My new workout??

Last evening Frank gave Destiny some new toys, including this Strawberry Shortcake dance pad. She was really "tearing it up" this afternoon. Hmmm. Maybe through these next two busy months when I probably won't have time to go to the gym often enough, I should try this thing out! But even if I do, there will NOT be pictures!!

Oops!

So last evening when I was shopping for something to wear that would match the kids' turquoise shirts..... Well, I didn't take a tee-shirt with me, but believe me - at Boscovs, this jacket most certainly looked turqoise to me.

BUT!! Guess what? Most certainly NOT the same turquoise as those shirts!!

And here are just a few pictures Dick took this morning. It was a very good morning. We (Dick, Destiny, and I) went to Pizza Hut for lunch, and now I'm ready for a good Sunday afternoon nap.

A good retreat

I had a really good time at the retreat today - great teaching, good food, LOTS of fun, and good worship, if I must say so myself, ha, ha!! Besides, it was wonderful to get the chance to spend a whole day with my sister Doris, a rare thing for us with our crazy schedules.

When I left the retreat at 6:30, it occurred to me that no one was at home. Dick works at Advance Auto Parts on Saturday evenings, and he had taken Destiny to her daddy's place for the evening. So I went to the mall in search of something to wear tomorrow morning that would look good with those turquoise tee shirts the kids will be wearing. I found a jacket and skirt that I think I like okay. Maybe I'll get a picture tomorrow.

Now we're all at home and I still have a little girl that needs a bath and her LONG hair needs to be washed. Dick said she slept till almost 11:00 this morning, so she's still going strong. Poor Grandma!!

My Friday

I had a typical full Friday schedule at school today, and then some. My worship team usually practices from 1:30 to 2:30 on Fridays, which is club period. Today, however, we went to the church next door for our practice, until 4:00. Of course, we took some time for a snack as well. I love these kids, I really, really do. They're normal fun-loving, crazy kids, but they have such soft hearts for the Lord.

I was home for about half an hour until I had to leave for the women's retreat. Destiny arrived in that half hour. She and Dick went to my school this evening. The parent teacher committee was sponsoring a family movie night. They watched Herbie, Fully Loaded. It was a great chance for Destiny to reconnect with some of her kindergarten friends from last year.

The resource speakers at the women's retreat are two sisters that I haven't seen for many, many years. When Dick and I were first married thirty-six years ago we lived next door to a family that had two little girls. Those two little girls have now grown up, married, have children, and speak at women's retreats! I enjoyed them thoroughly this evening.

Because the retreat is being held at a local place, I came home overnight. I just didn't have time to pack anything. Besides, Destiny needs some hugs tonight, and I just love my own bed. I'll be going back in the morning in time for their 8:30 breakfast.

I'm READY!

What a day. I finally got home at 8:30 PM and everything is READY - ready for my school worship team's final practice tomorrow, for their first time "on the road" this Sunday morning at Speedwell Heights Brethren in Christ Church, for the women's retreat at which I'll be leading worship Friday evening and Saturday, and for our church's youth worship team, who will be leading on Sunday morning in my absence. Whew!! Now I need to start our laundry since I won't be home on Saturday, the day I usually do it.

Yesterday after school I went to Lancaster to pick up the tee shirts I had ordered for the worship team. When I opened the box I was shocked. They were the WRONG COLOR!!! The kids had decided on royal blue with white logo. Instead the shirts were turquoise - not a bad color, but not what the kids had agreed on. I realized immediately that when I wrote down the order, the website had a picture of a royal blue shirt, but somewhere on the page was the word "Sapphire", and without thinking, I assumed that was the name of that color. I remember thinking that that was an unusual name for royal blue. So all last evening I dreaded having to tell the kids of my mistake. This morning I had the middle school teachers send the worship team to my room right away. I told them my mistake and they began guessing what color they were - they were thinking colors like gray, puke green, etc. When I pulled the turquoise shirts out of the box they EXCLAIMED that they loved that color, that they like it even better than royal blue. Bless their dear, sweet hearts!!! They made my day.

I just watched the most touching, inspiring story on Tonja's blog about a feisty 92-year-old woman who shared the love of Jesus with her would-be attacker and had him in tears and ready to pray! Apparently it was on the news and even on the Today Show, but I never saw it before. If you missed that story too, go over to Tonja's and watch it. It's so amazing!

Keeping at it, and funny kids

I am really needing to make good use of my time this week in order to be ready for everything that's coming up this weekend. I'm all caught up with my paper grading, in preparation for report card grades. I have word sheets ready to copy for Sunday morning - my school worship team's first time "on the road" this season. I also have my song lists picked for the women's retreat Friday evening and Saturday, but I still need to make word sheets for them. I also need to get everything ready for the youth worship team at my church, who will be leading in my absence this Sunday. And much, much more.

