And the Ice Gnomes are Marching From Their Norways...

A very merrily blessed Christmas to you all! I hope everyone had a marvelous celebration of our Lord's grace; any interesting stories to tell? Thoughts? Queries? Snide Remarks?

And what is this? The end of the year? Already?! WHERE DID IT GO?!! Does anyone really believe that it's December yet; cause I think there's some sort of conspiracy going on. Involving squirrels. And their acorn-powered time machines.

Closing Thoughts, Queries and (Possibly) Snide Remarks on the Year:

-God is good.

-I wish language were less weak to express God's [insert stronger medium here]. "How was your week? Good."; "Good job!"; "The Lord is good."; "Oh, that's good."

-My great apologies to any other string players out there, but cello is my favorite string instrument. Ohhh my word. (Hah, I just got a "Yo-Yo Ma and Friends" Christmas album...:D)

-Did you know that Yo-Yo Ma made a guest appearance as a cello-wielding bunny on the cartoon show Arthur? I didn't even know what he looked like outside of Bunnydom until this year.

-This year has brought me to ponder art a very lot. If we are a reflection of God's glory, and we are His own masterpieces/artworks, does that make our masterpieces/artworks reflections of our glory, which is really God's glory reflected through us?

-I have discovered that I am a very wordy person! Argh...:P

-Interactions between the two genders is awkward and complicated at secular schools. Like, really awkward.

-If the future wasn't scary, the present and past wouldn't be nearly as interesting.

-SNOW IS COLD. ACK.

-Consistent prayer is hard.

-People that I don't agree with can still be decent, amazing, lovable people. It's crazy. In my ignorance, I sincerely never expected to meet this many beautiful people who claim they will never believe in Christ as their savior. (Then again, we never have met a mere mortal, as Lewis says).

-And lastly, gummies.

I also discovered how much it hurts to miss people, even when you have met all sorts of interesting, gracious and lovely persons. You are all in my heart often, and you are sorely loved. (Ow! ^_^)

May Christmas be with you always; may we ever remember to weaken ourselves before God and other men.

Love,
Danielle

...

Some of you might remember the children's book, The Adventures of Columbus the Pigeon, that I was writing/illustrating a while back.

Well, the people at Landmark Editions (the company that was hosting the contest) didn't contact us by the last day they said they would if it won (aka Doomsday). We thusly assumed that it hadn't won and eagerly awaited the return of the darned thing. :)

However,

however,

HOWEVVVVERRRR....

They emailed TODAY and wrote the following message:

"We are pleased to advise you that [her] book has been chosen to be published in our PUBLISHER'S CHOICE GOLD AWARD LINE. Such books are ones which have not won outright, but one which we feel strongly about doing and ones we would hate to see the public miss out on and [her] book is certainly one of those. It was a tough decision on our part, because we would be pleased to send to print any and all of the top five in each category. After great deliberation, we have decided to bring it forward in print form."

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Is all I have to say about that! :D I think this means that I get to visit Kansas for like, two weeks to finish it up. WOOHOO KANSAS!

Home away from Home away from Home

You must hear these things.
You must, please!
You must know before it is December
And thought becomes barren as the trees.

In the home of the hearts of these;
Golden saints gaze on the
Curls that carress the face
That rests on the wooden pew.

("Oh! The water's cold!"
But you were so bold as to
Jump!
Into the frigid, stormy, churning, nightmare
Pool.)

No, cat!
Grand huntress of these realms.
You must not devour our friend the bird
For then who will chirp our souls to peace?

And remember
The one o' clocks
At which we read poems much better than this
And wondered how words sound in E minor?

In the home of the hearts of these;
Apollo stands and sings to us
Through transparent fingers and monochrome keys.

I must tell you these things before they are Unreal.
Before time becomes the place that I cannot remember
Before a myopic mind dissevers the dream...

Before the rain floods my head
And I forget to number the days
(Number the days!)
In the home of the hearts of these
Days both seen and unseen.