WOW

Wow, look what they're giving away at 5 Minutes for Mom!!!!!!!!!




Oooh I want to win that! I'm sure you do too! If so, just visit the 5 Minutes for Mom blog, leave a comment, and link to the post about the giveaway.

How to Help a Grieving Friend

My July book for the Non-Fiction Five Challenge was How to Help a Grieving Friend by Stephanie Grace Whitson. I started to read Word Freak for my July book but it was just too long and very interesting in parts and not in others and I just can't finish it. So I'm going to have to pick a new book for my fifth one of the challenge, if that's okay, Joy? I know it's a challenge but with all that's gone on in my life this past month I just can't muster up the energy to slog through a book I don't really care for.

Anyway, funny that I picked the book I did when I made my initial list. I am the grieving friend right now. Probably less than an hour after I wrote my last post last Sunday about my crocheting, I got "the call" that I knew was coming at some point. My sister called to say my mom wasn't doing well. My mom passed away the next day, Monday, July 9. I actually read the book Wednesday or Thursday of this past week (it's a really short book).

I really liked the book and recommend it to anyone. It will help you know what to do and what not to do when someone is grieving. Stephanie lost her best friend and both parents within a short time of each other, but most of the book is how she dealt with the grief of losing her husband of 27 years 5 years later. So my feelings aren't exactly the same as hers, losing my mom is incredibly hard of course but losing a spouse is a whole other ballgame I think.

There is one thing she said not to do that I disagree with. She said "Skip inviting our family to organized family events for awhile. They are just too hard. We don't feel like a family anymore." I would just change that to something like please invite us but please understand if we don't feel up to coming. That way the grieving person can make the decision whether or not to attend something.

I learned quite a bit about what to do and not to do through my own grief this week.

-Send a card! Send a card. Send a card. It's something simple but means so much.
-If you don't know what to say, a hug and I'm so sorry is enough, it means a lot. You don't have to have any elegant words.
-Bring over a plate of cookies, a pint of ice cream, some simple meals like buns and lunch meat, anything little like that is appreciated. "Comfort food" was what we all seemed to crave.
-Offer to watch someone's young kids if they have any. I had some neighbors who came through for me big time with my 2 little ones. I can't thank them enough.
-Any little thing you can think of to bless someone is appreciated. My hairdresser not only came in early one day so I could have a fresh haircut for the funeral, but she didn't charge me for the cut and style. That was a huge blessing.

I know I have probably missed many opportunities to bless a grieving friend or family member. I feel so bad about that. You don't have to even be really close to the deceased or to the survivors, a card still means a lot. You may already know this but I guess I was pretty clueless - I always felt like unless I knew the deceased personally, I didn't need to attend the visitation and/or funeral. But I realize now that if I know one of the survivors, I should still attend for just a little while if possible, and if not, again SEND A CARD.

I hope you don't mind my putting my own thoughts out there relating to the subject of the book.

Crocheting again

I got the crochet bug again! When I started this blog I was in the mood for crocheting (hence the "Hooks" in the name of my blog). I learned to crochet about 10 years ago and crocheted A LOT for about 5-7 years. I crocheted a few afghans for Lindsey (first of 2 beautiful, wonderful, sweet, little girls adopted from China) while we were waiting for her. Once she came home I finished an afghan I had started for myself, but then haven't done a whole lot of crocheting since (hmmm, 2 little girls, age 4 and 1, plus a husband and a teenager, plus my love of reading - wonder why my crochet time has been so minimal????? LOL). I did crochet an afghan for Allison while waiting for her to come home.

Anyway the other day I was straightening up the living room and saw the afghan I made for myself on the back of the couch....

...and I decided, I want to get into crocheting again! We recently put up a swingset for the girls and I can crochet in between pushing them on their swings (as well as other times of course). I made this dishcloth* while doing just that...

...and also this....

It's a toilet paper cover, a little old fashioned but I like it!

So the last few days I've been going through my zillion patterns and picking out some more things I want to make. I hope I have more pics of finished items to post in the coming weeks.

