my treasures

God gave me some treasures!

If you've been readying this blog, you know I have been moping and doping about not having access to a whole lot of craft supplies or thrift stores or dollar stores (might not have mentioned that one) or almost any place that has materials with which to be creative. I'm not sure why God chose to reward my whining but He gave me some real treasures (okay, I don't really think He was rewarding my whining, but it was just a huge blessing to me to get these things...)!

The mirrored coat rack was on the side of the road - the road most frequently traveled. I was walking to the school one day to this orientation thingy for Lucy and I saw it - like a beam of light shining on it. I kept going, but literally started praying that if I could possibly have it, that it might still be there on the walk back.

It was.

I walked right on past it.

I was too chicken (aka, proud) to take it.

About 10 yards further, the desire and longing overtook me, I turned back around, stopped at the guard shack (I didn't want him to pull his gun on me for taking something I shouldn't), asked him if it was "available" (yes, in Spanish), he said yes, and I took it.

I walked about five blocks with it, all up hill, with several people staring at the stupid gringa, carrying this wrecked piece of junk.

It was quite a work out.

But it was even more of a work out that it appears because I also had a backpack on my back filled with the Childcraft books! Not light (physically) reading!

You see, when I was at the school, I noticed a table they had out in the atrium with these books, and a bunch of other "crap", as Eric would say..... with a beautiful sign that said "FREE". Almost anything that says "free" on it is beautiful to me!

We had Childcraft books growing up, and I have very fond memories of looking at these books, so I knew I had to have them. HAD to.

Risking possible divorce (only to increase the odds by picking up the mirror thing), I shoved them in my backpack and headed home. I should also say that I took three bibles, two maps of Quito and four other books with which to experiment upon. They are all sitting lovingly on our bookshelves.

Beautiful.

My only sadness is someone beat me to getting the other volumes, especially the "arts and crafts" one. Oh well, one can't be greedy now, can one?

My biggest dilemma, however, is how to treat my treasures. The bottom legs of the mirror thingy have to come off (in fact they already have) because they are completely destroyed. I'm pretty sure that I won't be able to find good replacements, so I am just going to mount it on the wall. But other than that, not sure what to do....

One day my heart says to treasure them as they are, keep them in their original glory and appreciate them for what they are right now, as views yesteryear (sigh, sounds so romantic!). The next day (actually, it could very easily be a minute by minute thing with how my brain operates) I want to use all the book pages for various craft projects and paint the mirror coat stand thingy a high gloss turquoise.

I love to both create with these things but also appreciate what they are.

What to do, what to do.

What will probably happen is: One day I will be full boar with my creative side and paint the beautiful wood and tear our the wonderful pages. And then two hours later, even though I may love what I made, I'll well up with tears thinking "what have I done?".

Maybe we should have a vote?

What should I do?

HELP!

By the way, there should be lots more "creating" going on soon. Pretty excited about it!