Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL.
For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen †
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Merry Christmas to you, Treeper friends. Hope it’s wondrous and that God reaches each of you with His grace and mercy.
Our boy Danny cat is still with us and after kiddo enjoyed her gifts, we brunched with homemade biscuits and gravy.
The peace and quiet is blissful and I gifted my daughter the C.S. Lewis book series from which we read a passage of “The Screwtape Letters”
“At that time, the humans still knew pretty well when a thing was proved and when it was not; and if it was proved they really believed it. They still connected thinking with doing and were prepared to alter their way of life as the result of a chain of reasoning. But what with the weekly press and other such weapons we have largely altered that.”
With this… my blessing for each of you and yours… that the “weekly press” albeit pressures… be held at an arms length and your Spirit mysteriously an observer of such invokes your supernatural armor… that none harm, stress, detract, distract, isolate, or weaken your resolve.
That you are unaffected and surprisingly unentangled and unbaited… and can allow only God access to your heart, mind, and emotions.
That He may strengthen you and give you peace. The principalities of this world have no dominion over you, as a child of our God.
We are heirs to His Throne and all of this was foretold by Him, so as to bring about His Perfect Intent. Come, Lord Jesus, come.
I pray this in Jesus’s Holy and Saving Name, AMEN
I love you. ❤️
So excited to watch “The Chosen” season 3 episode 3 tonight via anglestudios.com 7 PM EST It is free and the message such a blessing.
Merry Christmas, JWoo…and to your beautiful “inside and out” daughter.
Thank you for your update on Danny. I was thinking of you all yesterday, and I hoped all was as well as it could be with your lovely lad.
What a wonderful gift! Anything by Lewis, but if it includes The Screwtape Letters, it is a choice for her can’t be beaten. She will learn from it, think about it, and it will be a treasure for her all her days…because it came from you. An extremely thoughtful gift, my sister.
Breakfast sounds yummy. And the peace and quiet as we all welcome the Son of God once more into our homes and hearts.
Last night we streamed Carols from Kings College Cambridge, A carol service with readings from Luke interspersed amongst those wonderful voices…the exquisite soprano voices of the boys, so many so tiny and all remarkable, not only in quality but precision…and older lads and adult men. Perfection.
One of the works performed was Ralph Vaughan Williams Fantasia on Christmas Carols, a work so complicated we were left open mouthed at the magnificence of the performance.
I am leaving the whole performance for you below, my Christmas present to you and anybody else in our beloved Tree who would like their spirits lifted on this joyous day.
The chapel at Cambridge is so glorious, the perfect setting for such a service. That was the much anticipated delight for us, always looked forward to with the anticipation, as befits the welcoming of our newborn King.
I hope you both are warm enough in this brutal cold, and I am so glad your Christmas has delivered the peace which passes all understanding…just as it should be. Blessings to both you ladies, with love. Bet 🌲💕
Thank you, Betsy. What a lovely performance and a precious gift you have shared. We streamed it as I made dinner this evening. Daughter’s favorite and a nice holiday meal… lamb chops with balsamic reduction, green beans, heirloom tomatoes. The Carols from Kings College made the meal preparation almost luxurious.
Dined in front of “The Chosen” where again… they did such a fine job humanizing Christ, the man.
So much love for you all. So much.
Merry Christmas, darlin . . . Glad to hear Danny is with you. Hope you, your daughter and your kitty will be blessed and be well. 🙂
Merry Christmas, gentle Garrison. Big hugs to you. How very blessed we all are. God Is Good.
Merry Christmas, ms Idaho and Doc.🙏🌲💕
It has been a long time since we’ve seen you, but I think of you both so often.
You said one day you might just disappear from this site…and so it seems that day has arrived.
I pray it is for reasons other than those you said would be the cause.
I wanted you to know (perhaps through Spicy or our dearest Mungrel whom I’m know you were in contact with) that you both are not forgotten.
And I continue to pray for you, and hope that your Christmas finds you coping, if not improving.
With affection and sincerest hopes for a better New Year.🙏🌲💕 Bet
I have been looking for MsIdaho, too, Betsy. She had macular degeneration, didn’t she? I’m pretty sure she is the one who advised me to skip the ophthalmologist and go find a retina specialist when I got macular degeneration in my left eye. My sight was all but gone except for a little bit of periphery vision.
I took her advice and have been wanting to thank her. My eye responded better than most, according to the doctor, and my sight has returned so well that I can read with that eye again!!!!!!! I feel I literally owe her my eyesight in that eye. I pray the best for her. I owe her so much.
