2007 – A year of blessings.

Too many to count, really.

The blessing of a beautiful new daughter-in –law, Abigail.

The blessing of a beautiful new granddaughter, Madelyn Saige.

The blessing of time with family – children, grandchildren, sisters, aunts, nieces and nephews, and their children.

The blessing of connecting with old friends and the blessing of making new ones.

The blessing of serving our risen Lord, as each month we were able to use our gifts at different ministries around the country. (Well, at least the eastern part of the country. )

The blessing of time at our little slice of heaven in Vermont.

The blessing of safety on the road, comfort in our little house, and continued good health.

The blessing of knowing that even when tomorrow has lots of question marks, God tells us He has a plan for us ~

“For I know the plans that I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans for welfare and not for calamity, to give you a future and a hope” ( Jeremiah 29:11a).

2007 – A year of blessings. Too many to count. Really.

Praise God from whom all blessings flow
Praise Him all creatures here below
Praise Him above, ye heavenly host:
Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost
Thomas Ken, 1709

And what a week it was!
Monday – Spaghetti w/meat sauce and a nice tossed salad.
Tuesday we drove to Panama City, about 60 miles south of here. We needed to get to Best Buy (my new computer wasn’t playing nicely with me), and one of the boys needed to get to the Panama City Airport. We were happy to bring him along (plus we get reimbursed for the gas!), and we managed to accomplish lots of errands while we were “south”. The computer appeared to be working fine when we left – and we were blessed with the following sight when we exited the store…..

Even with a shopping mall in the foreground, it was a specatular sky!
Wednesday – Beef Barbeque Sandwiches and Chicken and Dumplin’ Soup ( I was working with leftovers!)
Thursday – We pulled out late morning and headed to Orange Beach, Alabama, to spend an overnight with my niece Hannah and her family who were vacationing there. What an excellent time we had! Thursday was rainy so we played in the indoor pool, sat in the hot tub, and had yummy pizza for dinner. We awoke on Friday to a picture perfect day – as you can see from this picture. This was our view as we drank our coffee…..

Dazzling, eh?
Now Hannah and Brian have 6 beautiful children, ages 5 months to almost 14. Friday morning Gary and Brian and the 3 biggest kids went out geocaching while Hannah and I had a “quiet” morning with the little ones (ages 5,3 and 5 months). Here they are….
Pretty cute, eh?
After lunch the gang headed to the beach. The breeze was a little cool, but that didn’t deter those kids from thoroughly enjoying the beach in December.

So there are a whole bunch of pictures of blue sky and ocean and beautiful children here – so take a look if you’d like! But here we are all together before we left on Friday night~

It was so wonderful to get a “Family Fix” since we won’t be with any of our children and grandchildren this week.

But our Christmas, though not typical, will be very special. Gary has gotten permission to cook the boys a steak dinner for Christmas and he’s very excited about that. PLUS – he’s refereeing the big Paintball Event tomorrow. How Christmasy is that!

But on a more traditional note…..

May your Christmas be filled with Peace and Joy~
This is how God showed His love to us:
He sent His one and only Son….”
I John 4:9

God Bless!

Christmas has come to our little house. The wooden nativity is on the dashboard, the Christmas wall hangings are in place, and my small collection of ornaments has been pinned to the window treatment. Some of our neighbors have lots of lights up, along with small trees, but we are showing great restraint. Since we already did Christmas with the kids, I think we’re doing pretty good!

So, what else has been going on? Hmmmm….Well, I had TWO days off this week!!!! Tuesday I spent cleaning and organizing and cleaning. I must confess, it was lovely! I still have tons of organizing to do (all of my closets and cupboards need some thorough going-through), but it felt sooooo good to get “stuff” put away, and dirt vacuumed up! And the on Wednesday I joined the other Sower ladies for a day out. Karen orchestrated a full day of interesting stops in and around Dothan. Interestingly we started at the Esto Post Office – where I am sure we overwhelmed the postmaster with our presence and business (yes, we did have postal business to accomplish!). I’m not sure how pleased he was that we considered it a tourist stop……but here we are for the official photo-op!

Along with our postal stop, we hit a great little used book store, several thrift shops, viewed some of the amazing murals in town and had a delightful lunch at Mildred’s Tea House.

All in all a lovely day out – sweet fellowship, fun shopping and even a stop at the DQ!

