From a Cluttered Desk

I am Tammy Cardwell, she of the cluttered desk. (Hey, you think I'm kidding?!) I'm having a blast here in Blogland and invite to you to peruse my ramblings. Like a buffet, they offer variety - essentially whatever makes it to the top of the piles that sometimes clutter my brain. We'll eventually cover it all - homeschooling, God, our church, the Eclectic Homeschool Online, books I'm writing and publishing, conferences I speak at, the joys of grandmotherhood, and hopefully chocolate. Of course, this is only what's near the top now. Who knows what's in those piles?

Raindrops falling on my shoulder… NOT a good wakeup call, in my opinion. Of course, I’d already been awakened by my sister, who was calling while driving a mile or so away to tell me to unplug the electronics because lightning was hitting too close. She got to see pretty fireworks when it hit a power pole in front of her. Still, I was about to cozy back down under the covers when the rain started falling on me. I was not amused.

So, determined not to let the rain get me down, I put a bucket on the bed and another in the closet (where the cats found a puddle of water for me - thoughtful kitties), grabbed my Bible and headed into the dry living room to read. It made sense, yes? If the devil wanted me upset about not already being in my new house, I could get him upset by reading about the rebuilding of God’s house. That would be the Temple, which was being rebuilt during part of today’s reading.

My accelerated reading schedule is going well. I’m almost finished with Nehemiah, which means I’m into what I’d originally scheduled for the month of May. You know, Nehemiah was one impressive man to manage all he did in the short amount of time it took.

The thing that’s been most on my heart lately, as a result of my reading, is trust in God. This isn’t surprising, of course, considering I’m in a position of having to trust God continually like never before in my life. I trust Him, literally, for my daily bread as well as the much bigger job of finishing the safe, new house that’s being built just a few feet away. Yes, I had a moment this morning when I collapsed against my husband and whined about wanting to already be IN MY NEW HOUSE, but I got over it. God is taking care even when I can’t see it.

But I do fight the constant battle. As I was watching Extreme Makeover Home Edition the other day, I had to fight it yet again, wondering why I wasn’t already in my new house when so much has been done to get me there. And there God was, reminding me of two things. 1. He had our friends do the fundraiser for us back in August and it got us started on this house; He’s quite big enough to supply the funds and the labor (the big issue right now, though there are huge money issues too) to finish it. 2. I’d JUST seen, in the Bible, how He feels about people not trusting Him completely.

Yeppers, I had. You see it over and over again when reading about the kings of Judah and Israel, but this reference was to King Asa. He’d really been doing a good job of serving God wholeheartedly, but then he let worry win. In II Chronicles 16, when the king of Israel attacked, he called on someone else - someone other than God - for help. This was God’s reply through his prophet. (New Living Translation: Thank you BlueLetterBible.org.)

7 At that time Hanani the seer came to King Asa and told him, "Because you have put your trust in the king of Aram instead of in the Lord your God, you missed your chance to destroy the army of the king of Aram. 8 Don’t you remember what happened to the Ethiopians [fn2] and Libyans and their vast army, with all of their chariots and horsemen [fn3] ? At that time you relied on the Lord, and he handed them all over to you. 9 The eyes of the Lord search the whole earth in order to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him. What a fool you have been! From now on, you will be at war."

King Asa’s heart changed after this point too. It goes on to say that "At the same time Asa started abusing some of the people."

I’ve written out the first part of verse 9, above. "The eyes of the Lord search the whole earth in order to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him." That’s me!

Be blessed!

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

It’s a shame they’re not installed already, but at least we have them. Actually, we’ve had some of this for a while, but this is the first time Jack’s taken pictures.

Nothing fancy here, but unlike most of the windows in our current house, these are all in one piece! LOL! Huh… Okay, there is a tiny bit of fancy, but you can’t see it in this picture. There’s an octagon window set behind the windows on the left and Jack didn’t realize it wasn’t in the pic. It will be on the front of the house, lighting the sleeping loft.  Too, if you look behind the windows, you’ll see the dishwasher we were given. It’s a nice one. YAY!

