Turning The Page....

 Happy New year everyone!  

What a joy it was today to take down the old calendar

and put up a brand new 2015 Kelly Rae calendar; 

a sweet "autographed!" gift from my dear "Merry Bema!" 

Flipping the cover to a new month with

all those new white blocks of space

made my heart leap a little.  

While there were many blessings in 2014 --

It was one of the most difficult yet growing 

seasons of my 50 years.  

It's true that we often learn the most 

from our valley experiences

than basking on  mountain tops.  

I still prefer the mountaintops but

I know God is faithful and carried me 

through it all.  

We've had a lot of changes here in the 

past few weeks.  We  lost  4 family members 

and honestly I wonder will I ever, 

 be able to trust again?  

The  ripple  of one  persons decisions

can deeply affect every heart within the  fallout. 

So ... I Thank God all the more for this new beginning. 

I'm ready to let go and try to 

move on.  

One of the delightful joys we've had lately

is the little arm full above.  

Her name is Aspen Rose.  

 Already she has us wrapped around her little paw.  

Aspen is a miniature, blue merle, 

 Australian Shepherd.

This was love at first sight.

It's her photo from the website of the breeder 

at Cherry Hill Aussies.  We put a down payment 

on her and had to wait til she was big enough to bring home 

right before Christmas.  

Now she's just over 8 weeks old and 

boy oh boy is she a wonderful mess.  

Francoise our male corgi and Ophelia the kitty

think she's the cats meow but Addie ...

-- she's an alpha meangirl.  

We're  keeping them apart until Aspen gets a lot

bigger.  

 Another  recent joy  was a little time with my dear Auntie.

She reminds me so much of my Angelmother.  

I love to listen to her remember "the old days." 

She has so many stories inside;

little treasures unwrapped

in her telling.  

With the new year approaching I started becoming aware of a word that 

kept  repeating itself. 

Through sermons, books, art, podcasts, bible studies,

friends, even pinterest.  

I mentioned it to a friend on facebook when I saw the word again

on her page.  She even said, might you be getting your 

new one word?  

Affirmation yet... at the same time;

I really didn't want to let go of my word for 2014, which was

HEART.  

Hearts  appeared, 

sparkled, transformed- 

They were discovered in creekbeds- as rocks,

... and even anchored in verse- Ezekiel 36:26  I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.

Heart was everywhere and taught more love and

true beauty over the course of a year

than I ever dreamed.  

So letting go of it... for this new word.. 

was a bit of a letdown.  

That is; ..Until the love happened. 

My one word?

Perspective.

Saying it outloud... per-spective!

Okay... so now what?  

That's when the verse showed up during Advent 

Right there on the page of 

  the Greatest Gift.

But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

Perspective is all in the seeing-

the looking.  It can even change by tilting your head..

Every angle has a new perspective.  

And the LORD... He looks at hearts.  

It's all started coming together and I'm excited!

And then- walking through the woods;

I looked ahead of me and saw   

this.  

It really is in the looking

to see the heart of people

and things.  

Perspective.

 So far what I've shared is my small glimpse

of understanding with it. 

I'm hopeful the Lord will give me new eyes

to grow in everything He has for me to see

and be and do.  

    

With the start of this new year,

I look forward to new beginnings.

I've signed up with Documented Life,

Documented faith, the Inseparable bible study,

and a couple others.  Weeks have been spent preparing   

the Dylusions journal and moleskine planner.

It's kind of funny because the art I create is 

mixed media and I love it messy!!!!!!! The play of it 

and the uninhibited expression completely delights me.  Like; I really do NOT enjoy making straight lines, perfect points.. or in other words perfection drives me crazy!  Yet at the same time... I'm drawn to the beauty of architecture especially old cathedrals.  While playing in paint one day, the back of one of these journals came to be as pictured above. It's messy and sketchy and splattered yet today... through my one word.. when I LOOK at it.. I see a new perspective.  

So who knows what could happen?   

Happy surprises can... like this simple gelli print.  

Earlier I was writing out my new word and after jotting it down  in the moleskine in my own handwriting... I happened to glance at this stack of messy colorful papers.  They were already on copy paper .. so I decided to try one right in our printer.  The first one wasn't real flat and it kinda bunched up but I tried it again with another... and it worked!  Now I can cut parts off of this page and glue right into my book.  Now don't go jammin up your printer and get mad at me if it doesn't work but it did for me.  

Well it's time to take Aspen out again.  She can pee  two great lakes

and three rivers by 9 am.  She does good when we go out often 

but man... you forget how much they can hold- (insert big eyeballs here.)  haha  

Well happy new year dear friends!

Thanks for journeying along with me.

L