Thank God for His mercies and faithfulness

Thy mercy, O LORD, is in the heavens;
and thy faithfulness reacheth unto the clouds.
Psalm 36:5

Dear Friends,

Thanks for stopping by. Thank God for seeing us through another week.

♥ I thank God for His mercies and faithfulness daily. Thank God for continuing to strengthen me as I wait upon Him. Thanks for all your prayers and encouragements.

♥ I thank God for bringing me back into contact with an elderly lady, Madam Chan, whom I ministered to some 10 years ago. Madam Chan is already 92 years old this year. She loves the Lord and have been rather ill all of her life. She is wheel chair bound and house bound.

♥ I thank God that when Madam Chan first came to know our Lord 10 years back at the age of 82 years old, I had the privilege of being used by God to share His Words with her. Due to a change in providence, I lost contact with her. Thank God that recently, in His mercies, He brought me back into contact with her.

♥ I am thankful to God that Mdm Chan still recognizes me and remember my name after such a long interval! See my joyful face in the photo below and you can imagine what a great joy it was for me to be reunited with her :-)

She looked very haggard in this photo as she had a fall some 3 weeks back and was in great pain. She became bed-ridden and could hardly eat. So she has lost a lot of weight.

Nancie and Madam Chan

♥ I am thankful to God for preserving Mdm Chan's faith in Him. For the last 10 years she has practically no contact with any Christian except her son-in-law. But when I met up with her recently, she said every day she prays and thanks our Heavenly Father and our Lord Jesus Christ for shedding His blood to wash away her sins. She said she is a sinner and very thankful to God for taking care of her! I was greatly encouraged to see how the Lord has preserved her and kept her close to Him despite the difficult and lonely life she has led.

♥ I am thankful to God that Madam Chan desires baptism and she was baptised recently on 7 December 2008. She was able to testify of her faith in our Lord Jesus Christ in her own simple way. She expressed gratefulness to God that she can be baptised and belong to the Church of Jesus Christ. Her childlike faith is a great testimony to me and to my church brethren of what God is able to do in His beloved people's heart.

Madam Chan's baptism

♥ I am thankful to God for strengthening Madam Chan. Her health has improved shortly before her baptism and thereafter. Prior to that, for about 1 month she has been bed-ridden and not able to eat much. But now she is able to eat some solid food again! Thank God! So you can see in the picture above that at the time of her baptism her face is more fleshy. She is generally stronger and more cheerful. Now I visit her about once a week to minister to her whenever my health permist. She is able to sit up for a few hours now whenever I visit her.

♥ I am thankful to God for giving me the joy and privilege of seeing His wonderful work of grace in Madam Chan's heart. It is my regret that for the last 10 years I have lost contact with her. I am thankful that now God is enabling me to see once again His great work of grace in her soul, and give me the privilege to contribute a little in sharing His love and grace to her.

♥ I am thankful to God for providing precious people in my life ie. my family, church, friends and blogging friends who love and care for me in their very wonderful ways. These are tokens of God's love for me and I treasure very much.

♥ I am thankful to God once again for all of you, my dear blogging friends and visitors. I have been so greatly blessed by all of you and I thank God upon every remembrance of you. It is wonderful to read of how God is guiding and blessing you in your walk with our Lord and it encourages me in my walk with God too. Thanks again for your prayers and encouragements.

May God continue to bless you with His love and mercies in many wonderful ways every day :)

Thank you for stopping by. Take care and may God continue to bless you through this week!

