Beauty Tips

For attractive lips, speak words of kindness.

For lovely eyes, seek out the good in people.

For a slim figure, share your food with the hungry.

For beautiful hair, let a child run his or her fingers through it once a day.

For poise, walk with the knowledge you’ll never walk alone.

People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anybody.

Remember, If you ever need a helping hand, you’ll find one at the end of your arm.

As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands, one for helping yourself, the other for helping others.

The beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears, the figure that she carries, or the way she combs her hair.

The beauty of a woman must be seen from in her eyes, because that is the doorway to her heart, the place where love resides.

The beauty of a woman is not in a facial mole, but true beauty in a woman is reflected in her soul.
It is the caring that she lovingly gives, the passion that she shows, and the beauty of a woman with passing years -only grows!

written by Sam Levenson

Then the LORD God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” … And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

Genesis 2:18, 22-24

A Bit of Wisdom

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered;

Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;

Be kind anyway. If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies;

Succeed anyway. If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;

Be honest and frank anyway. What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;

Build anyway. If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;

Be happy anyway. The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;

Do good anyway. Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;

Give the world the best you've got anyway. You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God;

It never was between you and them anyway.

Author Unknown  

The wisdom of the prudent is to understand his way, But the folly of fools is deceit.  Proverbs 14:8 

Lightning



Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work.

Mark Twain 

As I write this I am sitting at my desk watching a pretty incredible lightning storm.  I know, I'm taking my chances with my computer and I should be smart and not only turn it off, but unplug it as well, but I love to watch the lightning and I wanted to share the storm with you. 

Don't you love thunderstorms?  It's been such a warm and muggy day.  We all knew that the storms would come; we hoped the storms would come, and remove all the humidity from the air.  Actually, with the flooding of the Missouri River right here, all around us, we don't need any more water, but if you've never lived in the Midwest, you can't know the feeling of the air when it becomes so heavy with moisture that you hope and pray it will rain.  Then, if only for a little while, the air becomes lighter again and it's not quite so difficult to move and to breathe. 

You can see it building, watching the clouds grow taller and thicker.  As the storm gets closer you can see them change from puffy white clouds to gray clouds and then to thick dark clouds.  When they turn an ugly green color, it's time to start watching closely.  I prefer to watch the storms in the daytime, not night, simply because I like to watch all this happen.  After dark, all that you are able to see is the lightning.



When my son was little, it was the thunder that scared him.  He always felt better when I reminded him that thunder was just two clouds bumping into each other and then yelling about it.  Once we talked about it, he could just relax and wait for the storm to pass.  He never realized that it was the lightning that could hurt.  We've been fortunate, we've never had a lightning strike too close to us.  Well, we had one hit the light pole outside our house when he was about eleven years old, but we've never had any damage from lightning. 

Like so many things, while it can be dangerous and must be respected, lightning is beautiful.  The power harnessed in a lightning strike can kill instantly.  Lightning is extremely hot—a flash can heat the air around it to temperatures five times hotter than the sun’s surface. About 2,000 people are killed worldwide by lightning each year. Hundreds more survive strikes but suffer from a variety of lasting symptoms, including memory loss, dizziness, weakness, numbness, and other life-altering ailments.

Powerful!  Frightening!  Exhilarating!  Deadly!

Lightning is a release of energy.  It can reach from cloud to cloud, from cloud to ground, or from ground to cloud.  It is impossible to know where lightning will strike.  It reminds me of people and human relationships. 



When you put two people together you never know what will happen;  sometimes really beautiful things happen, sometimes really ugly things happen, but all reactions are powerful leaving everything around them changed forever.  

As I sit here and watch the rainwater run down the street and sidewalk in front of my house, I hear the hail hitting the roof, the flag pole and the sidewalk.  I know that this storm is marking my house and my yard.  Just like those people that pass through my life, it will leave things just a little different than they were a few minutes ago.  It might be better...my yard will not grow dry; it might be worse...it could shatter a tree, like the one down the block that was split in the last storm, but it will be different. 

Isn't that one of life's greatest lessons?  To face the storms or the people, no matter what challenges they bring and move forward, learning lessons in the process.  And enjoy the beauty as it unfolds.