Brave Heart, Brave Soul. She who is brave is free.

Christmas is not just a magical time of year filled full of bright lights, candy canes and gifts we receive under the tree. Christmas is a sacred time of the year. Those who are not spiritual in nature still hold the Spirit of Christmas sacred. Even if you are not one to celebrate the birth of Christ most of us honor the meaning of Christmas, the spirit of this blessed season through the giving of ourselves and of our time. Sacrifice is the main ingredient in this season of holly and mistletoe and though we may not always have much to offer most of us find a way to make what we have go a little farther, to bring joy to others and those we love. Christmas in our home has always been a bit of homemade love, sprinkled with joy and the opening of our home to those in need of hope. As a little girl Christmas was filled with wonder … dancing lights, a sparkling tree, a warm beautiful glowing star with outside lights paving the way for Santa. I have always loved this time of year and all

When the Fates step in, they can bring many things our way...beauty, joy, sadness, death or a mixture of emotions for that matter.  We may feel she has not been fair to us, given us the short end of the stick or maybe we are left standing on green pastures rather than infertile land. Maybe they bring goodness and kindness our way today rather than the fear and worry of yesterday. Either way, if we are relying on the Fate alone to chart our path, then we are gambling with our lives and with our joy, happiness and the inner peace we find in knowing our lives are in God’s hands. Now does this mean we are always happy where God is leading us or some kind of angelic peace takes over the worry our lives create? Nope, not at all, life is tough. No one is given an easy road even if they are born into what appears to the outside world as perfect. Money, material things and beauty are not the answer nor are they the key to finding happiness. Happiness, true happiness comes from another place

Over this last weekend my parents treated the whole family to Disney’s Tangled. After checking times and deciding which theater we were going to Johnny and I made our way with kids in tow to meet my parents at our local mall on Sunday. Truthfully it has been a while since we have all been to the movies so I was very excited about this little adventure of ours. You know how it goes… the giant movie posters lined up in a row, the smell of popcorn and the excitement of grabbing the best seats in the house makes going to the movies a real adventure for most of us. So with our tickets, popcorn and drinks in hand we found our seats and waited for the lights to go down so we could be transported to a land far, far away. STOP! Alright you are tangled up in Tangled right? You are asking yourself, with two boys, seriously, a princess movie? Well truthfully it’s not so bad allowing the men in your life a movie from time to time where the hero trips over his own feet, learns a little hum