Recent Posts:

Thankful Thursday : Free Calendars 2009 and Bookmarks

God delivers us out of our depths - Psalm 130

God is our refuge and strength - Psalm 46

Resting in God

The Cures for Clinical Depression - Some helpful Tips

The Causes of Clinical Depression

Myths about Mental Illness

In remembrance of my Counsellor and a Tribute to her

From the National Council of Teachers of English: For Parents & Teachers

Most Viewed Views of 2008

Of all the weekly choices, more readers clicked on the following NCTE guidelines and position statements than any others:

• More Than a Number: Why Class Size Matters
• How to Help Your Child Become a Better Writer
• Tips for Parents from the National Council of Teachers of English: Helping Your Teenager to Write Better
• The NCTE Definition of 21st Century Literacies
• NCTE's Reading Commission Guideline On Reading, Learning to Read, and Effective Literacy Instruction
  

Best of the NCTE 2008 Inbox Blog
Effective writing assignments and strategies for teaching nonfiction along with the summer series of blogs on 21st century tools for the classroom were Traci Gardner's most read Inbox blogs this year.

• What Makes an Effective Assignment?
• Strategies for Teaching with Nonfiction
• Mind Mapping Graphic Organizers
• Google Lit Trips: Literary Maps Meet 21st Century Literacy Skills
• Wiki: Collaborative Authorship Made Easy
• Twitter: 140-Character Professional Development and Writing Tool

More Buzz about the Newbery Award

I think many of you may have already read Has the Newbery Lost Its Way?, an article written by Anita Silvey that appeared in the October 2008 issue of School Library Journal. Here’s another article from The Washington Post entitled Plot Twist: The Newbery May Dampen Kids' Reading that speaks to the same subject. It seems there are children’s literature and literacy experts who feel that some of the recent Newbery winners are too complicated and inaccessible to kids. What are your thoughts on the subject?

Here are the first two paragraphs of TheWashington Post article:

The Newbery Medal has been the gold standard in children's literature for more than eight decades. On the January day when the annual winner is announced, bookstores nationwide sell out, libraries clamor for copies and teachers add the work to lesson plans.

Now the literary world is debating the Newbery's value, asking whether the books that have won recently are so complicated and inaccessible to most children that they are effectively turning off kids to reading. Of the 25 winners and runners-up chosen from 2000 to 2005, four of the books deal with death, six with the absence of one or both parents and four with such mental challenges as autism. Most of the rest deal with tough social issues.

Click here to continue reading the article.

Overwhelmed

First of all, let me say that I am sincerely sorry if I concerned anyone with my absence.

I certainly had no intentions of causing anyone to worry about me.

I actually didn't intend to disappear, either. I have been under tremendous (albeit self-imposed) pressure to be the best I can possibly be at my new job. My new job is in the IT department at my alma mater. It's so difficult to work with my former professors - I know they know I'm smart, so now I feel like I can't say "I don't know" because I don't want to sound like an idiot or (worse) let anyone down. Even though, in my field, there are MANY times when "I don't know" is the appropriate response. (For those who are unfamiliar with information technology, programming, and computer science, sometimes it isn't necessarily about how much you know about something as much as it is about knowing where to look for the answer.) The thing is that I love this job and all the people there so much, so I want them all to think I'm perfect.

And then there's TSCS. I got sooooo far behind when I switched jobs, and despite my best efforts, I have not only not been able to catch up, but I've been falling farther and farther behind. Unlike a lot of other blogs, this is a one (wo)man Show. I used to pride myself on the fact that, even though I do this all on my own, I was able to respond to every single e-mail that I received within three days. Now my inbox is full of game day pictures, Roaming Penguins stories, links, requests for info and/or link exchanges, and other items that are backed up all the way to mid-September.

I loathe being disorganized and behind, so for a while now I've been getting really overwhelmed when I sign in and see how far behind I actually let myself fall. But I didn't (and still really don't) want to say anything to you guys about it because I didn't want you to think that I no longer want you to e-mail me - because that's DEFINITELY not the case. I don't know if you realize that when I call you Friends of The Show I really mean that you are friends of mine. But now that I've let it get this far, I feel like I'm letting all of you down, too.

All of this, plus missing my friend Fred, on top of the always stressful preparations for Christmas... well, it finally got to be too much, so I just abruptly decided to take a break and just kind of retreat for a few days. I haven't powered on my home computer since Friday afternoon until now. I didn't really answer my phone, either. In retrospect, I now realize that was kind of selfish of me, and I apologize for not publishing an "I'm taking a break" post.

