Friday, September 14, 2012

10 years

Doesn't seem like it has been 10 years since our daughter married this wonderful guy from Wisconsin!  They are just perfect for eachother and we are blessed to have him as our son-in-law.  He is such a caring husband and great daddy to our granddaughters!



Happy Anniversary, Adam and Jill!!



Thursday, September 13, 2012

For the Beauty of the Earth


We are having rain again. 

And it has gotten much cooler.  A couple of days ago it was in the 90's and now it is in the 60's!  I had to wear a jacket this morning when I went out.  That's Kansas!


"For the beauty of the earth,
             for the glory of the skies...


for the love which comes from birth
         over and around us lies;

Lord of all, to Thee we raise
         This our hymn of grateful praise."

"For the Beauty of the Earth" is one of only a few songs devoted purely to giving thanks.  One of the strange things about the attitude of gratitude is that we tend to exhibit it in reverse proportion to the number of blessings received.  The more we have, the less thankful we are.

Among the lessons Viktor Frankl learned in the Nazi death-camp, Auschwitz, was to take time to be thankful and to count your blessings.  He wrote that prisoners in the camp dreamed at night about certain things more than others.

Bread, cakes, and nice warm baths - the very things we take for granted every day.


Ralph Waldo Emerson observed that if the constellations appeared only once in a thousand years, imagine what an exciting event it would be.  But because they're there every night, we barely give them a look. - from "Then Sings My Soul" by Robert J. Morgan.


"Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good."  Psalm 107:1

"His mercies are new every morning."  Lamentations 3:23




"I will give thanks to Him in song" - Psalm 28:7













Tuesday, September 11, 2012

House for Sale

On Labor Day, we went to Lyons, Ks to spend the evening with Al's family.

 His brother has recently gotten a job in Hutch so they have put their home on the market so they can move closer to where he works.  It is a gorgeous house!
 Look at the detail of the woodwork!  I stand amazed at the craftsmanship of the workers of times past!
 

There is a pool out back.


Reuben grilled burgers.

Seems like many times we end up bringing the same dish.  This year, the "same thing" we all brought was macaroni salad.  One time we all brought green bean cassserole.  Sometimes we let eachother know what we plan to bring, but often we bring whatever.  We can count on Julie to bring her cheesy potatoes, but this time she made twice-baked potatoes and put them in the crock pot.  Delicious!!



Reuben and Brenda are empty nesters now.  Brenda took us upstairs to one of the girls' closets and showed us all the beautiful gowns (prom or other special occasions) that are still hanging in the closet.  She told our nieces that they could try them on if they would come downstairs to model them.

     This girl is a foreign exchange student, living with Al's sister.  Her mother,Sandra Myers, is an Olympian who grew up in Little River, Ks but ended up moving to Spain.  Got her citizenship there and married a Spanish guy.  She ran for Spain in the Olympics at Seoul in 1988 and in Atlanta in 1996.

We played a great game called "Telestrations".  You can buy the game, but we do a version of it that doesn't cost.  We had 12 players so we gave each person a stack of 12 1/2 sheets of paper.  Each person thinks of a phrase or a word; like "Hurricane Issac" or "Jared washes his truck."  You write that phrase down.

Then the entire stack is passed on to the person at your right.  They look at the phrase you have written down, puts that sheet to the back, then draws the picture of your phrase on the top sheet.  We set a timer for 1 minute for each transaction.  When the timer went off, again, everyone's stack is passed on. 
 Each person looks at the illustration, again puts that to the back of their pile, and then writes in words what they think the picture is on the top sheet.
 It is hilarious!!
 Hurricane Issac ended up to be "a snake crosses a river". 
"Jared washing his truck" ended up to become "a woman leaving her baby in the street."  What???
We laughed and laughed and laughed.  You can just see Reuben trying to keep from crying from laughing so hard.

Hopefully for Reuben's, they will sell their home quickly so they can move to Hutch!  But we will miss the fun times we have had here with the family!







Sunday, September 9, 2012

Packers

When our daughter married a boy from Appleton, Wisconsin, we all became Cheeseheads.  After they married, Adam became a youth pastor in Green Bay and they lived there for 4 years.  We began to follow the Green Bay Packers even more closely. 

Tonight we had a Packer party.  We invited Adam's parents (who have moved to Kansas for a few years) also. 



Gramsie got the girls some cheer leading pom poms. 


GO Pack Go!




 
Even Claire cheered the Packers on!

Football oreos!

Touchdown!


At half time, we stopped to eat some hoagies and Sandi's wonderful potatoe salad.


The tv station that the Packers were playing on went out.  Nada.  Nothing.   Adam's parents decided to drive back home to Valley Center.  They have dish tv so they knew they would be able to watch it there.  Adam began to follow it on the computer but finally the tv station reappeared and we finished watching it.

But.....   so sad.  Packers lost.

Sophie said "How did those backpackers lose?"