Easter with family

Hear they are, all dressed up for Easter! Our 5 grandchildren just after the 6:30 AM Sunrise church service.
What a blessing it is to freely worship our Risen Lord and Savior.

Our oldest grandson with his mother, our youngest daughter. He has grown so tall and looks so nice in his new Easter shirt, tie and pants.

One more picture of the 5 of them, here you can see the church tables joyfully decorated for the Easter breakfast. It was delicious too.

What a large bowl full of hard boiled eggs just waiting to be dyed. It looks like a lot of eggs but after each of us eats a couple, there aren't as many as one would think!

Our oldest granddaughter is being very patient and painting blue dots all over her Easter Egg. The Dye kit was a gift from a dear friend and had many options as brush painting, roller painting, stickers or regular cup dying. We all had a lot of fun!

Our youngest granddaughter trying her hand at the roller painting. She has always liked green and looks like she thought this egg would look its best colored bright green.

Now this was fun, here I am helping our youngest grandson color a egg. He is very into blue and each and every egg he colored was BLUE. VERY BLUE! He didn't think anyone else should use his blue dye!
I wonder if he will still want all blue next year? Time will tell!

This is our youngest daughter helping her oldest Nephew color a egg. They sure are turning out pretty!

All five are hard at work dying those eggs. They are being supervised by my oldest daughter and mother of four, expecting #5. We are all so excited and happy for them.

Even dad got into the picture as he made a special combination dyed egg.
Just look at that big smile, don't tell me that men can't have fun dying Easter Eggs or was that because of a good score for his team on his head phones?

"WOW! LOOK WHAT I GOT IN

MY EASTER BASKET!

It's a yellow peep bunny! It looks cute!"


UM UM! It tastes good and won't last long!

THE EASTER EGG HUNT!

I knew there was a egg around here someplace!

Our youngest grandson hunting for more eggs.

The older children were so good to leave the "EASY" eggs for the younger two children.

You can see he has a few in his basket.




It was a cold windy day but it didn't seem to hurt the Easter egg hunt much.

Hey look, he found yet another egg. Looks like they are mostly blue! I'm sure the first egg he ate was also a blue one.

It was our grandsons 9Th birthday on March 10Th, He received a Thunder stick from us and here he is showing how good he could hit with it. It is used to perfect the hitting skills for baseball or softball. I was amazed at how well he could hit the golf ball size wiffle balls.

Here is mom, our oldest daughter putting the finishing touches on a ballerina shoe birthday cake for our granddaughter. She always dose a very good job at making a special birthday cake for each birthday.

Our six year old granddaughter posing with her cake. She is the hardest person to get a picture of with her eyes open. I bet I have over 20 pictures with her eyes shut and she

tried so hard.

She is still very cute without looking right at the camera. Her birthday was on Maundy Thursday. We did the cake and special day out on Saturday when we could be there to help her celebrate.
It was a lot of fun with pizza and games for all.

She and her sister both take dance class. Here she is posing with her recital outfit. Below she was doing part of her dance routine. The cardboard cutout necklace was from a special birthday card she received from her sponsor, Jamie.

Here is their dog! He looks sad but he really did get a special treat, some of the children gave him their Easter egg yolks since they did not like that part of the hard boiled egg.
WHAT A CUTE DOG!

Palm Sunday 2008

The snow was coming down very hard, there were several inch's of fresh, heavy wet snow on the roads, driving was slow and treacherous. Our mission team had discussed canceling the Palm Sunday/Easter celebration at Porcupine on the Indian Reservation. We all decided to go anyway with the Lords help and blessing.

The scenery was beautiful covered in a blanket of white snow.

It took us an extra hour to get there but thanks to God we all made it safely. We were thankful we did. There were approximately 45 in attendance who were blessed with the Easter message of Christs death and Resurrection.

We did not have individual palm branches this year but each were given a flower to put on the cross as a symbol that Christ conquered death for each of us. Just as the flower springs up anew from a seed we will blossom forever with Christ in eternity.

We used both palm branches and Easter Lillie's to adorn the alter.

This is the Alter of our home church as we attended the Palm Sunday service on Saturday evening at the 5:30 PM service. We had special guests that evening, about 20 of the Ambassadors for Christ.

