Putting roots down

We have moved (round the corner, via six weeks with my father in law while we waited for the chain to get in with it). It’s my 20th move in 25 years, but we are finally settled.

It’s a lovely house, one which our boy will have room to grow up in. And we are friends with some of our neighbours, which I have never experienced before – it’s weird, but really good.

In the meantime I now have my plants in the ground. I can’t begin to say how much joy and peace this gives me.

We are still painting and unpacking and will be for a few weeks yet, but we have taken root… Finally.

Back to blogging and the new member of Team Turnbull

Its been a while since i blogged properly… I have been busy growing and delivering our first child.

Small T is our miracle boy and today he is six weeks old. I cant even begin to tell you how grateful to God i am for his arrival.

So as you can imagine its all change in our lives, and yet we are still who we always were.. Just minus lots of sleep.

In it all i had a 30 hour labour and an emergency cesarean, while R had spinal surgery on a back injury which had left him in excruciating pain.

You would think we were disheartened and down, but the joy of small keeps our perspective and we both enjoy the good things of now and have hope for the future.

Now we have a son to share what matters to us with. Our faith, our care for God’s world expressed through being vegan and living as lightly as we can in relation to the planet.

And fun stuff… We will forever be a geek household.

So expect future posts on all such things and our adventures as parents:

Something new, something old and preferably nothing blue.

So apparently the meaning of my life starts today, as I turn 42 😊

And I am planning to take hold of this coming year with both hands.

I saw a @tearfundlife  article recently on how our lives can be a place:

where the outsider is brought close, the excluded are ushered in and the down-trodden are given refuge.

This matters a great deal to me and I want my life to be:

  a roaring fireplace of safety and warmth, rather than a mat that tells you to wipe the dirt from your feet before entering.

So figuring out what that looks like this year is my top priority.

I have other priorities, never stop learning, keep on being creative, find wonder wherever I can and stay well.

So my something new is going to be joining a flower arranging club in January.

My something old will be continuing the diploma I have been doing… well forever really. And the future learn courses I have on the go, and maybe one or two more.
Finally I intend to keep in top of my health, so no blue for me hopefully,  just the gym, proper sleep, lots of prayer and healthy food.

I wonder, what would your old, new and not blue things be?

Comfort IN, dump OUT

I saw this article on Facebook and it is one of the best pieces  of social advice I have seen in a while, I throughly recommend it:

How not to say the wrong thing

#poetry #waiting

A life I aspire to

Jesus said it first:

 “Don’t store up treasures here on earth, where moths eat them and rust destroys them, and where thieves break in and steal. Store your treasures in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal.Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.
Matthew 6:19-21

But if course I live in the affluent west. R and I aren’t exactly well off by. British standards, but in the grand scheme of things… We are.

It means to take this seriously is a big challenge. For a start, I have a lot of stuff that really, I just don’t need. And then there are all the nice things I would like to do, and lets face it, going to the cinema is treasure of the earthly variety.

Not that I wish to be an ascetic, and I don’t think  Jesus meant that. There is nothing wrong with the cinema, but when it matters more than Jesus’ command to move your neighbour, you know your life is getting rusty.

I have been inspired by a couple of articles recently, one about how equality really is possible and the other a book on decluttering which is now on my wish list (I know, another possession!).

I thought you might find them interesting too:

Welcome to Marinaleda: The Spanish Anti-Capitalist Town With Equal Wage Full Employment and $19 Housing

Can KonMari transform your business?

On the move again

In three weeks time, R and I will both be living in Kent.
The house goes on the market this week and he moves first as his job starts soon.

We weren’t expecting to leave Thetford so soon, but the time is right. I will very much miss the dear people I work with and those i worship with, who have become valued friends.

I came to Thetford in trepidation, initially, I never wanted to work for any kind of Christian organisation again, having been hurt badly. But God has used the precious people I work with to restore my faith in people and my church to show me again how authentic Christians can be.

God has brought me such healing through them, and this:

I will miss you Thetford.

Limited Partnership | Portraits of Partnership: Photo Essay of LGBT Couples | Independent Lens | PBS

Some beautiful stories of long marraiges:

Limited Partnership | Portraits of Partnership: Photo Essay of LGBT Couples | Independent Lens | PBS.

What is #sacredness anyway?

I have a friend who I am intentionally journeying with. We meet every now and then and chat about our journey with God, our lives, our hopes.
As part if this journey, we have decided to both complete the book Wreak this journal.

My copy came today and even the first few pages challenged me. It asked me to do what it said on the front, and begin to wreak it, but I found a part of me balked at the sacrilege of disfiguring a book:

It got me thinking about sacredness in general. What IS sacred? Of course the dictionary says:

Considered to be holy and deserving  respect, especially because of a  connection  with a god.
And
Considered too important to be changed.

In some ways I agree, God himself is sacred, deserving respect, and he is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

But surely all of life should be treated with respect and is in some sense sacred, as the earth is the Lord’s and everything in it. But if there is one thing I am sure about in this life, nothing remains the same, everything changes.

So as I begin to wreak this journal,  I am left with the thought that perhaps because life is sacred, it has to be allowed to change… and me with it.