Happy Anniversary!

It almost didn't happen. Six months ago it looked helpless, two months ago highly unlikely, but today my son and his beautiful wife are celebrating ten years of marriage. God is good. Miracles still happen.

(Last summer's photo)

No Fun, No Fun at All

It's really no fun watching a marriage fall apart. It's no fun seeing people you love in emotional pain and turmoil. It's no fun knowing there is very little you can do to help. It's no fun and I am feeling helpless. I am begging for God's mercy, praying He will intervene and take what looks utterly hopeless and impossible and make something beautiful. Deep inside I know He can, but I find my faith often lacking. I'm almost surprised when I see Him at work. I almost don't believe and yet I desperately want to.

  ... sigh ...

Dave was here with the kids tonight. We had fun building a railroad with the wooden train tracks. We ate pretzels and Clementine oranges. We drew pictures. At some point in time Aubs decided to follow her Aunt Hannah upstairs... None of us knew until we heard the terrible sound of a child falling down the wooden staircase. Kind of threw our evening for a loop and put several bumps, a bloodied chin, and swollen jawbone on the child. She howled and cried, and we decided it might be best to have someone who knows check her over.

  ... sigh ...

God does work in mysterious ways. I hope this is one of those times.

Baby Boys

This is a random post. It's been a day full of kids (there was no school) and I am ready to plop myself down on the couch and snuggle up to my man.

Tonight you get a random collage of my baby boys, in no particular order. I have to laugh at how different they all look, and I am amazed that I can see my grandchildren in these little faces even if the particular face looking back doesn't have any children yet. Aren't they beautiful? Well, I think they are and you can't convince me of anything different.

Ordinary Heros

There are times when our offspring embarrass or exasperate us, and other times when they do us proud. I have boys like that. Years ago my second born was on his way home from a late night working at a local restaurant. It was winter and the snowmobiles were out riding the drifts and snowbanks. As Dave and his friend rounded a curve in the friend's car an individual on a snowmobile ran into them. The wounded man lay in the middle of the road, unable to move and vulnerable to approaching traffic. Dave thought quick, and though he knew the injured ideally shouldn't be moved, he gently linked his own arms underneath the man's shoulders, pulled him out of the road, and waited until the ambulance arrived.

Yesterday Ben witnessed another accident. While most people pulled their vehicles around the scene and continued without stopping, Ben stopped his truck, turned on the flashers, and got out to see if the injured woman was okay. Because of his experience riding with the local ambulance crew, he was able to let her know someone was there and ask her a few questions. Thankfully, though she initially looked incoherent, she knew who she was and what had happened. The police officer who eventually arrived on the scene however, was not impressed. He told him to stop trying to be a hero and leave or he'd give him a ticket. He had no idea that Ben has any experience with an ambulance crew and Ben had left his EMT jacket home hanging on a hook. I'm sure Ben just looked like a nosy kid to him, but I still think he's a hero.

Grinches

"The Grinch hated Christmas - the whole Christmas season. Oh, please don't ask why, no one quite knows the reason. It could be, perhaps, that his shoes were too tight. Or maybe his head wasn't screwed on just right. But I think that the most likely reason of all may have been that his heart was two sizes small."

He's trying to spoil our Christmas, a real live Grinch. I pray that someone gives him a bigger pair of shoes or straightens his head out. Then again maybe what he really needs is a good swift kick in the pants. If only there was something I could feed him to make his heart grow again.

Along Comes May

May promises to be wildly busy, and so I shall endeavor to savor the last few days of April.

May will bring...
1. A possible visit from an old friend. We're planning to make blueberry pie. :)
2. Physical therapy appointments for Mom. Twice a week for the next five weeks, at least that's the plan.
3. Gardening, the kind with green plants, not the "other" kind.
4. "Gardening," the kind with small life forms that are not green. :)
5. Wedding plans. We're kind of out of the loop being parents of the groom, but I'm sure there will be some planning on this end too... maybe.
6. A bridal shower to plan and help host. (Bethany is the real planner.)
7. A bridal shower to attend. (One planned by the bride's sister.)
8. Shopping for bridal shower gifts
9. The Ladies Banquet at church.
10. Mother's Day
11. A new baby sister for Alex and I still need to buy a baby gift.
12. A 50th Wedding anniversary party.
13. The Williamson Apple Blossom Festival? We've at least go to see the parade.

Hopefully, May will bring lots of sunshine and warm temperatures too. Days to play out in the yard with my little friends would be nice, along with visits from my grandkids, and maybe a cookout or two. Perhaps it will bring reconciliation. I can always hope.

Happy Birthday, Dave!

The pies look perfect! They smell good too. But I am certain they will not taste nearly as good as we hope. I forgot to add the salt when mixing up the filling. Blah. :(

It is a good thing Leta made pistachio cake and brought ice cream. It is a good thing I saved the pie for the birthday boy instead of serving it up to company. It is probably a good thing I realized before Dave cut into his birthday treat. He's had fair warning. It's too bad one can't salt an already baked pumpkin pie.

