Take a Minute Today....

In Honor of Thanksgiving and all that is good and right in this world, let us practice being thankful and pass it on....

1. Open the door for another person.
2. Drive safely and be courteous.
3. When visiting a hospital spend a few moments with someone who doesn’t have any visitors.
4. Make a new friend.
5. Invite a child or teenager over for a cooking class.
6. Collect can goods for a food bank.
7. Hug a friend.
8. Clean up litter on a street in your neighborhood.
9. Drop off a plant or some home-made baked goods to your local police or fire department.
10. Say something nice to everyone you meet today.
11. Provide a neighborhood child with homework help.
12. Leave a kind note for a family member or friend.
13. Tell kids why you love them.
14. Clean graffiti off your neighborhood buildings or walls.
15. Organize a sing –a- long at a senior center.
16. Shovel snow for a neighbor.
17. Cheer up a friend.
18. Donate blood.
19. Hug a family member.
20. Smile and say "Hello" to people you don't know.
21. Offer to babysit for free.
22. Offer someone behind you in the grocery check out line to go in front of you.
23. Pat someone on the back.
24. Volunteer to read to students at school.
25.Open the car door for your passenger.
26. Pull out someone’s chair for them at the dinner table.
27. Wash a neighbors vehicle.
28. Take a neighbors newspaper laying out on their driveway to them or leave at their front door.
29. Tell the mail carrier thank you for all their work.
30. Let a neighbor know how much you value their friendship.
31. Let a manager know you compliment a sales clerk for their pleasant service.
32. Give your pocket change to someone who is needing it.
33. Pick up small florist vases at thrift stores or yard sales for about 10 cents and buy wrapped flowers, for a few more dollars, then arrange them in the vases. Get the local phone book, pick a few names and deliver them to their doorstep, early in the morning before everyone is awake.
34.Print up some inspiring signs and post them around town.
35.Leave your change in the soda machine for the next person. It's a nice surprise.
36. Purchase a meal for a homeless person.
37. If your a boss of a company - allow your employees to leave a half hour early as a surprise.
38. If your a boss - send employees an e-card letting them know how much you appreciate them.
39. If you see your neighbor hasn't set his trash can out for that mornings pick-up, wheel it out to the curb yourself.
40. Add some quarters to a parking meter you notice is getting low.
41. Pay for the persons order behind you when in a drive through line.
42. Leave change in the vending machine.
43. Leave change in the public pay phone.
44. Do as many things as you can by being anonymous.
45. Run an errand for someone.
46. Offer to pick up a friends or neighbors children from school.
47. Make an extra serving when preparing dinner and take to a homeless person in your area.
48. Take a parent out to dinner to their favorite restaurant.
49. Call a parent just to say you love them.
50. Take blankets or warm clothing to a homeless person.
51. Connect someone who is homebound to the internet.
52. Contact your community action program to find out of someone who is in need and provide them with the help they need.
53. Help an elderly person care for their pet(s).
54. Purchase a couple extra bags of dog food and take to the shelter.
55. Volunteer to help at an animal shelter.
56. Help someone you know with finding a solution for a dilemma your aware they have.
57. Watch someone’s children for a couple you feel needs some alone time.
58. Take a meal to a family you know.
59. Check in on someone you know is alone.
60. Offer to pump someone’s gas who looks like they could use the assistance.
61. Get your youth group together to pump everyone’s gas for an hour or two at the nearest gas station.
62. If you notice a neighbors lawn is becoming over grown that otherwise has been nicely groomed in the past, go mow it without them being aware.
63. Send a bouquet of flowers to a hospital and let the hospital know it should go to someone who doesn’t receive any visitors and is alone.
64. Stop into a nursing home just to spend a little time with the residents.
65. Drop off books and magazines to hospitals, nursing homes and doctors offices.
66. Sponsor an eye surgery for someone who is blind in an underdeveloped country.
67. Donate to local causes you hear about of families in need.
68. Volunteer at a hospice.
69. Volunteer at a homeless shelter.
70. Send flowers to a teacher who has dedicated their life to educating children.

A Very Noble Event

I know the girls and I will be participating in this.... Volunteers will gather at the Gettysburg National Cemetery Dec. 3 and place more than 1,600 Christmas wreaths on the graves of veterans.
The project is an extension of one started four years ago by John and Susan McColley and the Sgt. Mac Foundation, according to a news release. The McColleys are parents of Gettysburg native and U.S. Marine Corps Sgt. Eric McColley, who was killed along with seven other Marines and two airmen in a helicopter crash in the Horn of Africa on Feb. 17, 2006.

Last year, the foundation placed 2,100 wreaths on graves at Quantico National Cemetery in Virginia were Eric is interred. It also placed approximately 800 wreaths in the Gettysburg National Cemetery.

This year, the group will expand the number of wreaths to include all of the headstones in the original section of the Gettysburg National Cemetery, with the financial assistance of local and other veterans organizations, private and business support. The group also received and is seeking assistance from anyone wanting to help.

The group will meet at the Giant food store parking lot on Route 30/York Road in Gettysburg 8 a.m. Dec. 3 to tie the bows on the wreaths. At 12:45 p.m., volunteers will meet at the Taneytown Road entrance to the Gettysburg National Cemetery and place wreaths on more than 1,600 graves.

The following day, the group will meet at Quantico National Cemetery at 9:30 a.m. and place wreaths on 2,500 gravesites. Volunteers and donations are welcome.

The cost of the wreaths is $ 7.50 each. To participate, contact Stan Clark at 717-337-1728 or e-mail at scmb@earthlink.net

Quote for the Day

"Remember that NOT getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck."

-Dalai Lama

Sometimes the Simplest Things To Do Are Really The Hardest.....

I have been wanting to take a picture of this barn for years and my youngest finally convinced me one day to just pull over and do it. What have you been putting off? Like the commercial says, "Just do it!"
I have been running past my computer now for over a month with the best intentions of updating the blog. "It will just take a minute to post," I keep telling myself, but then the phone rings, the bickering starts, my dog is whining to be let outside, and all of a sudden I have a pounding migraine and like the tide, life crashes in like a wave and swirls away all evidence of my organized thoughts into somewhere I can only name (very uncreatively I might add,) "THE DEEP UNKNOWN".
I realize, in the grand scheme of things, that posting on a blog is very minute on the list. However, it somehow helps me get centered and I have this romantic notion that somewhere out there, in the wild frontiers of the internet, I am striking a chord with someone. And with everything bad and scary in this world, it gives me a chance to focus and be aware of all that is good and positive around us.

I am starting to feel better already, as I am writing this. Winter is not a very good time for me-I secretly think I suffer from SAD-that thing where you don't get enough sunlight. It seems to me in the summer I feel better, I think I look better...my husband says it's just that I'm getting older, but I refuse to listen, lol. Winter is a time that reminds me of my mortality-all the more reason to try to live in the moment. Try to remember to do something special for yourself today (or very soon) We all need a little more love and happiness, don't we? Why is it so hard for most of us to be good to ourselves? Try to look at it like this: The Lord made us with all His love and attention-we need to honor this extraordinary gift He gave us by taking care of ourselves. I know it's so easy to get caught up in the daily stuff. Believe me, I am saying this as much for myself as I am for anyone. Moving forward, I am going to try my best every day to do better by Him-I hope you will too!