Focus Friday!!!

This week wasn't to exciting...no fun shopping trips to write about! ; )  I needed to take a picture for this week's, "Focus Friday," so I decided to use this little notebook that Grandma S. gave me to look at.  It was my Great Aunt Edna's who I don't remember because I think I was really little when she died...she put in the notebook a bunch of stories and poems, songs, articles and play scripts.  Some of them are cut out and pasted onto the pages, some are typed out on the paper using a type writer, some are just laying free in there and some are hand written...I think maybe she wrote some of the stories?  I wish I could read hand writing better...so I could read the hand written stuff.  I may have to get mom to help me!!!  : )  Mom said, "see, Aunt Edna was notebooking!"  Putting a notebook together of all her favorite poems and stories.  I have started to do something like that too!  One of the Wissmann Family's (Singing group)  daughter's, Bethany is now married and has a blog that I read.  I love her...she is a photographer and likes taking pictures so she has some amazing pictures too...love reading her blog!  She and her husband are so cute and so in love!  They have a little girl now too and she has the biggest blue eyes!!!  I have thought that I want to be like her!  : D  Anyway, one time she posted that she found a journal that her Mom had made when she was younger, where she had written down little sayings and stuff that she had found interesting, inspiring and encouraging.  So, Bethany was then inspired to do the same...and you can read her post to see what happened! ; )  I thought that was a good idea, so I think I then bought a journal and started to do that too! : )  And this was before I had even know about this book that Grandma gave me to look at..she had done this too!  There are some really good poems that I am going to have to copy out of it...I will copy the one that I read before I took this picture and that the note book is opened up to. This idea of writing these things down is so cool because anything here or read and think, "that is such a neat way of putting it", or "this really encouraged or blessed me," or "this is one of my favorite verses"...you can write in down in ONE place and you can always go back and look at just those things you found delightful...or "striked your fancy," as Grandma S. might say! ; ) 

: )

My Favorite Sayings

a piece of me...

*click on the picture to see it much better!

I am going to try and type it out just like it is on the page....This one was typed with a type writer and some of the words are underlined...I think maybe she underlined the parts she like...but maybe it was just her critiquing it?  Not sure but the very next page she underlined too and it looks more like just parts she liked...

Then at the end of the poem it is handwritten, "Song."

The Refiner's Fire

He sat by the furnace of sevenfold heat,

As He watched by the precious ore,

And closer He bent with a searching gaze

As He heated it more and more.

He knew He had ore that could stand the test

And He wanted the finest gold,

To mold as a crown for the King to wear,

Set with gems of price untold.

So He laid our gold in the burning fire,

Tho' we fain would say Him, "Nay";

And watched the dross that we had not seen,

As it melted and passed away.

And the gold grew brighter and yet more bright,

But our eyes were dim with tears;

We saw but the fire--not the Master's hand,

And questioned with anxious fears.

Yet our gold shone out with a richer glow

As it mirrored a Form above,

That bent o'er the fire, tho' unseen by us,

With a look of ineffable love.

Can we think it pleases His loving heart

To cause us a moment's pain?

Ah, no! but He sees thro' the present cross

The bliss of eternal gain.

So He waited there with a watchful eye,

With a love that is strong and sure,

And His gold did not suffer a bit more heat

Than was need to make it pure. 

{ Song }

I'll post another great poem next week!  There are sooo many good old ones out there!

~ Sarah