December 18, 2009
Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner! Winner found yesterday’s hidden Christmas image (Click on the WordPress logo located at the bottom right hand corner of the site) in record time and as a result will be sporting a snappy pair of Bug-Eye Glasses and jewelry from Beads for Life this Christmas. And Winner, you might want to consider having a photo taken of you in those fancy schmancy spectacles for next year’s Christmas card. Just a thought.
Today’s Game: So for those of you who couldn’t handle the toil and stress of searching for yesterday’s clue, today’s contest is all the easier and today’s prize all the more tantalizing. First for the contest. Below in the sealed envelope is a single number. In the next 24 hours post a comment offering a Christmas wish, thought, or prayer for all your SisterFriends and BrotherBuddies and Saturday morning I’ll reveal the number and the person who was that numbered position in order of comments will win (Only one comment per person will be counted but you can post as many times as your inching fingers desire).
And the prize? Hold onto your shorts my Holly Jollies. Our duet of prizes begins with a bucket of 100 temporary tattoos. Think about it! Amaze your friends! Terrify your parents! The possibilities are endless! And the second prize is a 50 dollar Target gift certificate. That’s right. A little extra spending money can come in mighty handy this time of year.
And even if you don’t win, playing won’t be a loss for anyone because in playing you’ll be sharing and receiving words of hope, encouragement, and faith with one another, and words of kindness can come in mighty handy this time of year.
Posted in Contests, Giveaways, and Games, Holidays and Special Times 
25 Comments »
December 17, 2009
And the individual who correctly guessed what Christmas song has been stuck in my head for days is…no one! That’s right, losers each and every one of you. And while I’m more than a little relieved no one was able to crawl inside my head and know what was bouncing around in there, I’m sorry no one guessed the right answer, but I have a prize to give away and by gosh and by golly I’m going to! So what I did was write everyone’s name down on a scrap of paper that submitted an entry, tossed them in a bowl, closed my eyes and pulled out the winner, and the winner who was wrong like all the rest of you but wins anyway because he was apparently wearing his lucky panties is Kevin. Congratulations for having your name on the right piece of paper Kevin! Now send your mailing address to anita@sisterfriends-together.org and a Superball and gift certificate to Uncommon Goods will be bouncing their way to your front door!
And the song was, despite it’s non-inclusive title, was and as of this morning when I was humming it once again is “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.” If I’ve sung it once over the past week I’ve sung it a 100 times, which is about 87 times more than my beloved wishes were the case.
Huh. The song, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen. The winner by luck of the draw, Kevin. It seems as though it was meant to be.
Today’s Game: Yes, it’s that time. It’s time for “Find the Hidden Picture!”, a repeat of a game from last year that nearly drove a few of you to drink….egg nog, that is. So here’s how this game goes. Somewhere on this website is a hidden link that will open up an image that tells what the prize is for today’s winner. The first person who finds the image and submits the text of EXACTLY what it says is the winner. So have at it my merry band of treasure hunters!
Posted in Contests, Giveaways, and Games, Holidays and Special Times 13 Comments »
December 16, 2009
You people are amazing! I originally thought determining the winner would be easy but as it turned out it took me more than an hour (on my birthday mind you!) to go through everyone’s lists side by side and cross out items one by one; a task further complicated in that some of you listed objects by number (i.e., 6 ornaments) and some by a detailed description of each item.
In terms of accuracy, Amy not only spelled out in detail everything others mentioned, but she also provided two items that even I hadn’t noticed in the photo, that being the Christmas cloth on the lamp table between the two chairs and the small ornament hanging from a corner of the television set. By the way, the hanging ornament is a wooden gingerbread man I painted one Christmas with my mom when I was about eight years old and it hangs there year round. So Amy, while you said you weren’t officially entering but wanted to have the personal satisfaction of knowing you won, then Girlfriend, it’s your moment to rival in your victory!
[Update: As I was preparing this post Meg and Jessie submitted their entries and also spotted the ornament hanging on the television too and even identified what it was! Hawk Eyes those girls!]
So with Amy being the “unofficial” winner that would mean that the official winner and recipient of Wooly Willy, Hair-Do Harriet and a 20.00 gift certificate from Starbucks is JessieJ! JessieJ mentioned the most items with the most detail and at the end of the watch no less. Congratulations JessieJ! Send your mailing address to anita@sisterfriends-together.org so you can have your hairstyle fashionista ways with Willy and Harriet!
As an aside, there’s one item everyone missed that totally surprised me. Hanging on the mantle just above the nativity set is an original painting by Richard Caemmerer of the nativity which I highlighted in a recent post. Most of you spotted the snowman painting on the wall behind the chair but you missed the Baby Jesus. Hmmmm.
