Year in Review-April 2017

 April 2017

I didn't realize we did so much and took so many pictures in April until I was ready to make this post!

Lamb 3 was so proud of the cake he made for his 9th birthday.

He received a Lego house that could change seasons. He was very excited to put the basketball hoop outside the house. He spent a lot of time trying to figure out which pieces would be used to make different seasons such as pieces that made a fireplace for winter made a grill for a summer barbecue before he opened the box.

We celebrated at my parents' house. He wanted green candles for his cake.

My last Lamb in his last year to wear the number shirts. I have such fond memories of  the Lambs wearing these.

Here the birthday Legos are put together until he decides to change it to the next season!

His life size skeleton puzzle was much smaller than him and too easy for him to put together.

Lamb 3 spent some of his birthday money on a Spiderman glove with silly string.  He had fun for a couple of days.

Photo Credit: Steve Blakey
Lamb 1 was an acolyte for the first time for the beautiful Easter Vigil service.

The ladies wore Easter bonnets and Easter was a joyous day at our church.

My mom hosted us for dinner on Easter. I was so full from Easter breakfast at church, that I wished we would have celebrated at my parents the next day. After the owl relish tray, she attempted a Easter bunny relish tray.

Lamb 2 and 3 dyed eggs, but Lamb 1 thought he was too old to dye eggs.

Lamb 2 continued and enjoyed his gymnastics session.

I worked the Vera Bradley outlet sale in 2003. I tried to work the sale this year, but it was much more complicated to be hired than when I worked. It ended up we had a lot going on that week and I was glad I didn't work the sale and miss activities at church and with our family. I did go on the "free" day along with a few other customers! I didn't spend that much money, but got some nice gifts. I may try to go every few years, but definitely won't fight the crowds to shop every year even though this is in Fort Wayne. This photo is when I was in the middle of the line to pay!

My sister made her godsons a Jeopardy game with answers from the small catechism in honor of Lamb 1's upcoming confirmation. We played some of the game with my dad, but it was taking too long and we never finished that game. Maybe next time my sister visits?

The last Saturday in April was a very full day. First Lamb 1 had confirmation questioning. He did very well.

Then my mom's church hosted an apron party for ladies. I attended as my mom's guest. They had these cute homemade decorations with the schedule of the day's events. My mom was one of the hostesses and her table had old mixing bowls with cookie cutters etc. as centerpieces.

I had taken many of my aprons from my collection to my mom to display at the party. Everyone brought one apron to tell about to the party. It was so much fun to hear about other aprons. After the party I discovered another box of my aprons as we get settled after moving. Oh well, at least I found some before the party!

My mom's apron is made out of a feed sack, mine is from Beatrix Potter's childhood home.

With the apron that my grandma gave me when I was about 10 years old. It was used as at a wedding reception for the ladies that served cake.

My mom with the apron that she made in home economics class in high school. She eventually became a home economics teacher. She wore this apron for many years early in her marriage and it is worn out. I am so glad she kept it even during her downsizing a few years ago.
I made a photo book of the apron party as a gift for my mom. She has had fun showing it to friends.

After the apron party, we went to an out of town basketball game for Lamb 1. 

Lamb 2 and 3 had to go along to Lamb 1's basketball games. Here they are standing on some famous basketball player's footprints. I don't know who it is, but some pro player from Indiana. It got to be too many games so usually Lamb 2 and 3 went to my mom's during games when Ram had class.

The Lutheran high school started a middle school team to try to build the boys skills before high school. Lamb 1 was on the 7th grade team. They learned a lot, had a lot of fun, but lost early in the tournament. I liked that all the Lutheran schools were involved in one team for boys that were really interested in basketball.

