I'm Having Surgery Within the Week

The last time I wrote in this particular blog we were postponing surgery for me....Was it a good year? Yeah it was a good year. Same little mishaps here and there. I fell occasionally, always seem to be good for one or two of those in a year: Nothing serious, but I wear out my poor husband Mike with worry...he is such a dear best friend and husband! Once again I didn't seem to work very much due to various ailments which taken individually are really nothing, but added together, add up to quite a few lost days. Next hear will be better. I will miss my days up front with the surgery and then bounce back and have a truly great year! I started a new Twitter account today called @Bouncin_Back about human resilience and my particular brand of it. I think it with raise and meet expectations and help me to understand my ups and downs by documentation and hopefully find and less hilly road in life! I'm looking forward to it. I'll talk about it here because it's all about faith and a God much Larger than us who's volunteered to help us through the lowspots! Thank you God!

Springtime!

Christmas 2008

We had a good Christmas. Christmas Eve, Mike and I spent together in our lovely decorated living room.

Christmas Day we visited tons of relatives in only two stops. The next day we caught up with others by phone. It was my kind of Christmas, thanking my Savior, watching Christmas movies and concerts Christmas Eve and lots and lots of people to visit on Christmas Day. Catch up, exchange e-mails, take pictures. Mike loves to talk one on one and found some great ones for that Christmas Day, so all of our needs were met.

I got the books and make up I wanted for Christmas. Mostly really good books :-). My favorite mascara is all. Well maybe some gloss. Something to improve my mind and my beautification project. Just kidding, I just like makeup. This is my blog so I guess I can mention the trivial as well.

Merry Christmas to all and a Very Happy New Year.

Life in the Sorta Slow Lane: Dogs and Picnics#links#links

Life in the Sorta Slow Lane: Dogs and Picnics#links#links

Cowboy Themed 50th B-day Party

We had a fabulous Birthday party last Sunday for my brother Bill above and my cousin Marcia also above. Bill turned 50 in August and Muffy turns 50 in October. As you can see they both fall into the category "I cannot believe you are 50! You look fabulous!" They look it and they are. Very loving happy people. Great to their families and in their professions. Marcia is a Teacher and Bill works for a large insurance company and is quite the Executive!

We all had a great time being together with our cousins. We were raised together and are very close! We had great times growing up and pick up where we left off whenever we get together. Happy Days!

A special prayer for my friend Stephanie

Well I found out yesterday that my dear friend Stephanie from Canada has a severe heart problem going on that is making her very miserable and that will sadly take her home to Jesus if it is not reversed soon. I say sadly selfishly because we who love her are not, by any means, ready to let her go. She is lovely and loving, sweet and giving. A wonderful mother, wife, and friend.

Dear God, reverse the destructive phase Stephanie's body is in right now I pray. Make it possible for her to receive good nourishment and build up the muscle mass she needs to receive her life saving treatments again, in the name of our Lord Jesus, I pray.

Our God is an awesome God who reigns forevermore. Please return Stephanie to us for a good while longer. Like you, we love her dearly. AMEN.

Friends

You'll notice there is a lot mentioned on this blog about friends. Even the type of Christ verse: A friend who sticks closer than a brother. That's Christ, for only God can manage that. And He is truly my first and foremost -- very best friend. He stuck with me at a time in my life early on when I lost my only son -- and my husband couldn't bear it -- and left. Now, fortunately, I have husband who's first name is loyalty and middle name is steadfastness -- and I have a wonderful daughter who is 25 and healthy as she can be! As anyone can be! Friends are very helpful in a crisis -- and in times of celebration both. But God is the best friend of all. I love this part in the Psalms: Psalm 139 vs 17-18 "How precious also are Thy thoughts to me, O God! How vast is the sum of them! If I should count them, they would outnumber the sand. When I awake, I am still with Thee."

My thoughts

I would like to endeavor to explain why my family and friends and my daughter and husband and of course my faith in a vital active God who cares are so important to me. When I was 23 I had a son named David with a serious heart condition. The doctor's had told us to get him to age 5 when the advances in medicine would make it possible for an operation to help me. So I set about doing what they said. We tried very hard to shelter him, but at 11-1/2 months of age he caught a slight cold and died in his sleep. It turned out he also did not have a spleen. No white blood cells to fight the cold. So you see, I appreciate family and friends all the more. My then husband left me in his own grief. I went from having a lovely little family to not. And the people on this page all but the new ones, rallied round. I treasure them for it. And I treasure the God who got me through the empty times, the lonely times and carried me when it was too rough for me to handle.