Today’s Game: Winning today’s contest requires nothing more than a fast entry and bum luck. Be the first to guess the Christmas song I found myself humming all day yesterday. I’m not giving any clues. Just flip a coin. Take a shot in the dark. And be quick about it because the prizes at stake include one of my most favorite toys from childhood….an Original SuperBall by Wham-O (I spent one summer trying to get it to bounce over our house like in the commercial with no luck!) and a 20.00 gift certificate to Uncommon Goods.
So get snapping and submit your entry now. One entry per person.
.
Posted in Contests, Giveaways, and Games, Holidays and Special Times 22 Comments »
December 15, 2009
The winner of yesterday’s Christmas Ornament Guessing Contest is e2c who nailed the answer on the head at 55 Christmas ornaments. Congratulations Girlfriend! Now send your mailing address to anita@sisterfriends-together.org and we all hope you enjoy many years ahead in your pursuit of “world domination” with your aquatic army of sea monkeys.
Today’s Game: Name as many Christmas-related objects as you see in the photo below. The first person who names them all will win an original Wooly Willy and Hair-do Harriet and a 20.00 gift certificate from Starbucks. Imagine the fun you can have coiffing a mullet for Harriet or just playing for hours on end with your magic magnetic hairstyling wand while hyped on caffeine! The fun never stops but it always starts here! So have at it already my little prize hungry horde.
Added Note: I won’t be posting comments until the end of the contest so none of you cheater pants take the easy route and use someone else’s list as a check list.
Posted in Contests, Giveaways, and Games, Holidays and Special Times 20 Comments »
December 14, 2009
Today begins one week of Christmas games with silly prizes. That’s right. One whole week. Seven days. I know this may seem a frivolous thing to do on a blog meant to provide spiritual support and encouragement for Queer Christians but there really is a purpose to it. This time of the year can be stressful for so many folks. There are complications to maneuver your way through with upcoming family gatherings where you and your partner may be less than welcomed to join. Others of you may have been robbed of joy in the Christmas story because you’ve been made to feel like the Holy One born in a stable so long ago would never have come for someone like you. Well, you can be sure I will continue to tell you in every way I know how that it was for people just like you and me that God sent Christ to bring assurance of his undying love, but for the time-being I just want to provide you a few minutes each day during this season to forget about all you need to figure out, all you need to get done, and all the worries and concerns that have been weighing you down, and invite you to play with us. As the old advertising adage goes, you deserve a break today, and sometimes the place we most need to take a break from is the mess that’s swirling around in our own heads.
Today’s Game: Below is a bowl of ornaments we have in our home. Okay fine. So I took the easy way out on decorating. I admit it so we can all move on. Anyway, whoever guesses closest to the actual number in the bowl (seen and unseen) without going over will win their very own….Sea Monkeys Ocean Zoo and a 20.00 gift certificate to Amazon.com. You’re probably saying, “Oh Anita, I’ve always wanted my own sea monkeys but always thought it was a dream that could never come true!” Well, my friend, the dream looms just out of your grasp so hazard a guess and the aquatic wonders of the sea monkey may be yours at long last. See contest rules at the bottom of this post.
How to Play:
*Post your entry in the comment section of this blog.
No entries will be received through email.
The contest winner will be announced the next day.
You can play everyday but you can only win once.
Anyone can play but prizes will only be sent to U.S. AND Canadian addresses.
*You may play anonymously by entering a pseudo name.
Your email address will not be made public!
Posted in Contests, Giveaways, and Games, Holidays and Special Times 52 Comments »
December 10, 2009
Oh, did I happen to mention that next week begins the annual week-long cavalcade of ridiculously awesome Christmas games and prizes?
I didn’t?
Oh.
Nevermind.
.
Just remember, if you follow this blog via email it can take anywhere from an hour to a day for the email to be sent through the system and so if you want to play you need to visit the blog each morning (beginning on Monday around 9:00 a.m. PST). You snooze, you lose.
And please note, due to the cost of shipping winners I regret that prizes can only be delivered to those living within the United States. There’s no way I’m paying 23.00 to ship a 5.00 item to Sri Lanka and even more than that, for the sake of what little sanity I have remaining I need to be able to ship from my house rather than going to a US Postal Office this time of the year. Just the thought has me reaching for a horse tranquilizer.
