Monday, December 26, 2011
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Snow-tubing on JB's 9th birthday
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| Gloria and Grandude on an inner-tube behind a 3-wheeler |
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| Friends, Bob and daughter, Louella, about to go for a ride. |
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| During ride. |
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| Post ride. |
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| JB with Grandude. Max ready to give them a snow-gliding adventure. |
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| After Max's 3-wheeler tipped over and had to be towed. JB trying to hitch a ride. |
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| JB hitching a ride. |
We started out with good, old-fashioned sledding...
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| Sticking out your tongue must make it a better ride... |
Oops...Benaiah had to go inside after trying to jump across the flowing part of the creek...
...I guess he had to learn about ice sometime...a bit frigidly.
Friday, December 23, 2011
JBs 9th birthday party...the indoor half of it...
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| Two things JB wanted to do for the indoor portion of his party...make fire-starters (works like kindling), which involves dipping string-tied pine cones into colored wax and then putting "funky flame" powder on them (an extra:)). |
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| ...the other thing JB wanted "indoors" was a Treasure Chest birthday cake. Gramma Shell did a great job. |
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| Not many kids get to blow our a treasure chest cake on a wood stove. Enough sun was coming in through the South facing windows that it didn't need to be "on". Plus, it provided a great kid-level display for the glorious treasure cake. |
First Evening in Colorado
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| Reading with Granddude after getting done with our long drive. |
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| Daddy's "cupcake" |
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| An early Christmas present...she's just getting into dressing up, but doesn't really know how to wear a princess skirt yet. Her older sister will have to teach her... |
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| She's also unfamiliar with how to show off a new skirt. Good thing she had her pjs on underneath... |
Bald Eagle
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| If you click on the pic to make it bigger, you can see an eagle on top of the post. |
We've had bad adventures before which involved witnessing a semi truck clip a farm truck in front of us, causing it to flip off the road, killing the driver, and then staying to report to the police and seeing the widow come and see her husband's body dead. This past experience on a drive from Oklahoma to Colorado a few years ago is burned into at least 4 of our memories (I don't think Benaiah and Evelyn would remember it). Anyway, that memory was also in a drive right before Christmas. This time we did not experience anything so horrific.
This time there were road closures we had to go around because of storms, which caused us to go the scenic route. And this truly was a scenic route. We spent more time in New Mexico than we ever had before on a drive to CO from OK. We ended up going west into New Mexico instead of North through the Texas panhandle, through NM for only an hour, then into Colorado. That route, which we normally travel, was closed and many were stuck in Clayton, NM or other places in Texas and NM, not able to get to their destination.
Since we didn't really feel like sleeping in our truck that night nor dealing with the snow storm that was coming the next day (the previous one left 15-20 foot snow drifts, which caused the closures), we planned a different route early on. Benefits to having a pilot for a husband are that he thinks about these things way ahead of time and was also able to call the weather shop on base to find out when the next storm was moving in.
We ended up driving through beautiful NM prairie and then suddenly a mesa (butte?) was in front of us and we got to drive up and on top of it, where there was a beautiful little town called Masquero and a humble village (which is what they called themselves) called Roy. The kids were great, already seasoned travelers, plus we found JB and Benaiah's missing Leappad before we left on this trip (thank you God!) and we got to see a bald eagle (in the picture above). Thank you, Lord, for your many blessings!!
The best Christmas presents ever...(other than Jesus:))
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| JB was due on Christmas and came two days before! Happy Birthday JB! |
Sister Love
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| Evelyn soooo happy to be on her big sister's bed. Gloria was reading to Evelyn from her picture Bible. |
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| Evelyn: I can't believe I'm getting away with this. |
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| So cute...I just can't stand it! |
The Making of A Gingerbread House
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| Building a gingerbread house as JB learns how to do a stop-action video. After this he moved onto stop-action videos with Legos... |
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| I wonder if anyone would notice if I took one little candy off... |
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| Benaiah and our newly finished gingerbread house... |
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| We entered it into a Christmas Party contest for the best gingerbread house. We won by default...were the only one that made one and brought it... |
Monday, December 05, 2011
First Deer for Tamsey
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| About to go out hunting with hubby. |
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| He's not big, but he's the one I felt comfortable shooting in terms of his position. Frankly, I was afraid if I didn't shoot soon, I wouldn't do it. I was shaking, but still managed a kill shot (with much urgent praying under my breath). I was excited and scared at the same time. I was mostly scared that I had wounded him, but not lethally, and that we wouldn't find him. Max was sure that it was a kill shot, but against my husband's instruction (we practiced shooting the rifle a few times beforehand and I was supposed to stay looking up), I pretty much collapsed after shooting into a ball of nerves, not watching to see where I shot, just looking up a bit after the shot to see that I had hit him because of the jump he made. He lay down for a while after that in the field and then decided to go die in the woods. Upon finding his body, I cried, not because I regretted shooting him, but for two reasons... 1) it was sad because he was beautiful and I had killed him and 2) because I was so thankful to God that I had actually successfully hunted big game, an experience I wasn't sure I would ever have with my husband, but about which my husband (and I, eventually) was very hopeful, and also thankful for the meat - we love venison. We had his tenderloins and back strap steaks and they were very tender and tasty. About 3/4 of the meat was given to a family who helped us butcher him in our kitchen and really appreciates the meat as well. We have a whole elk in the freezer already from Max's October hunting trip in Colroado. Thank you God for the meat and for the experience with my husband! |
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
JB encourages...
