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5 Wholesome Things I Learned in June

June 30, 2019June 30, 2019

We are halfway through 2019! Can you believe it? And as has been true for each month this year, I’m here to recap my wholesome ‘finds’ from the last few weeks. May they bless you or, at the very least, entertain you, for you are probably wiser than me and already know any bit of everyday wisdom I can share!

First, I’ll start with my most recent revelation, which is that in my early 20s, I had horrible taste in movies. I didn’t especially like Rocky, I thought Jerry Maguire was unconditionally wonderful, and I was bored silly by The Quiet Man, a classic made in 1952 and starring none other than America’s most famous actor, John Wayne. The infantile film critic in me was uncovered when I watched each film for the second time this month – the first two on a flight to Denver, CO, for a memorial service, and the last one with my husband and our kids in preparation for our upcoming family trip to Ireland. Now the kids finally know who John Wayne is (can you imagine not knowing!?! ha!), and I am questioning how fully developed my frontal lobe really was when I was 23. You should try this same exercise. Re-watch the films you once hated and loved. You might surprise yourself.

Next, if you’ve got teenagers, you know it can be difficult to bridge the generational gap. Chances are, you have different opinions about music. My oldest son is learning to drive, so we’ve been spending a lot of time in the car this month. One artist he’s shared with me on our longer rides is Lindsey Stirling, a classical crossover and rock violinist. He first heard her music featured in an Irish dance show. (His sister was also in the show, but perhaps that was beside the point?) In any case, I actually enjoy Stirling’s vibe! Who knew we’d find such a connection? Where there is peace while driving, mothers are grateful. And gratitude and good music are wholesome indeed.

Third, and now this is exciting – I learned how to revive wilting hydrangeas. I had gotten 6 stems of them for a dinner party and they looked just beautiful until the following morning. Droopy and sad, they resembled Snoopy in a rainstorm. So I scoured the internet and found a solution that actually worked! 1) Cut the stems at a 45 degree angle. 2) Make another 1-inch cut length-wise up each stem, starting at the bottom. 3) Submerge the stems in boiling water for 30 seconds (no longer) and then plunge them into clean lukewarm water. They will be bright green and the blooms should revive in a few hours. All but one of my 6 stems came back in full and lasted more than 8 days! This photo was taken on day 5.

Fourth, I read a few good books this month, but the best one BY FAR was Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning. I hardly know where to begin to explain why this text is so moving, so tender, so evocative and powerful except to say that Manning reaffirmed for me what I knew several years ago when I first truly encountered God and came to the understanding that He loves me (and you) personally. God is not interested in our posturing, law, or good works. Through Jesus Christ, he has made visible his invitation to us, and when we put aside our foolish pride and admit we are all paupers and in desperate need of His extravagant love, then He can make something beautiful of us. Each of us is made in His image, and He is for all of us. “God is a Being for others, not a Being for Himself alone,” Manning writes (p. 123). That’s why He is the very definition of Love. It’s the best book I’ve read in awhile. Period.

Finally, if you’re on Instagram, here are a few photography pages you really need to check out. They’re devoted to wild animals and especially the sea – a place many of us would like to be on a hot day! There are a couple photos on Sea Legacy that are so breathtaking my oldest son swore they were paintings and not actual shots.
Christina Mittermeier
Paul Nicklen
Sea Legacy
These pages are also in line with the two television series my youngest son and I have been glued to over the last few months: Our Planet and Planet Earth II from the BBC (both available on Netflix and narrated by David Attenborough). Like the TV series, the Instagram pages I’ve recommended are mesmerizing because they capture the indescribable beauty of our world. Let’s do what we can to care for it in whatever small ways we can.

That’s it for June. Thank you for reading! Look for a blog post later this week.

With gratitude for you,

Gretchen

5 Wholesome Things I Learned in February

February 28, 2019April 16, 2019

At the end of January, I started a monthly series highlighting a few wholesome things I’d learned over past several weeks, and now I’m carrying on the new tradition.**

Why “wholesome?” Because things that are wholesome contribute to, or are associated with, a state of well-being, which is a glimpse into the kind of life we are meant to know as we walk peacefully with God.

When Jesus said, “I came that they might have life and have it abundantly” (John 10:10), He gave us the promise of eternal life, but He also wanted us to know that we can enjoy the here and now. We can have some fun while we wait in hopeful expectation of God’s mercies.

