SAPPY CAN BE HAPPY!

Webster's Dictionary defines "sappy" as embarrassingly sentimental.  Yep, that's the way I felt this week, but there are several reasons for it!  First I had two sons with birthdays. Now this always throws me back in my mind to the day they were born.  I know....I know....men just don't understand this in us. But I always use the biblical example that Mary, the mother of our Lord, "pondered these things in her heart" so why shouldn't I?

Another reason I'm sappy, I got out my scrapbooks and was looking at old pictures.  This always starts me down memory lane. My granddaughter was wanting to look at some of the pictures of her father, so being the good grandma that I am, I pulled them out.  However, it did not end with her visit for I continued to pour over each picture.  Suddenly I found myself caught up like the old woman in the movie "Titanic" who looks at the seaweed covered chandelier and is suddenly transported back in time.  That is exactly how I was! I remember as a young mom, I used to chuckle when my mom and grandma did this sappiness. But now I understand perfectly.   As grandma said,  "All chickens come home to roost!"  (I feel that analogy applies here).

Yet another reason I was sappy was because I discovered some long lost relatives. They weren't literally lost, it is just that I hadn't found them!  On a Facebook Page, administered by the small town I grew up in, someone was wanting information on relatives on my mother's side. They had some names and information so I knew them to be legit. Thanks to the pictures and information my grandma kept and that mom passed on to me, I discovered they are long lost cousins!  Who says nothing ever good comes from Facebook?  My mom, who is now 84, is so excited to discover this for she had often wondered whatever happened to that branch of the family.  I hope to bring the cousins together this Spring. Can you tell I am beaming?   My grandma would be so proud of me!

I am so thankful to have these keepsakes, pictures, and records of the past, even though it does make me sappy! I think we women need to mindful that we are the guardians to pass these memories down to the next generation.  It helps to look back when this crazy, fast paced world, gets us caught up in its spinning and it gives us some firm ground to stand on.  It also helps us realize where we came from, the sacrifices made to get us where we are, of how God worked then and He is working now, and it helps us to count our blessings for God's faithfulness to us down through the ages.

Just some sappy thoughts on this Friday!  Here is a picture of a scrapbook page to be passed down to the next generation.