Thursday, April 30, 2009

A Whole Year!

I just realized that I just passed my first anniversary of blogging! It has been so much fun and I have been so blessed to meet all you lovely ladies on line. What an amazing amount of encouragement you all have been to me! I thought I would republish my first post that I made on April 21, 2008. It is called "An Angel Unaware".
It was a cold grey winter’s day and I was working as a florist in a small shop a little bit out of the way. I was in the back room making some arrangements for the display cooler when I heard the bell ring on the front door. I went out to see who it was and there at the counter was a small lady in her late 70’s. She had white hair that made soft curls around her face and she wore a tailored, blue, wool coat that was fastened with two large plastic buttons. She told me that she wanted to wire some flowers to her daughter in Florida as it was her birthday. I showed her some pictures of arrangements in the FTD book. She picked one with brightly colored flowers and party horns in it. We went back to the counter and I made out her order. She began to tell me how she had 4 children. Two of them she had in her twenties and two after she was forty. She said she loved all her kids very much but she said, “Oh, how I enjoyed the children I had after I was forty.” With the sweetest look on her face, she reached over and patted my hand and said, “Dear, don’t feel bad if you have children after you are forty. They will be such a joy!” I thought that was interesting as I had not told her that I was single, 30 years old and was waiting for God to fulfill the desires of my heart for a husband and a family. Little did I know that in two years I would be afforded the opportunity to come on staff at a local church as their secretary and that the job would provide wonderful fellowship and purpose, that would insulate me from the pain of loneliness that would have been too hard to bear during the 12 more years that I had to wait. I met my sweet husband, Richard, at that church and we married when I was 42 and he was 47. Four years later, when I was 46, I gave birth to our precious daughter, Mary Ellen. She is such a joy!
When the little old lady paid for her order of flowers that day, she walked out the door. I looked away for a moment and when I looked again, she was gone. I don’t know if she made a quick turn up the hill to the retirement center that was near the flower shop or hopped into a car I did not see or....she was an angel and just disappeared? Whatever the case, she was an angle to me. Angel means messenger and she gave me a powerful message that day that I will never forget and it filled my heart with hope during my wait!


“Therefore, let those also who suffer according to the will of God entrust their souls to a faithful Creator in doing what is right.” 1Peter 4:19

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Wordless Wednesday - Plates







For more Wordless Wednesday posts go to Dixie's blog.



Monday, April 27, 2009

Happy Monday!

Happy Monday dear ones! We had a really nice weekend. The weather was beautiful. It was sunny and clear but not too hot. Mary and I visited our neighbors across the street who were having a garage sale. I'm so happy the weather has warmed up because that means deals at garage sales. Yay! I spent a whopping 75 cents. I bought Mary 2 shirts and she picked out a pair of bright green sunglasses with orange polka dots. She loved them. I know she has a tendency to break glasses because she bends the bows too far out when she is putting them on or taking them off, so I figured 25 cents was worth several hours of fun for her. Later on in the afternoon, sure enough, she broke one bow off. She came running up to me handed the glasses to me and told me to not to break them! I just laughed, she is such a character. It didn't take her long to get the other bow broken off and during her nap, I just put them in the trash. This morning she woke up and was asking for her glasses. I told her they were no good anymore and they were in the trash. She got this distressed look on her face like, "What after I told you not to break them?!" She didn't worry about it too long and went her little happy go lucky way playing with her other toys. Saturday Rich pressure cooked a rack of ribs and then soaked them in barbecue sauce over night. After church he grilled them and we had his folks over. Mel made a delicious pea salad and a potato salad. Rich also made bread dough and I made them into rolls and we baked them in the oven. For dessert I made my twist on Napoleons. I bought puff pastry and cut it with a heart shaped cookie cutter and baked the heart shaped pastery in the oven. I mixed up some sugar free pistachio pudding. When the puff pastry had baked and cooled, I split them open and put the pudding in the center. I then topped them with whip cream and drizzled chocolate syrup on it. It turned out pretty good and was a nice sweet, but light, dessert after dinner. We love having Mel and Dan over as it gives us an opportunity to cook up something special for them. I have included some pictures of our weekend. I made Mary a little scarf for her head and she wore it on Sunday along with a denim jumper that my sister, Linda, gave her. Rich snapped some pictures of us before we left for church. The other pictures are of the dessert I made on Sunday.




























