Flash Back Friday 8

Edward, Maria 1992

Pancake Maker

John showed Bridget how to make pancakes the other night. Since they are both lefties, it worked out well.

Wolverine Spirit

The cable guy came and fixed our connection outside, but the next day, it didn't work again! But life goes on...

I have always remained a faithful Ohio State Buckeye fan even though I have lived in the land of the Michigan Wolverines for 26 years. Yet somehow, these kids that come out of my womb are popping out as little wolverines. Yesterday at Bridget's school, they had the "Great Divide" where you have to dress up for either Michigan or Michigan State, whichever is your team. Bridget LOVES any opportunity to dress up and show spirit. She won the award for the Best Wolverine in her whole class! Her hair was sprayed blue, but this is the end of the day.

Thoughtfulness

At work the other day, Sharon brought me these flowers and now I have another living thing in the house to take pictures of!! There had been an episode in our driveway involving a cable guy and a fender and a teenage driver and a whole tumbling sequence of events, and how I wished I could take just that one second back as in any accident, and I was at work preoccupied in thinking about the meaning of the universe-type questions, why does bad stuff happen, etc. These flowers took my mind off of the sometimes random chaos of life and back to the God who is in control.

In the meantime, John seems to have fixed things so they are not SO SO bad. Husbands and friends are the greatest!

For the Beauty of the Earth

Last evening, we had the privilege of attending Edward & Maria's orchestra concert at South Christian. Since Edward is always in the front row with his cello, I am able to get his picture from the audience. For the first time ever, the orchestra and band performed in the same program with the choirs. At the end, the choirs and the orchestra did the piece "For the Beauty of the Earth" which they had been practicing, but never together. At the end, they got a standing ovation which I think was more for our Creator.

For the beauty of the earth, For the glory of the skies;
For the love which from our birth, Over and around us lies;
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

For the wonder of each hour, Of the day and of the night;
Hill and vale and tree and flow'r, Sun and moon, and stars of light;
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.

We left the concert with that beautiful song vibrating in our hearts. Soft, thick snowflakes were floating from the sky and I wanted to hold it. We arrived home after 10 pm, and Edward left to go on his run. Our conversation went like this:

Mom: Enjoy the snow.
Edward: What?
Mom: Enjoy the snow.
Edward: Oh yeah, it's good to run on.
Mom: No, I mean just look at the trees, it's beautiful.
Edward: Oh... yeah, I know.

The Tree in Our Backyard

All the trees of the field will know that I the Lord bring down the tall tree and make the low tree grow tall. I dry up the green tree and make the dry tree flourish. "'I the Lord have spoken, and I will do it.'" Ezekiel 17:24

My Daughter, the Seamstress

The Sewing Gene evidentally has skipped a generation and gone from my mother to my daughter. It didn't like it in my body very much. I watched my little Maria save up her money several years ago to buy a sewing machine and I wondered where she could have gotten such an idea. She amazed me. And last night, she was almost a blur as she asked me for a sheet and soon was twirling around in this little dress she made for her Odyssey of the Mind team's skit. She doesn't sew that often - she uses it mainly for costumes and crafts and mending - but she does sew more than her mother.


Demonstrating the twirl for the OM skit

Flash Back Friday 7

Bridget, August 1998

Warming Trend

Spotty internet connections this week have forced me to take another sabbatical from the blog. On the bright side: this week it has warmed up considerably - to about 40 degrees - which has enabled me to once again have dominion over the road when I take my walks. I no longer inch timidly along the ice, half-frozen, one half step backward for every step forward.


Picture taken of the flowers on my table while on sabbatical

Kitty Showdown

So I'm back after my one day sabbatical. Last night, we were visited by this little wild green-eyed kitty who just sat there for over an hour watching us through his wild green eyes.




Leo made a a lot of those deep growls like this: "mmmrrrrrooooowwwwwww."


But the wild, green-eyed kitty stayed.


Leo was mad, but we kept reminding him that he was the indoor kitty here. So in other words, get over it.

Homecoming

Yay! I couldn't wait to push that ugly picture from yesterday down the blog. I am happy to present these lovelies from last evening:



Maria went to the Homecoming dance at South Christian with some of her friends. A father of one of her friend's prepared and served them a lovely supper of chicken cordon bleu with candlelight. I made them cheesecake and stopped over to take a few pictures.



Edward also went - I loved his style of going to the dance which started at 8 pm. At about 8:15 pm, after working all day, he said to us while I.M.-ing his friends, I wonder how long that thing goes... So I quick got him together a shirt and tie and shoes and pants he could wear, and he took off to meet, I think, the friends he had been I.M.-ing. Just before midnight as I was falling asleep, I listened to their happy sounds coming home.

Happy Birthday Little Blog!

It's hard to believe - Kingdom Jewels is 1 year old today and this is post # 336. I felt like I was posting every day, but evidentally, I wasn't. The first post wasn't very funny, so here's one to make up for it. This picture was taken by one of my kids about 5 years ago when I weighed about 93 pounds and wore glasses.


This is not a self-portrait.

Flash Back Friday 6

Photo 1: Edward & Maria, 1994
Photo 2: Edward & Maria, 2006

Stir Crazy

So, it's probably time for some cat pictures. This has been a very cold winter, and because of that, Leo hasn't been able to stay outside very long. Just this morning, he woke us up meowing at 4:30am. John got up twice to let him out and each time he just looked outside to see if the snow had somehow disappeared overnight. Five minutes later, he meowed and I got up to let him out. But the snow was still there. Five minutes later, John got up and tossed him out.


He loves to be right there in the morning when we are trying to get ready.


This is the ledge 10 feet above the ground where he likes to chase his tail.


It's always exciting to watch the water swirl down.


He loves how Maria's notebook matches his eyes....


...he just wishes Maria would pay more attention to him than Church History.