March 25th

March is a huge birthday month for us. Phil & I both have March birthdays. His Grandma's birthday was about a week before his. I had a great-great aunt whose birthday was just before mine. My aunt's birthday is March 20th (oops, I forgot! Happy Birthday Aunt Carol!). But March 25th is a remembrance day now. My mom's Aunty Edna was born on March 25th in 1910. On March 25th 1960, my brother Steve was born. Aunty Edna called him her "Golden Birthday Boy" because he came on her 50th birthday! I think it was as hard on her as it was for my grandparents when Steve died in 1978. It's been several years since Aunty Edna passed away now. But, the birthday of someone who has passed seems a much brighter day than the remembrance of the day they died. It's a day to really reflect on the life that God gave them.

Today as Natalie was bouncing around, I told her she reminded me of her Uncle Steve. My niece Becky also has some of those traits. Becky has no fear, like Steve. She can be a total ham like Steve was. Yet, quiet Bethany is the one who looks so much like him, and has the gift of art that he had. As far as I know, no one in our immediate family besides Steve could draw. I mean, beyond stick figures. I tried. I don't know that Greg (my big brother) ever drew at all. But, Steve could draw well. It's really interesting to see the things that made him special reflected in the "next generation."

I guess in these pictures you can't see the resemblance, but I don't have any of Steve as a teenager. You can see that we (and they, in the before I was born picture) were all SKINNY back then! LOL! For the record, this was the first and last of Steve's saxophone playing days. He later moved onto the drums. Greg, however, is a very good guitar player. To his credit, I must say he no longer wears the boots, and doesn't often perform with his pj's on. At least not in public!

The Kids

I was an aunt long before I was a Mom. In fact, I was an aunt for 16 years before I gave my nephew & niece a cousin. I was only 15 when Nils, my nephew, was born, so he & I are actually closer in age than he & Bethany are! Nils & his lovely wife Katie live in San Antonio now. My niece, Becky, and her lovely husband Chris (LOL! Just had to say that! Becky is beautiful!), came into town last week. They all took the girls to a cool place called, "Incredible Pizza Company." They took these goofy pictures. You can't really see the guys, but they are in the last picture. I think they all had a great time! It was a really nice break for me to do some errands and get some things done at home. Thanks guys!

He is Risen!!!

He is Risen! He is Risen Indeed!

Yesterday was the day we celebrated our Lord's Resurrection. Not only did He die to pay for our sins, but He gave us the promise of eternal life! For all who would call on Jesus as Lord, we can be assured that we will one day stand in His presence. Or, we will bow down in His presence. There will be no more tears, no more suffering, no more death. What a great God we have!

On Saturday night we watched the Disney movie, "Enchanted." It was a cute movie. In the movie the fairy tale princess often used the term, "Forever and ever." If anyone said, "Forever," she would add, "And ever." That is the way fairy tales go, after all. To me, it brought to mind the fact that God's grace and love and goodness are forever.....and ever. Life isn't a fairy tale. "True love's kiss" doesn't mean there is always a happy ending. And as of yet, I've never had a fairy godmother spin me a dress and a carriage. But we do have a Father God who gives us the promise that while there are trials in this life, one day we will be with Him and have that "happily ever after" that we can't even begin to imagine here on earth.

While we've always made Easter a celebration of Jesus' resurrection, we've also let the girls enjoy being kids with an egg hunt and fun goodies. Here are some pictures of them in their Easter dresses (that I finished sewing on Saturday night!) and with some of the goodies. If I knew how to put a movie onto my blog, I'd do that. You'll just have to imagine them running through Grandma's house looking for eggs. It was a dreary day, so they hunted inside.

We hope you had a blessed Easter Sunday and will continue rejoicing in our Risen Savior all year long!

Good Friday

When you were a child, did you ever wonder why it was called GOOD Friday? I remember being little and hearing about Jesus dying on Good Friday. I wondered why in the world this was a GOOD thing?

As a teacher, I had a reward program. Each Friday, if you had behaved during the week, you got to choose a prize, or I gave out cookies or something. We called this "Goody Friday." Well, when Easter time rolled around, the kids would refer to this day before Easter as Goody Friday.

As an older teen, then adult, I understood why it was GOOD Friday. My sin separates me from God. Plain and simple. I can never be good enough for Him. All of us have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Romans 3:23 God is perfect. There is no way we could ever be good enough to stand in His presence. The punishment for our sin is separation from Him. Death came after Adam & Eve had sinned. I don't know why He chose this way of making us right with Him, but early on He told people that to be right with Him, they could sacrifice a lamb. The animal's death would take the place of our death. But, that wasn't enough. A lamb could not ever fully pay for our sin. It took the death of God's own Son to do that.

Why was that a good thing? Because He gave us a way to get rid of all our sin in His eyes. He let Jesus leave Heaven to spend about 33 years on earth, then die, all so we could have our sins paid for or "atoned." It means I don't have to try to be good enough for God. The good that is in me comes from Him. Most importantly, it means that one day I can stand before Him perfectly blameless. How do you feel when you have to face someone you know you have wronged? There are feelings of guilt, regret, and maybe sorrow. If you can accept that Jesus already took on our guilt, then you can stand before God with none of that baggage!

