Friday, November 15, 2013

Newsletter - 11/15/13


Ephesians 2:10: "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus."
If you are His workmanship, you are satisfactory to Him. He is pleased with you. -- E.W. Kenyon

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Mama and Daughter Deer Sunning in Backyard
View This Newsletter On the Website.

Hello Dear Friends,

With the leaves on the ground in the woods behind us, the deer spend some time with us taking a rest after drinking from the pond. This is a mother and daughter. She also has a son with little bumps on its head, but you know boys, they like to play in the dirt while girls rest.  This is one of the families we have visiting this year on a regular basis.

Having a small pond in the backyard has been such a huge blessing since water is a critical necessity for all life and we sure do see a lot of wildlife because of it. Now that my office is in the breakfast area, I've been putting sunflower seeds and corn in the "wintering over" pots that sit below one of the windows.

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Rabbit Sniffing Heritage Chrysanthemums
It doesn't take a deer very long to find food, especially when they see birds and squirrels in and out of that little alcove. It gives me a real up close and personal look at them, as you can see from this photo that shows the deer only 3 feet from our window sill.

The wildlife have been storing up their bodies with any extra foods they can find. The garden beds are devoid of color other than holly berries and our bright yellow heritage mums which the rabbits have been nibbling on. The sweet bunny in the picture is sniffing the plant before taking a bite. Obviously well trained by its mother. They seem to enjoy the leaves, so we still get to have the color.

The sunrise brings the birds out early to the feeders. There's been a female Pileated Woodpecker that has been enjoying a tree that's a few feet from our deck rail. We cut it off at about 14 feet so it wouldn't fall on the rail, but would still provide food for the birds and nesting spots that give us a good view of the parenting process from egg to fledging. In the sunny afternoons there are some brave birds that bathe in the heated birdbath on the deck, but that always makes me shiver, even at 50 degrees.
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Sunrise View of Female Piliated Woodpecker

Would you praise the Lord and rejoice with me over one special sister that is breathing and living life again as God intended for her to do? One of my subscriber friends, Cherryl in Texas, has a daughter named Cheri who had been waiting for a double lung transplant for quite some time, keeping her faith up and knowing God had a plan, even though there were several "fall throughs" in the process. On August 20th, she got the call and match and surgery was performed. What a rehab time she had, but it didn't steal the joy from either of their hearts. On October 31st, Cheri was headed home. That family is going to have a very blessed Thanksgiving holiday, don't you think?

I share the news with you because we're all waiting for some kind of transplant, and rejoicing with those whose journey is being completed, gives our heart hope and assurance that God is good. Maybe we need to exchange a hardened heart for a soft one that allows our Lord to pour His love into. Maybe we need to rid our body of disease to walk in divine health and wholeness. Faith will bring it all to pass.

God's grace is so hard to comprehend because He has "given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these we might be partakers of the divine nature" (2 Peter 1:4). Unmerited favor and unconditional love strong enough that He sacrificed His own Son for us. It's there for us ... we just have to come to the place of revelation that allows us to reach out and receive it all. The first reach is to receive His amazing love till it fills our very being with a fullness and peace unknown to the world. When we come to the place where Jesus is truly our all, we are at the beginning of real life. I heard it put another way: "Give me Christ, or give me death." We shouldn't be able to imagine living without knowing Him more fully.

I have been determined to have a great Winter season and asked God to show me the beauty of Winter since I seem to dread it coming once September arrives, which is ridiculous! Nothing should be disturbing my peace which is in Christ Jesus.

It seems He's given me ideas to make it more comfortable which will certainly allow me to see more beauty in it. Since our breakfast area windows face South, it's a nice cozy place in Winter and has views of the pond, bird feeders and deck. During the Summer my office is on the screened porch. I love fresh air and am willing to sweat for it rather than be inside.

Donna's Winter Office
In Winter I generally move around from place to place never quite feeling like I'm settled anywhere. So, this year I decided to set up an office in the breakfast area which is a great wildlife viewing spot. I use the table for my desk and have binoculars and a camera ready for use. The chaise is for pondering moments with the Lord or just a sunbathing break. With the hardwood trees bare in the forest behind us, there's plenty of sunshine to bask in.

