Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Counting Down to New Years


Hindsight is 2020, what sight is 2010? Looking back 2020 and looking forward 2010, we make our plans for the coming decade.
Our lives have changed so drastically, over this past decade. Changes of life have brought us into midlife challenges and we are striving to live for God's glory, when our hearts and minds get so weighted with cumbrances of time travel. Where have the years gone. We were just a couple of youngsters starting life together and here we are, planning our midlife years. I'll not say that they are upon us, I will say we are suffering the early tremors of midlife onset. We will fight it for all that we are worth. Running or walking daily will be a part of my new decade, {second decade of the Millenium}. I must lose this babyfat, LOL. I can't blame this on the babies anymore. I must get rid of it. Healthy regimens and now that I have tasted the best chocolate bars from my Jo. I will keep myself for only that treasure, when I am smaller than I am now. Only for a special treat. I will make a poster of my New Years resolution. Getting some of the morning sun everyday, either before work or for the 15 minute break. God give me grace to change my ways.

Monday, December 27, 2010

The discussion on who should complete the clean up of the kitchen.

I find myself giving speeches, now to this wave of teens. I won't call them lazy, just helpfully challenged. I want them to think and do, without having to be coaxed and prodded. Until then, I give short pleadings, can we clean the kitchen now? Can we pretend that your friends are coming over?
We enjoyed a delicious meal of Lasagna and spaghetti and chocolate brownies and soda and sparkling cider and everybody was still at home. The conversation and the presence of my children with me and my husband enjoying the holidays at home is more special than anything else. We are still playing with Christmas on Monday.
But straightening for the New Year is the priority!



to the Good Old Days!

Sunday, December 26, 2010

Merry Christmas to All








I got my favorite Christmas present. 2 inches of snow fell, yesterday. I was so excited. Nobody carries shovels around and no one is ever ready for the snow down here. They said in the news that this was the first white Christmas since just after WWII. It cripples our fair city, everything is stopped at this time in the morning. We ought to brave the elements to go out to church, but, I don't think we will.
The beauty of the snow accentuates the Christmas lights. My yard is all one color, instead of several colors of brown grasses, with green patches. It is still snowing and we are enjoying the seats by the fire and the presence of one another. Loving eachother, in our family. Tis the day after Christmas.
The boys got a game for their Wii and they are plugged in, most time. But, on Sunday, we don't play Wii, so I have seen them this morning, in passing. Emily and Enoch got a camera, each and are photographing everything. Evelyn is enjoying ladylike fragrances that she received. I got a potholder and a vacuum and Ben got a Frank Lloyd Wright lamp. Elyse played Santa for everybody, this year. She is adorable. We are enjoying the family dynamic. Thank God for care and love for eachother and peace and unity in our home. God bless us, everyone.

Saturday, December 25, 2010

Glory to God in the Highest.

What Day is it? We ask that question every Christmas Day. It is Christmas day is the answer. That is a line from A Christmas Carol. We all wake up with the remembrance that Bah Humbug is the thought of the unbelieving and grieving. Whatever our emotional status, we must shake up Christmas in our souls. Embracing the beauty of the redemption that was wrapped in the skin of our precious Savior. We are redeemed by grace, through faith in a Savior who came in a humble form.
We shared that story, ever new, in our house. This time, it was 7 year old Ezra reading the verses from the Scripture. We are shaken out of our self centeredness by the Scriptures and rejoicing in the wonder of salvation won for us, by the obedience and payment of our great Savior.
The gifts that we give and recieve are a reminder of the most eternal and important gift that we have received. We dressed up last night for a lady in the family photo op.
Thanks to the big sister in the family, 2 cameras came for Christmas today. We had no working cameras for the photo ops. We used Elyse's phone.
Loving that we are all here enjoying the family love and hugs and kisses were manifold. Today the playing of the new Wii accessories and my new "vacuum" virtual reality wii in a vacuum cleaner. Christmas is a time for love. We are loving eachother and we are enjoying the silly day and the precious season that we have every year.

Friday, December 24, 2010

I heard the bells on Christmas Day.---Merry Christmas



Their old familiar carols play...
Last year, our church had this song and I couldn't catch my breath for crying so hard in the Christmas concert. {It is a good thing that I am not in the choir} I always loved that song, but the dicotomy between the beauty of the children's voices and the hope of peace on earth, was more than I could bear. I imagined compiling the words on a wonderful Christmas card to send to all of the loved ones.
Longfellow wrote the words in the middle of the Civil War and the words drip with the transcendency of generations of hope and want for peace on earth. Can we reach for it together? He said, or seemed to say. Let's let that sentiment help us reach for peace, through the tumult of the lives and loves that we've inherited. I wish that I could be with you to give you a big, "Peace on Earth" Hug! God Rest you, merry gentlemen and women. Let the Christ of Christmas, first bring peace into your heart and then On earth...

Thursday, December 23, 2010

And I love her?


I got permission to tell the secret. Ethan has an admiration. I don't remember any of my children being so forward on such things and it is so refreshing to see love blooming at age 11. She has a powerful left hook, was the confession that was the real reason why she is Christmas present worthy. We all love her now. The cat is out of the bag.

Love in a big family is a group hug. When can I ask her to be my girlfriend? When you are 20. When can we marry? When you are thirty. The answers are in place and the communication is open. I love that we can talk about such things with human and maternal-child abandon. I think that this perfect communication beats the nursing years by a longshot. I'll keep you posted on the response to the Christmas card and gift.

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

I love that Christmas gives us excuses to love people.

