Company Girl Coffee

Each week a group of ladies meet on a virtual coffee break.   Rachel Anne Ridge, of Home Sanctuary, encourages fellowship by  sharing small steps each weekday to make your home a sanctuary. On Fridays we enjoy gathering for a virtual coffee with Rachel Anne Ridge’s “Company Girl Coffee“…will you join us?

This time of year just speeds up for many folks.  I find that I become more aware of the frantic pace and faces of those I meet in the store and at second hand shops.  It reminds me and humbles me that we have so much at the Berry home.  This time of year is about giving. Whether its giving permission for something fun at home that you didn’t have time to do originally, or giving in to letting go of what you thought “should” happen that day.  This time of year I work on giving up my way and allowing God’s way of giving to be in my heart.  It’s recognizing no matter where you are in your life, there is so much more to be thankful for than we consider each day. It’s looking around our already over crowded house and realizing that there are people scouring stores for something to share with their loved ones and here you are not able to even put away all that is in the house. It’s about picking up the phone, text, or writing a letter to let people know you care. How many of the people near us are lonely this  year? How many of us are lonely too? How can we share with others in meaningful ways this season?  Our older children are on their own now and they recant story after story of young families who have no extended family, who don’t have family to go home to for holidays or for Christmas. Who have no clue how to prepare a meal that looks anything  like the storybook versions of Thanksgiving…after the storms in Alabama last spring, too many here don’t even know where the storybook is anymore.

What can you do where you are?

This week my youngest child reminded me that her art teacher provides so much for them each week, couldn’t we bake cookies each week through Christmas and relieve her of snack time provisions as a gift this Christmas?  She made and took 2x what the class size required with a note, “maybe these can be shared with your family.”  I would have not thought of that gift, but oh how her teacher was delighted and shared how just taking out that hour a week to bake would be such a gift.  Madi offered what she could do, where she is. Baking is her special gift.

A new friend mentioned that they didn’t have matching dishes like her childhood dinner with her Mom, dishes are one thing you can be assured the Berry house will have too many of.  We went to the garage and let her pick from three colors of sets and set her home to prepare her first Thanksgiving dinner with matched dishes.  I had to laugh, dishes are something I can always share. Not a big thing to me, for I am always on the hunt for bargain sets of dish patterns I love, but God so used my love of bargains to answer her prayers as a childhood set was exactly what was in the box…the ones she’d longed for the last few days facing her first Thanksgiving without her mom. Do you know the stinker part (as in God’s so stinking awesome as Sarah L Cook would say) the set I had was EXACTLY her childhood pattern she longed for.  God IS stinkin AWESOME.

What do you have where you are that would mean something to someone else, while it sits on your shelf unused?

My son is selling yet another vehicle this year. I believe this is his fourth.  As always, he has his eye on a shiny new to him jeep.  In the past, he’s not taken time to clean up his trucks well, but considered they were outdoorsmen like himself and wouldn’t care.  Yesterday he took the time to make the truck as nice as he could shine it, cleaned it out and then met his buyer.  The older gentleman was buying  the 2005 truck as his first “new” one in 30 years.  Chase was humbled as he realized what he took for granted in having might be a prize possession for another. He spent the afternoon with this gentleman, and I believe my son got the better end of the deal, the gentleman’s wisdom spoke deeply into his heart.  He showed him his farm where each item was treated with purpose and respect, for indeed each item had a role to play in supporting the man.

What do we fail to appreciate in our own lives? Who do we need to consider in our giving, our presence, and our appreciation?

I noticed our  son’s room was in a different place last night, and he had carried a stack of shirts and pants out to share with a friend who is a newlywed father and is now in a very different place financially than a year ago. When I asked, his words were precious….”Mom, I take so much for granted, I realize now that I need to be supporting folks who make right choices, who take responsibility and pay the price for the things that come up…I have so much, and here I am complaining about picking up laundry when someone else is simply hoping to have a shirt to wear for an interview”

What do we take for granted?  What do we forget to be thankful for?

Les Berry loves to hunt, but more than his love and accuracy in hunting, I love that he gives joyfully.  A 350 pound hog is truly more bacon and sausage than our family needs, but I believe he gets the huge hogs and large deer because it is first on his mind to share 1/2 of whatever he gets with a hunter coming out of the woods.  In our Alabama, most hunters are not hunting simply for sport hunting, they hunt for table food.  I am so thankful for a husband who shares his bounty.

How can you use what you love doing to help others?

It’s pretty easy to get caught up in the “I can’t haves” and “If only’s” of the holiday season.  We are fed such silly images of what family success is….this week I am just filled with the love of our Savior and His love for others…including me.  Can we all take the next few weeks and focus on the people God puts before us?  Can we share what we have where we are? Can we work on starting and finishing the day with thankful hearts? Can we ask God to help us realize what we have to share, whether its extras in our home or money we would have spend unwisely?

This is my Thanksgiving Prayer and I hope it will be yours:

Father God, thank you for all that you bring to my heart and life, help me to love others as you have loved me, to forgive others as you continually forgive me. Help me to be a good steward of your provision. In Jesus name,

Amen