Moving to new Diggs

Well we are moving in a few short weeks. It seems very strange to be moving without our dog Spike. I mention him on another blog. He went to doggie heaven last weekend. Or Hopefully to people heaven. Because quite frankly what would heaven be without dogs. I'm excited about our new apartment. It will be overly clean and quiet without our little friend. And orderly. But we won't mess it up on his behalf. We couldn't do it justice. So much new and so much loss.

I've been thinking about my dad

My dad is a really great guy. He grew up in the Great Depression. So he knows the value of a dollar. Yet he still managed to spend enough of them to be very generous with his children and grandchildren. He made his money as an insurance broker, which to my mind isn't a very easy way to make your money. But he did very well at it. You have to -- to support 5 children.

My parents were divorced when I was 10, yet he kept his promise of never moving more than one suburb away. We saw him every weekend and took vacations with him and his new wife and later my new little sister. He did a great job as a dad!

He sent us to college. Coached us when needed. Interfered when my mom asked him too and sometimes when she didn't like any good dad. As I got older we got even closer, which is the ideal with fathers, because they seem to understand grownups even better than they do kids!

My dad is 78 now and writing our family genealogy in great depth. He's visiting towns, graveyards, libraries - all around the U.S. to fine tune it. Interestingly he's putting in points of history for us to -- to put the genealogy in context. He is a great writer, great with detail and his stories, even when they're true, are very interesting.

I love my dad. For Father's Day, maybe I'll show him my blog!

My Best Girlfriends

My best girlfriends and I are quite a story in itself. The first one I'll talk about is the short haired blond here in the picture. She and I have been friends as long as I have had a really great friend -- since we were 13. Jr. High. The age that makes mince meat of us all. She stuck by me. She was a true friend. When I lost my son Davey. She was there for me. That's how I counted my friends then and there weren't many. Just her. The brunette in the picture -- and one other, not in the picture.

The brunette wasn't really my friend at the time. She had dated my little brother Bill for a time. But he was too young for her. And all of his fast talking couldn't saved it. Too bad. She would've been a blast as a sister-in-law, no offense intended respective spouses! She and I were at the same small church when my son died and she befriended me. Real friends. When I needed as many as possible. I got her and she's worth at least 50 or 60 friends, any day!

That made for three really great friends and I was grateful to God for them. The third gal -- not in the picture -- has been my friend since I was 18. She is a blast. She is funny and irreverent and a fantastic woman of faith. They all are. They've been with me through thick and thin!

And we celebrate the good and bad times every year by going out to lunch for our birthdays together. We are all June and July birthdays and we celebrate them on the same day by going out to lunch. We are on our 25th year! Mind you when we started they were my best friends and didn't know each other! You would never guess that to see us know. You wouldn't have guessed it the first year. We were fast friends, now we're all best friends! And old friends...just really great friends!

We've been together as our children have grown up. One or more years, babies came along on the lunches. Kids have gone through college. One of us, so far has become a grandmother. Children have wed -- before having their families. It's been a great 25 years and continues this year on Saturday, June 21st. So I'll have a good picture from it to round out the story: of all 4 of us!

Blogging: Children and Heaven

I think this blogging is very interesting stuff. I sent word of this blog to quite a few people. A few people even looked at it. I had 4 votes on my poll, 1 was mine, so that's 3 people. I heard from 1 person via e-mail so that's 4 people.

Oh and my daughter was here, because she fixed a problem I was having. That's another thing I forgot to mention about my daughter, Abby. She is a true computer geek. Enough of one to get paid for her talents. Needless to say I am very proud of her for it. She is good at anything she tries. When she worked at a large retailer for 4+ years she had learned every department and they needed help as a cashier in Pharmacy so she went over their to help out. They begged to keep her and she stayed six months and learned the names of all the prescriptions to keep from getting bored. She could have been a Pharmacy Tech and studied to be a Pharmacist, but she really wasn't interested in it. She just did it to occupy her mind! Well she loves computers, so she's finally hitting her stride and that makes me very happy for her. And proud, did I mention that.

Children are the delight of a mother's heart that is for sure. I mention in my notes about my business that it is named after my child David. He would be 32 now. I had him when I was just a bit over 20. He was a delightful baby. My comfort comes from the Lord - in knowing I will see him again in Heaven, which I know a sure as I'm sitting here typing this.

I'm in know rush to get to Heaven, but I know I'll have a great time when I get there!