The Blue Spruce

So here I sit... same as yesterday. There's still a pile of laundry to be put away, one in the dryer to be folded and another still in the washer ready to be dried. My house is still a wreck; toys, laundry, Christmas boxes, wrapping paper, craft projects, Christmas gifts and sadly, yes, breakfast are all still out in my house. I've been inching my way through the madness for the past few days. Trying to unearth one room at a time; pick it up, make it sparkly clean and then Christmas-fye it.

 I've been working on the putting lights and decorations out in front of the house. We have a 30' blue spruce in our front yard... the owner before us is from New England and had a backhoe brought in to break up the rock in our yard to be able to plant this special spruce he had shipped down from his home town. Basically, I think it's a sin to have a huge Christmas tree in your front yard and not at least put some lights on it. That's normally Braden's job, but this week's been crazy and so was the week before. Since we're only ten days out from Christmas I thought it was time to get this show on the road. I thought it would be a nice surprise to come home from being out of town on business all day, a bright greeting of a festive tree in our yard. One less thing for him to do. To nip a tremendously long story down to a few lines. Barrett and I worked on it late in the afternoon yesterday we ran out of lights and had to get more. I worked on it last night in the pitch dark while he was sleeping. I blew the fuse three times. After trying to change it for a third time with frozen fingers in the dark, I chalked it up as a loss and left it for this morning. 4th fuse is the charm! Tree is up and sparkly.

I've been wrestling with some lighted garland for our outside railings and have changed their fuses (4 times!) and to no avail have given up. As I was feeding Barrett and working with the fuses, I could feel that itch of remembrance. Why am I going to so much trouble? Why am I fighting with plastic greenery? What in the world does this have to do with the birth of Christ? Hello? Anybody in there? Every day as I take on more and more projects I fill up my day with to-do's; some of them are have to's, some are need to's and some are want to's. But you know what the worst thing is... when I spend my time doing the things that aren't even on my list. Jesus is on the written list, heck He should be the whole list, but why is He all too often the first thing to get booted?

With resolve, I've given up on the greenery. I'll put a small one out on the back porch, slap a wreath on the front door and be happy. My day would be much better served sitting at the feet of my Teacher. So that's what I'm going to do. Crank up some worship music and praise Him while I tidy up this huge mess... both my heart AND my house.