review of 2008 - january & february

due to major procrastination, it's now less than 2 hrs. til the new year. guess if i'm gonna do a stroll down memory lane, i better get my shoes on & start walkin-

three things about last january stand out in my mind.





- the most exciting thing was the birth of angela & justin's beautiful son, eston.
he was born on the 9th & it's hard to believe he's turning 1 next week. he is so much fun, so full of energy & really, really clever & smart. just don't try to feed him any green vegetables. his whole upper body shudders & shakes when he tastes anything green.

- i found out that i'm diabetic last january, too. for someone who loves pasta & mashed potatoes & white cake, it was really difficult
to accept that i would need to change my diet in a major way. but i have & though i still have to take 2 pills a day, i'm controlling it pretty well, especially when you consider the fact that i have severe food allergies & can't tolerate a lot of fiber in my diet. i've managed to lose & keep off 16 pounds, but still need to lose another 16+++. i'll get to work on that right away (ha!)

- the other thing that happened last january was announcing my decision to no longer be the coordinator of the columbus class of community bible study. it was what i knew the Lord wanted me to do, i just didn't know why. sometimes we are called to just be obedient & not know the reasons. this was definitely one of those times. i miss the servants team, the leaders council & even the busyness of it all, but the Lord has other plans for me. life is good.


in february i came up with a brilliant idea. basically: if i cook it, they will come. we wanted to provide a means for spending time with our grown children (a social session, shelly would call it.) so we created "SUNDAYS AT THE OLD FOLKS HOME". we issued a standing invitation (via email) that we would have provide lunch on the 1st sunday of each month & dinner on the 3rd sunday of each month. i guess i need some feedback from the kids as to whether they think it's been a good thing, but as for shelly & me, we have absolutely loved it. it's become hard to find times that work for all (due to children's schedules) but i hope we can continue it. yes, we love sundays at the old folks home! you'll see a photo in later posts of a typical "sunday at the old folks home"

another thing we do every year is an "all in one birthday party". carrie's birthday is in december, corrie's in january, dan, angela & lee in february & justin keller in march. so it made a lot of sense to celebrate them all at once! so, we do. we always have a theme (a fantabulous theme every year, i might add!) 2008 - brot the "BIRTHDAY RODEO AT THE STRATSHIRE FAIRGROUNDS". as you can see, it was a night to remember. unfortunately, the keller household had the flu & missed it! but a good time was had by the rest of us!




tune in soon for a couple more months!