blog worries

I'm getting ready to update my blogger template -- I never have before because I prefer doing things in HTML and I'm a little worried that if I get the "new and improved" template it'll make things worse for me, but I can't figure out what else to do. Blogger's comments have never worked for me (there's some conflict with my code) and I'm trying to get Disqus comments instead, since I already have an account with them, but trying to figure out where to put the code is taking too much time -- I can't simply replace the old Sensus Plenior code for some reason. It makes the comment box and all the comments show up under each post on the main page.

Well, here goes nothin!

Thankful Thursday

[Reposted from badgermum.cumbeeclan.com]

As I've mentioned, summer is my least favorite season, but there are lots of lovely things to be thankful for.

lightening bugs
magnolia blossoms, fully a foot across
the smell of freshly cut grass
being able to use the clothesline
home-grown tomatoes
watermelon, home grown or not
homemade ice cream
the Perseids
mockingbird songs morning and evening
crickets, cicadas, and all the other singing bugs
newly hatched guineas
thunderstorms

Monday evening as the sun was setting, we stood admiring the pink-gold clouds to the west of the house when a rainbow came out in the east. While we were admiring it, it started raining. We had sunset clouds, sunset rain, and a rainbow all at once. I've never seen anything like it -- the rain took on the clouds' pinkish gold color and the air was filled with a golden light and our roof looked like it was shingled in gold. No lightening, so we even got to run around in it.

What are you thankful for?

Trinity season

On the Church calendar, Trinity season is that long stretch of nothing after Easter/Ascension/Pentecost and before Advent/Christmas/Epiphany seasons. It covers the dog days of summer, which we’re just coming into. That’s a classical reference — it has something to do with Sirius, the dog star, but I always thought it was because you spend your days dragging around, panting like a dog.

Summer is my least favorite of all the seasons, even though I love the home-grown tomatoes, because I dislike being hot and sticky in spite of air conditioning. Someone should invent a set of personal gills for use in the South in summer — maybe the heat would be bearable if I could just get a lungful of oxygen.

I love the spring and we took off nearly the whole two months from Easter to Trinity, so we could be outside doing yardwork, gardening, and just enjoying life. But Trinity arrived, reminding me that we have all kinds of work to do as we wait for Christ’s return. The last Sunday before Advent is Christ the King, when we remember that he really will come again, and we are to be busy about his work until then.

So we went back to school on the Monday after Trinity. No summer break for us this year, which works out well since my mom and stepdad won’t be able to come out here or take the kids home with them for visits this summer as they usually do. We can have a twelve week term and then take off the month of September (my other favorite time to be out of school), when my folks will be free to visit.

I don’t know if we’ll do this again in future years, but for this year, so far it’s working out well.