But I'm feeling better about most things today because I had a good talk with a good friend who reminded me that perfection in ANY area of my life is 100% unattainable and that I need to just accept it and relax a bit. Though, I think "a bit" is a bit of an understatement! :P

I've got a twelve day break coming up for Christmas and New Year's during which I have decided that I am going to fire off a handful of "catch up" posts (like the ones I did back when I first got this job), so hopefully you all can bear with me for just a little bit longer.

I have also decided that when I am done writing this post, I'm done beating myself up for not being able to keep up. I still love doing The Show. :) I'll do the best I can to catch up, and hopefully it's enough. And if it's not, that's okay, too. I'll just keep recapping the games as they're played and using off days to post the great stuff you all have sent me, and if I have to wait until the summer to get to everything in my inbox, eventually I will get it all posted.

Again, please know that I'm so sorry for causing anyone to worry about me, and I thank all of you so much for your concern. And now it's time for us to focus on more important things...

GO PENS!!!!!

The Poetry Friday Roundup Is Here!

I'm doing the Poetry Friday Roundup this week. Please leave the URL of your poetry post in the comments. I'll be adding poetry links throughout the day.

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The Wee Hours of the Morning Edition

• At Wild Rose Reader, I have three original Christmas acrostics. I also have three clerihews that I wrote for Tricia’s Monday Poetry Stretch this week.
• At Blue Rose Girls, I have a perfect poem for December written by Russell Libby entitled Applied Geometry.
• Little Willow gives us Falling Asleep, a poem by Siegfried Sassoon.
• This week David Elzey is celebrating the Dutch tradition of giving poems with gifts for Sinterklassavond with his post Sinterklassgedichten.

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The Breakfast Edition

• Michele at Scholar’s Blog has a wintry poem for us—A December Day by Robert Fuller Murray.
• John Mutford of the Book Mine Set has a review of Beatitudes by Herménégilde Chiasson and translated by Jo-Anne Elder. In addition, he uses his style to attempt a short Christmas poem.
• Gotta minute? Then get thee on over to GottaBook. Gregory K. says he’s up with an original for the season: Why I Love the Holidays in My Family.
• Jill Corcoran’s post celebrates children's poets and the series that brings these poets to life, SPEAKING OF POETS.
• Cloudscome brings us an original poem by J. Patrick Lewis celebrating National Chocolate Covered Anything Day: Chocolate Covered Ants.
• Over at A Year of Reading, Mary Lee has a purr-fect poem for feline fanciers in honor of her cat: John Ciardi’s Why Nobody Pets the Lion at the Zoo.
• Julie Larios says she burnt herself out on the Poetry Stretch clerihews and Emily Dickinson this week, so she’s letting John Keats speak for her over at The Drift Record.
• Laura at AuthorAmok has an original poem and a writing exercise, "Poetry Rocks!" She says it was inspired by a third grader's enthusiastic doodle.
• Sara Lewis Holmes is in today with a post about creatively altered old books, a BBC modernization of Much Ado About Nothing, and Shakespeare's unchanging sonnet 116: "Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds."
• At Across the Page, Janet is sharing something special today—her 7-year-old's first poem: "Two Little Snowflakes."
• Stacey of Two Writing Teachers says she has a very rough original poem about her desk, which she FINALLY cleaned off this morning! Check out her post Poetry Friday & Photo Fridays Collide!
• And Andrea of Just One More Book!! Podcast is in with a chat about a fabulous rhyming story of sibling dynamics: When I Was King.
• At the Miss Rumphius Effect, Tricia joins the poetry posters today with a poem entitled Sorley's Weather.
• What will you find bubbling in Jama Rattigan’s Alphabet Soup today? Why, "The Twelve Thank-you Notes of Christmas"—that’s what!
• This week Carol reviewed EVERY HUMAN HAS RIGHT. She says it’s a remarkable new book of poetry written by children, illustrated with National Geographic photographs from around the world. She thinks it’s a book every adult who cares about kids needs to know.
• Over at Shelf Elf, there are some cute gift ideas for poets—poetry-inspired pins!
• Lisa Chellman’s contribution this week is "Fearing Paris," by Marsha Truman Cooper.
• Linda Kulp has a tribute to Lee Bennett Hopkins at her blog Write Time.
• Like me—poet Laura Salas is into Acrostics today, too! She also has her 15 Words or Less Poems for December 12, 2008.

