My Mother's Bible, Art During the Storm and a Phone Call From Finland......

 My friend Jutta lives in Finland and when I am waking up to start my day, she is on the tail end of hers since there's a 7 hour time difference between us.

I pray for her as she is praying for me.

And today we heard each other's voice.

I woke early - for me - before 8:00.

 First I pray for a few minutes before looking at my phone.

I know in my heart that God is the very first one I should speak to in the mornings.

I nearly always have a text from Jutta to start my day.

She and I met for the very first time in Galveston on Sunday, November 22nd, 2015 after having 'met' on my blog. We have been friends for a long time now and she has visited us twice now. We talk and plan for when I might go to Finland someday to visit her and her family.

So it was so special to talk to each other this morning for a few minutes - she in Finland walking home from the store and I in my girl bunk at the ranch. It's like magic!

I was up before Louis Dean and was so surprised to greet a chilly rainy Monday.

I did not look at the weather forecast so there was a change of plans for today.

We bring our Bible Basket with us from home with all our reading and devotional books and a Bible, of course. We just finished reading through Genesis to Revelation so for the next month or two we are reading Psalms and Proverbs.

Instead of bringing one of my large heavy Bibles, I brought one of my mother's.

It's smaller and obviously well read and it makes me feel good to hold it in my hands.

The one I've been using for the last 2 years and 3 months is one I gave to her in the 70's.

She bought this one herself.

I love how she wrote the dates on the front page.

She read this Bible well and used a red pen for most of her markings.

I also found a photo of Summer and Trish together as well as a few other pieces of ephemera.

I have many Bibles and I suppose my favorite one is an old Scofield Study Bible. I still read it sometimes but it is fragile now after all these years.

All my Bibles are old now and I will be buying a new one when I turn 75 - which will most likely be the last Bible I will 'break in.'

No gardening work for us today!

When it wasn't raining, it was storming!

A good day to do some art!

I started out with some rock painting ......

before I based in a canvas board with a hummingbird scene for Louis Dean.

This is from his calendar and he asked me to paint it for him.

(Too bad later on this evening as I was setting it on a shelf to dry, I dropped it paint side down on the dirty rug! )

I'm painting a sunflower and honey bee on Canvas paper.....

and now it's all based in and will be ready to paint when we get back down here next month,

My last project was the flag and cross for my friend, Tim.

I struggle more with paintings for others......for myself I do just fine but when it's something specific for someone else....it's like I forget how to paint.

We were under a tornado warning tonight and severe thunderstorms and lightning and WIND but I painted my way through it.

All is calm now and the art table has been cleared away.

Instead of fighting my paint, I scooped up what I could save and stored it neatly on palette paper in the freezer and it will be ready to paint when I come back in April!