SIX years old! Happy Birthday!

Hear she is, our 6 year old granddaughter, She wasn't even 1 years old here and was modeling my hand crocheted dress I used to wear as a infant.

What a cute smile she has! Hear in the arms of her daddy!

She loves the outdoors and always ready to learn something new.

This is one of my favorite pictures, Of course I have plenty favorites!

She was only 3 yr old when she did a very good job of being flower girl at a close friends wedding. Her mom also did a great job of sewing this dress.

This was just too cute and shows her fun personality playing with the new puppy. She loves green and also M&M 's.

What a cute pose with the wizard of Oz figures!

5 years old and loves the water. Here she is having a fun time with her mother.

This is at New Years and shows her almost 6 year old smile with one tooth already missing. Happy Birthday sweet thing!
We love you!

SPRING

It has been warmer out for the past week and it sure doesn't take long before these green spring flowers start showing.

These are some daffodils and they sure grow fast. The green looks so fresh and alive against the winter kill ground. These remind us of the Life and Resurrection of Christ Jesus that we are about to celebrate next week.

It's always fun to see these Hyacinths, tulips and daffodils peeking out. I know they won't be blooming by Easter as most years. We had a colder winter then normal and Easter is very early this year.

This picture is to get you in the Easter mood. I always make this old grass nest, fill it with colorful eggs next to my lawn bunny that I have had for over 25 years . This is the only outdoor Easter decorating that I do except for the wood welcome hanger by our front door. I hope you have all taken part in the Lent church services and I would encourage you to all take part in the Palm Sunday, Holy week and Easter worship services as they are offered to you. It is a very special time of year!

God so loved the world that HE gave His only Son! John 3 :16a

NINE YEARS OLD TODAY

What a sweet little boy, here he is a little over 9 months old and quite excited about the Radio Flyer wagon that he and his older sister received for his first Christmas from Papa and me. That wagon has had many miles put on and is still getting much use.

Two years old and look at that smile. He already loved cake. It was a base ball cake that his mommy baked and decorated.

He is so cute in his new cowboy boots, belt and hat that we gave him for his second birthday. He loved boy things like toy guns and base balls.

Even when he was just a tiny lad he loved to throw and hit the ball. He was very good at it too.

Here he is last summer just after hitting his first home run. It was so fun to watch and see his proud smile.

I like this picture because it shows the kindness and love in his big eyes.

It was hot that day and you can tell he had been

playing hard outside.

This is the most recent picture I have taken of my grandson, back in Jan when he was only 8 years old. What a handsome young man he has grown to be. I'm sure he hasn't changed much since then but turning 9 is a big thing especially when you are a boy and learning new things every day.

It was fun talking with our 9 yr old grandson today.

Both Papa and I love you very much! We pray that God will guide and bless your 9Th year of life.

Signs of Spring

This week we spotted a Robin, this was the first one this spring for me. I heard some friends telling that they had seen one about a week ago. This is always a SIGN OF SPRING! We also had 5 inch's of snow last week and Friday morning it was cold, 0 degrees, so mostly it still looked very wintry.

This Robin was enjoying a meal of very frozen crab apples from our tree. Many other birds feast on these crab apples throughout the winter months but there always seems to be a sufficient supply left for the spring Robins.

This afternoon we went for a drive up in the hills and had a sneak peek at the lakes to see if they looked higher. THEY DIDN'T! They are all still solid ice and were even hosting several ice fishermen.

I love our drives up in the hills, the scenery is lovely and the clean air is refreshing. The sky was so blue against the outline of the hills. Unfortunately this area didn't get much snow and what was there has about thawed.

I love the tall pines and the way God's wind sounds as it passes through the pine Branch's. We enjoyed seeing many, many, wild turkey and I would guess we saw over 100 Deer. (Not all in one herd but scattered here and there through the winding roads in the hills. ) I always watch for a Mountain Lion just because I think it would be fun to see one in the wild. I know they are around but like a cat, they are normally only seen if they choose to be. I would prefer being in our vehicle if we spotted one. Earlier this week,the local news reported a fisherman was attacked by a Mountain Lion. He only received minor scratches and bites but was shaken up a bit.

I hope you all take time to enjoy spring and that you remembered to spring ahead this weekend.