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The Brunch Bunch

• Kelly Polark presents an original Christmas cinquain entitled Tree Topper this Poetry Friday.
• Douglas Florian penned an original poem for Poetry Friday. He claims his meter reader was getting on his nerves. Fortunately, that annoyance inspired a well-metered verse entitled The Meter Reader.
• Sally Ito joins in posting on Poetry Friday for the first time at the PaperTigers blog. She’s in with Poetry and the Spiritual: The Work of Tomihiro Hoshino.
• Jennifer Knoblock has some Christopher Marlowe at Ink for Lit.
• The proud MotherReader has an original poem written by her wise seventh-grader titled The Third Level.
• Ruth is in with a poem entitled Schoolsville, which was written by Billy Collins—one of my favorite poets.
• Jules at 7-Imp contributes to Poetry Friday with a poem by Rilke entitled To Music.
• Karen Edmisten shares some Billy Collins, too. She's in with his poem entitled Her.

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The Literary Lunch Crowd

• Tiel Aisha Ansari gives us a seasonal original entitled A Box Full of Stars.
• Shelburns has The Dreidel Song…for Hanukkah at Write for a Reader.
• At Readertotz, Lorie Ann Grover adds to the seasonal chill with The North Wind Doth Blow.
• Lorie Ann also shares an original poem with us entitled Winter Night at On Point.
• Adrienne is into “Howling” this Poetry Friday.
• Anastasia Suen joins us jolly poetry posters with her picture book Red Light, Green Light—which she’s giving away for the 11th Day of Christmas.
• Schelle’s got a cockatootin’ acrostic for us at Brand New Ending.
• Jone is featuring the poems of “Silver Star Students” at Check It Out.
• Tadmack is in with a Meg Kearney poem called Creed.
• Becky at Farm School is in a poetic holiday mood with a few Christmas poems from one of her family’s favorite children's holiday anthologies.

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The Early Evening Edition

• In her Poetry Friday post My Dreidel’s Dancing in Highlights, Brianna Caplan Sayres included links to her poem, "The Dreidel's Dance" and Eileen Spinelli's poem, "The Christmas Story"—both of which appear in this month’s Highlights.
• Nadine C. Warner has her head in the heavens with Douglas Florian's Comets, Stars, the Moon and Mars.
• Kevin Conder thinks his post falls under the Evening Vespers section. He’s in with Charles Bukowski's admonition against being boring. Boring? Perish the thought!!!

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Late Edition

• Liz Garton Scanlon was moon watching and she’s got some Dickinson for us at Liz in Ink.
• Anamaria at Books Together has posted about a family favorite—Father Fox’s Christmas Rhymes.

Poetry Friday: Christmas Acrostics

I thought I'd write a few holiday-themed acrostics for this Poetry Friday in December.


Wrapped around itself,

Red-ribboned

Evergreen, fragrant of winter forests,

Adorned with berries, baubles, bells of gold,

Tacked to the front door...

Home for the holidays.




Trimmed with tinsel, bedecked with shiny bulbs,

Ribboned with red satin, strung with bright lights—

Each twinkling like an earthbound star in an

Evergreen sky.




Santa snaps the reins. Red-nosed Rudolph

Leads the team of reindeer this early winter

Eve. Up, up

Into the sky with a cargo of Christmas

Gifts and goodies they rise, weaving through clouds. Can you

Hear the merry jingle of their silver bells?

