Liz's Wedding

We went to another beautiful wedding on Saturday.
One of Beth's friends got married and Beth was a bridesmaid. They had a beautiful wedding and a very casual reception.
Mark's sister, Kathy, had offered to do the flowers for the wedding because she found out that the couple had very limited funds for their wedding and she has worked for a florist. Beth's friend bought the flowers at Kroger and Kathy made the bouquets, corsages, and such. Poor Kathy got up Friday morning with a migraine and felt terrible. Mark's older sister, Terri, came over after she finished teaching school, and helped her for a while. All together, they spent about 5 hours working on the flowers and they were beautiful....
Beth and her friends picked them up and took them to the bride's house.
Saturday morning, Liz (the bride) called Beth and said that her refrigerator had been too cold and almost all of the flowers were ruined! We were all sick about it, but didn't want to bother Kathy again since she had already put so much time into them, especially when she hadn't felt well. So three hours before the wedding was about to begin, two of the other bridesmaids went out and bought more flowers and then we took the old ones apart to see how they were done, and to reuse the greens and beads that were still good.
Beth and I spent a half hour constructing a new bouquet for the bride....something that neither one of us had ever dreamed we would ever do! It wasn't quite as pretty as the original, but we were amazed that it looked as well as it did and Liz was quite happy with it.
Beth did the bride's hair and makeup and she was beautiful....of course, me darlin' daughter looked beautiful too!
I, of course, got all teary-eyed as I watched the bride come down the aisle and thought that in the not-too-distant future, I will probably be watching my own beautiful daughter walking down the aisle on the arm of her father....

Life goes by so quickly...
A blessed, peaceful Monday to all.....

Dear Mother of Sorrows, Please Pray for Us

I went to confession last week and the priest told me that he felt I had made a very good confession which was wonderful, of course, and now I feel as if the old devil didn't like it one bit and he's attacking big time. Some times I get so weary of the battle. I know I have to keep going but when I struggle with not feeling very energetic, the battle seems even harder.
Mother Mary, please pray for me, your child....

Happy Birthday Dear Blessed Mother!

This day has not started out well at all.
It's Michael's first day of co-op for the year and every stupid little thing that could go wrong this morning did.
Now all I want to do is go back to bed and sleep the rest of the day but of course, that can't happen.
I'm starting to wonder if something is wrong with me because all I want to do lately is NOTHING! I have no energy, no ambition, no drive.

Today I am also thinking of our Jack (our nephew who died from brain cancer three years ago)....he would have been 12 years old today on this the birthday of our dear Blessed Mother. We spent Labor Day with Mark's family and the pain is still there so strongly in Jay's voice and eyes. Difficult to see indeed. Losing a child is one of life's hardest heartaches I believe.

A blessed Tuesday to all....

Someone dear to me has been heavy on my heart for the last 12 hours or so. That happens to me sometimes with this person and I don't why, but when it does I always pray extra for them. I kept waking up through the night and thinking about them and saying little prayers until I drifted off to sleep again. I was also praying for the sister of one of
Beth's friends. She is an ICU nurse at another hospital here and is very sick with a bad case of pneumonia. Yesterday they took her to the hospital because even after taking tylenol, her temperature was still 104. Pretty scary.
She's 24 years old and I can't help thinking about the fact that their whole family was in Mexico a few weeks ago for a wedding and wondering if it's more than pneumonia.
A brother and sister (ages 19 and 26) who lived about 20 miles away from us both died of the swine flu last month. They were their parents' only children and it just grieved my heart to see the pictures of their parents and see the pain in the mother's eyes. The thought of losing all of my children is such a horrendous one...

So I will keep praying this day and hope that the heaviness eases but if not, then I will just keep offering that too.

It's a beautiful morning here...it feels like fall....and I am enjoying the sunshine. Even with this heaviness of heart I feel His quiet joy.

A blessed, peaceful Monday to all of you.....

I'm tired tonight but a good kind of tired....the kind that comes when you feel like you really helped someone and made a difference in their life for a day.
Mark, the boys, and I spent the day helping Will's dad move from his house to an apartment. Only Will's youngest brother is still at home, so the house was getting to be too much and an apartment just fits their lifestyle better. Will was actually moving from an apartment to a rented house today also and couldn't help his dad so we volunteered. There were just his dad, his brother, another young man we know and us. The guys carried everything out and packed up the moving van and I packed up the kitchen, which hadn't been finished yet. We drove to the new place and started unloading. Fortunately, a few more friends arrived to help unload...especially since the guys were already tired and everything had to be carried up a flight of stairs. Two of the friends were a couple that Will's dad knows and the wife and I spent the next couple hours setting up the new kitchen. It was made easier by the fact that I had just packed everything up and knew what he had and where it was. We hit it off right away...she and her husband have five children, three of whom are adopted, and we talked about some of our experiences and had fun deciding where to put things. We changed our minds a few times and moved things around and knew perfectly well that Will's dad wouldn't care where we put things...he's so easily pleased!
We also spent time deciding how to arrange the furniture which can be a challenge when you're going from a 5 bedroom house to a 2 bedroom apartment! But we did it and his dad was just so grateful to have so much in order so quickly.
Of course, they still have lots of boxes to unpack but the basics were all in place so the rest can be finished gradually.
All in all, it was a good day....
Tomorrow, we get the pleasure of celebrating my brother's 50th birthday with family and I know I will enjoy that.

I hope that all of you have a blessed, joyful Sunday filled with His peace.....

Life has been crazy and I'm still struggling to blog. I've spent the last week getting things together for school and writing my notification letter to the school district and all that lovely stuff. Throw in a baby shower for my niece, a graduation party for my nephew, hosting a bridal shower for Beth's friend, church home, hosting a birthday party for my Dad's 89th birthday, and all my usual things and all I want to do is sit and do something a bit mindless when I get the chance.
Tomorrow we are having a workday at my parents' house. My dad has really slowed down this summer and it's making us all feel a bit sad to watch. He has been wanting one of my boys to go to the grocery store with him these last few weeks and he rarely comes to the farm to work in the garden any more. That's our clue that it is really getting bad because gardening has always been his favorite pasttime.

The Lord has been doing some pruning in my life these last few months.....He's doing things that make me lean more on Him. He always knows what's best...

A blessed peaceful weekend to you all.....