Who da thunk?

January 22 is:

Sanctity of Human Life Sunday
National Blonde Brownie Day - I kid you not
My late Father-in-law's birthday

And last but not least:  The 30th anniversary of our first date

I'm glad I didn't know Keith in his purple plaid polyester suit wearing days. 

He had improved considerably by the time I met him.

Keith and I started dating January 22, 1982. You can read the nitty gritty details here.  We didn't hit it off well at first. I thought he was a nerd. He thought I was ditzy. He was pretty rigid and I was hopelessly fluid. I noticed his gray flowered shirt and assumed his Mother bought his clothes. 

I know better now. He picks out his own clothes and loves flowered prints. When he preaches Sunday mornings, I look at him and marvel. One Sunday he's in a suit coat, the next he wears an ugly sweater. Sometimes he shows up in a dress shirt and tie, or a sweater vest, or an Hawaiian shirt. 

I think he closes his eyes and reaches into the closet and wears whatever his hand lands on. 

 I rest my case. 

Anyway, back then I also noticed his eyes. Later when we were dating I told him I liked his blue eyes. He claimed they were green and we argued for years over their color. 

We now have a blue-eyed daughter and a green-eyed son. 

An early memory is a spur-of-the-moment evening drive to Red Rocks Amphitheater in Morrison, Colorado. Before seat belt laws, a bunch of our college friends crammed into a suburban. Keith, another guy, and I squished into the space behind the back seat. 

A smidge awkward since I didn't know either guy. The guy on the right had a girlfriend and wasn't interested in small talk. Keith, on the left, being the poster child for Serious Students Inc. wouldn't talk either. I made sure to grab a different seat on the way home. 

We started being friends on a double-date. Keith asked my friend to our Fall Banquet and his friend asked me.

A month later, when he heard I didn't have enough money to attend a Josh McDowell conference, paid my way. We still rarely talked at this point so he was just being nice.

At Christmas, home-bound students crammed into a fellow student's car to ride to the airport--his destination Iowa, mine California. Bad weather cancelled flights and we spent the night in the airport, him on one concourse, me on another. If we'd only known then that we'd get married three years later we could have visited and got better acquainted. 

As I mentioned before he was a serious guy. Serious about his faith and his studies. Focused, intense, and very responsible. Though he was older, I was a year ahead in school.

Somewhere in the spring of 1981 he must have realized there was more to me than the ditzy person he thought me to be. We played games in the student union with friends and every so often would end up talking afterwards. Once he even walked me to my dorm.

Then one day he asked me to pray with him. We walked up to this pretty spot on campus and prayed together. Something happened that day but I didn't understand what. I wasn't interested in him but looking back I know that our hearts had started to knit together. 

We played many games of Rook and Dutch Blitz with friends and he started to loosen up. At the school year's end, he happened to be walking into the Spring Banquet the same time as me and two friends so he sat at our table and hung out with us the rest of the evening. 

My friends had the bright idea of staying up the whole night. Keith had never done this before or since and knowing him now, I'm surprised he agreed. We even toilet papered a friend's house which was another first and only for him. 

My first "Whoa Nellie" moment came after we'd known each other a whole school year, getting acquainted in small increments. One night I asked him for a ride to my friend's house. I explained where I needed to go and asked if that was on his way. He said it was, which was a bold-faced lie. I later learned it was an hour drive both ways. 

At the risk of sounding corny, it was an enchanted evening. We had a good conversation and when we got to my friend's house no one was there. We played backgammon while we waited. I remember being drawn to him but feeling confused because up until that point I had never been interested in him. I looked at him, noticing again his blue eyes, and wondered if he affected everyone that way or was it only me. 

Before we left for the summer, me to California, he to a summer missions' trip to England, he stopped by my dorm to give me two take-your-faith seriously books. 

He sent two postcards from England but except for the backgammon night nothing really had sparked between us. Just a friendship for which I was thankful. He was a neat guy and I had learned a lot from him. 