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At Blue Rose Girls, I have a poem by Russell Libby entitled Applied Geometry.

The Poetry Friday Roundup is at Wild Rose Reader this week. Click here and leave a comment with the URL of your poetry post.

Pens v Islanders (W 9-2)

YES YES YES! Casa de snoop now has a Christmas tree! (Haha, that's why I was a little late on the pregame post.)

No, that score is not a typo! Seriously, what kind of Wheaties did the Boys eat before this game?! Geez! It's been almost 2 years since the Pens' last 8 goal game, and it's been since April 1993 since the Pens have had a 2 hat trick night (the players were Mario Lemieux and Joey Mullen), but on the eighth anniversary of the Return of The King, the Pens made the Islanders look like complete amateurs.

And Philippe Boucher, Petr Sykora, and Pascal Dupuis had a spectacular night of firsts! Strap yourself in - it's gonna be a long one...

(Apologies for the lack of photos - there aren't many out there right now, and because I have a day job, I can't wait for them to be posted. I might add pictures tomorrow.)

FIRST PERIOD

John Curry was in the net for his second start (third appearance), and Tim Wallace's parents were in the house after only making it to New Jersey from Anchorage, Alaska, in time for the 3^rd period yesterday - even though they left at 6:00am! It took just 6:25 for Pascal Dupuis to draw first blood. He fired a shot from the far wall that hit Joey MacDonald, bounced up and over the goalie, and slid right over the goal line. Siddo was going hard to the net to ensure that the puck went in, but he went so hard that he ended up going into the net right after the puck did. [Pens 1, Isles 0]

Doug Weight got the night's first penalty. He went to the box for interference. Andy Sutton drilled Ruslan Fedotenko with a big hit during the Pens' power play, but the Pens didn't score on their advantage. Not to worry, though. The Islanders gave the Pens ample opportunity to get a power play goal with a series of overlapping penalties that gave the Pens an extended 5-on-3. First, Freddy Meyer went for holding. While he was in the box, Nate Thompson hooked Jordan Staal. This gave the Pens 1:07 with the 2 man advantage. Then with 12 seconds left on the first two penalties, Brendan Witt was busted for slashing. Since there is no 5-on-2, the Pens ended up with 52 additional seconds of 5-on-3. After shot after shot, Miroslav Satan added to the Pens' tally by going from his forehand to his backhand for the goal. [Pens 2, Isles 0]

The Penguins still had almost a minute and a half on the power play, but they didn't get another PPG. The Isles got their first power play of the night when Matt Cooke was called for tripping. On the Isles' ensuing power play, Mark Streit fired a quick shot for a goal. [Pens 2, Isles 1]

A mere 11 seconds later, Kris Letang got the puck after a faceoff win and took the hit that allowed Geno Malkin to rush the net with his friend Petr Sykora. A lightning quick shot from Syko sealed the deal. [Pens 3, Isles 1]

Only 39 seconds after that, Philippe Boucher returned to score his first goal as a Penguin with a wicked shot from the point right through MacDonald's 5-hole. [Pens 4, Isles 1]

SECOND PERIOD

Predictably, MacDonald was pulled and replaced by Yann Danis. He was put to the test right out of the gate as Sid fired a shot that Danis in fact caught but didn't realize it. (It was in his glove.) Just after that, the Pens developed a 3-on-2. Alex Goligoski shot the puck, but Danis blocked it. The rebound went towards Geno, who kicked the puck to his stick and scored. [Pens 5, Isles 1]

Joshua Bailey went to the box for holding, but the Pens didn't score on their advantage. The Isles got a power play when the Pens were caught with too many men on the ice. Syko served the penalty for his team. With about 30 seconds left on the Pens' penalty, Bill Guerin was called for slashing. Neither team scored on the 4-on-4, but after Syko emerged from the box, he shot the puck as he fell as he was hit from behind to score his second goal of the night. [Pens 6, Isles 1]

Now, Syko has had 44 - let me repeat that - FORTY FOUR 2-goal games. He was, until tonight, the highest scoring player that never had a hat trick. But we all thought the wait was over as he fired another shot that found the back of the net a short time later. But it was not to be. The ref had lost sight of the puck. In that occasion, he must blow his whistle and stop the play. The (non)goal was scored after the whistle. Despite the utter domination by the Pens, watching Petr plead his non-hat-trick-getting case to the ref was absolutely heartbreaking. But as they say, it ain't over...

