Today I'm linking up for One Word Advent with Bonnie of Faith Barista . Our writing prompt for this week is LOVE . Oh that word love! As a young woman, my mother told me I was in love with love. You know, the romance; flowers, soft music, candlelit dinners. It was the ideal I had in my head. But life happens and love didn't always live up to that vision.  It became easy to cover my heart to shield it from any possible further pain.  But God's love is different.  Maybe you know the verse from 1 Corinthians 13 as love is described.  Love is pat…

What is the one most important thing our society needs?  This is the question posed in the movie Miss Congeniality  starring Sandra Bullock. Listen to the answers from the beauty pageant contestants. (If you cannot view video, click here ) It seems that every time I turn on the television to watch the news there is another ALERT . A horrific bombing, a shooting, terrorism, hate groups. While many are bent on destruction, most in our society would claim to desire ... world peace. But is that really possible in our world today? I am linking up with Bonnie of …

I was in the habit of counting my every day blessings on Heart Choices. In fact, I'd recorded more than 1,000 blessings but somehow I got out of the habit. I decided it's time to start writing them down again. Being thankful changes my perspective. Instead of viewing my life through the lens of what's wrong, it causes me to notice all that's good. Over my Thanksgiving break, I was able to travel to Florida to visit my family. My dad will be celebrating his 87th birthday. My siblings' families are growing with grandchildren and I didn…