Anyone else into books AND hooks? :-)

*I really don't even like using crocheted dishcloths. LOL They fade really quickly and I prefer to use a regular cloth. But they're easy and quick to make.

June Reads

JUNE READS

FICTION

-Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler, 4
-This Heavy Silence by Nicole Mazzarella, 4
-The Other Side of the Bridge by Mary Lawson, 4 **

NON-FICTION

-The Color of Water by James McBride, 3.75
-Bryson City Secrets by Walt Larimore, 3

**Favorite book of the month

(Ratings on a scale of 1-5)

Velvet Elvis

Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell is my June book for the Non-Fiction Five Challenge. I loved it! I agreed with so much of, if not everything, he wrote. I like his philosophy on what a Christian is and does and what the church is. A Christian follows the teachings of Jesus! Duh, sounds obvious, but I don't think that is emphasized enough. I really want to do an in-depth study of the Gospels and apply more of what Jesus taught to my life. I am still studying misc. verses/chapters using the methods in Rick Warren's Bible Study Methods book. I'm only on the third method and using the "assignments" he gives for what to study. I think I'm going to change that to just studying the Gospels using the different methods.

I am not a great book reviewer but I will share some of my favorite quotes from the book:

"Somebody recently told me, "As long as you teach the Bible, I have no problem with you." Think about that for a moment. What that person was really saying is, "As long as you teach my version of the Bible, I'll have no problem with you." And the more people insist that they are just taking the Bible for what it says, the more skeptical I get."

"I have heard people say their church is growing because they "just teach the Bible". As if other churches don't."

"We have to embrace the Bible as the wild, uncensored, passionate account of people experiencing the living God."

"Jesus is the arrangement. Jesus is the design. Jesus is the intelligence. For a Christian, Jesus' teachings aren't to be followed because they are a nice way to live a moral life. They are to be followed because they are the best possible insight into how the world really works. They teach us how things are."

"Oftentimes the Christian community has sent the message that we love people and build relationships in order to convert them to the Christian faith. So there is an agenda. And when there is an agenda, it isn't really love, is it? It's something else. We have to rediscover love, period. Love that loves because it is what Jesus teaches us to do. We have to surrender our agendas."

Those are just a few of my favorite quotes, there were many more. Rob Bell also has a series of short videos where he talks about many of the things he wrote about in this book. We are watching them at our small group Bible study. They are excellent. They are called Nooma videos.

Note to the 2 or 3 people who read this blog: My mom was recently diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and we don't have much time left with her. So I probably won't be posting much this summer. Please check in once in awhile anyway! I will check in with your blogs when I can.

I don't usually quit at this point....

I was reading the book All the Numbers by Judy Merrill Larsen. I wasn't loving it but I liked it well enough. But I got about halfway through (HALFWAY!) and I realized I really didn't care what happened to anyone in the book anymore. Sounds horrible since the book is about an 11 year old boy who gets killed by a jet ski that got too close to shore, and the family dealing with their loss. (That's not a spoiler, it says as much on the back cover) So I feel bad in a weird way, that I don't care, but I just lost interest. So it's on to the next book....This Heavy Silence by Nicole Mazzarella. Wonder if I'll finish that one...:-)

(One of these days I will post a list of all the books I've started but not finished this year, there are quite a few. I am not one who will finish a book no matter what.)

May Reads

FICTION

-Inkheart by Cornelia Funke, 3.5
-Perfecting Kate by Tamara Leigh, 3.75
-The Myth of You and Me by Leah Stewart, 4.0
-The Amateur Marriage by Anne Tyler, 4.25
-Winter Wheat by Mildred Walker, 4.25
-Black Ice by Linda Hall, 4.5 **
-Cage of Stars by Jacquelyn Mitchard, 4.25

NON-FICTION

-A World of Love by Maggie Conroy, 3.0
-Winterdance by Gary Paulsen, 3.0

**Favorite book of the month

(Ratings on a scale of 1-5)