Happy, Happy, Happy!!

Happy, happy, happy!! That's what this weekend consisted of from beginning to end. On Friday evening we drove to Lancaster County, directly to Manheim Christian Day School where I used to teach. We arrived just before they stopped serving the famous barbecued chicken meal. As always it was scrumptious and made even better by meeting up with many, many friends, former students and their parents, and co-workers. After leaving there we went to see Dick's step mother Arlene. She was looking beautiful like usual and was happy to report that Dad had had a very good day. From there we went to my step mother Mary's for the night. Walking into her kitchen always feels like coming home.

Saturday morning we went back to MCDS for their wonderful country breakfast buffet. Even better than the breakfast was the company as we ate. On one side was my sister Doris and some of her family. On the other side were Ray and Thyda and Sam and Jenn!! Oh we had such a good time together!

 And now I am finally going to tell you our happy news that Sam and Jenn are expecting a baby in October! They are very excited about it and so are we. I have watched Sam relate in such a wonderful way with kids for years, beginning way back in '98 when Miki's family stayed with us for a month over Lisa's wedding. Sam was always out in the yard kicking a soccer ball back and forth with two-year-old Bjorn. I've observed the same kind of connection between him and various other children over the years, and now he will finally have his own child to play and bond with. 

And speaking of babies, we saw our great niece for the first time.  Dick's niece Laura, who was Destiny's kindergarten teacher at MCDS, had a baby two weeks ago and was there with her.  She is a BEAUTIFUL little girl!  I just couldn't get enough of looking at her precious little face.

Frank and Darla and her kids joined us for lunch. 

We were barely finished eating when we realized it was time for the candy drop. What fun to see the airplane swoop low over the ball field as candy "rained" out of it! But I forgot to take a pic. It felt so wrong for Destiny to be missing all this. She has never missed the MCDS auction since she was born. But more on that later.

After the candy drop we left MCDS to go to the nursing home near Lititz to spend time with Dad Stauffer. How precious to finally be with him. He was very emotional, but talking and expressing his feelings, which apparently is huge progress since the beginning of the week. Sometimes we all dozed, for a while he sat on the recliner beside his bed, I sang several favorite hymns to him, we prayed with him. It was all so precious. He has such a long road of rehabilitation ahead of him, and we all want to do everything possible to encourage him so he wants to do it. A number of his co-workers stopped in while we were there, and it was so obvious how much they love and esteem him. I enjoyed reading the many cards he has received, but was especially touched by the note Destiny had written on the card I had sent to her to send to him. 

We spent the evening and night with Mary again, but headed out very early this morning for Arlene's. We had a 7 AM breakfast there with Dick's brothers and wives. Of course it was a combination of fun and very serious, necessary conversation. 

Before going to our church I went to the nursing home, because I knew Arlene was planning to wheel Dad to the worship service in their chapel, his first chance to be in a church service in 6 weeks. For some reason I just felt like I wanted to be there for that. (Dick was playing bass at our church and had to go early for practice, so couldn't go with me to the service at the nursing home.) When I got to the chapel I could not believe my eyes. There was Dad sitting up straight, dressed nicely, his glasses on! I just had to get a picture! And I knew why I felt the need to go there this morning. Getting this very encouraging picture was reason enough!

I did have to leave their service early to get to ours at Grace. What a blessing to be there and just receive and be in the Lord's presence and be among friends.

We went to Mary's for a most wonderful meal of her good, Pennsylvania Dutch cooking served with her love and humor.  

 And topped with a beautiful dessert.

Again we went to the nursing home to spend a little more time with Dad Stauffer.  He'd been having pretty many visitors today, so we didn't stay very long. 

We went back to Mary's for short naps and to pack up our things.  We had one more place to go and one more person to see......

Destiny in Lancaster!  

I cannot go into details on a public blog like this, but  Destiny informed me this past week that they would be moving back from Florida to her other grandma's house in Lancaster this weekend.  I did not know exactly what day they would arrive, so I was delighted to get a call from her this afternoon that they had just arrived by train.  I would have been so sad if we had missed getting to see her before we headed back to State College.  Oh, how we hugged and hugged!!  I put big lipstick kisses on each of her cheeks!

 (Oh my goodness, that nap did a number on my hair.)

She was also happy to get to see her older sister who lives with her other grandma.  Here she is with her sister and brother. 

How much lighter my heart is this Sunday evening compared with last Sunday, Easter Sunday, evening.  I missed her so intensely over Easter and could not get hold of her by phone for a couple of weeks.  God has heard the cries of my heart.

WOW!!  What a weekend!!  MCDS, Laura's new baby, Grandma Mary, Dad Stauffer and Arlene, Dick's brothers, my sister Doris, Sam and Jenn, Ray and Thyda, Frank and Darla, friends at Grace, Destiny!!  Thank you, thank you, Lord!!