Photo Credit: Steve Blakey
Our Synodical president, Rev. Matthew Harrison was supposed to preach at our church in April in honor of our 125th anniversary. He was unable to come due to a family emergency. Our district president, Rev. Jamison Hardy, preached that day. The seminarian that assisted that day, Winston Grieser, was in 4th grade at the school that I taught at when I began teaching. Bishop Hardy was a student at CUW when I was in college. When our church photographer posted this picture with Winston on the left; Rev. Hardy preaching; and my family in the front row; I just had to laugh at how the small LCMS world collides years later. That was a very fun day with lots of friends. We are very blessed that we are able to be back in Fort Wayne and attend our church.

I entered Katie Schuermann's pie contest in April.

My sister and I are 7 years apart and ever since she was born we have been competing with each other. She was on the launch team for Katie's new book, The Harvest Raise, so she received a e-copy around the time that I was competing to try to win a t-shirt. She bragged a lot, but wasn't allowed to talk about the book with me until it was released. 

When I was a sophomore in college...

I never imagined that I would have a conversation with my husband 20 years later about which version of Epic of Gilgamesh was worth keeping in our library. I also didn't imagine that having too many copies of Epic of Gilgamesh would be a problem.

BTW: My version stayed in our library! Thank you, Dr. Ferry!

Trip home from Indiana continued

June 18: We got up at our hotel and had a bit of breakfast. I had hoped to get up early enough to pop down and say "hi" to friends at CCA, but the late night before meant that sessions already began by the time we would have gone down there. Our first stop was to CUW to see Lamb 1's godmother that works in the library there. We stopped in and saw her, a Looper that works there, and there was one library employee that still worked there that I knew from my time working in the library from college. We gave ourselves a fast tour of the campus to see what has changed since we were there a few years ago.

Lamb 1's godmother said that his godfather was really hoping that we would go downtown Milwaukee and see where he works. He runs the shipping for Lakefront Brewery so we got a tour and he gave us some of their root beer. He had presents for the Lambs including some icons that survived their house fire several years ago. The Lambs had no idea who was on these icons, but they will learn. Lamb 1's godfather was so happy to see the Lambs and show them where he works.

We had not planned on this stop to tour the Brewery shipping and I don't think the Lambs really appreciated a Brewery tour, but they did enjoy the root beer! We got on the road much later than we had planned, early afternoon. We stopped at Target for a few snacks for the road. We stopped at a grocery store hoping to buy the Lambs more Lakefront Brewery root beer but they didn't have it. They did have Lakefront Brewery beer so Ram bought a case for himself (shh...it's not Paleo!). We stopped for supper at Chick-fil-A and other than necessary stops the rest of the day was spent driving. We arrived at my cousin's house in NE at about midnight.

To be continued...

Finally Frozen Custard!

When I was in college years ago before the area around my college was built up like today, there were no pizza places that made deliveries to our campus. It was a little drive into town to go out to eat or get a treat. One of our favorite places to go was Freddys frozen custard. My classmates and I all have memories of college tied to Freddys. Oh, my memories of flavor of the day and of their shakes! Freddys is no longer there and it was a sad day to go back and visit a few years ago and not be able to take the Lambs there. I do not think Freddys from my college town was a part of the franchise Freddy's all over the country today.

My hometown opened several frozen custard stores in the area when I was teaching. Now frozen custard is one of my parents favorite places to go for a treat or go out to eat.

Our area has a lot of frozen yogurt shops where you pay by the ounce with whatever toppings you choose.

Recently a Freddys opened here. This is the first frozen custard place in our area. We took the Lambs on the grand opening day. They didn't give anything away like Chick-Fil-A does at grand openings. But the place was packed. I did my duty and introduced the Lambs to frozen custard even though we haven't been able to take a vacation back East for a few years. They want to go back again soon! We would welcome any other frozen custard places that want to come to Idaho!