Not that you can tell much, with just the framing there, but the dishwasher is sitting where the…uh… Well, it’ll either be the washer or the dryer. I can’t remember which. The saw horses with the lumber on them are sitting in my kitchen.

This is our front door. Now you can see why I was particularly uncomfortable with the idea of anyone at our front door being able to see all the way into our house. I mentioned earlier that the owner of a house that was being remodeled gave it to my husband, but as I said, he’s only just now taking pictures.

Hmmmmm…. Okay, I’m a little confused here. I could have sworn we had canceled the order for exterior doors because we decided to reuse the ones we already had. Ah well.. Jack took the picture, so you get to see anyway.

And that’s it. Now to get to the magazine work that’s been begging for my attention all day.

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

Proverbs 1:20
Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets:

In other words, wisdom isn’t hard to find or hard to gain. On the contrary, wisdom is desperately seeking us, trying to help us grow, to aid us in becoming the children of God that we are supposed to be.

Proverbs 1:21
She crieth in the chief place of concourse, in the openings of the gates: in the city she uttereth her words, saying,

I’ve never really thought, before, about the significance of Solomon having likened wisdom to a woman. It seems that tradition says men are more wise than women, yet wisdom is a woman? Interesting.

It’s also interesting, again, that she’s out and about, where the majority of the people are (the chief place of concourse) and at the gates where everyone who enters and leaves the city must pass her. To me, this really does say that wisdom is attainable if we’ll even put forth a little bit of effort to listen to what she has to say.

And what does she have to say?

Proverbs 1:22
How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?

These are good questions. If wisdom is available to all of us, why would any of us choose to remain simple, ignorant, and lacking?

Again, the obvious answer is, "Flesh." When flesh speaks, it is easy to listen. Our flesh, our natural man, really would rather take things easy, not putting forth any "unnecessary" effort, or setting standards that would take any kind of work to meet. Our natural man also prefers to run with the pack, where he looks just like everyone else in the crowd and only attracts attention when he chooses to.

The wise man, on the other hand, understands that energy well-invested leads to rewards and that running with the crowd can send you straight off a cliff. He refuses to allow the thought of looking different, sounding different, or acting different to intimidate him.

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

PS: You can read more of my Meditations on the Word right here at TammyCardwell.net.

Oh goodness…

I just read one of the first entries a friend made in her new blog, My House, Decorating Tolkien Style. She plans to share decorating ideas for those who love Lord of the Rings and I have it on good authority (From some who have visited) that her home is fabulously Lord of the Ringsish. (Yeah, so it’s not a word. Sue me. [wink])

In today’s description of what she calls Elrond’s Chamber Room (Her son’s bedroom), she shared about Tatouage Designs a resource for tatouage - high resolution dry rub transfers. I am seriously drooling here, and hope hope hoping that some money can eventually be found for a few purchases. Their pieces are fabulous!

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

The word "no" can really stink, can’t it? We have a hard time saying it, sometimes because we’re wimps and sometimes because we flat out don’t want to…especially when we have to say it to ourselves.

I was just going to post a thank you for your prayers from yesterday’s request, but maybe… I keep reminding myself that I often learn best when watching others walk through things. So perhaps I should share?

I wrote an article last year. In fact, I referred to it not long ago: Too Busy? It’s about the bad habit my generation has of over-scheduling ourselves. The results of our too-filled schedules are, among other things, dangerous health (physical and mental) issues and that we are training our children that over-scheduling your life is the right thing to do. I wrote the article, yet a few days ago I realized I had fallen into the very same trap.

I had taken an extra job for the holidays, to help out around here, and that job turned into something permanent. This has proven to be a good thing since my husband’s health has been less than consistently good. But here’s the thing - I already HAD a full schedule. There are only two reasons I made it through the hectic holiday season as well as I did. 1. God, 2. I’d managed to get a little ahead at EHO, and 3. EHO doesn’t publish on January 1. (We’re a bi-weekly Internet magazine, so the pace is usually pretty constant.)