School started in the fall and I was a junior and he was a sophomore. I expected to pick up where we left off but something had changed. No games, no jokes, no conversations. He sat in front of me in a class for half the semester and didn't talk to me.

In November, a switch went off and he started talking to me again. And they say girls are hard to figure out! Gradually we started talking more. A friend asked if I liked Keith as it seemed like we got along well. I assured her that wasn't the case, stating that we were just friends. 

So on January 22, 1982, after a year and a half of being friends, when he finally stammered out that he was interested in me I was truly in shock. I had honestly thought we were just friends, but as soon as he spoke up I immediately knew that I wanted to be more than friends.  

I'm historically an indecisive person. I agonize over decisions and make long convoluted pro and con lists. This was one of the few times in my life when I didn't hesitate. I thought about what I knew of him, his responsible, steady, stable character and without a doubt instantly knew that if he was offering I wanted to go along for the ride. 

God knew at that point, but we sure didn't, that we had just begun a 30 year journey. I'm glad we were friends for so long as that allowed us to get to know each other without the pressure of being romantically involved. 

So thankful for 27 years of being married to my best friend. 

Happy Anniversary to us!

Driving Lessons

Hopefully I'm not the only one with phobias quirks. I'd like to think there are other people paranoid of severe thunderstorms who can't leave the house without checking to make sure the stove is off.

I have an entrenched fear of sliding in a car. Perhaps it's because I grew up in California and never had to drive on snow or ice. Perhaps it was getting hit by a drunk driver in a snowstorm in the middle of nowhere three decades ago. 

Perhaps it was twelve years ago not knowing that I shouldn't use cruise control when the roads are icy and hitting a patch of ice and sliding across the road into the ditch and needing my neighbor to pull me out. 

Over the years Keith tried teaching me the basics of winter driving but I wasn't a good student. One slide and my adrenaline spikes, my hands grip the steering wheel, and my heart races. 

If you're ever driving on a bad weather night and come up behind a car going 30 miles per hour, that would be me.

Two years ago I blogged about getting our young friend's car stuck in the snow. This is the same friend we dressed up like a candy cane and who broke Christina's nose last spring. 

The subject came up recently and he said that all I needed to do to get unstuck was put the car in reverse, crank the wheel, and step on the gas. I'm real visual and couldn't figure out from his description what he meant.

Two weeks ago the subject came up again and I asked for a demonstration. 11:00 at night and we went out in front of our house and he spun his car around a few times. I wasn't scared because it was his car and he seemed to know what he was doing.

He asked if I wanted to try. 

Ummm...NO. But not wanting to appear chicken, I asked more questions about what to do when you're sliding around.

He finally said the best way to learn is to spin donuts. 

I did mention that I don't like to slide around, right?

I finally decided that I'm not getting any younger and if someone is willing to let me experiment in their car, maybe I should try. I asked if I needed my Drivers License. He said he didn't think so.

We went to an empty parking lot and he showed me what to do. Then it was my turn. 

Oh boy. I made sure to have the seatbelt on, put the car in reverse, cranked the wheel, and stepped on the gas.

Oh my goodness. 52 years old and I had just spun my first donut. I have to admit it was kind of fun so I did a few more. I mentioned to our young friend that he might feel funny if someone asked what he did on Friday night and he said that he was teaching his Pastor's wife how to spin donuts. 

I'd like to say I'm cured of being afraid, but I can only say I'm better. When I turned into our church parking lot the other day our big faithful red van slid and I didn't feel that spike of fear. The girls were shocked when I smiled. They asked if I did it on purpose and I said of course not. 

So last Saturday we were invited to a birthday dinner. I was a bit apprehensive about the icy hill I needed to drive up. I swallowed my fears and plunged ahead and did my best but couldn't make it all the way up. I got about 15 feet from the top and that was all she wrote. 

That meant I had to back down the icy hill. Thankfully my recent driving lessons helped me not to panic. 

Not even when the van slid sideways towards the ditch. The van swung around and came to stop. At that point I realized that I'd much rather go down the hill forward than in reverse. So we drove down the hill and went a long, circuitous route to go around the hill. 