Doxology Trip Day 5

This was our final day of our trip. We drove from our hotel to Cedar Rapids, IA. We ate lunch at Biaggi's, one of our favorite restaurants. Then I called my friend Elizabeth's house to see if we could get together. I caught her mom home on lunch break from work and she gave me Elizabeth's work number and cell phone number. We decided to finish our lunch and do a little shopping to give Elizabeth some more time at work. So of course we had to check out a Half Price Books and buy a few items while we waited. I was getting used to shopping for books without Lambs along! Then we went to Elizabeth's work place. We just missed her at work. We called her cell phone and she didn't answer. I didn't know how to reach her so we were trying to decide what to do. She called back while we were trying to decide. She was shocked that we were in town and could visit. We went back to her place of work and met her there and then we went to a coffee house. We talked for nearly 2 hours and waited for the rain to let up before taking her back to her car. It was so nice to have some time to catch up with Elizabeth, our match maker. It was hard for her to believe we are going to celebrate our 10th anniversary in December. We hadn't seen Elizabeth for about a year so it was good to get together again.
We finally drove pretty much straight home from Cedar Rapids with fast stops for gas, food, and bathroom breaks. We arrived home about midnight, we never would have made it that fast with the Lambs! I had hoped to get in before the Lambs bedtime. We both agreed time to see Elizabeth was worth getting in late. My dad helped us unload the car and then we all went to bed. Doxology, the trip alone with Ram, and seeing friends was all fun and worth being exhausted for the rest of the week after we got home!

Ewe and Elizabeth

Doxology Trip Day 4

A wonderful Divine Service began our last day of Doxology. Then Dr. Yahnke spoke to the wives. Her topic was "Parsonage Depletion Hazards". She spoke about this to the pastors earlier and now she talked to us wives about it. Pastors and their wives give of their time, love, and energy all the time. Sometimes it is good to think about your own (and your spouse's) health and well being. There is more that I could say on this topic so perhaps I will blog about this in a separate blog post as I think it would be good for all pastor's wives to hear.
Then we broke into small groups of wives and discussed our personal goals. We all agreed after participating in Doxology that we had some goals in common now, others were more personal goals. We want to work out our schedules to have more prayer/devotional time, more time with our husbands, and try to exercise more. It was interesting to hear goals from all the women at the table in different stages of their lives-some were just beginning an empty nest and others were pregnant and others had children in the ages between.
After lunch Dr. Kleinig led his last session on "The Cleansing Blood". He was a little rushed as he didn't have his full time but I took a couple of things away. 1. The devil stops people that need church the most from going to church. 2. The blood of Jesus is the remedy for sin. 3. Remember your baptism and attend Holy Communion.
Then we had our final church service and said goodbye to our friends.
When we went out to the car it was nearly 100 degrees. Next we tried to find a Starbucks to buy a St. Louis Starbucks mug. We finally gave up and went to my college friend's house, Matt and Karla and their 6 children. Karla made beef sandwiches and we had a nice meal together. After 4 days away from the Lambs, the supper table seemed noisy! It was cute how Matt and Karla and the children all tried to talk to us at the same time-the children were respectful but they wanted to tell us about things too. We've never visited a family just the two of us without the Lambs. Usually the children all play together while the adults talk. Karla told us where to find a Starbucks. We found our mug and of course had to get coffee and tea while we were there.
Then we drove to Hannibal, MO. We didn't know how far we would get so we hadn't reserved a hotel room. We were too tired after all the activity of Doxology to drive much farther or search too hard for a hotel room. So we went to Holiday Inn and slept and then had a nice breakfast the next morning.
I'm anxious to finish posting about Doxology (1 more day of our trip) so I can post about our trip to DeSmet, SD to see the Laura Ingalls Wilder sites.

Ewe, Daniel (almost 1 year old!), Karla

Fall Vacation Day 6 (September 10)

This was a driving/short visits day. When my dad saw our schedule for this Friday, he thought it was too much for one day, especially for the Lambs. We managed to do everything on our schedule. Our family plus my dad went on this trip. First, we drove to Indianapolis and stopped to see my friend from high school, Kristy. Kristy was one of my bridesmaids. I hadn't seen her since our last trip to IN, 2 years ago. Kristy had a little boy named Joshua that was about 6 months old when we visited. We met at Josh's daycare and brought her food for lunch and ate it outside. Kristy is doing a great job being a mom, working full time, and also making strides to promote breastfeeding in her office. The daycare is across the street from her office.