Tim Jackman took a penalty for roughing after trying to rally his team with a little physicality. On the ensuing power play, Saint Siddo got the puck and patiently waited while Syko got in position in front of the net. He centered the pass for Syko, and with a quick wrist shot, he finally got his first career hat trick!!! [Pens 7, Isles 1] He nearly crushed Siddo to death with a flying, leaping, laughing hug (see below). :)




Sutton was called for roughing after he tried to take Satan out. Incidentally, he missed and nearly killed Bob Errey, who was between the benches for this broadcast. Syko hit the post on the power play, but the Pens didn't score. Gronk somehow managed to drag the puck to the net around practically everyone and set Dups up for another goal. [Pens 8, Isles 1] As the period ended, Paul Steigerwald was singing the Spyhunter song for Petr Sykora, LOL!

THIRD PERIOD

Okay. I'm not going to list all the craziness from this period. Just know that the Islanders were frustrated and began taking liberties with the Pens. Boucher was called for hooking. The Isles did everything but score, as Curry was a brick freaking wall tonight. Siddo tried to set Dups up for his first hat trick while they were shorthanded, but to no avail. The Isles did not score on their advantage. A short time later, Geno tried to set Dups up, but Sutton lay down and blocked the shot. Gronk, who had set Dups up for goal #2, tried to help him get the third, but again - no such luck.

Geno and Raggedy Ruslan found themselves in a battle with the Isles in which both men lost their lids. (I never really noticed before, but Ruslan has some pretty glorious highlights in his hair... :P LOL!) The Isles ended up with the man advantage after Geno, Tank, and Andy Hilbert went to their respective boxes for roughing, but Curry made an unreal save on Bill Guerin to hold them at a single goal. Before the penalty was over, Dups got hooked by Weight, and Siddo made a fool of Streit on his way to the net, but his shot was blocked by Danis. Sutton scored on the ensuing 4-on-4. [Pens 8, Isles 2]

The Pens still had a power play, and it seemed like Dups couldn't buy a goal. With 6 seconds left on the power play, Jackman punched Geno in the chops and earned a roughing penalty. The Pens didn't score on the brief 5-on-3. On their power play, Gogo got nailed with a hooking penalty. With 1 second left on the 4-on-4, Matt Cooke led the charge with Super Duper by his side. He passed number 9 the puck for the 9^th goal of the night, giving him his first NHL hat trick!! [Pens 9, Isles 2]

Despite the fans' calls for a tenth ("We want 10!! We want 10!!"), this was the final score of the game. Before it was all said and done, though, Chris Campoli crosschecked Syko in the arm during a faceoff. That wasn't enough, so Campoli went after Geno. He caught Geno low with a pretty big hit. Luckily, Geno's a big guy so it didn't hurt him, but Sykora took exception to it and rushed in to defend his linemate. The Isles' captain Guerin, who had been barking at the refs for most of the 3^rd, finally crossed a line when he griped about this incident. He was given a 2 minute unsportsmanlike conduct penalty (served by Blake Comeau) and a 10 minute misconduct and was escorted off the ice.

As is tradition these days, tonight's creamed player was Super Duper. The video of his postgame interview (he had been creamed off camera) comes to us from Friend of The Show Traci M.:



Thanks so much to Traci for uploading the clip and sending it my way! :) The Pens head to Philly for an afternoon game this Saturday.

GO PENS!!!!!!!!!!