Does gift giving stop after you reach a certain age?

So, here are my thoughts about gift-giving at Christmas; I believe in giving gifts for all ages. Yesterday when I was talking with a co-worker, she asked if I had received any gifts for Christmas? My answer was yes. She was surprised because she knew that my husband and I were alone for Christmas. She then asked if we still give each other gifts for Christmas? I again said yes. She replied that she and her husband stopped giving each other gifts long ago. And this is why I want to explain my thoughts on giving gifts.

At Christmas, we celebrate the birth of Jesus. The birth of Jesus was a gift from God. And to show our acceptance of this gift, we are to give others gifts likewise. That doesn’t have an age limit. People say, including my husband, well we buy what we want when we want it, we don’t need anything. Buying gifts isn’t just buying what you want. We didn’t ask God to give us his only son; He gave him to us because he wanted a relationship with us, and to have that relationship, we needed Jesus. There is way more to it than that, but for this article, I hope you understand the condensed version. Giving a gift to someone who buys everything they want is tricky; you have to know the person. And that’s the point when God gave us his only son; that wasn’t easy. It was well thought out. It brought joy, happiness, and everlasting life to man. And that’s what we are to give when we buy gifts. Well, just the joy and happiness part.

My husband and I make each other a list, and we pretty much stick to the list each year, but we don’t buy the whole list. Even though I know what I’m getting is from my list, it still creates joy and happiness because he took the time to buy the gift for me. And it’s fun to see which things I got from my list.

I hope you enjoyed my thoughts on the reason for gift giving. I would love to hear your thoughts. Would you please leave me a comment? Changes are coming for the new year!

Interrupted Life

It’s been a while since I have written anything. It was because of the illness that doesn’t need a name. I think I was coming down with it for several weeks before I was tested for it. I’m going to say that I am not a doctor; I am only telling my experience, I’m not giving medical advice. They say my symptoms were mild. And ten days later, I was to return to work. I have returned to work, but I can not do the work I used to do. And I understand the symptoms I had were not severe but that word implies that it wasn’t hard to get over it. I heartily feel sorrow for the extreme cases because it is a lot of work to get well! And that is my purpose today. To tell my story.

I haven’t been fearful of needing hospitalization at any time yet. And I say yet because I’m still waiting three weeks after returning to work to feel better for more than one day in a row. I think I’m an active person, an average 13,000 to 18,000 steps a day. It’s all walking performing my job. And then I go home. And the first day back to work, 13,000 steps was too much. I stayed home the next day. I have learned over the last couple of years that staying home and doing nothing is not good for me. I can have periods of severe anxiety and depression. So I want to work I want to be active. So staying home sick another day was not what I wanted to do. Because my symptoms were not severe the treatment was rest and stay home. That didn’t help my anxiety. I wish I could say here that I found a solution but I haven’t. But I think about things differently.

I’ve also believed that you can not go through life doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different outcome. It doesn’t happen. So I am always looking for answers or trying something new. And I refuse to be one of those people who says, “I don’t understand this new technology” or “I’m too old to learn something new.” But getting back to where I was before this is the most complex challenge I think I’ve faced. The experts say active, but then say rest. I’m doing that. Time, give it time, they say. I feel that it is interrupting my life. I have other things to accomplish. Health is very important and determination are also crucial with this illness that won’t be named. It takes work to recover. I hope you never get it! But I am also thankful for having got it because the experience has taught me so much.

I have learned not to take life for granted. Be mindful of life because it is precious; it can change in a second. Don’t take your health for granted; make an effort to stay healthy. And don’t just live for the weekend, live every day with purpose.

Movies

I am thankful for movies. I love going to the theater and seeing movies on the big screen eating movie theater popcorn and a bag of candy. I watch them again when they come out on Dvd. I buy movies. I even watch them on my phone.

This year we turned off our satellite dish and are just watching what we can get with an antenna or dvds. That means no Hallmark Christmas movies. I don’t want to pay a subscription fee; that is why we stop the satellite dish, all the costs for different channels is just too much. We did keep Amazon Prime and that includes Prime Video. And they have holiday movies! Yeah!

I am grateful for movies because they can help me feel better when I’m down. The older I get, the sadder holidays are. Family matters prevent me from seeing or even sending gifts to my (step)grandchildren. So it’s hard to get excited about Christmas, except I have always believed that Christmas is important to celebrate even though I never had any children of my own. Watching holiday movies help.

Christmas to me is about the gift God gave us. Because He loves us. And we need to give gifts to each other to show our love for each other and all humanity. They don’t have to cost money. I grew up poor. And even when I was growing up, I believed that Christmas and giving were meaningful. I organized my sister and brothers into singing songs and acting out bits for our parents every Christmas. It created the best memories.