So here are a few delights from February:

Re-adopting a childhood habit can be a very good idea. When I was a child I read constantly. My parents had CB radios in their cars and encouraged my sister and me to have ‘handles’ just like them. Mine was “Bookworm.” So is it any wonder that I’d become an English major (well, double major of English & French), or that my not-so-secret fantasy is always to retreat to a quiet corner with a big, fat memoir? But we give so much up in adulthood, so this year I’ve made an effort to read more. A LOT more. And Anne Bogel’s podcast “What Should I Read Next” has been a big help. Her fascinating interview (#165) with James Mustich, author of 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die added another level to my self-created challenge, so I used a Bas Bleu gift certificate I received at Christmas to buy this doorstopper, which checks in at 948 pages. Having read only 95 of his suggestions, I’ve been eager to dig in. This month, I read Night by Elie Wiesel and wrote a blog post about it. In March, I’ll be reading Beryl Markham’s West With the Night and C.S. Lewis’s A Grief Observed. Nirvana for a bibliophile! I’ll be in a corner if you need me….
A son can make his mother proud…especially when he challenges her. Early on in the month, my 16-year old son and I had our first-ever, slightly heated exchange over an issue in the national news – the wall at the southern border. We weren’t totally opposed to one another, just both expressing concerns, and before things got truly uncomfortable my husband wisely said, “Let’s just admit that no one in this room is an expert on this subject or has any firsthand knowledge. We don’t live in a directly affected area.” We both conceded immediately. Aside from the fact that it was fascinating to see my son’s critical thinking skills in play, what impressed me more was the question he threw out to me just before my husband stepped in: “Mom, what are your sources?” I was stunned with shock and pride. Thank God for bright young minds who are considering the sources of information, and checking their credibility and trustworthiness. Carry on young people, carry on.
The latest food fad – avocado toast – is actually pretty good. My husband went on a business trip to NYC and had breakfast in a place with limited offerings. He ended up eating avocado toast, which was – as you’d imagine – avocado spread on toast – and, with a little twist on the obvious, a lightly poached egg. Surprise, surprise – he found it tasty and we replicated it at home. Now I’m buying 7 avocados a week and our daughter is making avocado toast for after-school snacks every day. There are certainly worse things.
The “good camera” is still worth using. In one of this month’s blog posts, Study Birds and Turtles – Or How to Love in Life’s Mundane Moments, I featured a photo of me and my oldest son when he was about 18 months. It was taken with a Nikon N70 back when that was still an expensive camera. We bought it used, and it was worth every penny. Today, we’re all taking pictures with our phones and the quality seems alright most of the time, but when I found this particular shot my heart fluttered. I could see so clearly every detail of my son – even the little curl at the back of his head. I remembered a friend’s recent comment, “Twenty years from now I might regret not making the effort to get out the nice camera and take better pictures.” Indeed. My intention for March is look ahead two decades, and then do what I think Future Me would appreciate.
I learned new ways to pray. I began the month on a weekend retreat with fellow mothers from my son’s all-boys Jesuit high school. In fact, one of those moms took the photo I used in this post at sunset on the second day. In our fellowship together, my prayer life was strengthened in two ways: First, I was taught a new way to pray the Rosary. The Scriptural Rosary incorporates a verse of scripture between each Hail Mary; it helped me to focus more clearly on the mystery of Christ’s life contemplated in each decade. You can order the book we used here on Amazon. Second, I learned the Suscipe, a prayer of St. Ignatius of Loyola incorporated into his Spiritual Exercises. I loved it enough to place it in a frame on my desk where I can offer the words to the Lord daily. I leave it here with you in closing.

May God bless you and keep you in March, and may you enjoy fullness of joy in your walk with Him.

Suscipe

Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty,
my memory, my understanding,
and my entire will,
All I have and call my own.

You have given all to me.
To you, Lord, I return it.

Everything is yours; do with it what you will.
Give me only your love and your grace,
that is enough for me.

-St. Ignatius of Loyola

**This post contains affiliate links, and I will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on my links.

5 Wholesome Things I Learned in January

January 31, 2019April 16, 2019

Wholesome. I love this word. It means anything suggestive of good health and well-being. It has a connotation of warmth and nourishment, virtue and pure intentions.

I’ve decided that for 2019, I’m going to end each month sharing with you 5 things that I found to be wholesome, because to paraphrase Philippians 4:8 – we are to dwell on the things that are true, honorable, right, pure, lovely, of good repute, excellent, and worthy of praise. In short – those things that contribute to the fullness of life that God intends for us. **

I know – that sounds pretty lofty. I’m not aiming for grandiose ideas, just everyday things I encountered that were notable, enriching, and/or helpful in some way.

So, here we go. FIVE wholesome things I learned in January.