Posted in Contests, Giveaways, and Games, Holidays and Special Times 4 Comments »
December 9, 2009
Humor me for a minute. I had a random thought the other day. Okay. Most of my thoughts tend to be random, obscure, and border on a need for therapeutic analysis but this was a fun one to play with for a while and so I’m tossing it out into the universe to ponder collectively.
So I was thinking of the Baby J in the manger and I call him the Baby J with no disrespect; we’re just that tight. Anyway, I was imagining Jesus being like the babies in the comedy “Look Who’s Talking,” where the sub-plot revolves around the film’s star babies engaging in very adult like conversations between themselves in the voice-overs while all that the grown-ups are hearing is your standard issue go0-goo-ga-ga-coo.
Now don’t go reading into my theology with where I’m going with this because I don’t believe when Jesus was born that somewhere within that tiny bundle of flesh embodied divinity was a developed mind that understood the sinful state of the human condition, or knew that his life would shift the entire course of world history or that he had any idea about the Good News he would be proclaiming once he had the teeth and the vocabulary to do so. When Jesus was a baby his world was eat, sleep, and poo just like any other baby that’s ever been or ever will be. He was fully human and fully baby just as he was fully divine and fully God.
So having established my theological leanings concerning a Savior who came into the world needing his diapers changed let’s return to the nativity, the visual Hallmark version. There in the stable complete with hal0-illuminated Mary and Joseph, awed shepherds, road weary wise men, and selected barn animals a heavenly spotlight shines down upon a manger where laying on top of the clean fresh hay and wrapped up in form fitting swaddling clothes is the world’s most long-awaited baby. Just rousing from a nap brought on by the exhaustive long journey through the birth canal, the Lord Jesus, (aka Savior of the World, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Lamb of God) awakens to find himself in a frail little human body complete with a wet bottom and a miserably sore belly button. With hay poking at his backside through the scraps of itchy woolen fabric wrapped around him, he blinks open one sleepy eye, takes in the sights and smells of his more than humble surroundings, furrows his eyebrows, inquisitively tilts his head to one side and looking up to heaven says, “You have got to be kidding me! Seriously?”
I LOVE the shock value of how God most often chooses to work in the world and no place is it more evident than in the birth of God’s Son, Jesus. Absolute perfection! No pomp, no circumstance, no kingly crowns or royal castles or fabric finery sown with golden thread. Just a bed of hay in a damp cave, shepherds smelling of sweat and sheep, an orchestra of stable animals and a pile of swaddling cloth to bundle the baby up against the cold of night. And this is how God’s Son shows up on the human stage. Need I remind you we’re talking about the ONLY Son of the ONE God. You’d think there would be something showy for the one and only Savior of the World. Okay, there was the heavenly host of angels which is a little glitzy by anyone’s standards but considering who had at last made their appearance on the earth, even that seems a little subdued. But when all is said and done I adore the surprisingly understated arrival of the King of Kings.
And doesn’t Jesus continue to show up in just the same style these days? In surprising ways. In unexpected moments. Through ordinary people. Has he ever arrived in the story of your life like that? Speaking for myself (who else would I be speaking for?) there have been times in my life I all but missed Jesus’ appearing because he didn’t come as I thought he should or would or even could. There have been other times when my heart knew that what was before me was all Jesus and nothing but Jesus and yet the unfolding of his presence was so out of my frame of imagining that I was the one looking in God’s direction with furrowed eyebrows saying, “You have got to be kidding me! Seriously?” Realizing I was a lesbian more than sixteen years ago was one of those moments. I had another one a few years ago when I was forced out of a church by several people who morphed from being trusted friends to behind the scenes antagonists in the time it took me to sneeze. There were times before then and other times since when at first glance I believed God wasn’t anywhere in sight. I’d think “God couldn’t have any part in this fiasco. God would never be found in this place. God would never use those people in my life.” But then enough time passes and looking back I understand that the very thing that had caused me to doubt the presence of God’s Spirit in the first place was the very thing that had been broadcasting God’s presence all along.
So that was the random thought I wanted to mention. Now get back to what you were doing before I interrupted.
Posted in Holidays and Special Times, Storytelling 7 Comments »
December 4, 2009
Tomorrow is my annual children’s gingerbread house party at our church which has made for a nonstop week of making and bagging 28 pounds of icing, gathering last minute supplies, opening and prepping two enormous cases of candy, and then schelpping all of it along with the parts for 35 houses to the church! It’s been a crazy-busy non-bloggable week and today promises more of the same so stay tuned….I will be posting next week!
