SEVEN!

The weekend was a busy one! We spent Saturday in the Captial City helping Mason celebrate another birthday, they're coming faster and faster each year it seems. Seven years old already!  SEVEN!! Wow. He has a loving a giving heart; his request, in lieu of gifts, was that his friends bring non perishable food items to be donated to The Food Bank. After bowling and pizza, the family (both sets of grandparents, Mom, Dad, Mason and Lucy Ann) drove to The Food Bank to drop off the donations; we all pitched and volunteered there together, sorting fresh corn for distribution. It was one terrific day we'll all remember.

Oh, and if you're wondering how old the birthday boy's sister is now, here you go. She'll be holding up all the fingers on that hand come October. Sigh.

Life is Good!

Simple Truths

The ongoing travelogue is temporarily interrupted by a three minute video clip.

Gee, I know you're disappointed!

Believe me, this was the top three minutes I spent yesterday! It's this Simple Truth that reminds me of a rhyme learned in my childhood:

"Open your heart, open your mind,

look for the best and that's what you'll find."

Inspiration can be found every day and everywhere; the truth is this: the simplest acts of giving are those that can have the most profound consequences.

Life is Good!

Surprise Revealed!

The super-secret surprise that Quiltteacher and I worked on has officially been presented and can now be revealed, it's a stole for our Senior Pastor! It has twenty-three small picture panels based on Old Testament stories done by the elementary Sunday school children. Today he was honored on the occasion of his twenty year anniversary at our church, it was a celebration of great proportion! Our Bishop preached, there was a brass ensemble providing music along with our choir during the worship service, and we hosted over 350 members and guests for a box-lunch meal following the service in our Family Life Center. It was a day to be remembered and cherished. Back a few months ago our Youth and Family Ministries Director approached me with her idea for the stole. I wasn't sure, at all, how to even begin construction on one, that's where Quiltteacher came in. She has made a veritable stole wardrobe for her sister-in-law, also a Lutheran Pastor. She was happy to help. We snuck into Pastor's robing room one day and made a paper pattern off a stole we knew to be the proper length. From there it was simply a matter of creating a layout with the blocks that the children had done and making it all fit. The twenty third block is on the back of the collar, it was turned on point and trimmed; perfection! I added the piping between the blocks to separate them, it adds a nice line of definition and dimension. We chose the green color for the longest season of the church year, the Sundays after Pentecost, when we thought he'd most appreciate a change of "clothes". I don't know who was more excited about the gift, Pastor or the children. See below two details of the illustrated blocks and the child-artists clamoring for a close-up look at their own handiwork in it's new form when the surprise was revealed!



It was a glorious day of celebration, tomorrow it will be back to work for our hard working Pastor; but today was "his" day to enjoy the well wishes, the gifts and the congratulations for twenty amazing years of dedicated service to God's church and a congregation that deeply appreciates him!

Life is Good!