This may not seem like to much to some people, but if this had been a race, I had just run my personal best. I had slipped and slided and whipped around on a icy hill, nearly missing a ditch and had not panicked. 

I was nervous going back down the hill two hours later, but not as bad as I normally would get. I tried to inch down the hill but gained momentum and couldn't have stopped if I had wanted to. Thankfully no other cars were on the road. I finally stopped near the bottom and the main roads were fine.

The moral of the story is you can teach an old dog new tricks and make sure your Pastor's wife knows how to spin donuts so she won't be afraid to slide backwards down icy hills.

Nesting

It's nice to have all the chicks home in the nest at the same time. I wanted to share a few pictures from Andrew and Rachel's holiday visit.

This didn't turn out quite how I wanted it. 

(Be warned girls, I want a redo)

My favorite people

(most of the time)

#4 and #7

#3, #4, and #6

We've Got Rhythm

The Occasion:  The funeral of a sweet 86-year-old lady from our church. Strong in faith and character, Harriet blessed all who knew her.  Her funeral was a beautiful celebration. She loved and was loved by many.

The Place: Our church has a simple floor plan. A big room doubles as sanctuary and fellowship hall, which only poses a problem the few times a year we need both on the same day.

The Music:  Peaceful atmosphere and beautiful flowers. Displayed pictures, shared stories, and shed tears. Harriet’s physical family derives comfort from each other. So does her church family. We loved this gentle feisty (yes, it’s possible to be both) lady, and our love language today is service and food.

The Dance:  Both fascinating and complex. No one leads yet everyone knows what to do. The spirit of cooperation is a wonder to behold.

Worker bees quickly remove hymnals and Bibles from under chairs and stack them in a side room. 

Many hands make light work and chairs are pushed to the side so long rows of white church tables can be set up. A team of apron-wearing ladies efficiently slap down tablecloths in short order. Like a giant Transformer toy, in ten minutes the room morphs from sanctuary to fellowship hall.

The dance pauses as we break for food. A long food table groans under our congregation’s offering. Somehow this feast unites Harriet’s two families as we grieve and rejoice.

Not sure how we know it’s time, but at some point the dance resumes. Someone refills coffee cups. Some else collects garbage. A lot of someones clear tables, bag up and disperse leftovers. Someone does dishes. Someone else takes dirty tablecloths home to wash.

Tables are put back into storage. Chairs are moved back. The carpet gets vacuumed. We once more change from eating hall mode back to church mode.

I am fascinated by a Godly woman who lived well and died well. I’m also fascinated by a group of people, united by their love for God and love and respect for Harriet who cheerfully did an amazing amount of work in a short period of time.

While we close a chapter of our church family’s story, Harriet is just beginning a new chapter of hers.

Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His godly ones. 

--Psalm 116:15-- (NASB)

Oh My Goodness

When I let Anna and Amy go to a retreat over New Year's weekend at their brother's camp I thought they'd do normal camp things like eat and play games. 

Certainly not this.

Nowhere do I remember seeing Polar Plunge on the brochure. 

Some polar plunges are done to raise money for a good cause. 

This was done just for "fun."

Why do rational people do irrational things? 

Amy claims the Iowa water was only as cold as Lake Superior in October.

And why, when everyone else jumped in from the platform, does my son have to jump from high above?

 

  He should know these kinds of things make his Mama nervous,

 

And posting pictures on Facebook makes it much easier

for a Mother to have eyes in the back of her head.

DIY - Marshmallow Shooter

Great idea I found on Pinterest for the snipers in your house. Safer than BB guns. Funner than spitwads. Cleaner than paint ball.

 

A full tutorial can be found by clicking here. 

I made this for a white elephant gift exchange last month and it quickly became a coveted item. After seeing how well it was received, I restocked and made two more. It's best to make these in quantities of two so as to better facilitate duels. 

The tutorial said she made hers for $2.50. Maybe PVC pipe costs more this far north, but mine cost $4.50. But still well worth it.

I'm cleaning the icky-sticky price tags off.