If a woman can’t have her family with her 24-7, the next best thing is a beautifully framed photo of the people she loves. I’m rather picky about photo printing. Now that film has gone the way of the dinosaurs, it’s hard to find a shop that delivers prints with true-to-life color. For years I have been looking for an online company producing premium-quality prints, and recently a friend suggested Mpix.com. This month, I chose from a nice selection of mats and frames to create a birthday present for my mom – a gorgeous, ready-to-hang 8 x 10 framed photograph of her two girls and 4 grandchildren that was taken last spring at my youngest son’s First Communion celebration. She cried when she got it. First-time customers get 25% off for sharing an email address. Check it out.
The most important sentence we can say just might be: “Tell me more about that.” Jonathan Fields says this a lot when encouraging his guests to continue in the podcast that’s got me completely hooked – Good Life Project. The premise of the show is that every story matters, and Fields’s guests are purpose-driven, community-oriented individuals who have meaningfully processed both personal and professional issues. I’ve only been listening for about two months, but in January, I was gripped by conversations Fields had with Brene Brown, Bronnie Ware (author of The Top 5 Regrets of the Dying), and Mark Nepo (author of More Together Than Alone: Discovering the Power and Spirit of Community in Our Lives and the World). I also loved that my youngest son happened to hear the story of Maggie Doyne – a young woman who took a gap year after high school, only to find her passion in caring for orphans in Nepal and collaborated on the formation of a Nepali school, health clinic, and foundation for 350 children. Good Life Project. It’s good food for thought.
The memoir Educated, by Tara Westover, is going to become a modern classic. If you haven’t heard of it, I’m surprised, but before long you will, because it’s an unforgettable story of a girl from a survivalist family in Idaho who is barely home-schooled, yet manages to teach herself enough to enter Brigham Young University and then Cambridge and Harvard, all while trying to negotiate unspeakably complex ties between herself and the people who love her in profound and profoundly unhealthy ways. Like all great writers, Tara Westover has a gift for drawing connections between the visible world and its invisible undercurrents, crafting electrifying sentences like these: “I had come to believe that the ability to evaluate many ideas, many histories, many points of view, was at the heart of what it means to self-create. If I yielded now, I would lose more than an argument. I would lose custody of my own mind.” (p. 304)
Fermented goat’s milk from Answers Pet Food is healing my dog. I have two canines – Luna and Seamus. Luna is a Beagle with a host of allergy issues and she’s been suffering from a cough for months that comes and goes in intensity. We’ve been working with our vet to uncover the root cause, but three weeks ago a nutritionist friend suggested I try adding a natural probiotic – raw fermented goat’s milk – to her diet to help support healthy immune function. The fermentation process increases digestive enzymes, b-vitamins, antioxidants and lactic acid, and it’s been working. Luna is still congested in the mornings, but the cough is basically gone. Cheers to improvement in the lives of our fur-babies!
Handwritten thank-you notes warm the soul. Okay – so maybe I didn’t really learn this one this month, but I received three very nice notes in January that are worth mentioning here, if only to say that when you take the time to tell someone that what they did for you touched your heart, you WILL touch theirs too. We are so glib with our thank-yous these days. Putting pen to paper and expressing gratitude in a few thoughtful phrases means so very much. Consider how it feels to read, “You are a treasured friend,” “You are truly amazing and appreciated,” “I treasure the bond that we have and thank God for you regularly,” “Thank you SO much for thinking of me.” For February – let’s go and put more encouraging words out there in the world.

That’s it for January’s wholesome list! I appreciate your reading time more than you will ever know, and I’d love to hear what you’re learning too. Email me via the “Contact” link on my home page. Peace and blessings in February!

**This post contains affiliate links, and I will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on my links.

From One Lit Lover to All Others – New Gift Ideas

December 7, 2018October 9, 2019

My love affair began with Black Beauty. I was 7 years old and devoured it page by page after receiving it for Christmas, 1979.

The note from my aunt inside Black Beauty.

Yes, before that I had lesser crushes – The Velveteen Rabbit had nipped at my heart – but none that had ripped it wide open like this one horse’s life story, replete with trials, tribulations and a tear-jerking reunion. It was my first and truest relationship with a classic work of literature, one that would forever set my expectations about what a story is supposed to do.

From this I learned that a world of genius just waits to be discovered, and there is never enough time to read ALL THE GOOD BOOKS!!

What is your favorite work of classic lit?

Is it the ever-popular Jane Eyre?

The always delightful Peter Pan?

The idealistic Walden?

The transcendentally beautiful Leaves of Grass?

I’ll bet you can find a lovely artistic rendering of it here.

If you enjoy great design and want to give the literature lover on your list something he or she will actually use, check out this new site, Literary Book Gifts. Creator and designer Melissa has placed old fashioned line drawings on tasteful tote bags and t-shirts for men and women. Use the code GRETCHENMATTHEWS20 and she’ll give you 20% off any purchase, no minimum.

Adorable totes from Literary Book Gifts.

The totes are sturdy cotton, fully lined, and come in three different sizes. There are 64 designs to choose from, including every one of the books I’ve mentioned above.

T-shirts are soft and available in more colors than I stopped to count. And beyond literary designs, some also feature images simply reminiscent of old times and refined living….an antique desk, a typewriter, a tribute to Beethoven.

Pretty much everyone agrees, life is too hectic today. Slowing down with a good read – or being reminded that you should by a tote bag or a t-shirt – is a great way to encourage someone you love to make the most of their time in the new year.

Remember – Literary Book Gifts and use code GRETCHENMATTHEWS20 . And just so you know, I receive no financial benefit from your transaction. I just like the products and thought you might too.

Peace and blessings to you and yours – always. Happy Holidays!