You know, patty, I don’t think it was macular degeneration. It was something else that I didn’t recognize. Don’t quote me on that. Just a niggle that it wasn’t.
But it has been a few months since her last surgery, and at first there was improvement, with her popping in occasionally, then nothing
But I do think of her often…and Doc, who has physical issues as well.
She did advise when she found herself unable to see, she’d suddenly disappear…which she has done for a couple of months. We worry for those who post often, then suddenly do not. I am hoping Spicy or Mungrel, if they had had permission of course, will be able to at least deliver our messages. I keep my prayers up for both.
And what glorious hopeful news from you!! Truly wonderful. She was so good, given her own condition and experiences to share advice. I hope she will come to know how valuable that advice was for you. Please know how sincerely overjoyed I am for your progress, patty.
I saw a article the other day wherein it seems research on MD is promising. A film constructed out of one’s own stem cells is being worked on to restore sight. I know it’s early days yet on this I am in hopes that perfecting this new treatment will quickly lead to good results. I will pray so for you and others who are losing their sight because of MD.
Blessings always, my Christmas loving friend. I am putting up you on my prayer list.💕🙏
Hi Betsy and Patty. Thank you for the Christmas wishes – multiplying them many times and sending back to the wonderful community here at the OT.
I follow your posts but don’t comment much. There is a tendency to focus on what we have lost – particularly as we age – and i refuse to burden you with my cry baby fears and tears.
Update on my eyes…
Surgery in September seems to have done what my surgeon wanted. Pressure immediately after was very low and has since stabilized – what my doctors deem ‘normal.
I thank God every day for the sight i have. Problem is that by the time i was able to get the surgery done i had quite a bit of damage to the optic nerve in my right eye. What that means is that there is a loss of peripheral vision and a loss of color differentiation.
i switched from the retina specialist who had been giving me shots to one who is with the same group that did the glaucoma surgery. I was afraid of more lucentis shots – which caused the glaucoma in the first place (side effects). Between the 2 doctors they are monitoring with imaging and pressure gauges.
Good news – i see the surgeon in February and the retina specialist in April – unless i have a problem.
I can ‘see’ well enough to do the things I want and need to do – but some days things are very dim and reading is hard. Why and how it varies i have no clue. Vision seems to improve as the day goes on.
My self diagnosis (never do that) is that i am reacting to ‘something’ or several somethings. That’s not really new, just worrysome because it affects my sight. I sometimes convince myself i could deal with other body part problems – but that may be a fallacy.
Good news (maybe). There is a drug coming out for DRY macular. Doctor said that may control the other issues. Dry will be a stopper for me if it damages my right eye. the left is already badly distorted. i could not read without sight in my right eye – or drive – or do anything. Patty, as you know, peripheral vision doesn’t do it.
thanks for your prayers and positive thoughts. we all know how powerful they are. Especially when backed by the will of God.
PS – Doc had his 89th birthday this week. Not many folks his age do as well as he does.
Thanks again for your concern
MERRY CHRISTMAS
Hallelujah!!! What a wonderful gift to see you, my friend! Your news is so hopeful I can only be happy and hopeful with you. And I am very glad to know Doc is with you. Best Christmas present from my view.
I understand your tears and particular fears and the determination to deal with them yourself. There have been many discussions on these threads about how this Season brings them on, for many reasons, but including remembering past times and people who are no longer with us. I have found myself suddenly and unexpectedly weeping, wondering where mine have come from. It’s life and the times we are in, I’ve decided. But so many in the Advent Season said the same. I’ve also decided that the best thing to do is to simply let them flow. Which I have done. Perhaps it’s an age thing in part. But that we are still here is something to celebrate. And that is what I do.
I am just so chuffed and joyously surprised to see your wonderful reply, ms Idaho. A perfect way to end this Christmas Day. I am sending hugs your way, and prayers that your doctors can keep your sight stable with little to no more deterioration from this point on. Blessings always, my friend. And even though he doesn’t know me, I pass on my highest regards to Doc with best wishes for good health.
Merry, Merry Christmas from your fellow branch dweller in this blessed Tree…Bet😘🌲
Dear Betsy
speaking of tears and aging …
There was a point in time when my mom started declaring ‘I’m an old lady’. i didn’t think much about it – that was my wonderful mom.
So in my life the years just kept sliding by. Getting old just never occurred to me. But sometime during this past year (I’m 80 now) it hit me. Maybe not that i am OLD, but that i am no longer young and no longer can do the things that used to be so easy.
Doc and I have spent so many of our years together (with each other and no others) that we don’t really miss relatives and friends who no longer walk this earth. We know we’ll be with them again when all accounts are settled.