(only necessary if you're OCD)

Armed and Dangerous

 

Extremely easy to make and seriously fun. I promise. 

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

I tell my kids that one of the benefits of getting older is that I don't care near as much what people think about me as I did when I was younger. But I had an acute attack of insecurity last week and may not be totally over it.

When invited to a birthday dinner recently, I offered to bring something. Since we would bring 10 people to the party I wanted to contribute to the meal.

I was assigned dessert. Aack!!!  Double aack!  I don't make good desserts. I can make bread in my sleep. My salads aren't too shabby. I'm a whiz with white sauce and Mexican food is my middle name, but desserts are hit and miss for me.

Procrastination didn't help matters. Who knew that waiting until the last minute was a bad idea?

My daughter-in-law Rachel suggested her tasty caramel brownie dessert recipe. My taste buds smiled in memory. Oh yes, quite tasty. Surely the ticket to impress people and be a suitable birthday dessert.

Trouble is I didn't have the necessary ingredients and procrastinating had used up the time margin so there wasn't time for a trip to a store.

I'm not sure where things went wrong.

Perhaps it was substituting the ingredients for a homemade german chocolate cake for a store bought german chocolate cake mix.

Perhaps it was trusting Google for a suitable replacement for evaporated milk.

Perhaps it was not wanting to spend $7.00 for two bags of caramels and deciding to use one bag and  leftover caramel ice cream topping.

Perhaps it was substituting ingredients, doubling the recipe, and using two different size pans so the cooking times weren't the same. 

Perhaps it was wanting to dribble white chocolate artistically in thin graceful stripes across the brownies, and then when the white chocolate held tenanciously to the spoon and refused to drip, electing to just spread the white glop like frosting. Only it didn't look like frosting. The dessert got uglier by the minute.

Perhaps it was when I had a panic attack, knowing we were already late and would be showing up with the world's ugliest birthday dessert I tried one last ditch effort and sprinkled red and green Christmas sprinkles on top. So just in case you ever need to know, Christmas sprinkles won't disguise ugly. For sure it didn't have eye appeal.

Perhaps it was the sleeve of Keith's jacket that dragged through the ugly mess on the ride over. 

Perhaps I didn't pray hard enough for the dessert to set up right.

I wish I could show you a picture of just how ugly it was, but I was too traumatized to take a picture.

I begged Keith to stop by our church to snitch borrow the leftover ice cream in the freezer to hopefully camouflage the dessert's shortcomings, only to discover the bucket was one thirds full. I prayed God would miraculously make that stretch for 21 people.

We arrived late (sigh!) and I set the dessert on an a bench on the deck outside, hoping the cold air would firm up the dessert and delay the unveiling a little longer.

I told my friend that the dessert had flopped and she kindly and politely said that she was sure it would taste all right. I didn't hold out much hope.

As people finished their meal, I knew the dreaded moment of truth had come. I whispered to my friend, "It's really ugly. I just can't carry it in with candles and sing Happy Birthday."

She smiled and said, "I'm sure it's not that bad."

I helped wash dishes and she went outside to fetch the bedraggled brownies. She came into the kitchen and whispered, "Did your dessert look like that when you brought it?"

I took one look at the big spot without white chocolate frosting and Christmas sprinkles and immediately knew what had happened. I whispered back, "Was your dog outside?"

She nodded and we both giggled, for now the dessert, if possible, was even uglier than before. We discreetly put the part the dog licked into the garbage, put one piece on the plate, added a small scoop of vanilla ice cream and a lit candle and walked out to sing Happy Birthday.

Turns out the dessert tasted fine. Very rich, but tasty if you didn't know what it was supposed to be like. Speaking of which, Rachel said, "Is this my recipe? I didn't recognize it with the white chocolate."

Either the birthday boy was being polite, or it tasted better than it looked, but he came back for seconds. No one asked for the recipe, but it's just as well as there's no possibility the recipe could be reproduced. It was an original, that's for sure.

Next time I'll either bake a birthday cake, buy one from the Wal-Mart bakery, or offer to bring Guacamole.

Or Little Smokies.

Or both.