I must tell a funny story from school today. First I must preface it with the definition of an old Pennsylvania Dutch word that my dad used to use when I was growing up. When he meant "vomit" or "throw up" or "hurl" or whatever word you might use for that unpleasant act, he used the word "kutz." I don't even know if that's spelled correctly. It's pronounced just like the word "cuts." I have not heard that word for many, many years. WELL - after school our Pre-K teacher said that one of her little girls was telling her today that she needs the "cuss bucket." Needless to say, the teacher had no clue what she meant. Upon asking the little girl, she was told that it's what you use when you feel like "this," and she proceeded to go through the motions of throwing up. (I also need to add here that this particular little girl is a born drama queen to start with!) When the teacher told this to me after school I informed her that the little girl probably wasn't saying "cuss bucket," but rather "kutz bucket!" Oh, did we get a good laugh over that one. That, and the little boy in her class who kept pulling his sweat pants down during Primary Chorus today, displaying his brightly colored boxers to the boys behind him. Oh my, KIDS!!

Our Easter Day

Here's Destiny all ready for church this morning. This new dress has a beautiful strappy bodice, but we had a very cold Easter morning, so I got this sweater for her to wear with it till warmer weather arrives.

We had a glorious Easter service - great worship to our Risen Savior, an emotional, awe-inspiring mime to the song He's Alive, and a wonderful faith-lifting message by our pastor. Did I ever say how much I love our church family?

After church we went home to get our Easter dinner ready to serve. I was in for a wonderful surprise! Ray DID come home for Easter!! He drove up yesterday when Dick and Sam did, spent the night at Sam's, and surprised me today! Dick and Sam knew it all along!

Sam brought his friend Jen along today. He says she's not his "girlfriend," but I surely enjoyed having her here.

Frank was here for a little while with his new girlfriend Jess. Unfortunately they were in a car accident on Friday night. Frank has a broken hand and a very bruised face, so he was in a lot of pain. He did not bring his little boys along this time. We had to persuade Frank to take his sun glasses off, assuring him we would rather see his bruises than the sun glasses.

Later in the afternoon we did our traditional Easter egg painting. Sam and Jen hid all 27 of them outside, and this year Destiny had to hunt all of them herself since her brother J'von was not here. She didn't seem to mind that one bit!

Look where Sam hid one of the eggs! She found it when Dick asked her what was the last thing we had made in the grill.

She was delighted to have found all 27 eggs, and then....

...she accidently dumped the entire basketful of eggs! Instead of an egg hunt, it became an egg scramble!

But after they were safely back in the basket they didn't look so bad after all!

Ray had to leave around 7 PM to return to Virginia Beach. He works tomorrow. He called home three times this evening to report on traffic conditions. I know he wished he could stay home.

Sam and Jen stayed this evening to play Take One, a crossword game played with Scrabble letters, but not the board. We had a great time. Jen won, hands down.

Well, this week it felt like getting ready for a big practice on Friday, an Easter morning service, and a family dinner was like running a marathon. Now I need to start another marathon. Next weekend I am leading worship at a Women's Retreat for my sister Doris's church (Friday evening and Saturday), my school worship team will be having its first Sunday morning engagement, AND it's report card weekend. I still have off tomorrow for Easter break, so I will be catching up on paper grading in preparation for those report card grades. So I really need some sleep, because grading papers is THE most boring job I can think of and usually puts me right to sleep.

We did not get any snow that stayed, thank God! In fact, the day turned out to be quite nice and sunny. I took Destiny shopping for her Easter outfit and for groceries. We went to Panera Bread for lunch. I spent a lot of time on tomorrow's music, I'm still finishing the cleaning, and there's food to prepare for tomorrow as well. We won't have many coming this year.

Dick and Sam got home around 4:30. Below are some pictures from their quick trip to Virginia Beach.

Ray outside his apartment building.

Sam and Ray.

Ray and Dick.

Thyda is on her ship for 30 days. This ought to give Ray something to work on while she's gone! I think he's a very lonely young man. How I wish he could have come home for Easter.

And now for round two

Earlier this morning I looked outside to what looked like a snow storm. I couldn't believe it. I had figured if we didn't get any overnight, it had missed us. But half an hour later it had stopped snowing, and all the snow on the grass and cars and roofs had already disappeared. I thought, "Good!" But now it's trying again. Boy, we couldn't have a white Christmas, but maybe we'll have a white Easter. I hope not. (If you don't believe there's snow in the picture above, click on it. Big, old snowflakes will appear - yeah!)

We accomplished our big jobs today

This morning was a bit crazy around here, with me trying to get everything ready to go for my practice, and Dick and Sam getting ready to leave for Ray and Thyda's place in Virginia Beach. But here I am at 7 PM - my practice (a good, thorough, very necessary one) all finished, a good nap under my belt, and a call from Dick that Ray's things are unloaded.

Last evening when Dick got home from Advance Auto Parts, Destiny was helping me in the kitchen to make the barbeque sauce. As she heard him at the door she decided to dive into a cupboard and make him hunt for her!

Now she's in her "heavy cleaning" mood, because she knows her daddy and brother J'von are coming for Easter. I'm trying to get myself in the same mood!