But you are right – it is super easy to fear the unknown – the frustration of trying to fix things you don’t know how to fix – and banish tears to the woodshed.
We are living in an ‘extended stay’ facility – it spent most of its years as a motel – ha ha.
so ‘residents’ were invited to a pot luck get together. about 40 of us showed up. we were chatting with the ‘host’, the person who bought and prepared the food. He is used to family get togethers with over 100 people. They are gone or otherwise living lives going in other directions. i’ll try to find out his relationship to our ‘residence’, but we did appreciate his efforts on our behalf. Enywhoo – he said he loves to cook and loves to have lots of people around.
I think that ranks pretty high on the list of things we are all grateful for.
Yes…I think it was Bette Davis who said old age doesn’t come on its own. She was right.
But she didn’t elaborate in detail what came with it.
I in my naivete assumed she meant only the physical. I was not prepared for the emotional as well. And it is as much that as it is the other. And just as painful in so many instances. The price for living a long(er) life, as others do not. At Christmas, those feelings which we perhaps bury during the year really do come to the fore for me, and I’m certain for others.
That’s what I tell myself…
How lovely for your dinner,and what a generous host you had. There really are such good people in this world. More of them I suspect than the other types, though sometimes it may not seem so. I hope you and Doc are comfortable where you are. I remember when you moved in and had to find room for your things having downsized. We’ve gotten to the age where less is really more in every respect…the simpler the better. Things don’t matter in the end. It’s family and friendship that are everything. And blessing to understand that beautiful fact of life.
Ah well…enough philosophying. Tis Christmas still, and it has been the best present (unexpected and therefore all the sweeter) to chat with you, to know you are maintaining the status quo, and that all is still well. Bless you always ms Idaho…thank you for putting my mind at ease. What I don’t know I make up, a phrase I learned from a friend in Wales who is much like me in that arena.😉
other lessons learned along the way
An image re: $ and power from long ago: imagine a bucket of water. you put your hand in – plunge, splash, agitate for as long as you want to. Remove your hand; the wager goes still. That’s how much all your life’s efforts are worth.
Maybe you splashed some of the water out of the bucket. Maybe you had scent on your hand and made the water better. Maybe the water is exactly the same as when you put your hand in.
Dunno how good a story that is on life and living – but it sure gives one food for thought….
I am so glad to hear from you. You literally saved my eyesight. Honestly, it is so good now that I don’t even think about it most of the time. You are a true blessing for me.
I live out of town and have spent my last 40 years rescuing abandoned dogs/cats/ducks/chickens. Whatever makes it way to my place or that I see has a home with me. My greatest fear was that I would have to leave here and what would happen to all God’s critters that I feed.
Thanks for the news about the dry MD. I have the dry in my right eye and wet in the left eye. I’ll be asking the doctor about that at my next visit.
You are in my prayers always. And 80 isn’t old. It’s not the age that makes one old, it’s how old you feel inside yourself. Inside I have never felt older than about 30 and I’m 70.
Patty – i know exactly what you mean about losing the ability to stay where you are and keep doing God’s work to save and protect his precious critters.
A year ago or so i heard about help for DM. it was said to be stem cell. After what i have read about how ‘they’ get stem cells I am hesitant. While part of me is hopeful about the treatment – another part wants to know a lot more about it before rushing in where angels fear to tread (so to speak).
Also, – do I really want to be one of the early ‘test’ subjects? The doctor’s attitude is we want to preserve what vision you have – stop progression of vision loss. After what i have gone thru this year my question (for myself) is yes, but is it worth it? is the ‘cure’ gonna be worse than the problem?
The other part of this debate with myself – how do you prove the negative? what would my sight be if I don’t take the treatment? What if I have a bad reaction to the new drug and sight gets worse?
Aah, no sense worrying about the future. Stay focused on today’s blessings (says she to herself with a pinch)
Amen… v
Amen.
Merry Christmas, my friend….with affection🌲😘
Amen
Amen.
Amen🌲🙏
Amen
Amen
Amen.
Amen.
AMEN–AMEN AUSCITIZENMOM
May I add a prayer to lift up all our Americans in praayer who are caught up in these freezing conditions that do not have sufficient shelter, food or clothing during this time of year.
Amen
Amen.
It was a wonderful Christmas for us, even though my wife was under the weather. I hope you all are as content as I am. She is definitely feeling better this evening.
Glad to hear she’s feeling better and you’re both enjoying this beautiful holiday.
✝️ Lord, thank You for the day. Amen.