Thursday, April 23, 2009

Show and Tell Friday ~ Plain and Simple

I have an Amish heritage. My father was raised Amish until he was 15 when he left the church and then 2 years later was lead by some friends to make a commitment to Christ and said the sinners prayer. He has loved and served the Lord ever since but he never did go back to the Amish church. All his brothers and sisters left the Amish church except one sister. So, I have many cousins that are still Amish. My dad's father died when my dad was 13 and his mother remarried and lived in the Amish faith all her life. My dad has told us many stories of growing up in the "Plain and Simple Life." It was very interesting to me and I am proud to have a heritage like that. The other day I was at the Thrift Store with my dear mother-in-law and I was so pleased to find a little Amish doll for Mary. The Amish do not believe in having their picture taken. They believe it is making an image or idol. So, their dolls have no faces either. I just loved her little black bonnet and blue and black clothes. The first picture is the doll sitting by a beautiful bouquet of roses that my husband gave me!


Here is Mary with here new doll!

She was most interested in the bonnet and wanted it for herself!



Here is the only picture I have of my grandmother. She was at an English (that is what they call all non-Amish things) wedding and the photographer snapped a shot of them. The man she is sitting next to is her second husband, after my grandpa died.




I am also including the program of her funeral in 1984. She lived a long and full life and had many descendants! You can click on it and get a better view.












For more Show and Tell posts see Kelli's Blog.






Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Mary loves to look at books and have me read to her. She really likes this Noah's Ark book that I got for her a little while ago. The video is just the first two pages. She does know her colors but it's hard to get her to perform on video and she does like to mess with you and tell you the wrong color on purpose and then rolls her eyes to see what you think and has big smile on her face! She is quite a little character! She makes me laugh and brings so much joy to Rich and I.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Kings Firecrackers

These young girls have rhythm and lots of endurance. I was so amazed to see this! The first video is an overview of what the do. If you click more at the end of it, you will see an actual performance that they do. It is amazing too!

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Wordless Wednesday - Tax Day




Christian Art Dot Com






For more Wordless Wednesday posts go to Dixie's blog.




Tuesday, April 14, 2009

It's Bloomin' Tuesday

I went out to my greenhouse right before Easter and I found my freesia plant blooming. I brought it into the house for Easter. It smells so sweet! The next day I noticed it was covered with aphids as you can see in one of the pics. So, I washed them off and that worked pretty good! To see what is blooming at other peoples places, go to Jean's blog. She is so sweet to host this fun event!





Have a wonderful day!

Monday, April 13, 2009

Our Easter

Here is a slide show and some scrapbook pages of our Easter weekend. I hope you all had a great Easter! Be sure to turn the sound up on your computer to hear the songs that go with the pictures.











Click to play this Smilebox photobook:

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Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Wordless Wednesday - Easter

For more Wordless Wednesday posts go to Dixie's blog!


Friday, April 3, 2009

April Showers Bring May Flowers

Today is Show and Tell and my mind is on Spring! The birds are all singing and my flowers are beginning to bud with life. So, I wanted to share my garden and love for flowers. We have a beautiful little bird called the American Goldfinch that comes to our feeder and here is a picture below. If you click on the picture you can create a flower garden of your own. Once you get to the black screen, just click on it and see what happens! I also have included a slide show of my garden. I love spring because it is not only time for flowers but also the time to celebrate Jesus' resurrection from the dead and wonderful hope he gives us for new life!




Here is the link to the video:
http://www.onetruemedia.com/shared?p=68b50817b6bf8020222938&skin_id=1011&utm_source=otm&utm_medium=text_url

For more Show and Tell treasures and the stories behind them go to Kelli's blog.