Remember Me?

 
The one cursed by a procrastination fairy at birth. 

This might be a new personal blog record for me. The longest time I've left one post up. Apologies to anyone nice enough to check back that kept having to see that last post for days on end. 

In my defense, November was a blur and December isn't looking too promising either. 



The blurriness began the middle of October when our daughter-in-law Rachel came to visit to run a 10k race with Christina and Kiah.

 

 She took my three youngest girls home with her for the week. The next week, Andrew, Rachel, and two friends came up for a short visit. They were all headed to a friend's wedding two hours northeast of here in Upper Michigan. 

I'd written earlier this fall about our recent rash of birthdays.  We have our four fall birthdays, then two guests, Ruth and Rachel, also had birthdays. 

When Andrew and his carload arrived, I was amazed to find that their friend Megan would turn 25 while at our house. What are the chances?  

Kiah loves to concoct one-of-a-kind decadent birthday treats so she created what I affectionately call, "Death By Birthday Cake." She made a Three Layer Red Velvet Cheesecake, which was heavenly for the first few bites, but sat like lead for the rest of the night in the stomachs of those, myself included, who weren't smart enough to eat a small piece of that rich dessert. 

On November 3rd, Keith, Anna, Amy, Lani, and I flew to Virginia for ten days. 

We spent three days with six others from our Wisconsin church at the headquarters of Advancing Native Missions in Charlottesville, VA. 

Our church is exploring how to become involved with the work ANM does worldwide. ANM supports the work native missionaries do in their own countries. Sending American missionaries to a foreign country is very expensive. Supporting a native missionary who reaches out to his own people can be done at a fraction of the cost.  We thoroughly enjoyed our time with the amazing people at ANM headquarters.  

Our church friends went back to Wisconsin and our family stayed for five more days. We reconnected with old friends in Virginia and also visited Washington DC.

We returned home and a week later drove six hours down to Iowa to Andrew and Rachel's for Thanksgiving. Kiah, Rachel, and Anna cooked most of the Thanksgiving Dinner which tasted wonderful.  

This past weekend, Christina, Amy, Lani, and I went with twelve other people from our church to Minneapolis (four hours away) to volunteer at an Operation Christmas Child Processing Center.  We had a great time and hope to go back next year. 

Then my laptop died and my sweet husband replaced it with an iPad, which took awhile to learn since I'm not a teenager, and is horribly distracting, especially for people cursed by procrastination fairies.  

So now it's the first Tuesday in December and while I'm very thankful for all the visits and trips we've had, things like blogging and cleaning bathrooms has slipped through the cracks. 

If you're still reading this post, you've earned 50 Messy Cars and Muddy Shoes points. These can be redeemed at our house anytime, but maybe not during your birthday unless you're willing to risk eating one of our recklessly decadent birthday treats.