Posted in Anita, Blog Basics and Info 4 Comments »
November 26, 2009
Every Thanksgiving for the past five years D and I have spent the holiday in the small coastal town of Mendocino, California and every year we stay at the same Inn, eat Thanksgiving dinner at the same restaurant, and fill our days doing the same things that we always do. We engage in lively conversation every morning around the breakfast table with the other guests who have been coming here for Thanksgiving even longer than we have. We go for long walks along the headlands that overlook the ocean. We browse at a snail’s pace through the stores. We sit cross-legged on the floor of the local bookstore and flip through cookbooks and magazines. We take naps. We read. We take hot baths two or three times every day. In the evenings we bundle up against the cold and with a flashlight in hand stroll through the tiny town, or pull the two Adirondack chairs on the front lawn together and D points to the night sky amazing me with her knowledge of constellations and stars. Even if she’s making it all up, I’m still equally impressed by her creativity and skilled ability to fib and fool me once again.
I love, absolutely love, this tradition we’ve created for ourselves but another part of every Thanksgiving for me is remembering all the Thanksgivings that have come before this one. I remember the Thanksgivings in my childhood home when there were only six of us around the table and that by the time the table had moved to another house it had grown to hold more than twenty people as siblings married and had children who grew and had children of their own. I remember my mom’s tempestuous relationship with the Thanksgiving turkey over the years. There was the year the dark meat was so underdone it was nearly gelatinous around the leg bone and so we wrestled over the white meat. There was the year the white meat was so overdone it was as dry as sawdust and we were left to fight over the dark meat. There was the year Mom somehow managed to end up with little more than a cup of gravy and so we battled one another for the chair at the table that was nearest in reach to the gravy bowl. Or how every year by the time the sweet potatoes made their way to the table they were unrecognizable as vegetables from the continual handfuls of marshmallows my sister and I had thrown on top of the orange spuds every time Mom turned her back to the oven.
Today is Thanksgiving and I have not only the warm comfort of this moment with D (and with you) to savor but cherished memories of past Thanksgivings when both my parents were alive and seated at each end of the table with my siblings and I sandwiched between them on either side of the table. When I am old and gray and haven’t a tooth in my mouth to call my own I will these times with the all the fondness and gratitude my wrinkled body can hold.
I also carrying with me into this day the memory of the first Thanksgiving after I came out to my family when my mom and I had a conversation that was equally painful for both of us as I told her I didn’t feel I could spend the day with family while the hurt I had encountered in coming out to them was still so raw and in turn she told me she felt it would probably be easier on everyone if I didn’t join them that year while the disappointment of my coming out was so fresh for them. I spent much of that Thanksgiving Day missing my family and deeply wounded that my mom had thought it best I not be there. I can only imagine the pain it caused my mom to have said those words and to know I had chosen as well to not be with them. I don’t think it was a good Thanksgiving for either of us but it was a Thanksgiving we loved each other through and followed up with other Thanksgivings when I was at the family table again and with my beloved. At this point in my life, all the hurt from that one regrettable Thanksgiving has faded long ago and all I have is gratitude for the Thanksgivings before and most of all for the Thanksgivings that have followed and for the relationships that have continued.
I know some of you must be going through a terribly difficult time with family separation or tension weighing on your heart through the holidays. Some of you will be with your family today but carry the fear deep within you that should you ever come out to them it might well be the last time you’re on the guest list of your own family celebrations. Some of you have been torn in half with the painful choice to spend this holiday with your family or with your beloved because your family has said, “We want you to come but not with him, not with her.” Some of you will sit at the Thanksgiving table with family and though everything would look normal to a stranger peering in through the dining room window, you know the distance that cuts between you and your loved ones and you feel the burning ache of their disapproval even in the polite smiles and table conversations. Some of you are alone today. Whether it’s their decision or your choice doesn’t matter. What matters is that you feel forgotten and alone. Maybe you’re gay. Maybe you’re straight. As I’ve said a thousand times, GLBTQ people don’t hold sole-property rights on pain and suffering or being rejected and outcast even from the very ones they most love, and sometimes it helps ease our own pain, even if just a little, to remember that we are with others in our alone-ness, and that our hurt is a hurt we share with so many others in our world. When we suffer we remember with compassion the suffering of others including the suffering of Christ. Rejected. Denied. Despised. Misunderstood. Outcast.
If you are suffering today, open your heart to the assurance that the Christ who suffered feels your sorrow. The Christ alone in his anguished garden prayers sits beside you. The Christ misunderstood by his enemies as well as his closest friends knows you intimately and completely. The Christ who was rejected and despised, receives and welcomes and loves you.