I'm T- I - R - E - D

I am one tired girl. I had a very full day at school, starting off with my worship team leading the rest of the middle school in worship before their special speaker, followed by teaching six classes. After school I went home because Destiny was on her way to my house for the weekend. I was glad to find out that I didn't need to drive to Reading to get her.

Dick went right from work to the Budget rental place to take care of the truck reservation, then went right to his second job at Advance Auto Parts. Destiny and I went grocery shopping at Hilltop Acres, a country store near my school. I had to get all the food for feeding the 5000 tomorrow, oops, I mean the 17 kids on my worship team. From there I took some of the food right to our church where we will be practicing tomorrow. This evening I made ten pounds of sloppy Joe meat. I know that's way more than I need for tomorrow, but it's easy to freeze the leftovers. Besides, when Sam arrived late this evening he was starving.

After making all that I still had a messy sinkful of dishes and pots and pans to clean up. Boy, cooking and cleaning up is harder work than teaching. At least I can sit down to play the piano for part of each class period. My feet, especially my right heel, are such a pain, literally. And to add to my joy, the weather has turned cold and windy, and they're even mentioning the possibility of snow for Friday night.

So tomorrow morning Dick and Sam are heading for Virginia Beach with a truckload of Ray's furniture and boxes. And I'll be heading to church for this big four-hour practice with my school worship team. Only after that's finished will I start thinking about Easter Sunday. Well, that's not quite true. I do have three dozen eggs ready to cook and paint, and a ham ready to bake with cloves, pineapples, and maraschino cherries. Ummmm.

Time to take these weary bones to bed.

Looking for some sunny days

No, I certainly wasn't any place that looked like this today! I'm just reminding myself that bright, sunny days are ahead. I remember the day that Destiny and I went to our local park, and I took this picture, the weather was absolutely perfect - warm, sunny, and low humidity. It doesn't sound like we'll have a warm Easter, but with April around the corner, we should soon have some lovely days. My tulips and daffodils are popping up, so that's a hopeful sign.

Jeremy is finishing up the five courses he took this quarter at the Art Institute of Tampa. With design classes the projects are enormously time consuming, but he must be doing some amazing work, according to the responses from his professors when he turns things in. Take some pictures of them, Jeremy!

And tomorrow Ray takes a very important test. With good results he will be promoted to a higher rank. I have no doubt that he will do well. This Friday and Saturday Dick and Sam will be taking a rental truck with the furniture Ray has had in storage down to his and Thyda's apartment in Virginia Beach. I wish I could go, but I already had a big practice scheduled with my middle school worship team before we made these plans. It will be nice for the guys to be together.

Worship team, a good speech

This week the middle school is having a special speaker each morning and my worship team is leading the praise and worship. It's a good way for them to get some extra practice before we start going out to churches. On Friday we have off school for Good Friday, so I am having the worship team come to my church for a four-hour practice and lunch. It's good to finally practice in a real church sanctuary instead of a classroom.

I am the last person to get into a political debate. In fact, I get nervous when people start discussing politics at a family gathering, at school, or at church, because I know there will be disagreement. And I hate to see something like that divide people who otherwise love each other. So I rarely discuss my views on anything political. I am not now promoting any political view or presidential party or candidate, but I do want to say that I was moved to tears when I heard bits and pieces of Barack Obama's speech on race on the news this evening. He was so balanced, so totally understanding of both sides of the issue, because he belongs on both sides. The entire speech can be heard on MSNBC's website and I hope to find the time to listen to it. With a family as diverse as ours I often feel like I belong on every side of every fence and I feel what everyone feels.

Sunday afternoon

What's an energetic little girl supposed to do when her grandparents want to take a Sunday afternoon nap? After we woke up, still in her Sunday dress and pantihose, she brought her scooter in from the sunroom and rode around the "circle" of our house about 50 times - through the laundry, the kitchen, the dining area, my office, our bedroom, our bathroom, back through the laundry..... In that black dress she might even pass for an Amish girl. Anyone from this area knows how common it is to see Amish children riding their scooters along the country roads.

We had a really good weekend with her. Yesterday was gorgous and she got a chance to ride her two-wheeler while Dick worked outside, then in the evening he took her to our church's game night while I went to the musical at Manheim Central. And now she's back home in Reading for the week.

Dick's trip to Sweden

On Friday, March 7, Dick FINALLY had the chance to fly to Sweden to visit our daughter Miki and family. We have hoped for him to be able to this for years, but several unexpected visits from cancer, plus our big downsizing move, then his missions trip to Louisiana delayed the trip until this year.

There's the SAS jet ready to take him over the Atlantic...

...to the Lindmark family - Bjorn (11), Miki, Krister, and Katrina (14).

Hugs from Grandpa.

Dick with Miki and Kris.

This is the outside view of their home, actually much bigger than it appears from the front. It is a two-story house with a finished basement.

The family around the dinner table. Notice the Peanut Butter Captain Crunch reached its destination!!

When they say "sit" to Jackie, she sits!!!

If only this picture came with sound. Kris is an amazing pianist.