Currently How Sweet It Is By Alice Wisler see related

HELLO!!

Well I was trying to get on here each week, but I see it's been 2 weeks since I last posted, the week got away from me.

It's been a busy 2 weeks and weird emotionally. I am up most days but the last couple have been sad and blah.  I guess that is to be expected. 

Here's a pic of my sister Tammy, who flew in from Texas a week ago. She is now living with my mom and started her job at the Boston store this past week.  So glad she found one quickly.  It's been nice having her up here again.

 My mom and sister came over for Halloween and we all watched tv, had snacks, and passed out candy to the trick or treaters.  November 1st, is national candy stocking up day when it all goes 50% off. I also got some for 75% off yesterday at Target.   This will last 6 months or until the day after Valentines day! haha

I took one day off last week and uploaded and ordered 742 pictures from the last 2 years from Winkflash.com since they were having a 4cent and 6cent sale.  Brought back so many memories with my dad as I was looking thru all those pics he was in.  Glad to have that done!

I've had a few drs appts to figure out what is wrong with my ear.  Recently I've had ringing, noise, pressure, air wooshing sounds in my left ear and so 2 weeks ago Friday I went to Urgent care and he said the ears looked fine (no fluid, etc..) so I went in a couple days later to see an Audiologist for a hearing test and that came back great, no problems with the hearing. So then I went to see the ENT dr and after a few tests he said it all looked fine and that hopefully it will go away. If it doesn't by 6 months time, then I go in for an MRI and more tests.  It's annoying!

Mark Jr had 2 job interviews this past week, at Hobby Lobby and BP.  He's hoping for the gas station so he doesn't have to take out his piercings. We'll hear something this week. He really needs a job! 

 He's been knitting more lately, he made me a scarf with some Homespun yarn I bought at work and he made this cute elephant for one of his friends.  She loved it!   I told him to work on making more, various animals for some of the little cousins for Christmas.

I have taken up loom knitting. Still need to continue reading the loom pattern book I got at the library to understand more than just making hats and scarves, but it's fun!   This pic was one I first started working on. To me the loom is easier than messing with the needles.  I just haven't found alot of time this week to work on it and 2 other looms I have going.  

This week will be busy, I've gotten more hours recently since the holidays are coming and went from 22 hours to 30 hours.  

Tuesday Night we have a Women's Holiday event to go to at church.  They will be talking about saving $$ during the holidays and ways to do it.   They're going to demonstrate how to wear a scarf since they are the new "in" clothing item.  They have holiday treats, etc.... Should be fun. My sister, mom, and our friend Lorraine will come with me.

This Friday evening is our Ladies Card Making Class, always enjoy going and making cards.

We've had mild weather all week, yesterday and today being in the mid 60s and so nice out.  I had to work 8 hours yesterday so I missed it, but I plan on going out later and taking a walk  to enjoy the sunshine.  Not looking forward to the winter weather.

I'd appreciate some prayers for my mother in law who is going in for surgery tomorrow morning, they are taking out part of her colon since there is a blockage and she will be in there for a week. 

HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!!

Currently Lady of Milkweed Manor By Julie Klassen see related

Reckless faith is being abandoned for Christ, completely surrendered to Him without restraint, and at peace with the consequences of what might happen. 

HELLO!!!!

Today was a nice fall day. the weather was mid 50's and sunny.   I enjoyed a nice relaxing afternoon reading the newspaper and watching some shows I had recorded on the DVR.    

Church was good, the pastor did an illustrated sermon this morning.  Hubby has joined the sound/video crew so he helps with the lights & sound done during church.  He was helping with all 3 services today. 

 Tonight we are going to church to see the 40 Year Journey, the story of Arthur Blessit who carried a 12 ft cross around the country the last 40 years.  Should be interesting.

  Mark Jr and his good friend Jenna carved pumpkins the other night.

Here's his finished product, he did a good job.

Oh Oct 12th Katie and her boyfriend Neil celebrated their 2 year anniversary of dating. 

     They went to the melting pot restaurant.  She loves the fondue food. So she just ordered a fondue pot on amazon.com last night to have fondue parties.