I think I'll be cooking up a couple more pies in the very near future.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DAVE!

Sunday Afternoon

Beautiful afternoon full of sunshine and autumn air. Dave and Leta came over with the little ones and Baby went to sleep in my arms. There is nothing quite like it when there is time to sit and soak it in. Today was such a time. I enjoyed watching my son play with his little boys.
There is something heart- warming about hearing my own boy called "Daddy" and watching him interact with the little guys. I should have had the camera out sooner, but I was busy holding my granddaughter and watching her sleep.

Thanks Be to God

Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift!
2 Corinthians 9:15

The turkey is in the oven and I have a moment to sit down before the fun begins in earnest. Well, before I need to finish cleaning the house and peel the potatoes anyway.

It is a day to be especially thankful, a day to make certain that we stop for a moment, count our blessing, and acknowledge the One who loves us more than anyone else ever could; One who is beside us each step of the way, and who paid the ultimate price that we might have our sins covered by the blood of Christ.

This Thanksgiving Day I am thankful for many things but one in particular comes to mind. It involves a wayward son, a mother's desperate prayer, and a near head on collision with a DOT dump truck...

Moms and Dads want nothing more that to see their children grow into successful, law abiding citizens, but sometimes our children follow a path quite the opposite of what we had hoped and dreamed. Though our situation could have been much more dire, I knew deep inside we were headed in that direction if something in our son's life didn't change. In a moment of desperation I cried out to the Lord, "Please,... ... ... do whatever it takes..." It was a frightening prayer because I knew that sometimes God uses desperate measures to reach His children.

Dave and Leta had been married for about five months when I got a teary phone call from my daughter in law. All she knew was that Dave had been in a bad accident, he was still alive, and had been taken to a hospital in Rochester, NY. It was Dave's friend, Chris, who really knew the severity of the situation and when I watched tears roll down his cheeks in the waiting room at the ER, I had to stifle the panic that wanted to well up within.

Dave had been delivering pizzas for work when he stopped to make a left-hand turn. It was a dark rainy day when on a cold, soggy stretch of highway not far from home, he was rear-ended by a pickup truck which pushed him into oncoming traffic. The on coming traffic was the DOT dump truck whose driver swerved just enough to avoid a full head-on impact that surely would have left our son dead. Miraculously, he survived the initial collision, the subsequent spinning and bouncing off the dump truck, and narrowly escaped being thrown out the passenger side window. He also walked away with seeming minor injuries which continue this day to be little reminders of God's mercy. Little did we know that he had actually fractured his C-7 (neck).

Rarely does a life change overnight or in an instant, and there was a moment when I looked heavenward and said, "God, it didn't work," but in His love God had begun a work in Dave that He wasn't about to give up on. He began to open my son's eyes to the love and grace of God, to a Savior who actually gave His life that we might live, and to Dave's own responsibility to give back to God which was rightfully His to begin with.

So, this on Thanksgiving, like several before, I am thankful for the life of my son and God's amazing mercy and grace in not only his life, but ours as well.

Twenty-Seven

Today is my son's twenty-seventh birthday. (He is the one with the frog... and I think he was seven at the time.) It has been a rough week for us, but I pray that things are getting better. Being a parent continually presents new challenges and opportunities for both failure and success, for pride and disappointment in both our own selves and our children. I have had to take a giant step backward and reevaluate my own heart this week and found myself severely lacking.

In spite of our trouble, and the fact that he is working both tonight and tomorrow and has plans on Sunday, I decided to make him a pie. I rolled and pinched the crust and wrapped it in plastic wrap and foil, mixed all the ingredients for pumpkin filling except evaporated milk, sealed it in a bag, and delivered it it to his home to be mixed, baked, and eaten. We might not be together this time around, but at least he has his pie. I can't let a birthday go by without pie.

Happy Birthday, Dave.
I love you.

Happy 23rd Birthday, Dave!

Today was Dave's birthday, so... 13 things about my son, Dave.

1. He has a tender heart and loves to help people.
2. He loves to cook and makes some yummy stuff!
3. He has a beautiful wife (my favorite daughter in law).
4. Dave is about 6' 1" tall.
5. When I close my eyes I can still hear his little boy laugh.
6. He love little kids.
7. He loves a good pot roast.
8. He enjoys working outside doing yard work.
9. He likes cats and has two.
10. He told me he wasn't going to smile when I took him for this picture, and he didn't.
11. He is a writer and a dreamer.
12. He used to fight with Bethany but now they are friends.
13. He survived a terrible car wreck 2 years ago, and God used that accident to change his life.

I love you, Dave, I'm so glad you're my son.