My Sweet, Sweet, South

Not long ago, as a little Christmas gift to myself, I bought the book My South by Robert St. John. First of all, the book is full of fun little one liners that only Southerners can truly appreciate. Things like "My South uses knives and forks, but biscuits and corn bread finish the job." Second of all, you all know I eat this stuff up...

Here's a poem by Christine Carr from the book:

In my South, there is a spirit, a holy spirit that

heals old wounds, melts the heart,

and brings all people together.

It's that spirit that is the source of our progress.

We are moving - we are moving forward, you know.

And now that we are moving and

We've got all this progress and that's great.

But you know, I can still have my front porch,

my sweet tea, and that good home cookin' -

even on a low-carb diet.

We can hold on to the beauty of this

old, old place, as we're moving.

We are moving forward and we are moving forward together.

I love this. One of the things I like the most about the South is that it is a place that sort of stands still in time. We are really good at preserving our culture, which I think is so important. You can't know where you're going until you know where you came from.

With that being said, I also think it's important that we move on. Let's face it, this is an amazing place, but it has a sorted history. It's a well known fact that the South is by no means perfect. We need to let go of as much of our history as we should hold on to, which I think we are doing.

I love my South, and this poem really sums up how I feel about it. Just because we hold on to what is great about our history, doesn't mean we are behind the times. We can live in harmony and sip sweet tea together. We can let go of our hate, but keep our cornbread, and that's my kind of South.

Ok, this is insane...

The deck in our backyard is covered with snow. When it snows in Mississippi, it never sticks, but this is incredible.

We're supposed to be having a Christmas party tonight, but I'm kind of thinking that nobody will show. I'm not rescheduling. I dipped strawberries in chocolate all night, so the show will go on. My husband and I may end up eating lots of chocolate covered strawberries by ourselves on into the night.

Rude Awakening

This morning I was awakened by a shrill shriek. "It's SNOWING! It's SNOWING!" I thought my poor child was going to have a heart attack. Snow in MS. A perfect Christmas...

Unanswered prayers...hopefully

This was my daughter's prayer at breakfast this morning:

Next time my mommy has a baby in her belly, please let it be a girl and two boys, Alexa, Brady, & Austin. And please let them be in there now.

I know full well that God answers prayers, but in this case, I'm hoping for an unanswered prayer.

I love kids

"Get up! You need to marry me!"

This is my daughter and her friend, sometimes "boyfriend." Breaking up is a regular occurrence in their "relationship." They really act like brother and sister. I love kids. They are hilarious.

The Mustard Seed

The Rankin Ledger just ran my story on the Mustard Seed in Flowood. Stop by and pick up one of their ornaments or ceramics as Christmas gifts to benefit a good cause.

Thanksgiving in Clinton...

I had the pleasure of visiting Brittany Brown's 1st grade class at Clinton Park Elementary to write this story. The kids were so much fun and had lots to say about Thanksgiving. Thanks to Sandi for all your help!