Cloudy days bring forth treasures

Today the view out of my window looked like this:

That's not out of focus - that's blowing snow, including at times little snow tornadoes blowing around and as usual, really cold.

So it seemed like a good day to do something about the top of my desk that looked like this:

That shows too many projects going on at once and always being distracted from one project to another.  So I cleared it all off and in a little while it started looking pretty good.  So good in fact that I moved on to a bookshelf next to the desk where even more piles of papers and projects are kept.  I started on the top shelf and found several fun things, including a bumper sticker someone had given us for the 2016 presidential campaign (I know, don't you just shudder thinking about that coming up again?), but the bumper sticker says "Clinton - Warren 2016."  Hmmm....

But underneath everything was something we had found in the old house here a few years back and somehow it ended up on this shelf.  The date is 1896 so it was probably done by my grandmother, Regina Larson.  It's tiny little cross-stitch stitches in black thread on a piece of heavy paper with little holes in it.  It says Joh.2 (Johannes) so I thought it was from the book of John, second chapter.  But it wasn't.  So I did the Google Translate thing again and eventually realized it came from Revelation 2:10 with the complete name of the book being The Revelation to John.  But maybe she just thought it came from John.  Anyway, in English it says: "Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life."

"Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life."

And from much of what I've learned about the Larsons who lived here before me, relying on their faith in good times and bad was how they lived their lives.

And by the time I finished cleaning things up a bit around my desk, the skies opened up and the sun shone...well, at least for a little while.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And congratulations to my cousin, Ingabritt, whose blog, Aktuellt i Grekland, came in third place in the travel blog competition! She inspires me!