Sunrise, Sunset

Today, I made 7 dozen cookies. Easy easy recipe ... cake mix (2 boxes, any flavor, I used chocolate and lemon)cool whip (half tub per box) and an egg (1 per box). Mix thoroughly ... roll into balls ...roll into sugar ..powdered or regular ...and bake for 10 minutes in a 350º and you have the most delicious cookie. Two boxes makes 6 to 7 dozen depending on the size of the balls.

When I make the chocolate and lemon, I usually make about a dozen or so of them mixed together so they are half chocolate/half lemon. Those are really really good.

These make really good cookies with ANY cake mix ...spice, gingerbread, carrot, strawberry, white, sprinkles ..doesn't matter ...favorite cake ... great cookies.

I made them for a Cocoa and Cookies party at church. It was supposed to have been a fellowship at church. It ended up being a reception for our resigning associate pastor. It was beautiful and wonderful ...

There was a quilt that was made by one of the women in the church with blank squares, with a picture of our church in the middle. On the squares, we were all able to sign the squares. I went to sign for our family and my boys had already signed it. They'd both thanked her for everything she'd done for our family. Benjamin thanked her for being super super wonderful. Samuel thanked her for being a wonderful example of an adult. (ok, so how am I supposed to top that???)

I was filled with awe when I went to say thank you to her. Several years ago, I went to sit down in her office the first time, a very insecure person who thought that I had nothing to offer anyone. She told me that she saw me teaching, and that she saw a 'gideon in the winepress'. We talked several times and she would get so excited as I'd share with her what God was doing in my heart. I'd get so confused at how what little bit I was sharing with her, she was turning into this great big adventure.

I was just this mom, on government assistance, who was sick, and didn't have anything to say ..and never succeeded at anything ... who would listen and what would they listen to? What was she talking about?

She talked with me.
She prayed with me.
She laughed with me.
She encouraged me.

Before long. I started to believe that spark in her eye. Maybe? Maybe someone would listen to me. I talked to the person sitting next to me. I started to listen more to her, and to those around me. I started to believe a bit more in me.

Between her, and my pastor, and my pastor's wife ... I started to see ... I was more than my past failures. I was more than my circumstances. I started to share my writings with her. She really became excited.

I shared with her that I wanted to write a book and I thought maybe I could do it. She KNEW I could it. Her excitement was infectious.

I applied for Habitat ... and she prayed me through it.

I worked my way through it ... and she celebrated with me. She mourned with me when the complications came and she thought our church was not going to get to work on the house.

No one, was happier than she was, when it worked out that they would. Our house, was her baby.

The end of this month, she resigns. She will no longer be our associate pastor. There are things that she needs to be able to do that no longer fit with in the constrains of the boundries of the pastorship. She's a bird and she needs to fly free.

I will miss her being our associate pastor terribly. But this is a good thing. We need to rebuild. We need to reconstruct.

We have gone from sunrise to sunset ..but soon, it will be time for sunrise again!