Watching holiday movies today rekindles those feels, and I need that spirit—that feeling of joy, hope, and love. Holiday movies also have magic in them that everything will work out and life still has a happy ending. And that is truly why I love and watch holiday movies.

Contentment

Today is November 1st; I want to spend this month focusing on the blessings I have received.

Today I am grateful for contentment. Contentment is a sense of happiness and satisfaction. I am content with my life, and I am happy. My life isn’t perfect, but whose life ever is perfect. I have enough, and that’s all I need. Winning the lottery would be fun for about 5 seconds, and then I would be worried about all the people who would want some.

I am content with the way I live my life. I go to work and come home to a house I relax in. If I won the lottery I would buy some more land but I would want it to be in this area. I have lived in this part of Kansas for 50 years. I don’t want to live anywhere else. It’s nice to say you know where this building is, that use to be something else. I know the roads and places to go for different things. I know the traditions and events that take place here. And I know who people are. I would miss them.

I haven’t always been happy, the things that stress me out are not enough time to do everything I want. Not being able to build the house I want because of county requirements. I wanted to build a tiny home, 300 square feet, but the county requires 600 square feet. I get stressed by others who want to control my life. I’m happier when people leave me alone and let me live the way I want. I’m satisfied with the way I live.

I am grateful for what God has given me.

Life changes

Today is cloudy; the forecast says a chance for rain. We need some rain in the area because farmers have planted their wheat for next year. I don’t live on a farm, but farms are all around me. So, farming feels like part of my life. We do raise chickens for the eggs, and we grow a garden every year. Yesterday our current chickens, we have five, gave us five eggs! This is exciting to us. These chickens are only six months old. One chicken has been laying eggs for a month but to get five eggs in one day means they are all laying eggs. Just in time for the days to be shorter, which can mean they will stop laying eggs. Chickens need lots of sunlight to lay eggs. We will likely get some eggs every day but not always five every day. We also got our first apples off our apple tree. We planted it about ten years ago. It is a self-pollinating tree that should have been producing apples five years ago, but I’m happy to have apples finally. The birds or wildlife got most of them; we only found three, but I’m excited about the three!

Something that I’m learning to do this year is to be happy. I know that that’s crazy. People don’t learn to be happy they are happy. But my life has had a lot of trials and bad times. I’m not writing this to share my difficulty but to share positive thoughts and grow more positive experiences. I suffer from deep depression and anxiety, but I’m a survivor, and I’m going to be happy. I heard someone say on a tv show that sometimes you have to tell yourself to be happy repeatedly until you are happy. And that’s what I’m doing. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it’s a real struggle.

Recently I found a youtube channel that has inspired me. It’s Homestead Tessie. Please look her up; she shares a daily video about her life and she has a fascinating story and inspiring life. The only things we have in common are we both live in old mobile homes, and we both have an acre of land, and we both suffer anxiety. She suffered a significant life event that changed her life ten years ago. And her vlog shares how she is surviving and living happily. And I want to take her example and become happier.

I’ve been a believer for years that nothing changes by doing the same thing over and over again, expecting it to change. It won’t. So I have made changes several times in my life. Some of those changes have been wonderful, and some of them didn’t work out as planned. I met and married my husband in one of those life changes and we just celebrated 30 years of marriage. It worked!

So, you only change things that don’t work. And that is where I’m at right now. I’ve working on getting the negative out of my life, and growing the positive things in my life. So I will be sharing the positives, counting my blessings, and living a simpler life. I won’t be sharing my problems because that is private and not productive. I don’t have to live with oil lamps or cook outside like Homestead Tessie, but I could spend less time the negative like watching the news. I could eat less processed food and make my own. I hope you find this interesting and want to follow what I do. I will share what I’m changing and how it helps me.

Shopping, YouTube and Volcanoes

Yesterday after work, I did our grocery shopping. Where we work right now only pays once a month. Because of higher gas prices, I am trying to shop less, so I tried to buy enough for a whole month. Going to town isn’t far, about 10 miles, but everywhere we go, 10 miles. Work, gas, shopping, and soon those miles start adding up. And gas prices went over $3 a gallon here. So staying home is better. When you live 10 miles from every, it makes you think more and plans for what you need. I used to stop at the store every day on my way home, but then they built a new grocery store and closed the store I always went to. The new store isn’t in the path I travel anymore. Then the pandemic happened, and everyone was told to stay home, and my shopping habits changed. We shop online more. It used to be if Walmart didn’t have it; we didn’t need it. Now, if Amazon doesn’t have it, we don’t need it.

