I love learning new things and today I was taught how to make a loom band bracelet.
We visited Little Pickle Deli Cafe in Boscombe and a little girl was sitting at the next table with her parents. As it is a very small cafe, the tables are quite close together, so you can’t actually help speaking to those at the next table.
Today was no exception, and I was interested to see that Isla was making loom band bracelets, which were all the rage a few months ago. We got chatting, and I asked her parents if it was all right for Isla to show me how to make a bracelet – they said it was, so she was round to our table like a shot!
It took me a while to pick it up, but she was a very good teacher, so here is my bracelet.
My first loom band bracelet
I guess things like this go in phases – when our boys were younger, it was playing marbles, collecting football cards and swapping the doubles and mastering the vagaries of the Rubik’s cube.
How can he make it look so easy?
Going back even further to when I was young, the “in-thing” was to have a pocket solitaire game and jacks.
Pocket solitaire
I am pleased to say that I am able to play the game of solitaire and end up with one peg in the middle – but the Rubik’s cube was just not something I could master, although I know our older son was very quick at doing it – I can’t remember our younger son doing it, but I daresay he did!
However, I can still type faster than my husband and sons, and it has been a constant joke in our family that if they can do anything I can’t do, I say to them “I can still type faster than you!”
Actually, thinking about it, does it matter? Of course not – and in our family, it is just a bit of fun, but sometimes we can make things like this the “be all and end all” of our life. We can say things like – “our car is bigger than yours” – “we have a five bedroom detached house in an acre of ground” – “we belong to the best gym in the area” – “I have at least 5 lenses for my top-of-the-range camera” – not forgetting “we have a 65″ television”!
At the end of the day though, we all have to stand before God and account for what we have done with our lives and the things we have been given. Have we been kind and compassionate? How much did we help our colleagues at work? And what about our neighbours – did we help when they were going through a bad time or did we just shut our front door and let them “get on with it”? Did we let someone in the queue go in front of us, especially if it was lunchtime, or did we pay for someone’s coffee in the queue behind us? I have done the latter on several occasions, but people often don’t know how to “receive” although they would willingly give to someone in need. Actually, someone did that for me a few weeks ago, and I was really surprised!
Capuccino and cake
Does any of this make a difference – or should we just let people live their lives and turn a blind eye to what is happening in our street, our town, our country and even in the world?
Disasters like the earthquake in Nepal make us realise that we can be alive one minute then badly injured or even dead the next – and then, however much our car or house cost or however many “things” we own, that will not stop bad things happening to us. It’s true that we might be better prepared for a disaster but ultimately, as the saying goes:
He who dies with the most toys, still dies.
So what counts in life – is it the fact that we have merely lived and accumulated lots of things and “stuff” and still hanker after more, or is it the fact that we have made a difference to those around us and any others we may have helped, many of whom we may never meet?
Envy
It is very true that:
The more you have, the more people come to help you spend it.
So what good is wealth—except perhaps
to watch it slip through your fingers!
Ecclesiastes 5:11
Life was so much simpler…..
But Jesus said:
I have come that they may have life,
and have it to the full.
John 10:10
Is your life “full” or is it “full of emptiness” – perhaps we all need to take stock of our lives, before it’s too late.
The best way to live!
The Post-it Notes are a selection of those I have been putting up in various places for the last year – in fact, since last Lent; as a Christian, I believe that Lent is not just about giving things up but about making a difference to those around us by being generous with our time and our money, showing them God’s love, making them think, and sometimes even making them smile.
LIFE IS A CHALLENGE! 