Be Encouraged

 

Dandelion Summer ~ a book review

 

Dandelion Summer by Lisa Wingate is a book that I will not soon forget.

This is #4 in the Blue Sky Hill series and with this being the first book that I've read by this author, I had not read the first three books, but it did stand well on its own.

The story primarily deals with two individuals,

J. Norman Alvord, who is a man in his 70s who is retired from his work at Cape Canaveral.  

Epiphany Jones is a 16-year-old girl whose father was black and her mother Italian.  Her mother's family, who owned and operated an upscale Italian restaurant, disowned her when she became involved with Epiphany's father and then had Epiphany.  

"J. Norm", as Epiphany refers to him throughout the book, is a widower, just having lost his wife a few months prior to the story's beginning.  His daughter, with whom he did not have a good relationship, is concerned about his safety and has been trying to persuade him to give up his home and move into an assisted living facility.

When J. Norm doesn't agree to the plan, Deborah agrees to hire someone to come to the house one day a week to do the cleaning and prepare a meal for her dad.  He finally begrudgingly consents to that arrangement.

Shortly thereafter is when Epiphany enters into the story. She's had a very unstable life because of her mother's indiscretion with men.  For a time, they had lived in another part of Texas, and they had lived with an older woman who had taken Epiphany under her wing, giving her a lot of good wisdom and taking her to church.  When they moved to the current location where this story takes place, Epiphany had to start in a new school where she was constantly bullied by the other pupils because she was of a mixed race.

In time, Epiphany went to work for J. Norm and little by little they became great friends.  He became like a grandfather to Epiphany, as she helped him to try and solve the mystery of his childhood because of some reoccurring dreams he had.

I enjoyed this book immensely because it dealt with social issues that in today's culture, I feel gets overlooked.  In reading Epiphany's story, it caused me to think about things that I hadn't really dwelt much on before...

things like what a child who is bullied goes through, and how the actions of parents can set their children up for hard times.

Definitely recommend...especially if you like surprise endings.  

Rustic Ratatouille

 

This has become one of our favorite meals/side dishes.

The recipe came from Jan at The Low Carb Diabetic blog.

Oh, my goodness!

You seriously need to try this if you enjoy roasted vegetables!

While I wasn't able to acquire the fennel bulb,

I added diced parsnips in its place.

If you enlarge the picture, you will see

eggplant, zucchini, red peppers, yellow peppers, grape tomatoes, onions and garlic!

The recipe calls for fresh basil which I did not have,

so, I used dried.

I found this recipe probably six weeks or so ago

and we've already had it four times!

Yes, it's that good!

Please pop over and say hello to Jan.

She's such a delightful person and posts wonderful recipes.

When the Negative Becomes the Positive ~ Resilience

 Our prompt for this month from Lisa was to think about our One Word for 2025 in relation to its synonyms and antonyms.

As you may remember, if you have followed along with me this year, my One Word for 2025 is Resilience.  I'd done a listing of synonyms at the beginning of the year and thought it would be fun to just recheck both synonyms and antonyms and see if I have experienced any of the words on the lists. 

I wanted to take you along with me on this journey...so let's begin.

DEFINITION OF RESILIENCE: "the ability to withstand or adjust to challenges" (according to Merriam-Webster)

SYNONYMS: strength, tenacity, power, doggedness, potency, persistence, stubbornness, grit, perseverance, fortitude.

ANTONYMS:  weakness, helplessness, dependence, inadequacy.

First and foremost, I want to stress the fact that while I have gained strength these last three months, it's not been my strength, but rather God's strength.  The opposite of strength is weakness, and THAT is what I lay claim to as my own, for without it, I would not know HIS strength.

Without really sharing personal experiences (for isn't that where we learn our most valuable lessons?), I've learned that in my times of helplessness, once again, the power I needed was not my own, but HIS.  

I've learned that acquiring resilience definitely requires persistence and to be fair, that does require a bit of stubbornness (which I plead guilty to when it is necessary).  Where do I acquire such persistence?  It can only come through my dependence on HIM.  It's the same with perseverance.  I found that I can only persevere through dependence on HIM.

Developing resilience definitely requires fortitude, because I quickly learned that what I have to offer is inadequacy apart from HIM.  

Most of what I am learning about resilience is that it is a gift from my Heavenly Father...and my growth in that area is gauged by how much I depend on HIM.