Bright lights

My cousin, Lezlee, is having another party over at her place. Lezlee is extremely gifted in repurposing. She blows me away. In fact, I'm just plain jealous of her talent.

Back to her party. People show how they've repurposed stuff in their blogs and link to her blog.

Not too long ago Lezlee posted a picture of her guest room with a fun birdcage she turned into a wall lamp.

I don't have any nifty birdcages around the place, but I do have something else that I made into a lamp. I had planned to make it a fish bowl, but realized that I would probably just kill the fish. I don't have a good reputation with fish. My family makes fun of my inability to keep fish alive. Every time I get a strong urge to get a fish I remind myself that I have a creek full of fish. It's also full of turtles and snakes, but I try not to think about the snakes. So here is a picture of my repurposed lamp.

Mine Fields

Yesterday we had a training day out at Coventry.

One of our exercises was to walk our partner through a mine field with only our voice. The partner was blindfolded. I did NOT want to guide anyone. I don't think I'm a good guider. And when they called on me I begged them not to. Yeah, that worked.

So, they blindfolded my partner and I began to freak out a bit. I had chill bumps.

They added a twist. Everyone that wasn't on the mine field made noise. My partner had to concentrate on my voice and I had to stay close to her so she could hear my voice. And I had to stay calm.

I was doing okay until someone started twisting a plastic bottle. That's when I was ready to flatten someone! It was weird. They were putting my partner in danger and I was on the verge of taking them out, but I had to stay focused on her and remain steady.

The point of the exercise was to understand how many of our participants feel all the time. They are constantly bombarded with distractions because of how their brains function.

What got me was how inadequate I felt to guide and how protective I felt about my partner. I was wanting to yell at the person with the bottle that if they didn't stop making that awful noise I was going to hurt them. But, inside me I knew that probably wasn't a good idea.

One of the cool things about Coventry volunteers is that we all get that all of us are special needs in some way or the other. We all have situations or physical difficulties that make us function differently, that cloud our thinking sometimes. Now we get it a little bit more.

And, if you want to take it in a traditional spiritual direction: We have to concentrate on God's voice when we're walking through our mine fields. The great news for us is that He will always be at our elbow and He will always be calm.

Missy

This is Missy. She left her family and friends last week after living a very fun and full life.

My kids, mainly Clay, were her sitters over the last few years.

Missy was a funny dog. Even after she had gone pretty blind she still knew exactly where to go and stand for her treat when she came in from doing her business outside.

And sometimes she was funny about doing her business outside. She didn't like to get her feet wet, so she would try to avoid the wet grass. Or she would pretend that she had done everything and want you to let her back inside. But, if you stood your ground, she would get to it so she could get back inside and get her treat. She liked her treats.

One of her favorite things to do was play hide and seek with Clay. Oh, she would make me laugh. She would hide under the coffee table which might have worked if it hadn't had a glass top.

There was the season she decided that she only wanted to sleep in the bathtub. Her mother had put something like a blanket in the tub and Missy jumped on it like a junebug and claimed it to be hers. She used it to scare us to death. We couldn't find her. She had completely buried herself under the blanket.

Missy was picky about her toys. Once she had a favorite, none other would do. There was the hamburger toy. Her parents tried to switch it once with an identical toy. Didn't work. She demanded her old one.

She was a sweet, sweet heart and dearly loved, but it was time for her to say good-bye. She had lived a very full and fun life.