Top 5 Plants for Indoor Toxins


In 1989, NASA teamed up with the Associated Landscape Contractors of America (ALCA) to study the affects of houseplants on indoor toxins, with a goal of improving the quality of indoor air. Their goal was cleaner space station air, but their findings proved useful for our well-insulated, energy efficient homes, as well. On this rainy, winter day, it’s good to know our houseplants (3 per room is recommended, but 1 makes a difference) are helping to keep our homes free of toxins while we sip hot chocolate with our feet to the fire.

Below is NASA’s chart of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), or household toxins, common to most homes. We all know being outside in nature is great for stress reduction, and filling our lungs with fresh oxygen, so bringing plants indoors just makes sense. Now, with NASA’s study, it makes even more sense.

Houseplants can absorb unwanted
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The Entitlement of a White, American, Southern, Christian Girl


When sad or uncomfortable things happened to me, I was able to steady myself with retail therapy, lunch out with friends, dinner with family, a random tv show or movie. All sorts of “normal” things returned my mindset from anxious, grieving, disappointed or whatever, back to “normal” again. It was akin to the old bury-the-head-in-the-sand ploy and it worked fabulously. Without realizing it, there was an unconscious (or maybe not so unconscious) part of me that was thinking, “I’m a white, American, Southern, Christian girl. What could happen to me?”

Even this week, as my plane circled to land in Asheville, where the smoke from the forest fires was so bad the pilot was forced to take a couple of “go’s” at it, I was simultaneously pleading with God to get that plane on the ground, while reminding him that this, THIS, wasn’t supposed to happen to

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How May I Pray for You?


If you’re stuck thinking everyone else has such a great life and your life is super crummy, then ask someone, “How may I pray for you?”

My ex and I prayed together almost every night. We laid in bed, held hands and prayed before going to sleep. Obviously, we weren’t the perfect couple, he’s my ex. So, prayer doesn’t necessarily fix everything the way we’d like it too, but it definitely puts things back into perspective. For instance, it was hard for the ex and I to stay mad at one another, if we’d just had a fight, when we were finishing the night with prayer. Why? Prayer is spoken to God. Things get real when God steps in or when we step toward him.

Ask someone, how may I pray for you, and instantly, things will get real with them. You’ll watch their perfect life fade

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Random Weed Day (And Other Days)


I did learn a few things from my ex. It wasn’t all smoke and mirrors.

Like, don’t drink Mike’s Hard Lemonade before doing yoga. It throws your balance off. And, if you wait long enough, and are still enough, a copperhead will come back out of the woodshed (that you saw it go into 2 days before) and then you can kill it. (Got that?)

In the garden, I learned a few lessons, too. One crucial one was really, oh-so-simple. There’s always poison ivy. My 2016 garden exemplifies this truism. The poison ivy is spectacular while everything else is withering from heat and drought. Which brings me to random weed day.  Without benefit of the ex’s wisdom, I stumbled upon random weed day by myself. Well, that and Impulse Hill, but that’s another post.

It goes like this.

If you’re a gardener and you’ve lived long enough,

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humble pie

Humble Pie? Yes, Please.


Want a piece of humble pie? Try this. Read your old journals. I’ve been reading my old journals. That I’ve written since I was 12. I can’t even.

Describes me from age 12 to say, 45: Narcissistic. Silly. Ridiculous. Delusional.

I know, you’re thinking, uh, yeah. We knew.

Then why the heck didn’t you tell me? But you were narcissistic (and often the victim), you say. True. I’d have thought it was like, so your problem not mine. Like NBD. Learn some boundaries, people. I’m on my journey. You’re on yours.

I wish age wasn’t the thing here. The thing that allows you to stop. Stop the obsessing about yourself. Stop the insanely, crazy idea that you must be happy or well, well, you just must. (Truly, happiness is a state of mind.) I wish age didn’t soften the edges or turn the mind toward others, but

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Christians, Gays, Transgenders and Lord Help Us


Everybody is a Donald Trump anymore. Everybody has turned so mean.

And since I am a Christian, it is even more upsetting that Christians are mean, too.

I am referring to mean conservative Christians who shout ugly things about gays, transgenders, and whoever else to the rooftops. And, I am referring to mean liberal Christians who name call and hurl insults at their conservative counterparts.

Somehow, both the liberals and the conservatives ended up with God on their side. Amazingly.

The liberals like to make everyone look stupid, and the conservatives like to make everyone look immoral. One group shouts stupid, one group shouts sinful. Both groups like to toss around the phrase “What would Jesus do?” insinuating that the other group was not behaving as Jesus would, since both groups seem pretty convinced that they know what Jesus would actually do.

Poor Jesus. What a tug

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What God Did


Sometimes it’s important to tell others what God has done in our lives. You never know, maybe that person is in a similar situation, or any old situation, where someone like God would be darn useful.

So, here’s a story–really the pared down version–of what God did in my life when I had no money, no job, no home and no plan.

I was divorcing and for all the convoluted stories divorces can be, I won’t go into how this next thing happened, but it did. The ex got the house, and most of the money. I hadn’t worked in 15 years (stay-at-home mom), and was unemployed when this happened.

Here’s what I needed: a home, money to move, a job that would pay for myself and my son, and a plan. A really good plan.

The plan was the thing that bugged me the most. I

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How Long Do You Get to Live?


Just yesterday.

A woman said.

“I can live until 77.” Cracking a joke everyone over 50 identifies with.

I thought, when is the value of a life measured in dollars and cents?

Of course, she was referring to her retirement account and it’s longevity. Which seems to be the determinate of a lifespan (at least among my crowd) these days.

Saving for retirement is a lot like saving for a child’s college. Completely necessary, often forgotten, and, I would add, not always realistic when college tuition is skyrocketing, and stocks are dive bombing. I was told 2 things regarding old age.

  1. Marry well so someone can take care of you in your old age.
  2. If you don’t marry well, have a lot of children so they can take care of you in your old age.

I did neither. I’ll add that neither did I work

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Skinny Girls and Over-50 Girls


You know what I really don’t like? Women who post pictures of their food and it’s pancakes piled high with syrup dripping everywhere, bacon, eggs, and a slab of ham for good measure, and that woman is a size 2. And then, later that same day, she posts pics of her peanut butter pie with chocolate sauce on her face, captioned, “Peanut Butter Pie!!” As if we can’t see that. It’s all over her social media. You can’t escape it.

I’m sorry. I’m 56. The word metabolism left my vocabulary just like it left my body somewhere in my mid-40’s. Listen it’s a 19 year old’s world (and girls, enjoy it now), because once you’re over 50, unless you’re fasting the other 6 days a week, there is no eating like that. If there is, something ain’t right.

On our first snowy morning, I delighted Micah with

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Morning Bible Study

A Morning Bible Study


I’ve learned, over the years, to reach for my Bible first thing each morning. Nothing else can come first. Well, a pot of coffee can, and the dog gets to go outside to pee, but that’s it. I won’t even switch last night’s load of laundry because we all know what would happen if I did. And, my phone is turned off.

It goes like this. I read the chapter, pick the first 5-6 verses, and begin. Here’s my page header.

Galatians 1: 1-5       January 11, 2016  

I divide each verse into a, b, and c.

1a) From Paul, an apostle (not appointed by men, or a human agency, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him [Jesus] from the dead). 1b) God raises the dead and God gives us our appointments. 1c) What appointment has God given me?

A: I

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