Thinking on those things that are good

 

How you think is how you live... and when life is tough, thinking on those things that are good, and pure will influence if you are just surviving or thriving! 

It is so easy to think negatively about your experiences but it will definitely help you in coming out of the Pit of Despair. 

It's easy to become entrapped in that Pit but it is difficult to free onself. But it's not impossible.

Keeping close to the LORD through reading the Word, praying and worshiping is key to overcoming morbid introspection, overthinking, discouragement and sadness.

With God's help, we are to bring negative thoughts in to the captivity of Christ by the renewing of our mind. And of course, that begins with thoughts we are thinking...

By being immersed in the Word and prayer, we will learn what thoughts are from God or what are from the evil one. We know thoughts that lead us to better ourselves and repentance, can help us overcome sadness are become godly. And of course, we know which ones are not- for they do the opposite.

We can learn that the Holy Spirit will convict us of any sin and lead us into repentance and joy in our salvation. Consequently, we learn that the evil one condemns us and leads us further into self-condemnation and grief and anguish.

Our whole life and enjoyment in it come from closeness to God, discernment of godly repentance opposed to condemnation and keeping our thoughts in the captivity of Christ.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

 

Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. -Philippians 4:8

Not with little sparrows

 

Lately I have been feeling a bit down and today it looked like more sadness was in store for me.

Our cat Xena was outside sunning herself. Chris noticed that she had something in her mouth and called out to me.

To my horror, it was a little brown sparrow. And Xena was determined not to let it go. She ran from me as I frantically called her and tried to get her to drop it.

Finally she dropped the quivering bird and I quickly picked it up. It didn't look too damaged, but there was some blood on its neck.

Knowing sparrows usually die from a shock, I called out to God and asked Him to spare it. I didn't want to take it inside the house, as it would undoubtedly add to its' stress. 

Cupping it with my hands to give it some feeling of safety, I walked up the back of the garden and put it gently down in the bushes. 

Unsure if it would make it. I lingered near it in case Xena came back for her prey. She was pretty ticked off with me for taking her catch off her.

I bent down to examine it for injuries and I thought it had passed. Then I saw it blink. As I got closer, it was quivering...

After a few minutes, I checked its leg and put it on its feet and quick as a flash, it flew up and over the fence away from me.

Immediately I gave thanks to God for answering my prayer and saving the bird. It gave me confidence as I remembered that God knows even when a little sparrow falls to the ground.

Its life is even important to God and we are worth far more than a sparrow.

And another light note to finish this post on- I managed to move pretty fast when it was needed... another thing to be grateful for.  It wouldn't have had a chance if I hadn't acted quickly.

I guess Xena will come round when she's hungry tonight. She knows Mum will always feed her.. just not with little sparrows...

 © Glenys Robyn Hicks

   

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. -Matthew 10:29-31

Out of my comfort zone.

I am so exhausted right now. We have just moved house and as expected, I have welcomed a new fibromyalgia flare.

Having fibromyalgia for 23 years, I knew it would end like this, but in life some things are unavoidable and you just have to go with it.

So I sit here writing to you, trying to wind down enough to actually fall asleep. I have succeeded in making the home functional but there's much to still be done.

It will have to wait until tomorrow. As long as I have clean clothes for tomorrow and some clean cups and plates, it will have to suffice.

I hate moving so much, but I do love the house we have moved to and I am hoping the next tenants feed the birds and stray feral cat who comes to dine. I will miss them.

Wednesday I need to go to our doctor, so we will hand the keys in to the real estate then. Then they can inspect it and show prospective tenants through.

It looked lovely after the cleaners had been yesterday and the carpet cleaner's spray was perfumed so nicely. It was hard work for me to get to this point, but as I said, it was necessary. 

I cleaned and packed like a pro and we expect to get our bond or security money back with no problems. My muscles are so weak now but I think the results of my effort should pay off even though I was out of my comfort zone. 

 

On the move again!

We have been busy looking for another home to rent. It's been a nightmare. There aren't many homes to rent and when we apply, we are vying with about 20 other people for the same home.

Most days we have to go to look at these houses and as we are in the country, it is at least an hour's drive each day. I am exhausted.