This photo is of our oldest boys, who were both born the first week of March. Lamb 1 did not want his photo taken and Josh was more interested in his fingers than the camera.



The photo of the moms with their "babies" went a little better. There was still something more fascinating than the camera to Lamb 3 and Josh though.




After our lunch visit with Kristy, then we drove to Saint Louis. Our first stop was to my college friends, the Roeglin family. Baby Daniel was just 11 days old when we visited. We just stopped in for a quick visit, but Karla's family (parents, one sister and her kids) were also just arriving for the weekend because Daniel was baptized that Sunday. It was crazy between all those kids, and we didn't have much time, but I was so glad to see Karla and her family. I don't do Facebook so I had only received a couple of photos so it was great to see and hold Daniel. It was also fun to see Karla's older sister, because she had taught at the same school when I student taught. It was great to see her oldest daughter that was a baby that year that I student taught, that was now FIFTEEN.



The last time I saw Karla was when her 5th child and Lamb 2 were both babies, about 4 years ago. The last time I saw Karla she said that they were probably done with their family now that they had 5 children. I'm so happy for her that she had #6! She said her biggest problem was that there were 5 older siblings but only 1 baby for them to hold. Daniel was adorable. My babies were so tiny compared to Daniel (2-3 lbs less) that I did not feel like I was holding an 11 old day baby.



This was our attempt at a 2 family photo. Matt and Karla, their 2 girls and 4 boys, Ewe and the 3 Lambs.



I couldn't resist taking a photo of Lamb 3 with Daniel's Charlie Brown doll since Lamb 3 was dressed as Charlie Brown.

After a short visit with the Roeglin family, then we met Lamb 2's godfather and his wife for dinner at a restaurant like Panera Bread. Jonathan and Megan have been married about a year. Jonathan is my cousin. We hadn't seen them since their wedding. Jonathan is a 4th year seminarian at Saint Louis. It was great to see them and to have help to know where to go at the Seminary. I had been to the Seminary one time several years ago and my dad had never been there before. Lamb 2 enjoyed the attention from his godfather. This visit was much too short too.

After dinner then we had a terrible time getting to our hotel that we had reserved. We could see the hotel from the road, but we couldn't figure out where the frontage road was to get into it. We finally found it and got a little sleep before we had to get up early in the morning.

Saturday was a very big day. I'm going to have to think through what to post about the day and I'm sure it will be more than a one day post. Everyone else posted shortly after that day, but I'm just getting to post to it now.

Visiting CUW

I left Ram at Holy Hill at his retreat, and I took the Lambs over to CUW to visit for the day on June 16. The Lambs were quite wild after riding in the car to WI. They enjoyed "driving" the golf cart parked outside the entrance to CUW.

I wasn't able to convince Lamb 1 to be in the photo, but here I am in the curriculum section of the CUW library. I prepared many of these books to go on the shelf over 13 years ago. Lamb 2 and 3 cooperated for a photo. We didn't stay in the library long, because they were too noisy and too wild.

I met 2 new Loopers that I had never met before-Deidre and Fay. CUW has a grill outside and we were able to have a nice lunch and chat together. Thanks Fay for arranging this!

I probably shouldn't have walked down the bluff with my newly recovered sprained ankle, but the boys standing here like this "made" me do it. They were begging to walk down.

Lamb 1 thought it was like going to the ocean so he was afraid. I took a photo to prove that he really went all the way to the bottom. Going down the steps would have been faster, but we took the ramps because of my foot and because we had the stroller. Some women were sitting at the top and they were quite impressed that I took all 3 Lambs down to the bottom and back up.

Here the Lambs are back up at the top after our walk. I must say the bluff is beautiful now that it has been restored. Not only will it not erode, but I'm jealous of the students that get to take walks there now!