JB has a very sensitive spirit. Today my parents left to go back to Boston after visiting for a wonderful, rich week of both food and fun and meaningful times together...the best visit with them ever (it gets better every time and harder to say good bye each time as well). This is the last visit for them here in Oklahoma, at least at our current house. We have some great memories here as they have visited at Thanksgiving time three years in a row. This good-bye was especially hard leading up to it, so I tried to busy myself cleaning up to keep the tears from coming so early.
Hugging them good bye of course brought on the tears for all of us adults. The kids tend to go with the flow and had fun this time pushing the car as my Dad backed out and pushing it from behind as the my Dad pulled forward, of course, with my Dad honking the horn every once in a while to tease them. The kids then ran after the car yelling good bye. The kids and I went back inside, which is probably the second hardest part after watching them pull out because the emptiness of having them gone now fills my aching heart.
By the way, when Max leaves on a deployment and I'm sure when he leaves for the his year deployment (have never experienced that yet, thank God), the heart ache and emptiness is a bit different, but is also about 10 times worse. It's hard to quantify, but I know when my other half leaves, since we are one, it feels as though a part of me is being ripped away. In about 7 months, saying goodbye to him for a year, I think my heart might explode or sink to the bottom of my toes, I'm not really sure...but I know that God will pull me through it no matter what and I take comfort in Jesus.
Sorry, a little detour there, but missing my parents is bittersweet, whereas missing my husband, especially when he first leaves, is basically just bitter, anticipating a year of physical separation. The sweet part is experiencing Jesus' comfort as well as getting closer to the time that he will be back. This brings me to the sweet part of my parents' leaving, which comes through God using my children to comfort me.
I was sitting on my bed after my parents left, reading a note that my Dad put on our bed, of course with tears streaming down my face, and JB came in and asked what was wrong and I told him that I just miss my parents and it makes me sad because I don't see them very often. JB then asked what he could do to cheer me up. I thought that was very sweet and told him to give me a hug. Then he asked what he do to comfort me now. I told him I would love to read to him to get my mind off of my parents leaving. He left the room with a smile saying that he had the perfect book. He brought back his Action Bible and said "I think this will cheer you up." We sat on the bed again and he opened it to the story of Ruth and Naomi and Boaz as Ruth's kinsman redeemer. Now talk about a story (a true story at that!) going from bitter to sweet for everyone involved!
After reading that JB made a very astute analogy (he's his Fathers' son); he told me he chose that one because the men in Naomi and Ruth's life had died and while my parents had left, they had not died, they just went away for a time. What perspective and yes, joy, that brings when an eight-year-old (our own first-born son) reminds me that parting is sweet sorrow, but temporary for those who 1) have not died in the physical sense and will see each other again on this earth, but more importantly 2) are believers in Christ Jesus and will never be eternally separated because we have a common Savior, the only Savior, our Redeemer.
Hugging them good bye of course brought on the tears for all of us adults. The kids tend to go with the flow and had fun this time pushing the car as my Dad backed out and pushing it from behind as the my Dad pulled forward, of course, with my Dad honking the horn every once in a while to tease them. The kids then ran after the car yelling good bye. The kids and I went back inside, which is probably the second hardest part after watching them pull out because the emptiness of having them gone now fills my aching heart.
By the way, when Max leaves on a deployment and I'm sure when he leaves for the his year deployment (have never experienced that yet, thank God), the heart ache and emptiness is a bit different, but is also about 10 times worse. It's hard to quantify, but I know when my other half leaves, since we are one, it feels as though a part of me is being ripped away. In about 7 months, saying goodbye to him for a year, I think my heart might explode or sink to the bottom of my toes, I'm not really sure...but I know that God will pull me through it no matter what and I take comfort in Jesus.
Sorry, a little detour there, but missing my parents is bittersweet, whereas missing my husband, especially when he first leaves, is basically just bitter, anticipating a year of physical separation. The sweet part is experiencing Jesus' comfort as well as getting closer to the time that he will be back. This brings me to the sweet part of my parents' leaving, which comes through God using my children to comfort me.
I was sitting on my bed after my parents left, reading a note that my Dad put on our bed, of course with tears streaming down my face, and JB came in and asked what was wrong and I told him that I just miss my parents and it makes me sad because I don't see them very often. JB then asked what he could do to cheer me up. I thought that was very sweet and told him to give me a hug. Then he asked what he do to comfort me now. I told him I would love to read to him to get my mind off of my parents leaving. He left the room with a smile saying that he had the perfect book. He brought back his Action Bible and said "I think this will cheer you up." We sat on the bed again and he opened it to the story of Ruth and Naomi and Boaz as Ruth's kinsman redeemer. Now talk about a story (a true story at that!) going from bitter to sweet for everyone involved!
After reading that JB made a very astute analogy (he's his Fathers' son); he told me he chose that one because the men in Naomi and Ruth's life had died and while my parents had left, they had not died, they just went away for a time. What perspective and yes, joy, that brings when an eight-year-old (our own first-born son) reminds me that parting is sweet sorrow, but temporary for those who 1) have not died in the physical sense and will see each other again on this earth, but more importantly 2) are believers in Christ Jesus and will never be eternally separated because we have a common Savior, the only Savior, our Redeemer.
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Gaylord Opryland Hotel in Nashville, TN
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| Banquet on the final evening of Airlift/Tanker Association Convention |
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| Behind Max is an indoor building that houses a very nice restaurant. Max took me there for an evening of fine dining and great company, my hubby. |
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| View from our room on the 6th floor |
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| View across from our room. Pretty amazing hotel. |
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