   I work 24 hours this week and 30 hours the next week.  My boss handed me a 22 page delete/add change sheets yesterday at work. We use those sheets to change the prices on all the products that they are either clearancing or raising the price.  And we use a price gun in the store, there are no scanners/electronic pricing, so it takes longer. Saturday I finished 11 pgs and I have the rest to do tomorrow along with my weekly order in my needleworks dept, so it will be a busy day tomorrow.

Hope to come back and blog again soon in a few days, I've missed journaling.  Thanks to all of my friends here who have stuck with me for so long.  I have been on Xanga since November 2002, mostly journaling daily until I started working outside of the home this past year, then I got too sporadic (once a week or once a month and then didn't blog at all this past summer! )

 And a good friend at church who reads my blog left me a gift on the table this week.  Hubby brought it home from church last night and it was a nice surprise.  She gave me a the Scrabble Slam card game for our family game nights I mentioned in my last post.  So sweet.  Thanks Lacey~love you!!

 BE BLESSED!!!

Currently Cook Yourself Thin: Skinny Meals You Can Make in Minutes By Lifetime Television see related

Trying to get back to blogging each week.....

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts.
Col. 3:15

HELLO!!!

  It's been a weird couple of weeks since my dad died. I had a hard 2nd week.(Picture above is our pastor speaking at the beginning of the funeral service) Just getting used to the idea that I won't see him again till I get to heaven.  He always would drive by my house since he only lived a couple blocks over and he would honk twice, so if I was home I knew that was him thinking of me as he went past.  He and I love popcicles and ate them all the time.  My mom gave me a few boxes of them that she had left in her freezer from my dad.   Just lots of little things that make me think of him. I miss him.

Here's a great picture of me and my mom and siblings at the funeral, I need to have it framed.

Katie and Mark sang the song "Taken" by Plumb. I don't know how she sang without crying cause we all were as she sang and he played.  Here's the song on Utube if you want to hear it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2Xg-Yvs2OY

 My sister Tammy (her 17 yr old son in the pic) flew back home to Texas Saturday.  It was nice she stayed with my mom the week after the funeral, I think my mom really needed someone to be there with her.  So she has decided to move up here to Wisconsin permanently!  She had a job interview at the Boston Store the Friday before she left and they called her the next day that she got the job.  So she is moving up here the first week of November. We are all so excited to have her back in our lives again. It had been a long 6 years since I had seen her before the funeral.

Oh and another bit of good news came out of this is that my sister Debi, who lives about 35 min from us, is going to try to sell her home and move to our town to be closer to my mom and us.  It will be awesome to have all of us together again.  Praying it all comes about quickly and easily for them to do this.

God is drawing us all closer together and even more bonded as a family. It's neat to see Him working.

Here's one of all the grandkids with my mom at the funeral.

   We've decided to start a new tradition and have a family lunch/game day at my mom's house each Sunday that we can.   We grilled steaks and played Scrabble the first Sunday after my dad wasn't there and then last Sunday my sister and her hubby joined us and we had a lasagna lunch and played Scrabble Slam and Monopoly cards.  2 very fun games.  They are only $5 at Target, I need to buy them.  We had a great time and my mom needs us to be around alot like this.  I still have pics from the past sunday to upload.

The weather has been weird. We had a not so hot summer and then a warm september and a really cool first part of October and now this week we had a few days of "Indian summer" it was nice out.   But that didn't last too long, it's in the high 40's low 50s and rain the rest of this week.   The fall trees are gorgeous around town.  Hubby got all the plants/flowers in my garden trimmed down for me for the winter this past weekend. Yeah for me  since I do not like gardening.

A week ago my good friend Lorraine and my mom and I went to the Fall Diddly Craft Fair in Illinois.  That was one of the strange weather days cause it was freezing and 40 degrees/windy out.  We had fun but it was sooo cold. We were inside and out of the tents at the fair grounds. Saw some cute things and drank alot of hot apple cider and coffee. 

