Sense and Sensibility

Yesterday I read Sense and Sensibility. Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen is the story of Marianne, the story of her older sister Elinor and the story of their family- the Dashwoods. The Dashwood family settled in the village of Barton. They recently moved from their old residence. Some background about why they move to Barton village is given in the first few chapters. They are getting acquainted with the village. One day Marianne goes for a walk with Margaret. It was raining and she falls. It is in this scene that the character of Willoughby is introduced in the story. Willoughby gives a lot of pain to Marianne. Since I have read this book before I know how the story goes. Willoughby is staying in the village with his aunt. He appears to like Marianne. Marianne genuinely likes him. They have read the same books and enjoy similar things. Her liking for him causes her to behave in a slightly impolite way a few times to everyone else except Willoughby. They spend a lot of time together causing others to surmise that they are engaged. To everyone it seemed as though Marianne and Willoughby are engaged. Then suddenly Willoughby has to leave. Willoughby leaves. The parting scene is very significant and I don't remember all the details. Something with Mrs Dashwood and Elinor that I need to read again. Marianne does not confide a lot with Elinor or Mrs.Dashwood. So they also do not know for sure how advanced the relationship between Willoughby and Marianne is. After Willoughby leaves there is no news from him. He does not send any letters. He does not send any message. Marianne is really worried. One day Mrs Jennings decides to take them to London. Marianne goes in hopes of seeing Willoughby. In London Marianne sends several messages to Willoughby. She gets no response. Then it was a ball and everyone attends. Marianne and Elinor go for the ball. There Marianne sees Willoughby in the distance. She tries to meet him. Willoughby does not show the warmth he shows earlier. He is very formal with her. Marianne faints. Marianne knows it is over with Willoughby. He returns to her all the letters she send him. Willoughby is engaged to be married to Miss Grey, a rich woman. Marianne falls sick. She is taken to Mrs Jennings' daughter's house. There she is in real danger. Everybody fears for her very life. Colonel Brandon goes to Barton to fetch her mother. The day her mother is reaching to see her health improves and the doctor pronounces her out of danger. Her mother and sister nurse her back to health. They all go back to Barton village. There Marianne goes through a period of soul searching. She immerses herself in studies and learning. Then one day she goes for a walk with Elinor. They have a conversation about Willoughby. They discuss the lessons she has learned. Elinor tells her that Willoughby once visits while Marianne was sick and tells Elinor his side of the story. This gives Marianne peace. Finally Marianne marries Colonel Brandon. Elinor gets married to Edward. Mrs. Dashwood is happy. Willoughby is sort of happy with his rich wife. Lucy Steele marries Edward's brother Robert. The lessons learned by Marianne and the harrowing experience she goes through is the most riveting part of this novel. Truly there is so much to understand about human interactions. Willoughby did not give any promise to Marianne. However the way he showed affection to her raised expectations in her. Which resulted in her mental and physical breakdown. This teaches us how guarded we are to be. This is how I remember the story. Yesterday I reached the part of Willoughby rescuing Marianne during the rain when she falls and how he is introduced to her family. Today I may read the rest.

Decorated Pumpkins

Several years ago there were a lot of bloggers who decorated pumpkins this time of the year. Some painted pumpkins into different colors. Some painted gold dots on pink pumpkins and some made chevron patterns on pumpkins with paint. Some made glittering pumpkins and some made pumpkins with satin or velvet fabric. Inspired by such blog posts I decided to decorate pumpkins by attaching large sequins to them. This is how they looked.

I attached sequins on large pumpkins and small pumpkins. Would love to do similar projects this year too.

New England Traditional Style

One day I was searching for something in the internet and suddenly found myself in this page which showed this picture. The name of this style is New England Traditional. For some reason I liked this look. I think it looks unpretentious, simple, laid back and comfortable.

Usually I like chandeliers dripping with crystals. This is the first time I liked such chandeliers. I searched the internet and found these two chandeliers from some website that I think are in the same style. I think the color of the walls, the dark glossy furniture, the old fashioned carpets and old world style curtains in the first picture make it look like a nice home.

Here is where I found these pictures. https://freepoolsk.shop 30 Modern Ideas for Dining Room Design in Classic Style Elegant dining room, Traditional dining rooms........

Silver Earrings

I found these large silver earrings in Etsy. These earrings have lotus and umbrella pattern on them in addition to other intricate patterns and silver beads. I don't know if they are very heavy. In the etsy picture the model wears a light colored top with it. May be that is how you ought to style these earrings.Do you like large silver earrings? Hope you have a lovely day!

