Extreme Blog Makeover

So, my blog is boring.  Not the content, obviously, rich as it is with thoughtful insights, witty commentary, and punctuation which is more or less accurate.

I'm talking aesthetics.  My blog is ugly and boring.  Those of you who have clicked through it know that I'm still using the freebie blogger template and looking very bush-league.

I get it that if I want people to read my ramblings, I need to step up in the design department and attract their eyes.  Trouble is, I'm aesthetically challenged.  I like rules, structure, timelines, and spreadsheets.  My friend Ethel is an artist.  Whenever we attempt to do artsy-craftsy things together, our styles could not be more different.  I carefully read directions, measure out supplies, and count beads.  Ethel just lets fly--paint, beads, glitter glue--whatever she's working with.  She doesn't rely on the instructions because she can see in her mind what she wants to create.

I appreciate the artists in my life--writers, musicians, painters, craftsmen--the way they reflect and echo gifts of beauty given by the Creator.  Having just heard Eugene Peterson speak at my daughter's graduation, I ran* out and bought his book Practice Resurrection.  In talking about the church, Peterson references Plato's three universals:  the True, the Good, and the Beautiful.  He suggests that the American church tends to focus on the first two by emphasizing teaching and morality, but too often neglects the third.  Without beauty, he suggests, truth and goodness become abstract, bloodless, loveless, and graceless.

Connecting with the Gratitude Community has helped me to slow down and appreciate beauty, to see grace from the hand of the Giver, and to practice the art of giving thanks.

And I do intend to spiff up my blog one of these days.  So far, I've been resisting the temptation to wile away hours surfing web sites looking for nifty template, widgets and gadgets to spruce up my little corner of the internet.  I'm just trying to stay focused on the words and ideas, putting my rather substantial buttocks into a chair on a somewhat consistent basis, practicing the stringing together of subjects and verbs.

But I am open to recommendations for nifty blog improvement tips, suggestions, and web sites any of you have found helpful.

And speaking of Ethel, my writing project for this week is a devotional for her daughter's bridal shower.  Speaking at events like this is something I very much enjoy doing, and this is a piece I've been working on in my head and my heart since Ethel asked me to do it years ago, when the bride-to-be was still skinning her knees on the playground.

*I just made up the part about running.  Running is not a thing I enjoy doing.



Continuing to number the gifts:

299. Bluebirds

300. A job for the new graduate.

301. Friends reaching out to our daughter and blessing her as she settles in a new place and steps into the next stage of her life.

302. Wedding showers, brides-to-be, and the promise of godly marriages.

303. Eugene Peterson’s Practice Resurrection.

304. Time to sit by the pool, listen to birdsong, read, and rest on a beautiful Sabbath afternoon.

305. An encouraging mid-quarter progress report.

306. Grilling the first cheeseburgers of the season.

307. The way my friend fights her cancer with style and grace, laughter, and songs of praise. The way she says, “Stupid cancer.”

308. That damaged cherry furniture can be restored.

309. So can we.