Another wonderful addition to the pleasures of Winter has been the purchase of a humidifier for our home which I share with you in case you've had the same issues as we have in Winter. When the air dries out as it does in Winter with the heat blowing, nasal passages dry out and begin bleeding and it also makes me feel stuffy which affects my sleep. Not to mention my skin drying out and my knuckles feeling very rough.

I did some studying before Fall arrived about humidifiers and found out that the more humidity in a room, the warmer it will feel. Saw reviews stating that heat could be turned down to lower temperatures for more comfort than received from a higher temperature. So, we decided to give it a try. We had a small room-size humidifier that I would use in the bedroom at night, but it didn't seem to make any difference at all, so I wasn't quite sure what this would do.

We are pleasantly surprised at all the benefits. None of the drying issues are occurring with my body but more than that I can wear a light long-sleeved shirt and be totally comfortable with the thermostat set at 68 degrees when before I had 2-3 layers on and still felt cold.

Wow, that's incredible and I'm loving it! What a simple thing to do to provide so much more comfort. Having to wear layers is one of the things I disliked about Winter since I like easy-on and off clothes and thermal underwear does not fit into that category. I researched a variety of humidifiers and found the one shown with a ton of reviews and under $100. The main downside on reviews was that this Honeywell Quiet Care Humidifier wasn't quiet at all. Other than that folks really liked it and with almost 400 reviews, it was obviously one that had been purchased a lot.

Our assessment is that it is great! Yes, you hear the fan blowing, but it's really easy to fill and that's important. It has wheels so you can roll it about. There's no wet vapor to drip water or leave mineral deposits like our room-size humidifier did on our fireplace hearth. It has two containers and it uses one of them at a time, so you can just fill the empty one each morning while the other one is being used. It has a lot of nice features and looks pretty nice too and covers 1900 square feet for multiple room use. I'm finding that I like it at 60% humidity to feel toasty and for mucus membrane comfort.  Well, just thought I'd share my excitement about this new-found treasure. And I thank God for giving me two wonderful ideas to make Winter less miserable.

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Gorgeous Turkey on Driveway
Robin's House in Georgia
I hope you'll have a nice Thanksgiving celebration. It's a time for getting to see family from afar for many people. Since our family is 20 hours away and it's too cold for outdoor adventures, we get together at a warmer time of the year. The downside of the holiday for me is the slaughter of 45 million turkeys.

The turkey was introduced to the Pilgrims by the Native American Wampanoag tribe in 1620. Their first year in America was bleak on food so the Indians assisted them, introducing them to native foods such as corn and squash and showed teaching them to hunt and fish. The first Thanksgiving was celebrated in 1621 and the Native Americans were invited as guests of honor. Certainly not the treatment they received in years to come.

Thanksgiving became an official holiday in our country on October 3, 1863 by President Abraham Lincoln. The proclamation declared the last Thursday in November as Thanksgiving Day. In 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt moved the official Thanksgiving date to earlier to encourage a longer Christmas shopping season as a Depression recovery strategy. His idea was shut down by Congress, and the official date was declared permanently as the fourth Thursday in November. The popularity of wild turkeys nearly wiped them out until the government offered protection in 1991, and they are now found in 49 states. Alaska is the state without this bird.

Speaking of Thanksgiving dinner ... I had included a recipe for a Cabbage Walnut Cranberry Salad in the last issue and had responses that people were going to make it. Susanna in Georgia has already made it and reported it tasted good.  Her suggestion is to let the dish marinate for 12 hours prior to serving.  I think that's a wise thing for any cabbage dish since it tends to "soften" the crunch a bit.

Hey, what better topic to discuss than poop after thinking about Thanksgiving dinner, right? Recently I was searching for lyrics to a song and a YouTube video link came up with the song title, so I clicked on it and there was an ad placed on it that ran before you actually got to see the video. This particular ad grabbed my attention (along with 19 million+ other people) since it was very unique.