So much exhaustion is hard to take, especially when it brings on a fibromyalgia flare. But as in lots of things in life, it just has to be done.

I think the most stressful part is actually securing a property to move in to. The actual move is not so bad, and this time we will be paying my grandson to help us move.

With the fifth wheel and tow vehicle sold, we are in a position to get someone to do the move for us and it's especially important with our failing health to enlist help this time.

We are going to miss the birdlife here for sure, but with us being in our 70's, we have decided that we need to be closer to family and hospitals if we have an emergency.

This house is old and has no insulation and is incredibly cold and it's our winter now. With the price of electricity going up on July first, we won't be able to afford the heating in our all electric dwelling.

We are feeling the cold and are looking forward to ducted heating again.

Today there's no house viewings as it's Saturday. I have used the time to catch up on washing and I have two slow cookers going with different meals in them.

I am contemplating using Prednisolone for a few days so that my neck and jaw pain (TMJ) abates. I don't know if it will help my muscle pain in my shoulder and upper pain, but it can't hurt.

Today is the first day for awhile that I have been able to post as my muscles feel like they're tearing. But I just wanted to touch base and tell you what's happening in our part of the world at the moment.

Next week is another day of house hunting and tonight I feel like I am running on a wing and a prayer- on the move again!

 

We just have to embrace it

We have been looking for another house closer to family. We have applied for one yesterday and had a phone call from the real estate this morning which sounded positive. 

Our fiver got to South Australia to its new owner and they rang us to tell us how pleased they were with it. So that's good. 

We are taking our GMC Sierra to the mechanic for a good overhaul Monday and then we will decide what we will do with it. Over here they are seen as a luxury ute and we think a young buck would love it. That's what we are hoping. 

My twin and son and granddaughter continue to recover from Covid but are still very much under the weather with it. 

I am convinced that our prayers have helped keep my twin. She's so many serious health issues such as lupus and I was afraid for her. 

I have done a load of washing, cleaned my kitchen and am about to make some lunch.  I have a flare of fibromyalgia again and my spoons are nearly all gone.  I will be  taking a nana nap soon.

With an imminent move, I am not looking forward to the energy output, however I am looking forward to being nearer family.

I will miss the birds and our feral cat who is gradually becoming less timid as we feed him. We have named him Teddy Bear as his face is surrounded by bushy fur and he is gingery brown and looks like a teddy.

But I know in  life that one rarely gets everything one wants and so we have weighed up staying or moving. We have decided that we want to be closer to family, particularly our daughter who has had leukaemia.

With a bird bath/feeder and garden swing to take with us, we will continue to feed the birds as we watch from the swing in the garden.

It's true what they say: nothing is sure except death and taxes. Life is full of change. We just have to embrace it.

Another day at the beach

So we were watching the birds coming down for the seed and bread and I grabbed my phone and did a short video.

As you can see, the beautiful coloured small parrots came down in droves, making it a lovely afternoon at The Beach aka the couch.

With pacing and resting during fibromyalgia flares, I find the beauty of nature helps to lift my spirits and give me some peace.

I thought if I shared it, it might brighten your day. By the way, although the sound's not great, could you hear Xena crying "Mum!"? She badly wanted me to allow her to go outside.

I couldn't risk it as she would most likely attack the birds or at the least, frighten them. We don't want anything to jeophardise the possibility of another day at The Beach! 

The downside of country life

So  the other night I was going into my bathroom when I noticed this huntsman on the frame near the door. My heart nearly stopped!

Walking into the bathroom, I must have passed close to this horrid spider who could easily have jumped on my head and such is my fear of spiders, it possibly would have killed me in a cardiac event brought on by fear!

Not an overly big spider by huntsman standards, he would have been about 3 inches across. But he was big enough to induce panic in us as we scurried to find a broom and the fly spray!

I didn't want to lose this guy as we wouldn't know where we would find him, so there was a great over use of flyspray and frantic loud bangs of the broom. Suffice it to say, he got a burial at sea!

It is said that they come in pairs, so we were watching everywhere until his mate was found. And she was...