Easter is coming. That is when we remember the most important step that came after Good Friday. But, for today, on "Goody Friday" I think we have the greatest prize ever: Jesus!

Going to bed at 3 a.m.

I just had to put this here because it's my mother's fault. NO, she didn't teach me to stay up til the wee hours. No, she isn't standing here telling me to stay awake. Certainly she will fuss at me for being up this late. However, I still claim it is her fault.

You see, when I was little, and even when I was bigger than little, my mom made a lot of my clothes. And it went something like this: While we were gone to school or playing with friends, she would start the dress. Then, I had to try on this dress with pins stuck all over it, accompanied with the admonition, "BE careful not to let the pins poke you." Now, I was somehow responsible for maneuvering my body around the pins. "Be still! I can't measure the hem if you keep moving!" Oh, wait, is that just what I tell my girls. It all runs together now.

Suddenly, Mom would realize that it was the day before whatever the occasion was for the dress, and she wasn't finished. Thus, she would stay up til the wee hours finishing the dress. Or, sew a hem as we drove wherever we were going.

When I got married, I made my wedding dress, under the guidance of my mom AND my soon to be mother-in-law. Yes, it gave me plenty of time to practice "ripping" what I had "sewn." My dress was to be made with this one condition: It had to be FINISHED one month before the wedding. Mom's orders. And, with the help of several friends and the moms, we had all the pearls and beads sewn on in time.

That was then. This is now. Have you heard that children learn more by what they see than what they hear? Yep, it's true. You see, Easter is in 3 days. We will leave Saturday to go to my mother-in-law's house. I started the girls' dresses last week. Now, in 3 days, they need to be finished. Meanwhile, we have had days away from home, sleepover guests (which required far more supervision than anticipated), and even a night at an ice show. So, here I am, 3 days before Easter...no, wait, it's after midnight, make that 2 days before Easter, at 3 a.m. going to bed because I must get some sleep. I am determined to finish these dresses before we leave.

If I don't, well, just blame it on Mom. I think she'll approve if I'm still sewing hems in the car. But, if the girls get poked with pins, I'm sending them to MAMMAW to explain it!

The sweet sound of laughter

It is now nearly 12:30 a.m. I am to the "shhhhhhhhh!" stage in this sleepover. I think our 7 year old guest is out cold. The other girls are going to play the movie again b/c they talked through it. Earlier I heard giggling. Much giggling. The kind of giggling that only pre-teens can have.

For the "normal" parent, or parents of "normal" kids, this may not be such a big deal. But, I have an autistic child. I have a child who would not answer a yes/no question before she was 5 years old. She would not participate in Sunday School. She would hide under tables at birthday parties if I weren't holding her. Now she is having a sleepover with her "birthday twin" (one of our neighbors is a little girl born about 1 1/2 hrs. after Bethany). AND she is giggling. It is a sweet sound.

The other reason I love that sound is because of the memories it stirs. Beverly & Denise at my house. Denise & I at Bev's house. Bev & I at Denise's house. If it was a Friday night, at least one of us would be at the other one's house, and often all 3 of us. Oh, we giggled so much. I think that MAY be why my parents bought a house with the kids' bedrooms upstairs & theirs downstairs! We didn't have a TV in every room. We only had a few stations and it was back in the days when you had to actually walk TO the TV to turn it on & off. So we usually listened to records (those big black things that went around & around). But mostly we giggled. We giggled ourselves silly til we cried and our sides hurt. We continued this well into young adulthood.

The last few times that the 3 of us have been together, it's been the 8 of us with kids, and it was our kids laughing. They were little, so it was the precious giggles of preschoolers splashing in water, fully dressed. We were all too tired to laugh ourselves silly.

My mom always told me that her dad would tell her & her sister when they got the giggles, "If you keep laughing like that someone will end up crying." Well, as I was typing this I heard a big clunk. Natalie just fell off the bunk bed. She's okay, but I guess it proves my Grampie's point!

Maybe I need to call Denise & Bev & see if they want to laugh themselves silly with me!

It rained MUD today!

We went outside this morning. I had not watched the news. My car was COVERED in mud. It looked like we'd been 4-wheeling. Everything from "Were the girls out here playing yesterday with water?" as they'd been getting muddy in the backyard to "Pollen is heavy, but this is BROWN not yellow" crossed my mind. I then said, "It looks like it was raining mud. But it doesn't rain mud. That's crazy!" I told the girls we'd have to stop at the gas station & clean the windows. My windshield cleaner tank thing has a leak, so I can't use it. Natalie said, "Mom, you need to clean them now so you can see." I was like, "Nah, I can see enough to get to the gas station." I thought it was just the glare on the car. I backed up & realized I couldn't see. I had to get out & clean the windows just to get TO the gas station. Natalie & I tried to clean them better, but apparently everyone else had been there, too as there was next to no cleaner in the holders. I started looking around & it was then I realized whatever this was had affected ALL of us. My parents told me what it was when we got there. Apparently dust from Mexico blew in at the same time the rain hit. Weird!!!!

And, just as an aside, sometimes in our pollen count we have marijuana when they are burning fields in Mexico! Now you know our secret to happiness!