But, even so, things were slipping and I didn’t even know it. Late last week, for example, I realized I had a New Year’s picture book sitting in my office. I specifically requested this review copy so that I could publish the review mid-November, but I forgot all about it. I asked a reviewer to handle it quickly for me, and I’m publishing its review on February 1st. It’s still a great book that reveals snippets about the way different cultures celebrate a common day, but the point is that the review was meant to publish at a certain time and because I was distracted it didn’t. This upsets me. I do make mistakes; I’m hardly claiming to be perfect. It’s just that I know the root cause of this particular one and it hurts.

And then there’s my service to the church. It’s part job (I work in the office one day a week as secretary to our minister of music) and part my reasonable service as a "fitly joined together" member of our church body. I’ve unknowingly let several things slip through the cracks there over the past few months. None of them have created disasters, but they could have created some pretty tense situations. Fortunately for me, I’m surrounded by loving and forgiving people.

And then, I explained in the last post about how I spent most of Wednesday (when I kept my grandson) doing magazine work instead of playing with him. I’ve kept him one day a week since shortly after he was born (And he’s "awmost free" - translation: "almost three") specifically because I want to have the type of relationship with him that I had with my mother’s parents - read: close. But the type of "keeping" him that I did on Wednesday hardly leads to that.

So, having realized my problem, I went to God. He gave me my answer, but I didn’t like it and came here to ask for backup prayer, because surely there had to be another solution. Obviously, God’s answer didn’t change.

So I told my daughter-in-love that I have to give up my one day a week.

Like I said, saying "No" can be REALLY tough, especially when you have to say it to yourself. Logically, I know that I can take him any time I want and have time to give him the attention he deserves, even if it’s on a week day when he’s with the sitter, who really doesn’t live that far from me. Logically I know this was really the only regular thing I could give up, even though emotionally it stinks (Okay, so I’m tempted to use a stronger word than "stinks"). My other responsibilities really are regular, God-given callings I can’t walk away from; I understand this.

God called me to minister with and through EHO over ten years ago and, realistically, even if I wanted to leave I’m close to being irreplaceable. I don’t say that egotistically. Technically, any good editor could take over my job in a heartbeat. The problem is that any good editor, unless called by God to the position, would never consider it because we’re a volunteer organization. From the Editor-in-chief and down, we do our bi-weekly jobs as unto the Lord and in service to our fellow homeschoolers. Not many people are willing or able to do that. I am, which is a good thing, since it’s where I’m supposed to be.

What I do for my church… In theory, I could give up the one office day if God would let me. In practice, not only do we need the money, things being as they are right now, but for me to walk away from that would be to put a major cramp in the music ministry. I’ve been doing this job for so many years now that even I don’t know what all I do. When my supervisor asked me to make a list of my responsibilities a while back, I couldn’t do it. I had to start a perpetual list, instead, and I’m adding to it as I realize I’m doing yet one more of those things that I do without thinking about it.

And I’ve not even mentioned CJ Press, the publishing company God definitely told me to start, which sells - or should be selling - not only my ebooks and audio recordings, but electronic reprints from my antique collection. I’ve not mentioned it because I have had NO time to do anything with it. And you know what? The general rule is that if you aren’t promoting your business and your products, your products aren’t selling.

Trust me, if you are a homeschooler - if you are a Christian - I have a lot over there to offer you. Even most of what is written/recorded towards homeschoolers contains messages that are vital to Christians today, whether they homeschool or not, even if they don’t have children. For instance, the ebook A Homeschool that Handles the Hard Times and both of my audio recordings (We call them eWorkshops) teach principles that can make the difference between a strong family and one that falls apart under pressure. That may sound like a strong statement, but I say it confidently because everything I share is Scriptural truths I’ve seen proven in my own life and in those of other families. (In May, my dh and I will have been married 27 years.) And besides that, because they’re electronic products, I’ve been able to keep the prices really low.