   Then we stopped at Edwards Apple Orchard in Poplar Grove, IL on the way home, fun place.

Currently Plain Pursuit (Daughters of the Promise, Book 2) By Beth Wiseman see related

Hello!

I'm going to try to update xanga every couple days even if it's just a quick post, I feel bad that I hadn't journaled since the end of April.

Thank you to everyone who left a nice comment to me about my dad's passing. Thanks for the prayers too. We had so much love and support poured out to us this past week, God is good!

Today the last of the house guests left to fly home after the funeral.  It was so good to be with all the family, some we hadn't seen for 6 years.  My 2 aunts (my dad's sisters) and some cousins flew out from California and Colorado, I hadn't seen them in over 20 years.   We took so many pictures this past week I probably have 500 to upload.  We even took pictures at the funeral, I wanted to remember that day. 

So today I cleaned, did laundry, and washed the bedding after my niece and her husband left to fly home. I also spent the afternoon relaxing with hubby and watched a few shows that we had on the dvr from this past week.

I went with my mom to the funeral home today to pick up the ashes, they were heavy!  It was surprising.

Tonight my mom, sister Tammy (who is still here from Texas), and I are going to go pick up our good friend Lorraine and go to Rubberstamping Card class at church tonight.  A fun diversion after this stressful week.

Have a great weekend!

I'M BACK..............

Oh wow, I feel horrible not being on Xanga since May.  I've of course been busy and when I do go online I go to Facebook.  I will try to get over here more often.

Well I am on here posting sad news today.

Saturday, October 3rd, my Dad passed away and went home to be with Jesus.

He was in the hospital for 8 days with complications from his congestive heart failure and the last couple days got worse.  He had internal bleeding that wouldn't stop  (from the cumidin blood thinner meds he was getting injected in his stomach), his heart and only kidney was failing. 

My family & pastors waited together and bonded in the ICU waiting room. We were able to go into his room at times to talk to him~we all said we loved him while he was conscious and he looked at each one and smiled or grunted and to Katie his last words spoken were "I love you too"

They put the breathing tube in him and then he became unconscious.  At 2am they had to perform CPR (which was sooo horrible to watch) after he had a heart attack.  His heart stopped for 16 min. therefore causing lack of oxygen to the brain.  In the morning he had surgery on his chest/stomach to relieve the pressure off his organs caused from the internal bleeding. They did the surgery in the ICU room, it was too risky to move him. He was so bloated and puffy.  He came thru the surgery very well  but an hour after he started to bleed out again.

My brother from Oklahoma had been driving straight thru and was almost there at that point. I was hoping my dad would hold on until he got there and he did, my brother sobbed when he saw him again, it had been 5 years since he last saw him.  Then 45 min or so after he arrived his pulse and heart stopped and we turned off the breathing machine.   We all went to be with him and stood around his bed saying goodbye and those that weren't able to be with us we called on the cell phones, putting the phone to his hear letting them say goodbye.   We sang/cried Amazing Grace as he died.

The drs said within 24 hrs they gave him 23 units of blood and platelets. they treated him like a trama patient and they had never done an operation in the ICU room before.  Glad my dad made history there!  lol

The last few days all the family have been meeting here at my house.  My sister and niece/husband flew in and aunts I haven't seen in over 25 years came.  We've had such an out pouring of love and support with our friends and pastors and our family has bonded closer thru this.   The meals that were brought helped so much because I have been too busy getting all the details together to cook.  Picking pictures/music for the slideshow, writing the obituary, etc...

Oh and the funeral home here gave us such an awesome deal, $2200 down to $800 for a cremation. God is our provider, because we didn't have much $ to pay for this.  We went to hobby lobby yesterday to buy the urn.

Today is the funeral & lunch that the church is so graciously providing us.  Katie and Mark are singing/playing piano as a special song to grandpa. Each of the siblings/grandkids are saying a 1 minute eulogy.  There will be a slideshow, we are singing praise songs to make this a "home going" celebration for my dad.  He's in heaven now dancing with Jesus!

Pray for us as we go thru this hard day.  Thanks so much.