Being in the natural health industry for over 30 years, we talk about poop a lot since cleansing is a great precursor to any health or weight loss program you do, so this prim and proper gal talking about poop definitely caught my attention and kept it throughout the entire ad. If you choose to watch it, listen carefully to the amazing variety of well-chosen words this gal uses. This is a real ad and it's for a real product. Enjoy the video: Girls Don't Poop!

While we're on the subject of poop, a friend told me there is now a "poo pill." This was his description on the item: [it contains] "fecal matter from a healthy person to re-introduce the good bacteria into someone who has lost or destroyed theirs with antibiotics; apparently a very potent cure for some illnesses." How gross can it be to swallow a poo pill? No more discussion of that for further visual images. I told him that I'd rather take a potent diverse bacterium probiotic in capsule form for a couple of weeks rather than consider that option. I've not had any antibiotics since 1979, but I do use Probiotic Eleven now and then for the many benefits of probiotics.  The product is on sale this month so this whole subject has reminded me to order.

Speaking of probiotics, there's research that shows that they also break down pesticides in the gut. Not only that, but they've been found to offset a wide range of toxic exposures, including Bisphenol A, chemotherapy, gluten, aspirin and sodium nitrate. Isn't it amazing? God is always ahead of us.  Science is eventually catching up to God.  View the article: Pesticides Broken Down by Probiotics

We're in an age where so many people are in bondage to special diets such as gluten-free and there's so much fear about chemicals on foods and I've been one to pass this kind of information around. Lately I've been wondering if God doesn't have an answer for every environmental issue there is. After all His promises are no better for previous generations than they are for this generation.  He's still an awesome Daddy.

"He who did not withhold or spare [even] His own Son but gave Him up for us all, will He not also with Him freely and graciously give us all [other] things?"  Romans 8:32

With the 24/7 news media, it's easy to soak in the negative and have our hearts darkened with fear that doesn't allow our faith to shine through to expect God to take care of us in the many facets of life.  I think GMO is sinful and Christians should vote and write accordingly, but still trust God to protect them. The Word is alive and active (Heb. 4:12) so we need to feed it into our hearts.

I've memorized and personalized Psalm 91 and this passage applies to this topic: "I have made the Lord my refuge, even the Most High my dwelling place, therefore, no evil will befall me and no plague come near my tent because He gives His angels charge concerning me to guard me in all my ways." I have not arrived there yet due to all the wrong teaching I've had fed in, but I am on the road to renewing my mind with the only thing that can do it ... The Word.  Consider that it may be as simple as a prayer over our food for Him to cleanse and detox it and increase nutritional value.

Who We Are In Christ

"I am always on God’s mind, He thinks about me constantly."  Psalms 139:17-18
"I am blessed with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places." Ephesians 1:3
"No weapon formed against me can prosper." Isaiah 54:17

About a month ago, Rainbow, a friend in Massachusetts, emailed me a picture of Jesus that was very unusual with a request for me to tell her what I saw in it.  So I did.  We exchanged it with some other friends and found it so interesting the many varied responses of what each one saw.  I have posted this picture in a blog post earlier this week.  Share what you see or feel in the picture.  Consider it an Art Appreciation assignment. You can see what others have said after you leave your comments.

Donna on Butterfly Bench - A Gift From Charlie
On the downside of life ... I would appreciate your prayers for my heart and breathing.  The devil returns again.  I mentioned months ago that I was having minor breathing problems, but not at all limited in what I could do.  They have continued to worsen and for the past two weeks it's not been at all comfortable and I'm very limited in what I can do.  It seems the harder I try to be well, the worse it gets.  There should be a lesson in there on that ... grace doesn't require our participation, but seems I've got a thick-head on that issue.

Jesus gives me such peace that passes understanding in these situations that I just assume they are short-lived, but I realize that there are times when we need others to "hold up our arms" to win the battle.  I know that your prayers almost two years ago were powerful in my healing and so I humbly ask again for that agreement for total health and healing.  Thank you, dear friends.

Until next time .... 
May you find a long list of things to be thankful for when you search your heart.

Donna

P.S.  Anything in here that might help somebody you know?  
Here's a link to the online version of this newsletter: 
Newsletter - 11/15/13
www.thenatureinus.com/2013/11/newsletter-111513.html

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