Grandson

Hey! we're so pleased, Jon and Mindy's little boy has become theirs more officially tonight. They will just wait for the state to make the adoption final in about 6 months. God is truly good. We're thinking He has amazing things in store for this little boy. I'm looking forward to having him come and visit grandma and grandpa. Camping. playing in the park. Christmas. Dedication. Exasperating his parents. kisses.Bike riding.... I didn't realize how great it was to be a grandma. I like this season.

Random picture

Ok here's a blast from the past. Taken in about 1989, when my hair has hardly any grey in it at all. This is a 3 generation picture: my paternal grandmother, Amy at 14 and myself. I really value these kinds of pictures now, as I don't have a whole lot of pictures of my kids with their great grandmother. She wasn't exactly a "grandmotherly" (whatever that is) type of person. But she was at least trying for this moment! Someone was telling me that they were getting a formal 4 generation picture taken soon. That's pretty cool. This second picture is a 5 generation picture taken in

about 1970. It's awful and I wonder

if I was holding the camera and

cutting people off! My grandmother is at the left, again looking much younger. Still not overly fond of the grandma thing. Oh well.

Hands

Working, playing, praying, helping, holding...Our hands seem to express something of our inner selves. Open hands that give and reflect the selflessness of our lives. Hands that grasp and hold tight, the greediness of our hearts. With my hands I sense the world around me. I use them to make sense of what's in front of me. The sense of touch is so important in our everyday lives we often don't even think about it. Maybe because my hand still hurts from surgery, i'm thinking more about hands and how much I use even my unhandy left hand. These photos i've posted are cropped from bigger pictures. Isn't it amazing how our whole focus changes when we just look at the small portion of the picture? Each one of these hands has a story to tell all by itself! Wow.

Does this look Orange?

Well, you know how one thing leads to another? That's our basement project for sure! I just wanted to paint, so Ron let me have at it on the ugly green chimney. Now it looks like a chimney. Everything else? Looks just the same. That's because he looks at things a bit differently than I do. He looked at all those pipes and said, "those galvanized pipes are going to start leaking" (said in low male voice) "That 1" hot water pipe is not big enough. I will fix". And so it went. He spent the whole day Saturday happily plumbing. Which meant that I ... cleaned, napped, cooked and lolled around. Oh well. Tonight he will go to get another portion of the project over in Peterson. Nothing is too simple for us! Just keep telling myself that it will be worth the effort!