Happy Monday! This Monday is especially special for our family! Why? Because our oldest has officially become a teenager. That's right...Tucker is 13! We are so thankful and blessed by this special young man and cannot wait to see what lies ahead for him!!! :-) We love you, Tuckman!
This week Mimi has a bit of encouragement about learning from surprises. Read, share, and enjoy! Shannon :-)
Green
Frogs and Great Surprises
Surprises come in
different shapes and by different means, but they come to all of us!!! Some are better than others. On rare occasions, I have been greatly
disappointed by surprising news, but for the most part, I think it would be
fair to say I enjoy surprises!!!
I relish the moments of
anticipation when I know a surprise is coming.
Joy may be found in waiting before I unwrap my special Christmas family
photo calendar. Or it may be the wait in
between the sound of car doors slamming and the grandkids running inside for
hugs. These surprises are small, but they
are special surprises that I treasure.
But, yikes, sometimes there
are sudden happenings in life that we do not treasure or even like at all!!! Such happenings catch us off guard and are
sometimes even hurtful. We can find
ourselves in difficult predicaments as a result of “surprises” like these.
A couple of weeks ago, we
had a few days of really nice weather. I
ventured into my backyard and pool area to piddle. Really, what can you do in January, but
piddle??? There is not too much
gardening that can be done.
I have a large blue tub
that sits on my deck for storing pool toys. During the course of several rainy days, the
tub had filled with water. I wanted to
empty it, but I was very aware of the possibility of uninvited critters hiding
in the tub.
It was getting late, and I
had somewhere else to go. I am not afraid of green hopping or even slithering
residents…I just didn’t want them on my legs that day. I hurriedly turned the tub on its side, but
failed to properly place it away from me. As the water was emptying, I quickly reached
in to pull out the toys. The green frogs
picked that exact moment in time to exit the bucket.
I could almost hear them
croak “SURPRISE” as they jumped to freedom toward me. I stepped back and came very, very close to slipping
off my small deck. Actually I did misstep,
but I remarkably recovered with an awkward maneuver. The two froggies went on their way, and so
did I!
The next day, as I was cautiously
picking up the scattered pool toys, I had to shake my head. No surprises today!!! Surprises?! I knew there had been a possibility of frogs
being in the pool toy bucket, so why the earlier mishap after all? Could it be that I was in a hurry, not paying
attention, and just carelessly reaching?
As I apply that to my own
life, it speaks volumes to me. What a
life lesson! Let’s be sure that our
actions and our stance are such that when untimely events come, we are not
taken aback or shaken around.
Sometimes we must pay close
attention to how we are standing. Actually
the two green frogs were not a great surprise at all. I was just in no position to get out of their
way!!!! Let’s be ready for the lessons
God sends our way. Good or bad, there is
much we can learn from daily “surprises.”
Blessings, Mimi (AKA Anne)
1 Samuel 12:16,
“Now then, stand still and see this great thing the Lord is
about to do before your eyes!”
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