I was in the adjacent laundry and found her sunning herself on the glass panel in the back door. I grabbed my flyspray and went to spray it, but then realised that she was outside the door. She too had to be gone because I didn't want her coming in the house. I'd had enough excitement with her mate's intrusion.

A few sprays of the flyspray had her on the move, and a few heavy thumps of the broom, and she was no longer. Except for food for the birds and ants. 

Indeed, I had to chuckle at how fast I moved, considering my two damaged knees and fibromyalgia. It's marvellous what an adrenaline rush can do for a body! 

Not only did the fear of losing the huntsman to perchance come back to terrorise me, rattle me, but so did realising that I had married a man who refused to rescue me from dangerous wildlife! Such was my expectation of my knight in shining armour! :)

Don't get me wrong: I still love living here in the Australian bush with my liver-lilied Chris,  but snakes and huntsmen are definitely the downside of country life.

You wouldn't see June Cleaver doing that!

 

So today was a productive day. Apart from doing a few loads of washing, I had enough spoons to prepare some meals to freeze for during the week.

I confess I had a nana nap at "The Beach" aka the couch as the sun was shining and gave a beautiful warmth as I listened to the birds calling through the screen door.

Six more meals have been added to my freezer and I can say that it seems to be working out for me. I don't worry about cooking desserts- I usually serve some fruit with a scoop of icecream or a banana split. Easy.

With fibromyalgia  and other ailments making it difficult to achieve much, I can't tell you how pleased I am with my efforts today.

I feel quite the Homemaker and Chris is pleased as well. Only question is: does it still count if I did all this in my nightie? You wouldn't see June Cleaver doing that!

My eternal quest

 

I slept well last night but still had no spoons to speak of. After a morning of minimal chores, I sat down next to Chris to watch the birds coming to eat the food I had thrown out for them.

Because of my heart failure, my feet and legs are up like balloons and Chris rubs them for me to help move the fluid up towards my heart. With neuropathy from my diabetes, he rubs my toes to move the blood around and help the circulation. It is heavenly.

Suddenly, I heard sonorous sounds that woke me up: to my horror, it was me snoring! Chris just laughed when he saw that I had woken myself up and suggested I try to get some more sleep before lunch. But the moment was lost and I got up and made some grilled toasties for our lunch.

I soaked the few dishes in hot soapy water, removed a small leg of lamb from the freezer, did some computer work and fell asleep at the screen. So I went for a nana nap as that's the only thing I can do with a fibromyalgia flare.

After I napped, I put the lamb on to roast and completed the dishwashing. We ate dinner and Chris cleared up the kitchen. We took our night medications and Chris watched TV while I blogged.

And so, here I sit, talking to you and longing for my bed again. I had no joy today finding some spoons and it may well be that tomorrow I will be pursuing my search again- it is my eternal quest.

It's gonna be a PJ's day.

 

The rain is pouring down but it's not cold just pleasantly warm after the last few days of summer heat. Xena is still asleep on my bed.

Chris is watching TV and I have got the breakfast dishes soaking in hot soapy water. The house is tidy and cosy. Life is good.

I woke up early and left Chris to sleep. I heard the birds calling each other and watched as my beloved Kingfishers came down searching for some left over sausage among the rice dish I put out for them last night.

Carefully opening the sliding door that opens onto the decking where they congregate waiting for me to feed them, they sat only inches away from me. Gradually they are coming closer to feeding from my hand. 

The washing machine is churning away at the load of clothes I am washing. I try to do a load a day so as not to use up all my spoons in one hit, folding them and putting them away. 

People with fibromyalgia would understand the need to pace oneself in order to achieve some completion of household tasks. There's so much job satisfaction in even doing one load of washing and putting it away. 

I have some steak thawing for dinner tonight. I am planning on cooking a vegetable intensive beef stew.

With the cooler weather and rain, the menu begs for a stew...

I still haven't changed out of my pajamas and it's 1pm but I don't really care. We aren't going anywhere and I am feeling pretty laid back and a tad achy. It's the change in weather.

It was a pretty slow but pleasant morning with Chris making me some breakfast and a cup of tea. The panadol is kicking in helping me with the aches and pains of fibromyalgia that's reacting to the weather change, but I am glad to report that it's not a fibro flare per se.