Anyway, my point is that I’ve not mentioned CJP because I’ve had no time to even think about CJP. I even got so overwhelmed during the holidays that I had to cancel some things that would have benefited the company - read: hopefully increased sales.

No. Time.

So… To finally get to the bottom of this too-long blog entry…

Make sure you take time to reassess your own life periodically, because the overfilled schedule is not something that just appears out of the blue. It’s something you build over a period of time and then, worst case scenario, the day comes when you realize that your house of cards has come crashing down. Or, as I’ve said of myself before, you find that you’ve been semi-successfully juggling plates and made the mistake of adding that one-too-many with the result that several of them have just hit the floor.

Don’t wait for the crash.

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

PS: I know today was supposed to be "From the Archives," but that will have to wait until next week because 1) I felt this was more important and 2) I never had time to go dig in the archives anyway. I was too busy.

I’ve finally admitted to myself that I have too much on my plate. I don’t know about you, but I reach this place every few years (In the past, it was a LOT more often. LOL!) and when I do it’s time to step back and reassess my life in general and the things that fill it in particular.

See, I’ve reached the place where I’m not doing anything with excellence anymore. Well, that’s not totally true. I do well at my Bath & Body Works job because I go to work, do my job to the best of my ability, and leave. The problem is outside of that. My work for the magazine has suffered; two days ago I found a big messup I made that…well, I’ll deal, but I don’t like it. My work for the church music ministry has suffered; I don’t even want to think about all the things I’ve been forgetting to do lately. Even keeping my grandson one day a week has suffered; this week I was doing magazine work, trying to catch up, instead of playing with him or reading to him or doing whatever with him.

So, my friends, I would appreciate prayer for wisdom in this. I’ve got too much on me and, while I"m not afraid of cracking myself, things are definitely slipping through the cracks. Something has to give - meaning I have to give something up. I’m pretty sure I know what that something is going to have to be and I hate the idea. Of course…no matter what has to go I’ll hate it.

We all have to learn, and usually relearn on occasion, when to say no, first to ourselves and then to others. And oh man, it can be hard.

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

I’ve had some emailed questions about our floor plan, so I’ve finally gotten off my backside (Well, technically, I was on it while I worked on this.) and scanned a copy of the most current floor plan. We’ve actually made quite a few changes since I uploaded the last one.

Obviously, this graphic is a lot smaller than the one I uploaded earlier. I do have a large graphic on site, but my webmaster is the one who set the other up to link to the large graphic’s page. I, unfortunately, am too software illiterate to figure out how to do that and simply have to make it small enough to fit here. Sorry about that.

Anyway…

If you studied the previous floor plan (Yep, believe it or not, some of you did), you can see that I’ve given up 2 feet of my office in favor of the living area. It just made more sense, especially when we decided to take the office ceiling all the way to the roof and put in a sleeping loft. No, the loft doesn’t show in the plan, but the edge goes to just about under the dimensions and it stretches out over much of the porch (labeled "deck" on the plan).

Adding two feet to the living allowed us to extend the kitchen wall a bit so that people coming in the front door won’t be able to see all the way into the house (I was never comfy with that). It also gives us a living area that’s large enough that we might consider a small sofa or loveseat instead of two small chairs.

We’ve settled on putting the washer and dryer across the hall from each other instead of stacking them. This means we can use our existing washer and only have to buy a new dryer (The old one is gas and we’re going all electric. Anyone wanna buy a slightly used gas dryer? [grin]). It will also allow a hanging bar over the dryer and a supply cabinet over the washer, both of which are needed.

We’ve decided to use our clawfoot tub instead of buying something new; that explains the rather interesting wall in the bath - the tub was too long for the room as it was originally laid out, so we swiped a few inches from the bedroom closet.