After working 8 hours, then shopping and putting it away, it was nice to sit and do nothing for a bit. Luckily my husband was happy with a chicken I picked up that was already prepared for supper. And I put a pizza in the oven for myself, Not the healthiest meal, but we like it. I love pizza. I could eat it all the time. My husband loves chicken the same way. So he eats the chicken and I eat the pizza. We used to cook full sit-down meals, but not anymore. Maybe it’s because we are older and don’t want to eat as much or we don’t want to cook anymore. It works for us.

Today after work it is come home and do nothing. It is my favorite way to spend time. I’m usually not doing completely nothing, I’m usually watching youtube videos but that’s the same as nothing. Right now my favorite video to watch it the live feed of the volcano erupting in the Canary Islands. It’s been erupting for over a month now. That poor island. I feel bad for the people. Homes and crops buried under lava. And they say they don’t know when it will end. But I think it is so fascinating.

One of the first times I wanted to watch the news when I was growing up was when Mt. St. Helen erupted. I was shocked and fascinated. Back then, all I could manage was what they showed on the 5 o’clock news. Later there were some shows about it, but now I can watch a volcano eruption in real-time. And the camera can zoom in and get close-up views. The beauty and destruction are mesmerizing. The fact that nothing can stop it, they can’t say when it will end or what it will do next, is so uncontrollable. We live in a world where we think we can control everything, but not this, I can’t stop watching. I feel sad for the people and the animals for their losses, but I feel amazed at what I see.

Well, I promised my husband and cooked meal from scratch tonight, so I better stop writing. I want to say thank you to my first follower, blmaluso. I hope you enjoy this post too. Please leave me a message if you want to talk. Good night!

Country Living

The thing people always say about Kansas is that it is so windy. Yes, it is. Today is a windy day. My problem with it is my allergies. And everything is so dry right now, so there is a lot of dust in the air.

I love my home in the country. We have multiple tall, old Cottonwood trees on all sides. They are not our trees. We didn’t plant them; nature did, I guess. They are far enough apart, though, that all kinds of trees grow in between them and around them. The Cottonwood trees are at least 20 feet tall, and the trees that grow around them are 10 feet or more, so it looks like trees box us in. I love looking out my window and just watching the limbs and leaves moving to the wind and hearing the wind roaring through the trees.

We also get wildlife walking through our yard now and then. Mother deer’s with their babies occur daily in the spring. We don’t see the wild turkeys in our yard as much as we hear them. But you see them when you’re driving down the road. Skunks, raccoon, and one time we even have armadillos, two of them. And birds, we love the birds. Cardinals are our favorite birds. We also see blue jays and bluebirds; the blue jays are mean. I’ve even seen a Meadowlark, which is our state bird. Sparrows make a nest in our clothesline pole every year. Owls, I had never heard an owl growing up because I lived in town, but I listen to them now all the time. And this year, we started feeding the hummingbirds! They are so much fun to watch. They chase each other. We think we had two pairs of hummingbirds. They are very territorial. They each want their feeder. They don’t like to share.

Nothing is happening today, which is why I spent so much time talking about the wind and trees. It’s so relaxing. When I was growing up, we lived in town; when I got married is when I moved to the country. I’ve never wanted to move back to town. It has meant living without cable TV, barely having an internet connection (because of all the trees), and no food delivery services. Suffering from allergies, but I wouldn’t trade it for any of those things.

Gratitude

The evening has come, and I have to go to bed early. I get up at 4:30 am to be at work by 6 am. It’s early, but it has the benefit of getting off the job at 2 pm. But before I go to bed, I want to thank you for my first like on the blog! Thank you, Sebastian@relatocorto.com. I look forward to reading your blog! I am also grateful for the beautiful weather we had today. And I am thankful for all the blessings that God has given me. I ask that God will continue to watch over me, my family, and this blog. Good night!

Sunday afternoon

Well, the Kansas City Chiefs won, so that’s a plus for the week. Sunday’s are when I try and do all the big chores of the week like washing bedding and clothes. It’s crazy the amount of laundry two people can make in a week. Lol, that’s life. I have written out our supper menu for the week. We decided to try doing that because after 30 years of marriage, deciding what’s for supper and whose turn it is to decide is old. It stays about the same every day, but I try and make something different once a week. So this week, we will eat leftovers tonight. Monday baked chicken, Tuesday pork chops, Wednesday I’ll try a recipe for a chicken casserole, Thursday hamburger soup, and Friday will be leftovers. Nothing fancy we like it simple.

I prefer to write just little posts because nervous about writing. I hope this gets easier. 😉

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I want to tell you why I’m writing a blog. I want to show the world that life is not all terrible. We have many things in common. I want this blog to be a positive impact on the world. I have many things to be grateful for; I have a home and job, food to eat, and a car to drive. God has given me many blessings, and I am grateful for them. My health concerns are anxiety and depression. I’m not a doctor or giving any advice here. I am just recording what I do to deal with my health. I hope you read this and find we have something in common.