Crafts, Creativity, & Conviction

It's a crafts-and-creativity post!

Say hello to my mom's monster. Mom made the monster out of a thrifted fleece baby blanket. So clever.

LC has a neat little Dover coloring book. It's a "stained glass" one about birds. We looked up the first bird, a nuthatch, on the internet, and she commenced to coloring. (It was really early in the morning, hence the darkness of the photos...)

 Sometimes during our history lesson, MK will draw. She's one of those rare ones who can (usually) learn more if her hands are busy. I thought her characterizations of Catherine the Great and Czar Peter of Russia were quite comical. As the story goes, Peter was a rather uncouth fellow who drank too much, had bizarre habits and was just plain off in many ways. Catherine's opinion of him is rather obvious in the illustration, yes?

These photos are several weeks old, but I love them. I think MK was also the mind behind this setup. When my Playmobil fans do a scene, they do it with purpose, and there's always a story, which they are happy to tell you...

I walked in to see this arrangement spread across my bedroom floor. It made me smile, how thoughtful the girls are in their pretending and arranging.

Lastly, summer sun on the last bunch of flowers BB gave me, these right after we brought Baby H home from the hospital.

I wanted to quickly share a little of what God is doing in my heart these days. Let's see. Well, He is showing me sin. Lots of it. This can be discouraging, right? However, He keeps reminding me:

...being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. 

Philippians 1:6

I've got a tendency to run from facing the ugly of sin; and then there's prideful defensiveness that rises up; oh, and don't forget the perfectionistic trait of believing I need to deal with this quickly, efficiently, and perfectly.

God's constant tender reminder about His commitment to carry the burden of responsibility throughout this process is such an encouragement. It's okay for it to take some time. He's helping me see, understand, and feel what needs changing in me. It's not fun to see the yuck in my own heart, but it's comforting to know that the end result is being more like Jesus.

Also, we talked about Colossians 3:15 at church on Sunday -

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace.

When I choose to rest in God's promise to finish the good work He has started in me, I surely enjoy His peace!