Hm… I thought we’d done away with the pocket door plans, but I do know one pocket door came with our last order, so either my office or the bath will still have a pocket door. The other room will not. I can’t remember which is which right now.

The area that was going to be a makeup table for me, flanked by drawers, has turned into a second closet. Our contractor, assuming we’re able to come up with the money for the lumber, wants to build us a new water bed frame (Right. The dh is NOT letting go of our water bed.) so that we can put drawers under it.

I’ve been asked about a water heater. That little item is going in the attic, which is really large. The attic access will be in my sleeping loft. Right now it’s smack dab in the middle of what will be the living area. Yeah, not a good location at all, especially with 10′ ceilings; that makes for a looooooooooooooong ladder!

I’ve been asked about heating and cooling. The budget demands reusing our existing window units and floor heaters, so they’ve framed an area in the side wall of my office for one window unit and we’ll have units in both the master bedroom and living room windows. They tell me that this building will be well enough insulated that these three units should keep the house sufficiently cool in summer and still not give us too high of a light bill.

And to answer the flooring question: The entry and the two closets will be ceramic tile. The bath will be ceramic tile. The rest of the floor will be wood laminate. I actually, in an earlier post, gave a link to the laminate we bought. At this point, we’re running the numbers, trying to decide if we still need to buy one more box or if we have enough to squeak by. This is because we’d originally planned on using the sticky tile I bought for my office. Since we moved the office door into the living room, however, I want the same flooring in both rooms. The sticky floor tiles will go in the sleeping loft, for which we’d never purchased anything.

There. I think that covers all of the questions I’ve been asked lately.

Oh, except for the square footage question. I really need to change this category heading to "750 Square Feet," since that’s a more accurate square footage estimate now.

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

Okay, I admit it; I’m grateful for the cold.

I’d noticed in recent months that the smell of mold didn’t hit you in the face the second you walk in the door of our house (The one we’re living in now, of course.) In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that it’s so stinkin’ cold most of the time, I might actually spend time in rooms other than the master bedroom (The only room we’re able to consistently keep warm).

I realized that it has to be the cold hindering the mold’s growth when I noticed that it’s started showing up again in the master bedroom closet. Yeppers… [sigh] …the master closet, which we keep relatively warm. I’m not at all sure what I’m going to do if it gets any worse in there. I’ve already retreated from so many parts of this house that I don’t know where I could possibly move these clothes.

Still, for all that I’ve grumbled about it (When I get cold, I seem to stay cold), I do have to admit that I’m grateful for all the cold weather we’ve had. At least if the building of the new house has been delayed, the growth of the mold has too.

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

Good Company, my oldest son’s band, is at a TV studio this morning - Daystar, one of the Houston Christian stations - recording five songs. He says they’ll be plugged in when singers fail to show for a program or whatever. Is that serious cool?

And then, tomorrow and Saturday, The Access, my younger son’s band, will be in the recording studio recording their first album.

Mother’s grinning from ear to ear right now.

Celebrating Jesus! (And sons who use their God-given gifts)
Tammy C

Proverbs 1:16-18
For their feet run to evil, and make haste to shed blood. Surely in vain the net is spread in the site of any bird. And they lay wait for their own blood; they lurk privily for their own lives.

It is inevitable. They may seem to get away with their schemes for a time, but ultimately they bring terrible punishment on themselves. As Solomon put it, he who lays a trap for someone else falls into it himself. He may set an ambush for another man, but he is the one who will die.

Proverbs 1:19
So are the ways of every one that is greedy of gain; which taketh away the life of the owners thereof.

Right. Anyone who is greedy enough to kill someone else in order to gain their belongings is destined to face a terrible end. According to verse 18, they cannot plan terrible things for others without facing those things themselves.
    Yeah, say, "No" and get away from them as quickly as possible.

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

PS: You can read more of my Meditations on the Word right here at TammyCardwell.net.