Creation Cleaner

The Labor Day weekend is past. Even though the days are still warm, this is symbolic of nature's seasonal movement from summer to fall. The children are back in school. I miss them and their friend's trapsing through the studio while I work. So it's up to my studio dog, Abby "the Labby" to keep me company while I sew, design, sew, market, sew, and sew some more! Abby often comes out of the marathon sewing sessions the victim of stray threads landing on her as caught in this photo.

The seasons may be changing outside my window but the church continues to mark Ordinary Time. How do you honor this? In worship I see the green paraments and ministry stoles. I hear messages encouraging me to grow in my faith. I sing old favorites like "Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah." Beyond worship how do we honor Ordinary Time? Abby and I love working through our days in the studio but we also enjoy the daily break of a walk through the neighborhood. We marvel at the ordinary....the shadows the trees make on the grass, the sounds of a child laughing in the distance, the birds holding court while sitting on the wires up above. We also use our walking time to help keep this creation cleaner. Taking a bag on our walks to pick up trash is an easy way to help keep God's creation cleaner. This is such an easy task for all ages to get in the habit of. You can even teach your little ones to join in this activity! Thinking about "creation cleanup" reminds me of the day my son, then seven years old, took our habit of litter patrol maybe a little too seriously. His teacher called to tell me that he arrived at school with beer bottles in his backpack (she'd discoverd them from the stench that was oozing from his locker.) She thankfully knew us well enough to understand my son's explanation of "caring for creation" on his way to the bus stop and the need to save the bottles for the recycling bin when he got home. But, she did highly recommend that he not continue to bring empty beer bottles to school! So, outside of worship I encourage you to take time to enjoy the ordinary (that is really extra-ordinary) and pitch in to help keep our creation cleaner...but tell your kids to not to pick the beer bottles up on the way to school!