Let’s see, what else. Well, this weekend was Parents’ Weekend.
About 3/4 of the parents were here – some to watch their sons graduate (which 10 did ) some to spend the weekend and then take their sons home for Christmas (about 25 did that) and some to see their sons for the first time in four months. Those last parents left tonight, leaving their sons here at TC. These weekends are always a mixed blessing – a healing time for some, a reminder of past hurts for others, the joy of the reunion only making the pain of the separation seem so much more severe. And of course, add into the mix missing Christmas with your family, and I’m sure you can understand why it was pretty quiet at dinner tonight. As much as we are going to miss being with our family this Christmas, I’m glad that we’ll be here with our “boys”. The staff here try to make it as special as they can – I hear that Gary is refereeing a paint ball tournement Christmas Day. Now That should be interesting!

That pretty much sums up our week. The kitchen still consumes most of my working time, though I think the schedule will be settling down for the next couple of weeks (especially since there are only 40 boys here). One of the Sower ladies has become my kitchen buddy, so that has been great fun. I’ll miss her when this “batch” of Sowers leave after this week. But not to dispair – another 8 couples will be arriving in early January! Gary met with the engineers last week, and is very hopeful that come January he can start ordering equipment and begin to get that process started.

It was 80 on Wednesday (when I was at the DQ), but right now it is only 38. Brrrrrrr. We had lots of hard rain and then high winds last night, (Gary was out at 2AM bringing in the awnings) but we aren’t buried in 10 inches of snow, so I’m not really complaining. Just commenting, honest. Especially about the 80 degrees on Wednesday. Honest. It’s just a comment.

Yes, we made it through the weekend. Phew! It will be very good to see the cook (Ms. Betty) tomorrow! Everything went very well – we had great help, the meals were all ready more or less on time, and the line was always long when seconds were offered. (Always heartwarming to the cook!)
But more important – new pictures of the little ones…..

Maddie first – our newest cutie!

All three in a group hug….

And a final one of Maddie in the sweater that Lara knit for her. I think I see a smile!

Such little blessings!

Yes, we’ll be cooking. 100 meals, 3 times a day, 7 days a week. OK, so we haven’t cooked every one of those meals, but we’ve certainly been on hand for most of them! And the next 9 meals will be our personal responsibility (the cook’s away!). But aside from the panic that the rice really will NOT BE DONE in time, or the questions about cooking butter beans, seeing the smiles on the faces of the boys (along with the hands that go up when asked if anyone wants seconds) has made all of the extra hours worth it. Hopefully next week we’ll get a day or two off, so I can get some housework done!

But since about the most exciting thing that has happened in my life lately is the fact that the rice did indeed get done (never underestimate how long it is going to take to get a huge pot of water to boil – I really should know better!), I thought I’d share some photos of my quilting projects that I did for the family this year. (This is mostly for my quilting buddies – everyone else, view at your own risk! )
Hayley’s Quilt
Since the girls are together in the same room (bunk beds no less!), I made her a quilt to coordinate with the one I made for Ellie last year. Tammy and I picked out the fabrics when we were together in August, and we chose a simple fat-quarter pattern (Yellow Brick Road). Since it was an easy pattern, I tried to put a little extra detail into the quilting. I don’t have a picture of it on her bed, but here are a couple of it on my bed – along with some close up detail shots.

I also made a pillowcase and a little pillow to match. (Those pillowcases are so easy to make – and are such a big hit!)

Maddie’s Quilt
I also made a quilt for our new granddaughter – though at the time I didn’t know if it was a granddaughter or grandson. So while this may look a little like we were expecting a boy, I actually just built it from my “stash” – and I tried to make it nice a bright and interesting. Again, it’s a simple brick pattern, and I did just basic machine quilting. But the back is nice soft flannel, and I hope it gets lots and lots of use!

The Nap Quilts
And the rest of the gang got “Nap Quilts”. I used the same Yellow Brick Road pattern, and put a nice cozy fleece on the back. Two were done in homespuns (again from my “stash”) and two were done in some fun bright prints. I kept one of the print ones – and can verify that it works great! (for naps, that is!)

Still on the horizon – a keepsake quilt for Maddie, finishing up a wall hanging and a table runner, and catching up on my “memory stars”.

But the very next thing on the horizon is chicken and rice for 80 hungry boys!