What I Learned in July

I find I am really drawn to the “What I Learned in ________” posts written by many of my fellow bloggers.

• These posts are a little window into the heart and soul of the writer,
• They allow me to connect with a sister as I read along uttering, “Me, too!”

AND

• “What I Learned in ________” posts are just plain FUN!

So, here goes.

When I first began to think about what I learned in July, I must confess I came up blank.

“What?  I learned nothing in July!  It can’t be!”

But sticking with it, here is what I came up with:

1. Don’t rely on your seven-year-old granddaughter to be your GPS! Don and I often play the “I don’t know how to get there” game with our grandchildren allowing them to direct our turns toward the desired destination (usually their home or ours from within the neighborhood).  It works.  We’ve never gotten lost!  One day in July, my daughter-in-law and I took her children to visit my daughter and her children in Indianapolis.  The plan for the day included a trip to the zoo.  Three adults and six children, of course, requires two vehicles, one of which does NOT know the way to the zoo.  Deciding on the “We’ll follow you” system over plugging in the GPS, we headed out.  All the while, my eight-year-old granddaughter kept reassuring us from the back seat that she could guide us to the zoo if ever we became separated.  You guessed it!  Downtown Indy, we lost sight of the van in front.  While pulling up the GPS on my phone, we turned to our back seat guide for direction.  “Well, I don’t know how to get there from HERE!”

2. You haven’t met a DRAMA QUEEN until you have an encounter with a four-year-old. On an out-of-town picnic with our six-year-old grandson and four-year-old granddaughter, she got hurt on the playground.  The six-year-old is sent to tell us she is hurt.  No one has any idea how badly.  Parents are not along on this picnic.  We go running – our daughter, the nurse, leading the way.  No broken bones.  Someone has put a band-aid on it already.  Little Miss is bawling and hobbles all the way back to the picnic area with us.  Won’t let me take the band-aid off to have a look.  I tell Dad about it when we drop her off that night so that he can take a look.  The text I receive from him the next morning, “Puh-lease. There is NOTHING there!! Sucker!”

3. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE that my husband has taken over the yard work. And I love him!!!  Don has always mowed the lawn, but until last year I took care of the weeding and trimming of bushes.  With the added writing and speaking responsibilities it was becoming too much, so he volunteered to take over all lawn duties!!!!  Can I say that this month I have been reminded just how much I do not miss all the weeding?  Thank you, Babe!

4. Summer gets shorter every year. Where. did. it. go?

5. Body clocks don’t readjust so easily at my age. Here was the plan:  Don would come home from work Thursday evening.  We would eat a light dinner and then go to bed and sleep for a bit.  We would get up around midnight and drive the twelve hours to our daughter’s.  What actually happened:  Don came home from work.  We ate a very light dinner and went to bed.  Neither of us could sleep.  We decided to go ahead and leave at 7:30 PM, drove a few hours, spent the night at a hotel, and drove the remainder of the way on Friday.  Don’t ask an aging body to do new tricks!

6. Thousands of voices lifted in corporate worship is a beautiful sound. Part of the visit to our daughter’s included conducting a workshop at her church on Saturday.  She called a few weeks before the visit and wanted to know if we would like to go hear Chris Tomlin and others for A Night of Worship in America at Madison Square Gardens on that same Saturday evening — after the workshop.  “It will be tight getting there in time.  Maybe it’s too much.”  Are you kidding?  Madison Square Gardens was packed.  We were in the VERY TOP row.  We could see and hear it all!  I wish you could have, too!

7. Women are eager to learn new ways to engage with God’s Word. Speaking of the workshop on Long Island.  It was such a privilege to share Praying Scripture in Color, Verse Mapping, and Scripture Journaling with the ladies who gathered.  But the blessing was mine as they shared their experiences and responses with me.  (I even received word through a little birdie that many of the ladies are not only using these newly learned methods in their own private study but are incorporating them into their sermon note’s taking!)

8. One can never begin to pray too early. Some things you learn are not necessarily new.  Sometimes you learn a new twist.  I’ve actually even made this statement before when encouraging others to begin praying NOW for the future spouse of their child or grandchild.  However, currently we are gearing up for a 30 – Day #PrayingwithPurpose Challenge for grandparents.  The challenge encourages grandparents to commit to 30 days of specific prayer for their grandchild(ren).  And we have been spreading the word about the challenge – to grandparents.  My “aha” came when I read this comment to a recent blog post about the challenge, “Love this idea! I desire to be a grandma who lifts her offspring to the Lord. I don’t have any physical grandchildren yet, but it’s never too early to pray, is it?”  Well, duh!!  She is right.  Why didn’t I think of that?

9. God CAN (and WILL, if we cooperate) use our perceived weaknesses for His purposes. I am a s-l-o-w processor.  It took me years to figure this out.  So THIS is why I struggle to keep up with group discussions.  Issue pinpointed, I began searching for strategies to help me with the processing of information.  I’ve been working on this for a couple of years now.  To be honest, I have mostly viewed the fact that I am a slow processor as a weakness.  Enter the month of July.  I received an invitation from one of our church pastors to join a writing team.  During September our Pastor will be leading us through a sermon series on 1 Peter and our church communities will be involved in corresponding sermon-based lessons.  The team will be writing the lessons.

“I can’t do this.  It will take me  f-o-r-e-v-e-r  to figure out the questions.  I won’t be able to keep up so I won’t be able to contribute.”

“Debbie, maybe this is why you have been invited to join the team.  Perhaps others who struggle with slow processing could benefit from having a voice contribute to the development of the lessons!”  Oh, now I get it!

Perhaps I HAVE learned a few things during July!

How about you?  I’d love to hear what you learned during July.  Please share in the comments below.