This may be a hard day for you but this day will pass and until it does know or hope or dream that you are held in the loving embrace of One whose table always has a place reserved for you and One whose joy is incomplete until your chair is occupied by you. Receive Christ’s compassion and in turn give compassion away to others….to those who you gather with today as well as to those who are gathering this day without you.
You are in my remembrance and my prayers throughout this day.
Posted in SisterFriends 4 Comments »
November 19, 2009
This week I unveiled my personal blog, The Passionate Plate: Savoring Life in Small Bites, which focuses on three areas of interest to me: Food and Health (Savoring), Spirituality and Faith (Saviouring), and Our Adventures at Home and on the Road (Savouring). I hope you stop by sometime. Oh, who am I kidding?! I want you come by all the time! Bookmark me. Tag me in your RSS feed. Plan your days around my posts. Add your comments. Pass the word to your friends. Come and see me. I need you. I’m co-dependent.
But seriously, one of the reasons I’ve gone ahead and created a personal blog where I can yammer away is because I’ve been concerned that I’ve muddied the original purpose of SisterFriends with posting a few too many things from my life that have little to nothing to do with being gay and Christian. The intention of SisterFriends-Together is to provide a place where queer folks can be encouraged in their faith and where those who are struggling with their sexuality can find a place of safety to ask the questions, share their fears or hopes, and have the chance to consider a different voice in the conversation on the Bible and homosexuality than what’s often held up as the only true Christian understanding. SisterFriends is here to witness through the lives of countless gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people (I’m only one of them) that yes, you can be GLBTQ and a Christian and you can be assured that God’s love for you is unchanging and unending no matter what your race, gender, sexual orientation, past mistakes, present circumstances, or whatever. On the day you were born God entered into a full-blown love relationship with you and that relationship will continue on beyond your final breath on this earth. Please take seriously the Word that, “Nothing will ever separate you from the love of God.” Take it seriously and take it to heart. Own it.
Whew. Okay. As I was saying….
Rather than jumping around on SisterFriends between the message of God’s love and reporting on the best bowl of pasta I’ve ever had in my life, my aim is to keep SisterFriends for those conversations that pertain specifically to being queer and being Christian and when I say “queer” I’m not limiting that word to folks of the rainbow persuasion but to anyone, whatever their orientation, who feels in some way different, outcast or on the edges of mainstream Christianity. Those who have been wounded by the church, judged harshly by other Christians, or had their personal faith development move them to reflect on God and what it means to be Christian in the world that doesn’t always square with the status quo.
This doesn’t mean I’m not going to be sharing stories from my life. I’ll continue to do so because just as I suspect it is for you, what happens in my day to day life and all that I encounter among people and experience in those moments when God shows up is what most informs my faith, my hope, and my convictions. I also believe that the best thing, and in the end maybe the only thing that any of us have to give one another is our lives, in hardships and in glory. Please know that you teach, strengthen and encourage me through the simple act of living your life and I only wish to return the same to you. So I’ll share my life as openly as ever but I just want to stay focused on why we’re here instead of holding you a captive audience to my vacation photos. You can come over to The Passionate Plate for that and I hope you will. I hope you will not only because of my desperate need for attention but because I want those of you who have lost so much in coming out or fear losing so much when you do come out, to see through the simple act of living my life that as life has gone on for me, life will go on for you.
You can survive the rough spots of coming out with all the losses and rejection and find incredible joy again. There are churches that will welcome you and your ministry. There are life-long friends who will return to you and new friendships that will come to you. A day may come when you and your family will forge a new relationship made possible by a God who specializes in reconciling hearts to one another. There’s every chance in the world for you to share your life and love with another human being who will cherish you as much as you cherish them. And if you open your heart and your eyes you will see God show up day in and day out in acts of such grace and goodness that your knees will go weak. You might not believe any of this now but let what God has done and is doing in my life and the lives of others witness to you that there is hope for you who are hopeless and joy for you whose joy has been lost or taken captive.
There I go again.
So SisterFriends will always be here and a-n-y-o-n-e looking for a place to explore their faith and how God is calling them to embody that faith in the world is welcome here and it is to their longing to embrace themselves in their wholeness, to experience God’s love in the center of their being, and to learn and grow into a Christian life of faith that is most true for them that SisterFriends is here and will continue to be here until Grace in it’s full glory is revealed and then some.
[My intention for the time being is to add one new post here per week though in time I hope to be posting twice a week once I get a rhythm back to my writing which was shattered this summer.]
Posted in Anita, Blog Basics and Info, Love and Grace, SisterFriends 11 Comments »
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Edition 1: Volume 2
Edition 1: Volume 2
Edition 1: Volume 2