning with “One Tribe Short of Twelve.”  Basically, numbers in the Bible are significant. For example, the repeated references to the number eleven in Judges indicates the ominous absence of a single tribe; Bejon argues, the tribe of Levi—the erstwhile religious leaders in Israel.  It is a man of Levi who hands over a woman to be treated horrifically in the most disturbing passage of Scripture I can think of (Judges 19).  This incident leads to civil war, and Bejon’s analysis is a recognition of the import of biblical numbers.  

Note first of all how many Israelites fall in the first two days’ battles.  The Benjaminites slay 40,000 out of the Israelites’ 400,000 men (Judges 20:17-26), which seems significant.  The Levites’ presence in Israel is supposed to cost Israel a tenth of their produce (Numbers 18:21-24), not a tenth of their men.  Something is very wrong in terms of the Levites’ effect on Israel.

In other words, there is a lot of meaning to be gleaned from lists of figures in the Bible, and Bejon encourages us to do the work to uncover it, rather than just letting our eyes glaze over these challenging sections.

Hogwarts birthday

Somebody turned 11! 

We enjoyed a quiet family evening of sparkling apple cider, Chinese takeout, and cupcakes.

And then the birthday girl opened presents, the largest of which was a new bunny hutch for Buck.

She was very pleased.

The weekend approached with fine weather for a Harry Potter party.

With Buck tucked safely and happily in his new digs and Lizzy out of sight at a friend’s house, it was time to prepare Hogwarts.

The garage was set up as a dungeon for Potions Class (not a huge stretch, really).

Ada did all the design and printing for these posters, as well as the potions recipes, class schedules, and various signs and labels.

Diagon Alley was in the living room (not to be confused with Downton Abbey, as Caleb did).

The Great Hall, of course, was in the dining room.

We set up this very terrifying Common Welsh Green dragon in the driveway for Defense Against the Dark Arts class (no worries, the dragon was Stunned beforehand, so the girls would just need to finish him off).

And Greenhouse 1 was on the back patio for Herbology class.

When the guests arrived, we started by visiting Ollivander’s for wand selection.  Each of the girls was able to light a lamp with the wand that chose them, so they headed straight from there to the great feast.

First up after lunch was Potions in the dungeon.  I was much nicer than Professor Snape and didn’t take away any house points.

The class made four different potions:  Exploding Filibusters, Laughter Potion, Ghoul Toothpaste, and Skele-Gro.  

The glittery powdered unicorn horn was a hit with certain students, who added copious amounts to their Laughter Potion and Skele-Gro.

Next, up Defense Against the Dark Arts.  The girls were brave and valiant facing the Welsh Green.

It didn’t stand a chance, really.  These girls were natural-born dragon slayers.

I so love this about girls.  They piled all the pinata goodies together and then sat cross-legged in a circle, quietly taking turns picking one thing at a time.  

Ada and I steered clear of candy, since they were already getting cupcakes, soda, and a trip to Honeyduke’s Sweet Shop.  Instead we put in bubble gum, lemonade packets, stickers, hair ties, and flavored chapsticks (did I mention I love girls?).

The last class of the day was Herbology, where the students potted Flutterby Bushes, which bloom every hundred years with deadly flowers that attract unsuspecting victims.  Fortunately, these are babies, so they won’t be blooming for a long time.

I found these unbearably cute owl pots on Amazon.  It came as a set of six, so the girls each got to pick one to bring home, and we have two left over currently sitting on my kitchen windowsill being adorable. 

After classes the girls got to visit Honeyduke’s and pick out treats to take home.  Each got a selection of Jelly Slugs, Chocolate Wands, and Drooble’s Best Blowing Gum, as well as a box of Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans and a Chocolate Frog box, complete with a Chocolate Frog card inside featuring a different famous witch or wizard.  Ada printed, cut out, and assembled the boxes and the Frog cards and made the Chocolate Frogs from a frog mold we bought.

Lastly, we sang Happy Birthday to the birthday girl and shared Butterbeer cupcakes (also made by Ada, and amaaazing).

The verdict:  Ada and I were very proud of ourselves… and very tired afterwards.  Lizzy has appreciatively thanked me multiple times over the past few days for doing it.  And I overheard comments from the guests such as, “This is the most fun birthday party I’ve ever been to!” and, “How could we NOT have fun?!”

So I’d say we passed our O.W.L.s with flying colors.  50 points to Griffyndor.

The state of things

The state of things:  

We’re six weeks into the school year.  Our days are a bit unpredictable as far as how much schoolwork is on the schedule.  Today Caleb was done before 10am; other days we still haven’t finished at 4:30.  

Jeddy got his license six days ago.  It was a roller coaster day that involved getting up really early to drive out of town to the only DMV we could get an appointment at during these unprecedented, etc., times; realizing halfway there that the car we had selected for him to test in was four months past the inspection date; turning around; starting over; being 17 minutes late; rushing through the paperwork while praying the next appointee didn’t show up on time; getting kicked out when said appointee did show up; sitting dejectedly in the parking lot despairing over the lack of availability at any DMV; and getting called back inside when the punctual appointee was rejected as ineligible.  

After all that, he took his test, which turned out to be a road test since we were clear in the next county (our county is only doing tests in the parking lot, with cones and a masked official calling instructions from outside the vehicle).  Fortunately, however, part of the usual testing route was shut down because a work crew was trimming trees or something, so he only performed an abbreviated test.  Which, after all that drama… he passed.

So far he’s driven to the grocery store for ice cream, brought a couple of friends home, and gone to youth group and Bible study.  And thus far, as far as my knowledge extends, he hasn’t crashed or taken the road to perdition.  

Ada turned 14.  Fourteen!  Her maturity is pretty much summed up in Jeddy’s recent comment that I only have one teenager.  When I pointed out that I have two teenagers, he said, “Yeah, but one of them’s Ada.”

Also…Lizzy is turning eleven.  And as Hagrid said, it’s not every day your young lady turns eleven.  Forgoing a party of her own (see: maturity, above), Ada jumped on my idea to throw Liz a Harry Potter party, which we are working on together to surprise her with.  She already received her Hogwarts letter via post owl.

I’m doing my best to live in denial that fall is here, telling myself every morning that it must be especially cloudy, which is why it’s so dark outside, and wondering why my feet are so cold every day while I still wear flip-flops.

The national downward trend in covid infections doesn’t seem to be affecting our area; it seems like half the people we know are either suffering or recovering from covid this very moment, and I’m pretty sure it’s sweeping through our church.  The Lord only knows what this winter holds.  

In the meantime, Lord willing, we’ve got PSATs to take, the orthodontist to go to, laps at the (heated) pool to swim, school to work on, birthdays to celebrate, and Hogwarts to attend.