Our Granddaughter's First Year

Anyone Remember This?

Anyone else out there remember stuff like this from the 1970's & 80's?  I was cleaning out some old boxes of papers I'd collected over the years and ran across this.

God Is Like . . .

God is like Coke - He's the real thing.

God is like Pan Am - He makes the going great.

God is like General Electric - He lights your path.

God is like Hallmark Cards - He cares enough to send the very best.

God is like Tide - He gets the stains out that others leave behind.

God is like VO Hair Spray - He holds through all kinds of weather.

God is like Dial Soap - Aren't you glad you know Him?  Don't you wish everyone did?

God is like Sears - He has everything.

God is like Alka-Seltzer - Try Him, you'll like Him.

God is like Scotch tape - You can't see Him but you know He's there.

- Barnwell (S.C.) People-Sentinel

Being There For A Friend

This past week my best friend's mother died. The funeral was today.  She had Alzheimer's and had been slowly disappearing both mentally and physically.  D showed such love and patience with her mother and had found very good care for her.  They were very close and this will be a difficult loss and yet at the same time it was an answer to my friend's prayer that something would take her mother before the Alzheimer's totally took every shred of who she had once been.  Although she had shrunk to a mere 60 pounds and maybe 4' 8" and had been robbed of most of her memories and abilities, she could still respond to questions and prompts and knew who her children were.  We had just taken her to lunch with us last Tuesday and upon returning to her room she told D that that would probably be the last time as it was just too tiring.  On Friday she slipped into a coma like state and died Saturday morning.  D gave me 40 pictures of her mother from throughout her life which I scanned and made into a slide show for the service today.  It not only gave them a visual reminder of her, but helped them to get past the awful or just plain weird things that this disease made her say and do, and help them remember what she had truly been like.

D and I have known each other since high school (over 40 years now) and although we were always good friends, it has been in the last ten years that we have truly become best friends.  With the children grown and gone we've had more time to get together and our husbands have become best friends as well which makes for a really nice foursome for dinner, or cards or a trip to the beach.  We've also come to value our friendship enough to make allowances or not let little things bother us like they might have when we were younger.

She sometimes feels like she's always the one asking my help (such as the slide show or transportation or .....) and that I'm never needing help in return, but I beg to differ.  She is the one who has been my emotional support these past few years.  She is the one that when the depression was so bad and I almost never left my house, she insisted I go shopping with her so I could help her find what she needed.  The one who can always make me laugh.  The one who invited me to go to TOPS with her when I complained about my weight gain after thyroid surgery.  The own who gently nudges me to go or do or enjoy.  The one I took a 4 week road trip with two summers ago and had a blast.  The one who loves me even with my imperfections.  In short - she is my friend.  I love you D.

Our First Grandchild

Our son and daughter-in-law were blessed in July with a healthy baby girl. Their first child and our first grandchild. She's a petite little thing, weighing in at 5 lbs. 9 oz. and 18 1/2 inches long. She has a good set of lungs, is very alert, strong and hungry, hungry, hungry. When she wants to be fed or to have her diaper changed, she wants it now. I had mentioned to them that her daddy had been very demanding as a baby (that hasn't changed). Can we all say payback? She was very active in the womb so we shall see if that continues now that she's out here in the world at large. Hopefully she won't be too much of a handful since I'll be helping to care for her when my daughter-in-law goes back to work. I don't know how soon that will be though - she's really loving the mommy role and 3 months is going by fast. She's thinking of asking her boss if she can use some of her sick time for another couple of weeks off.

My daughter and son-in-law flew out to spend a week visiting with their new little niece and my husband is already wrapped around her little finger. We're all enjoying her very much.

Happy 4th of July

Let freedom ring! We are so blessed to live here. There are a lot of wonderful places in the world, but none with the type of history and freedoms that this country has had. I hope you have a fantastic and safe holiday celebrating our country's independence.