Catch-up :)

My nephew says this is going to be a long post. We shall see. :)

Contrary to what may appear to be true, I have not fallen off the face of the earth. : ) I've fallen behind in blogging for several reasons: not much was happening, too much was happening, I was procrastinating, and I was having too much fun connecting and keeping up with friends in FaceBook. If you know me and have found me here but not in FaceBook, look me up so we can connect! I'm listed there as Faith Cooley Young.

December felt like the Grinch had sneaked in and back out one night. We wanted some decorations up because we knew we would be here at home by ourselves for Christmas Day, but we wanted to keep decorations to a minimum since we knew we would be visiting family just after New Year's and we didn't want to come home to a huge un-decorating job. I learned from my grandmother who told me (more times than I could handle!!) one January, "If you don't put it up, you don't have to take it down!"

So we decided on setting up the tree and hanging one longgg string of lights. Because Ken loves nutcrackers (has a shelf load of them as well as 3-4 24" ones), I bought up an army of little ornament nutcrackers one year after Christmas and promised him that "some year" I would do a nutcracker tree. This was the year!

We assembled the tree (yes, artificial. I hate the smell of pine). Then we strung one strand of lights through its branches. I specifically opened a new package of lights because last year's strand blinked on the top half of the tree, then the bottom half, top half, bottom half and I didn't want that craziness again. Next we hung beads, balls and nutcrackers, topped it with a star and plugged in the lights. All the lights came on, and then the top half blinked off, the bottom half blinked off, top half, bottom half... Grrrrrrrr!!

I said, "Where there's a will, there's a way! I will fix this!!" I'd rather see all the lights on all the time than top half then bottom half. So I located the flasher lights and replaced them with regular bulbs. Yesss!!! :)

We plugged in the lights again. Sure enough, all lights came on and stayed on... for about 3 minutes. Then the top half blinked off, and didn't come back on. Then the bottom half blinked off, and didn't come back on. And we said, "Forget it! We're having a dark tree this year."

We intended still to hang the longgg strand of lights but lost heart and never did.

The weekend after Christmas we traveled over to be with Ken's parents and family. I thought I had taken some pictures there, but if I did, the Grinch must have swiped them because I can't find any. Then the Saturday after New Year's, we started our year with a trip to see my family!

All but ONE household of my parents' descendants were together for Christmas, but by the time we arrived, two of the families had already traveled back home. Still, we were thankful to be able to see as many as we did! I enjoyed little Christopher snuggling up to me. Apparently I was too focused on holding him and didn't take any pictures of him or of our fun time together with my brothers' families.

We have a wonderful host of nephews and nieces and great-nephews and great-nieces and enjoy giving something to each one. I had gathered a number of things in my shopping cart but wasn't feeling very excited about some of them when I found "sticky hands" akin to the "sticky feet" we had given Rose & Fanie's two boys this past summer. Remembering how all the kids wanted to play with the sticky feet, I knew the sticky hands would be a hit! Here's Karissa having fun with hers.

Philip & Jennifer's kids kept Uncle Ken occupied with reading to them...

or serving as their personal horsey! First Elanor (because she's the oldest!)...

then Jeremiah...

then Hana...

One time Ken put Hana over his head, he suddenly had a new "hat" STUCK on his head!! We laughed so hard we could hardly help him remedy the situation!

Shylah wasn't so certain this horsey was safe to ride, but after Uncle Ken PROMISED her he would go real s-l-o-w, she cautiously agreed. Of course, it took only one ride to convince her how much fun it was and she was ready to ride again and again!

And when Uncle Ken was plum tuckered out, they were just happy to be near him. (I like that pretty much myself! :))

Hana has such a contagious grin. I don't know if anybody can look at her happy grin and keep from smiling! (Are you smiling yet?!) Her smile just lights up her countenance! She's my "Happy Hana." :)

Elisha also has a contagious grin. I missed a Kodak moment when he opened his "loot bag" and pulled out the packet with the sticky hand. His little brow wrinkled as he tried to figure out what it was... We could tell the instant he recognized what it was. He broke out into a grin bigger than this one and his face shone!!

I SO enjoyed holding Micah! He's cuddly but squirmy and usually ready to smile. I held him so much he was probably relieved to see us go!

It won't be too long before he won't need Grandma Becky to hold him up!

I don't know if Micah had seen the kids riding horsey with Ken or what, but when Ken held him, he started jigging about until Ken could barely hold on to him. It was so cute. I needed a video for that!

Being with my sister is always a delight, but I had to share her during this visit! She was showing the kids how to play a computer game with cakes and frosting and other toppings. I think this was the night before Becky was to fly out, and since Rose & Fanie and family fly to South Africa on March 31 (THIS Tuesday!), it was their last time to be with "Oma Becky" for who knows how long?!

Sweet Liliva takes a turn at the bakery game.

As the evening lengthened, the reality that this would be our last visit with Rose & Fanie and the kids really hit us and dampened our mood. We tried our hardest not to cry because we don't want the children to think serving the Lord in Africa should make them cry, but we couldn't stop the tears because we dearly love them and are going to miss them soooooo much!

So we took some time to sit and talk and admonish and encourage and pray together and express our love to them. Our hugs have to last a long time!!

We are so proud of them for serving the Lord and training their children to love Jesus and be like Him. Our hearts are so torn! We want so badly to hold them close to us, but we want to see them obey God and follow His leading for their lives. Did I mention that we are going to miss them?!?!

Before we knew it, we were saying good-byes to Becky and Tab as they left for the JFK airport to return to their places of ministry, and then to the rest of the family who "stay by the stuff."

A couple weeks after we returned home, a knock on our door announced someone. Since Ken had noticed when he came home from work that someone had mowed down our mailbox, we assumed it would be the culprit. Instead we found our neighbor lady waiting to talk with us. She was not the culprit, but she knew who was the culprit because her security camera had caught the entire episode in full color, complete with date and time stamp! She had already been to see the property caretaker to report the damage and offer a look at the video footage. Within a few hours, the property owner, caretaker and sheriff were at our door and at the door of the home from where the vehicle had been before driving up the hill and nailing our mailbox! At first we thought it not so necessary to involve the sheriff, but they explained that there was damage to federal property (you only think you own your mailbox!) and this was a hit-and-run incident. Oh my!

As bad as our mailbox looked, we were relieved that he had hit the mailbox with such force instead of our car! The video showed that he verrrry narrowly missed hitting our car, then swerved completely off the pavement into the grass. He hit the mailbox with the passenger's side of his vehicle! The neighbor was also glad that he had hit the mailbox, and especially the concrete base--which did move about two feet, or he wouldn't have been stopped before he would have rammed her truck! (That's her red truck in the photo below.)

We didn't press any charges, just asked that the mailbox be either repaired or replaced. By the next day, things had been straightened out good as new. Whew!

I don't remember the date now of this next photo, but we have had more snow this winter than any winter in the 11 years we have lived in TN! We still have not seen the grass completely covered, but this was a fairly nice snow for here.

And now it is only about a week shy of FOUR months since I have posted. I was determined to post before April 5! Yay!! :)