So in spite of aches and pains, I am feeling pretty good today, but even so, it's gonna be a PJ's day. 

Our little haven

 

So yesterday was a day of horrible fibromyalgia pain and fatigue. I felt a little down so I came to my couch and sat next to Chris for a cuddle and rest. 

We love feeding the birds that come into our back garden and all through the day, our garden is like an airport. Birds of all types come to dine and drink and it is so restful and fun to watch them.

They have their own little antics and natures and they can be quite amusing. And apart from watching their different natures and antics they have something else that we find very attractive: they have babies.

It's such fun to watch the mothers feeding their babies and to watch the babies venture further and further from her as they learn to feed themselves. They fly but are still juvenile and yesterday their mothers were distancing themselves from their chicks and refusing to feed them, much to their annoyance. 

The magpie juveniles are especially raucous and squawk even with food in their mouth. They are almost always feeding. The minor bird mummy also is weaning her chicks from her and as soon as she moves away, they follow like the duckling family juveniles do. So fun to watch.

But by far, my favourite birds are the Kingfishers which have also had babies. Whilst laying on the couch, I can see outside and I was delighted to see a mother Kingfisher with one of her three babies on our garden swing.

They were watching the porch which was covered in birdseed for the galahs and rosellas. I had thrown out some cut up luncheon meat, and they were waiting for the magpies to vacate the porch so that they could dine. Kingfishers are shy and besides, magpies are three times their size. So they wait.

It is the season for little white cabbage moths too. They are flying around the agapanthus plants and I guess they are mating because they seem to be in pairs. As are the pigeons that come for the seed.

There are three that regularly call in and partake of the parrot seed on the ground. There's a little female who just wants to eat, but there also is an amorous male who has romance on his mind. He pursues her constantly and hopes to make her his by dancing for her. 

He fans out his tail feathers and hops towards her, then takes a few steps back. He repeats this courting gesture until she tires of him and runs a few feet away. But he is insistent and pursues her over and over again. I hope that he wins her heart as it is such fun to  watch the young birds as they leave the nest under their mothers supervision.

We have a bird bath/feeder in the back garden which we used to fill with seed, but now with torn meniscuses in both knees, I cannot get down the steps to fill it, so they get fed from the back sliding glass door. I just toss the food onto the back porch. They don't care where it is. 

They are quite used to me now and I have them almost eating out of my hand. So much so that as soon as I open the door, they come flying in to the garden from all directions, calling each other.

We have water in the bird feeder and in a plastic container in front of the steps. They bathe and drink and sing and they enjoy our back garden as much as we do.

It's a lovely place to recoup one's spoons during a fibromyalgia flare. The daily scenes are so peaceful and we love our little haven and we know the birds think of it as their haven as well. Their constant visits and frequent broods of chicks speaks of a place of plentiful food, water and safety.

We are grateful God lead us to this little country town- it is a gift from Him: our little haven

What a drenching!

There's nothing nicer than being in bed listening to the rain on a tin roof. Especially if you don't have to go out in it...

L

I took this picture from our back door just after I fed some bread to the birds that frequent our garden. I love the smell of the rain! We are getting some relief from the heat with a top temperature forecast for 21C or 69.8F. 

It was my plan to go to church this morning, but with all the storm activity yesterday my fibromyalgia's flaring and I honestly can't make it. Hopefully, next Sunday will be better.

Usually, I listen to the Bible on You Tube and worship and rest at home when I can't go. Which is often, unfortunately. 

I will be hanging up the clothes I took out to wear there this morning. Later on I will cook some curried sausages in the slow cooker, which is my favourite way of cooking when I am in a flare.

There are a few dishes in the sink soaking in hot soapy water as per Sylvia's Sunday List. I will attend to them later on after I have had a rest. 

It isn't ideal that I am seeking to go back to bed so early in the day, but such is the life of a chronically ill person. I no longer feel any false guilt over it like I did in the early days of finding out what my new normal would be.  I can only get through this flare by resting...

So list of to do's today:

1. Hang up clothes
2. Set slow cooker going with sausages for dinner
3. Rest

And last but not least, I will be rejoicing as more rain falls giving our parched land a drenching!