We are wrapping sundries for loved ones as we can find them. There are many we love for whom we can't wrap presents, but the new loves we must tell them. We love you! Do you know that we love you and we wrapped this and set it under the mistletoe, instead of a kiss or with a kiss as the case may be? Love in the Walker house comes from a long line.




Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Setting our souls in order

is more important than setting our house in order. As we clean and go over our affairs for the closing of the year, our hearts yearn for closer communion with our Father in Heaven. Our Blessed remembrance that Jesus came to save us, all the way from Heaven, gives us a launching pad to expect that God will not leave our souls destitute on the earth. Heaven and communion with the God of Glory is the inheritance of them that fear Him and live in the light of sins paid for by the blood of Jesus. Those who know communion with God enjoy this season most of all. Our greatest debt is paid for. Hope that the others can be negotiated or obliterated, keeps us going on. Those who live on earth a complete debtor to God, because of a hardened heart to the reality of the reason for the season, have a testimony all about them, in the Holidays. Even Santa's gifts are wrapped in the mercy of an everliving, ever interceding Savior. Even the beauty of the snow is touched with the remembrance that God has mercy and forgiveness for the greatest sins.
Christmas is coming. Halleluia.

Monday, December 20, 2010

Thank God!


Holiday seasons always have their own story. This year's story included meeting a precious new group of brethren in the Lord through AWANA. My Ethan and Ezra went every Wednesday for this semester and yesterday was the Christmas Service. What a delight. Southern simplicity and hospitality combined. How precious the presence of God with His people and to see my boys singing, like a choir of angels, was a tremendous blessing.
AWANA was the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love. The fellowship of loving hearts is like to that above...

Thursday, December 16, 2010

Every Birthday above the grave is a birthday! 49?

My Birthday card from Jo, with the best Chocolates since the school sales:)
I am grateful for:



Salvation of my soul,
My precious husband of nearly 28 years {what patience he must have? :)},
My wonderful children, {the ones on earth and the ones in heaven}
My Mom and brothers and sisters, great relationships with them,
My inlaws,
My Church and Pastor,
My job and provisions for our earthly needs,
The country that God has blessed us with,
My President and Vice President,
My local police and local firefighters,
My precious neighbors, especially the ones on our block,
The schools that my children are attending and their teachers and administrators,
Our home...

Sunday, December 12, 2010

Friday, December 10, 2010

Thank God For Grandma's Hands

I am remembering with fondness, my Grandma's birthday. I don't know how old she would be today. But my heart remembers being her birthday present and her being mine. I love that feeling and I miss her deeply.

Title- The Studious One!

Title-  The Studious One!
artwork by Elyse

Of biscuits and syrup

Of biscuits and syrup
tasty treats

Happy Saturday!

Happy Saturday!
a day at the Raptor Center.

Widdle Emmie in outer space school

Emmie jumped on the bus and off it flew out into the atmosphere. There was a set of clouds with turbulence right above the house and it took a few minutes for my Emmie to buckle her seatbelt. They hit the bump hard and it knocked my Emmie out of her seat and she bumped her head. The video camera came on and the monitor looked through and stated, Ms. Emmie, where are you? You are not in your seat. Where are you? I am alright I fell because I hadn’t buckled correctly. Well jump up Emmie we have a long way to go and you have to be buckled there is entirely too much turbulence in the stratosphere for you to unbuckle now. As soon as we are through this weather system there will be straight sailing but right now you must buckle. Emmie scrambled into the seat with intensity and purpose now. She watched every cloud pass her window and her nose was pressed to the window trying to see the top of the house as it drifted slowly out of sight. Soon they were not only out of sight of the house, the sun came out brightly and just as quickly they were putting on the atmospherical breathing apparatus and the outerspherical lights. The ABA and the OL. These precautions were to make them appear to be satellites to the radar as they were out in the ionosphere. Emmie knew all about this now. She had gone to the orientation and had a good breakfast and it took them 20 minutes for her to get out past the atmospherical pull and to feel the zero gravity. It would be 15 minutes before the gravity simulators would take effect, a glitch in the system which was being worked on. Until then, they enjoyed the couple of minutes of floatation, while being connected to the seats by belt. The first thing they saw everyday was the strataflotsam. The items which had been dumped into the atmosphere by earlier generations. What would their generation do about this ecological waste area that remained floating above their heads? This was a question for the generations. For now it was the area that they had to guide through on the way to school.

Midnight at the OASIS

Midnight at the OASIS
Sunset in Huntersville

My little Emmie

ran to the bus on the first day of the last year of school. 2 buns on the side of her head. She kissed me and ran at dawn to the bus. She was starting the adventure of a lifetime. I would never see that little girl again, she was going to woman school!

My Father and I 1989

My Father and I 1989

to the tune of Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme

A VISIT TO PAPA











Are you going to Mary Immaculate?

Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



Remember me to the one who lived there,



He once was a true love of mine,



Tell him to buy me an acre of land,



Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



Between the muddy Hudson in Jamaica Bay,



Then, He’ll be a true love of mine,

Tell him to sow in it seeds of pure cream,



Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



And build Ice cream mountains and buildings of whipped cream,

Then, He’ll be a true love of mine,



Tell him to reap them with sickles of M&M’s,



Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



And chew bubble gum and eat till we’re done,



Then, He’ll be a true love of mine.



Tell him to run it off down the motor parkway,



Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



After your done 50 pushups



and jog down the West Side Highway,



Then he’ll be a true love of mine…

(Don’t wait for me today dad, The kids are sick again, My tummy’s bulging again, My heart is aching again, And now there’s no love there…)





He once was, a true love of mine….So, Girls, I do beg you don't miss your Daddy,Apricots, Chocolate cherries and Pie,You have one short chance to see him on this side, Go visit him and let your light shine.