Books arranged according to color

This is an idea I got from another decorating blog. In that blog the blogger arranged the books on the bookshelf according to the color of the books. The blogger arranged all the books with the same color on one shelf and another color on another shelf. I did the same. For the white books on the top shelf I covered each book with computer paper. Books should be arranged according to subject or topic and not according to color. But for that season of my life I enjoyed trying out this idea. Alternately we can arrange books according to color and subject matter. I think it does look more appealing to arrange books according to color. Long ago there was a childrens show on PBS called Between the Lions. It depicted a Lion family in a library and was aimed at encouraging the reading habit in young children. It also taught funny lessons on grammer to children. The library in that show looked like an ornate medieval building. There were elaborate patterns on the walls and grand staircases. I thought about that library in that children's show while arranging the books.

Bittersweet branches

Here is a picture of how I used artificial bittersweet branches to decorate our home. These branches are intriguung to me because it is not everyday you hear about a plant which has the name of an emotion. Here is what I wrote about this. Bittersweet is the name of an emotion. If one experience elicits two emotions such as happy and sad at the same time it is called bitter sweet. Lots of people go through lots of experiences. Some are happy and some are sad. If you use the word bittersweet in your conversation you can sound very philosophical or you can sound like a deep person. Consider my surprise when I was told that bittersweet is actually a plant with orange round berries. It typically grows around Thanksgiving time in the Midwest. Atleast the very first time I saw a bittersweet plant was on Thanksgiving day several years ago. It is like a vine or shrub on the side of roads. Our family had a pretty bittersweet wreath which was bought from a farmers market years ago. I did not know it's name and just hung it in our home. Then a visiting friend said it is a bitter sweet wreath. Then we moved to a new house and I think we bought a bitter sweet artificial branch from somewhere. It could be Pier 1 Imports or some other store. Every fall I used it to decorate our home. One day we drove to Indiana from Iowa on Thanksgiving day. There was very little traffic on the roads. On the side of the roads there were ramshackle barns, fields, little wood houses and lots and lots of bittersweet vines. They were growing profusely and abundantly on the side of roads. Orange is such an autumn color.. The whole world seems to become orange in autumn. The pumpkins piled outside grocery stores are orange. Many leaves are orange. And now these berries growing on the side of the road to Indiana from Iowa on the day of Thanksgiving.

On the Importance of Prayer and earning God's love

Alexandra Osteen who leads the worship team in Lakewood church said the most important thing about leading worship is ourselves praying to God. We have to pray by ourselves and have time alone with God. Then automatically we get peace, joy etc with which we can handle anything that life throws at us. I think what Alexandra Osteen said is so true. Some days at home I am not able to pray well. Even though I try to pray that time somehow becomes ineffective. I feel so happy when I am able to pray well. We are vulnerable creatures. Our mind, body, soul, and spirit needs that time with God. And everything that we are going through can be prayed about. If we pray by ourselves our everyday life will have a lot of blessings Plus we can feel stronger. I hope I can pray well everyday the rest of this year. If there is something we find difficult to do such as exercise then if we pray about it it becomes easier. I never thought I would like the song Reckless Love by Cory Asbury much. This song is in direct reference to the parable of the Lost Sheep where the good shepherd leaves the 99 and goes to find the one lost sheep. But when I listened to it today I liked one line. It says we don't deserve the love of God and we cannot earn it. Sometimes due to various reasons we may repay with unkindness or indifference or complaints someone's kindness towards us. Then we may repent of it. Then we may work hard to get back into the good books or good opinion of the person whose feelings we may have hurt. This line seems to address such a scenario with regard to God. If we displease God we cannot earn it back. And we don't deserve God's love in the first place because it is so exalted. This means that we can just be ourselves and not try to earn God's love. It is a reasoning that sometimes I feel I can understand but sometimes I feel I cannot understand. In a musical reality show the theme is Let your heart sing. If we don't deserve the love of God and if we cannot earn it we might as well allow our hearts to sing. It is our parents who fashioned our hearts. We should not allow the worlds standards or judgement to prevent our hearts from singing. Often I think I would not say this or write that thinking it will not be approved by others. But if we look at God all these disapproval's seems to melt away. If we think we cannot earn God's love by saying a certain thing or being a certain way then we feel we can say what we truly feel inside even if we think others may not like our choice of song or clothing. When we do that we reach a larger audience. An audience that likes the way our heart sings. I liked this line a lot. After I reached this conclusion I thought about it some more. Is it really true that we cannot earn the love of God? I think not. I think we can earn the love of God. Not by not saying what we really feel inside but by obeying all the commandments. When we obey all the commandments God loves us more, I think. When I think of my parents I get their joy over me more if I study well and am loving towards everyone. If I don't study well I don't get their joy over me. Let my goal be to get their joy. Let my goal be to make God proud of me.